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THE ASPIRANT AND THE TEACHER. 43
gle, a constant fight, an unremitting grappling with our lower nature, till the higher want is actually felt and the victory is achieved. It is not a question of one or two days or years, or of one or two lives-the struggle may have to go on for hundreds of life-times. The success sometimes may come immediately, but we must be ready to wait patiently for what may look like an infinite length of time, even. The student who sets out with such a spirit of perseverance will surely find success and realisation at last.
In regard to the teacher, we must see that he knows the spirit of the scriptures. The whole world reads Bibles, Vedas, and Qurans ; but it reads only the words, syntax, etymology and philology of these—the dry bones of religion. The teacher who deals too much in words, and allows the mind to be carried away by the force of words, loses the spirit. It is the knowledge of the spirit
