Theos-Talk Archives (April 1999 Message tt00064)

Hi Dallas,

You ask:

> What is it in us that exercises the WILL ?
> In fact, what is the Will ?
> What does it work with and for ?

There is a very interesting passage on WILL and DESIRE in HPB's "Collected
Writings" Vol 8, p109.    I give it below for those who are interested in
HPB's view on this.

...Peter
*_*_*_*_*_*_*

WILL AND DESIRE

Will is the exclusive possession of man on this our plane of consciousness.
It divides him from the brute in whom instinctive desire only is active.

Desire, in its widest application, is the one creative force in the
Universe.  In this sense it is indistinguishable from Will; but we men never
know desire under this form while we remain only men.  Therefor will and
Desire are here considered as opposed.

Thus Will is the offspring of the Divine, the God in man; Desire is the
motive power of animal life.

Most of men live in and by desire, mistaking it for will.  But he who would
achieve must separate will from desire, and make his will the ruler; for
desire is unstable and ever changing, while will is steady and ever
constant.

Both will and desire are absolute creators, forming the man himself and his
surroundings.  But will creates intelligently - desire blindly and
unconsciously.  The man, therefore, makes himself in the image of his
desires, unless he creates himself in the likeness of the Divine, through
his will, the child of light.

His task is twofold;  to awaken the will, to strengthen it by use and
conquest, to make it absolute ruler within his body; and parallel with this,
to purify desire.

Knowledge and will are the tools for the accomplishment of this
purification.

(Originally in "Lucifer, Vol. 1, No 2, October, 1887, p96)





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