Dictionary of all Scriptures & Myths

WILL OF MAN

The spiritual centre of relative existence in the lower mind. From this centre the higher determinations of choice emanate, and these derive their power and also direction from the mind. That which may be called the lower, illusive, or inverted will is merely the blind self-assertion of the desire-principle which for a time dominates the mind and prevents the expression of the true will.

"Each of us is this eternally free âtman (which is exempt from the constraint of causality). We do not first become the âtman, but we are it already, though unconscious of the fact. Accordingly we are already free in reality, in spite of the absolute necessity of our acts, but we do not know it. . . . The constraint of the will, absolute as it is, yet belongs entirely to the great illusion of the empirical reality, and vanishes with it. The phenomenal form is under constraint, but that which makes its appearance in it, the âtman, is free. The real consistency of the two points of view is expressed in the words: 'It is he who causes the man whom he will lead on high out of these worlds to do good works, and it is he who causes the man whom he will lead downwards to do evil works' (Kaush, III. 8). The eternally free átman, who determines our doing and abstaining is not another, contrasted with us, but our own self.” - DEUSSEN, Phil. of Upanishads, p. 210.

"The voluntary attitude of man as a self-determining will, to the Absolute Divine Will is the most fundamental element of religion. . . . No wisdom goes beyond that of the poet: Our wills are ours to make them Thine.' For it is, in fact, the choice of the Object of religion in a spirit of faith and self-surrender, which carries with it all else that is most essential to its supreme realisation as an experience." - G. T. LADD, Phil. Of Religion, p. 342.

"Matter causes nothing at all; force causes nothing but motion, and cannot determine its own direction. Therefore whatever problem of originating and directing power arises from the present arrangement of things arises equally from their arrangement in the furthest past we can discern. One true original directing cause, and only one, is known to us in will. Our own will we know by direct experience, and other wills we infer from outward actions. . . . Deliberate choice as opposed to unreasoning impulse implies a pause for deliberation; and we know as certainly as we know any scientific fact that in the deliberation, we contribute from ourselves an irreducible element which prevents the issue from being anything like a mechanical result of those motives (which stir the will). Though we are conscious of power to do anything whatever within certain limits, a man in his right mind has some principle or general aim, good or bad, to which he endeavours to subject that power, so that a choice of motives in particular cases resolves itself into a choice of means for carrying out such principle or general aim." - H. M. GwATKIN, The Knowledge of God, Vol. I. pp. 64, 65.

"The only transcendental thing in the world is Will, and this we know directly in ourselves. We are on the inside of things because we will, and we know everything to be part of the one evolution of life or will. There is no explanation of will; it itself is not known by the mere intellect although its different assertions may be. . . . As soon, then, as a man has grasped the notion of volition as the keynote of the self, he ceases to explain himself by things outside of himself. has also at the same time done with external explanations of the world, and he is prepared to find the reality of the world in the one Will that is manifesting itself in himself and in all things. I must take to myself all the guilt of my finite existence, and admit that I too have willed to live, have willed the world. . . It is literally true that liberty is a mystery. As finite will I am enslaved, but as infinite will I am free. The finite will must be made to die unto itself, and to affirm the eternal Ideas of the eternal Will. What-ever else religion is, it is first and foremost a perception of the radical evil that is in the finite will." - W. CALDWELL, Schopenhauer's System, pp. 393, 396-7.

“Nothing can make any change in you but the change of your will. For every. thing, be it what it will, is a birth of that will which worketh in you. You have nothing, therefore, to inquire after, nor anything that you can judge of yourself by, but the state of your will and desire. where these are, there are you; and what these are, that are you: there you live, and to that you belong; and there you must have all the good and evil If your that can be called yours. will is with God, you work with God; God is then the life of your soul, and you will have your life with God to all eternity." - WM. LAW, The Way to Divine Knowledge, p. 137.

"Now let us remember that our wills are ours, we know not how,' but they are ours it is equally true that they are ours to make them God's. But when they are made God's, made to accord with His, they are no less ours; indeed, they will be ours more than ever when we have made them His; we shall never be our full and true selves until we have found ourselves in God. . . . The self that is lost is the little self; not the ego, but the egotism; the self that dreams it is separate, and seeks advantages as 8 separate entity." - T. RHONDDA WILLIAMS, Serm., Dying in the Lord.

"All the events that meet a man in his Outward Life are nothing else than the necessary and unalterable Outward manifestation of the Divine Work fulfilling itself in him, and he cannot wish that anything in these events should be otherwise than what it is, without wishing that the Inward Life which can only thus manifest itself should be otherwise; and without thereby separating his will from the Will of God, and setting it in opposition thereto. He cannot any longer reserve to himself a choice in these things, for he must accept everything just as it happens; for everything that comes to pass is the Will of God with him, and therefore the best that can possibly come to pass. To those who love God, all things must work together for good, absolutely and immediately.. To those who do not love God, all things must work together immediately for pain and torment, until by means of this torment, they are at last led to salvation." - J. G. FICHTE, The Way Towards the Blessed Life, pp. 164, 5.

See Also

AEGAEON
APES (Nine)
BRIAREUS
DOG
DOG-STAR
GEORGE AND DRAGON
GUARDIAN JERUSALEM
SPIRITS
MAISHAN
SERVANT OF GOD
SHEEP (lost)
SWORD OF SPIRIT
UNION