Study in Karma

Author(s): Annie Besant
Publisher: Theosophist Office Adyar

Page 38

THE LAWS OF NATURE
27
A law of nature is not a command, but a statement of conditions. This cannot be repeated too often, nor insisted on too strongly. Nature does not order this thing or the other; she says: “Here are certain conditions ; where these exist, such and such a result will invariably follow.” A law of nature is an invariable sequence. If you do not like the result, change the preceding oonditions. Ignorant, you are helpless, at the mercy of nature's hurtling forces; wise, you are master, and her forces serve you obediently. Every law of nature is an enabling, not a compelling, force, but knowledge is necessary for utilising her powers.
Water boils at 100° C. under normal pressure. This is the condition. You go up a mountain ; pressure diminishes; water boils at 95°. Now water at 95° will not make good tea. Does Nature then forbid you to have good tea on a mountain-top? Not at all : under