ant after we have recognized our state as a temptation. Whatever
the stone may be that we have tripped over, we have learned that it is
there, and, while we may trip over the same stone many times, if we
learn our lesson each time, it decreases the possible number of
stumbles, and smooths our paths more than we know.

There is no exception to the necessity for this patient, steady
plodding in the work required to gain our freedom from
self-consciousness. It is when we are aware of our bondage that our
opportunity to gain our freedom from it really begins. This bondage
brings very real suffering, and we may often, without exaggeration,
call it torture. It is sometimes even extreme torture, but may have to
be endured for a lifetime unless the sufferer has the clear light by
which to find his freedom; and, unfortunately, many who might have the
light will not use it because they are unwilling to recognize the
selfishness that is at the root of their trouble. Some women like to
call it "shyness," because the name sounds well, and seems to exonerate
them from any responsibility with regard to their defect. Men will
rarely speak of their self-consciousness, but, when they do, they are
apt to speak of it with more or less indignation and self-pity, as if
they were in the clutches of something extraneous to themselves, and
over which they can never gain control. If, when a man is complaining
of self-consciousness and of its interference with his work in life,
you tell him in all kindness that all his suffering has its root in
downright selfishness, he will, in most cases, appear not to hear, or
he will beg the question, and, having avoided acknowledging the truth,
will continue to complain and ask for help, and perhaps wonder whether
hypnotism may not help him, or some other form of "cure." Anything
rather than look the truth in the face and do the work in himself
which, is the only possible road to lasting, freedom. Self-pity, and
what may be called spiritual laziness, is at the root of most of the
self-torment in the world.

How ridiculous it would seem if a man tried to produce an electric
burner according to laws of his own devising, and then sat down and
pitied himself because the light would not burn, instead of searching
about until he had found the true laws of electricity whose application
would make the light shine successfully. How ridiculous it would seem
if a man tried to make water run up hill without providing t