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THE HOLY TRINITY.
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taken to be the repository of character, which is nothing other than the sum-total of all the different tendencies of the soul. For, a tendency is an inclination towards a certain end, and points to a conscious or sub-conscious awareness of the object to be attained. Remove this end from the mental horizon, and you at once reduce will to pure energy, devoid of all those characteristics indicative of the presence of mind which are the concomitants of desire. But will is nothing is not energy inclined towards and determined to achieve a definite end. Hence, unconscious will is a contradiction in terms. It is true that the ego does not proceed with the assistance of deliberation in the act of willing, but it is no less true that all acts of willing depend on
character, which is the outcome of past experience. Where the course of conduct is already determined, the act of willing is sub-conscious, but where it is to be worked out according to circumstances, which may, or may not, present themselves, as obstacles in the path, consciousness appears in the shape of intellect to guide the footsteps of will.
Besides, there can be no act of willing where there is no awareness of a desire of some sort or other, so that awareness is a condition precedent to willing. But awareness and consciousness are merely two different names for the same thing; hence, every true act of willing is a conscious act. Further, if will is 'blind’in itself, how can it possibly be benefited by the 'lantern' (intellect) which it employs for the guidance of its steps? Either, then, will itself becomes the ‘lantern,' or there is some one else behind it who rides on will,
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