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THE FIRST GREAT PRINCIPLE OF FEAR-CONQUEST

Categories: Chapter I - The Twin-Verses
Books: Mastery of Self

Timidity, apprehension, fear, alarm, fright, consternation,

terror, panic, desperation, are all false imitations of reason's

interpretation of the warning signals of Nature, to be displaced

by reason itself, which may then determine whether the occasion be

real or unreal, and always to be disregarded and overcome if

evidently refering to causes which do not actually exist



This principle is a
duced in the interest of three things: peace,

health, power You are invited to note how vital these interests

really are



The truest peace, of which courage is a sublime bloom, is a growth

solely of honorable living and robust self-respect



Health is of the following realities: body, mind, soul--the deeper

self Health is soundness A sound human is a triune wholeness

Physical soundness with weak intellect is often the athletic field

of superstitions innumerable Intellectual greed in an unsound

body may breed the direst fears of life A decayed soul is always

a House of Fear The ideal of human existence is--The white life

in the sound mind in the vibrantly whole body



It is because there are so many people who are in some sense sick,

that fears abound in every direction But--it is because so many

fears are permitted and actually nursed as boons that so many sick

people abound in every direction If all our fears could be

removed absolutely, we should no longer require physicians This

world would be a paradise in every respect I do not know anything

wrong with it that cannot be traced to a fear



The causes of fear are weak reason, uncontrolled imagination, want

of self-control, and ill-health And the first three items are

really phases of the last



The ability to master and destroy fear depends, it would now seem,

upon the following factors of our life:



The General Tone of the Individual; The Soul's Power of Will; The

Development and Balance of the Reason



Reason is demanded to distinguish between right and wrong causes

for personal effort in self-protection, and to utterly ignore all

wrong causes



Will-power is demanded to banish fears and to utilize reason's

dictates



But the sway of reason and the force of action are always

immensely assisted by a vigorous general tone of the personal

life Now appear, in view of these considerations,



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