OUR FINAL LESSON in this Department of the Magnetic Eye will deal with the organ when under the full sway of great feeling, as distinguished from the sway of the mind. Thoughts move people in one of two ways; either by the ideas they convey; or by the feelings they arouse. Whilethe most useful of all displays of personal magnetism come in the convincing force of ideas, the most interesting exhibitions are found in the outpouring of feeling when accompanied by magnetism. We have never yet seen an audience that did not enjoy to the utmost those tense moments when the power of some speaker was brought home to them in currents of magnetism; not in shouting, or declamation, or physical energy. Some of the greatest victories have been won in quiet tones of the voice; but not in lifeless ones.

Noise is a physical product, and for that reason is never magnetic. A din, or racket, if prolonged, tends to induce sleep, in the person hearing it. Loud speech must be avoided at all times.

A shouting preacher or declamatory orator may put an audience to sleep if he keeps at it long enough. A quiet voice that has no magnetism may empty a church or hall. It all depends on the presence of magnetism.

What is true in public displays is even more (rue in the various avenues of life, in business, or home, or professional affairs, as well as in social meetings. The tense voice is far more influential than the loud one.

Before the tense voice can be aroused and used with effect, the tense eye must be developed; and it is the purpose of this lesson to teach the habit that brings this about. But even such a result cannot be attained until the conditions of youth that are taught in the preceding lesson are acquired by the formation of the habits there described.

The tense eye comes about from the habit of charging the system with magnetic interest in which both mind and feelings participate. It means that the mind is wide awake, and that the emotional nature is likewise aroused, both uniting to find expression through the eye even if no other faculty than sight participates. By emotion is not necessarily intended the control of the feelings over the mind; for that is weakness, and indicates that the judgment is being warped by some influence that is driving it from its moorings. Thus the imaginations that bring a mob into existence and dethrone their reason are illustrations of the control of the emotions over the mind.

Just as the human system is a nice balance of acid and alkaline conditions, so the magnetic system of intensity should be a nice balance of feeling and thought. In the absence of feeling thought becomes magnetic only under the influence of an idea that possesses moving power; by which is meant the power to win. In other words it is a winning idea. Great men and women rise to this estate who are never emotional, yet are magnetic; but it requires the element of true greatness to do so. Yet a mind that has once been aroused in these powers quickly forms the habit of creating winning ideas. It then is only a question of acquired habit.

We have met many persons who are over-charged for a time with nothing but feeling. Some lawyers will begin an address to the jury with this overflow of emotion; but with no winning idea back of it the effort soon falls flat, and the affair becomes ridiculous. But when mind and feeling are both magnetic; that is, when the thoughts are worth while and they are propelled by emotion, the combination is irresistible. The best indication of this nice balance is found in the tense eye; for it is lighted with the fire of the thought and the fire of the nerves.

In order then to cultivate this brilliant and glowing eye, for unusually attractive, the thought itself must be powerful, the feeling must propel it. One of the best illustrations of combination to be found in history undoubtedly was the and piercing eye of Patrick Henry, of whose appearance during the heat of eloquence many accounts have been handed down from persons who were present and who faced him as he spoke. Take for instance his defiance of British rule and repudiation of loyalty to the mother country when he said: "Caesar had his Brutus, Charles the First his Cromwell, and George the Third," at which time he was interrupted by cries of "Treason."—"And George the Third may profit by their example. If this be treason, make the most of it."—As stenography was not in use at the time, his exact words may not be known; but ideas are more vital than words, and these were the Ideas that he expressed. It is said that his face, which ordinarily wasnot usually attractive, was lighted up by a fire that shone from his eyes and gave him a godlike appearance.

The student of these lessons has witnessed similar scenes probably many times; but we quote the foregoing in order to bring home a stirring example of the combination of the most intense thought coupled with the most intense feeling. Yet Patrick Henry did not break down. Had his feelings not been harnessed to his thoughts and made a well-balanced team, he might have slopped over, as so many persons do when they give way to their feelings. The evidence of great magnetic power is found in the ability to feel to excess and to hold this pent-up dynamite of force in perfect control. It becomes a beautiful exhibition of human ascendency over the masses.

The quotation we have given above is also intended for use in practice, for the reason that it holds in its few words the most intense thoughts. Try repeating the words a few times, and note the result in your own force of expression. Do not use force of voice; avoid mere noise. A magnetic thought must live in the mind; it must make the scenes behind it live again; it must see with mental vision what it refers to as it is uttered.

All the preceding lessons in this Department of the Magnetic Eye may be given attention at once, or in their order in the book; but this final lesson should wait on others that follow. As it belongs where it is, we prefer not to move it ahead; but we advise that it be omitted for a while.

The progress of this study is so interwoven with Departments that claim attention, apparently all at once, that it is difficult to arrange an order of sequence in adopting them. The best plan is to do nothing but read them and think about them, even if this method is never aided by exercises; for the reading of a thought will often change a whole life. This is merely a suggestion.

In this lesson as in many others we must borrow from lessons that are ahead, and from some that have been given. Thus in order to acquire the tense eye, the youth habits of the lesson just before this will do more than any other influence. Then looking ahead to the Department of Tense Exercises, we find help that is very effective. Also there are lessons in the magnetic voice that possess unusual value. A reading of them will show what is meant.

With these helps, and with a thought that is on fire like the extract from the speech of Patrick Henry, it is a very rapid and easy process to develop the tense eye. The value of this acquisition is that it beautifies the face, gives it an unwonted attractiveness, and makes the eyes brilliant and capable of holding any attention even under the most discouraging circumstances. So important is it that every man and woman should acquire it even if not another thing is learned in this study. The familiar story of Andrew Jackson when Judge of Court in his home State, in which he is described as arresting a desperado who was armed, while Jackson had no weapon, shows how interesting a tense eye may be. The desperado defied the armed officers to arrest him and bring him into Court. Jackson, hearing this, rushed out, took the man in custody, disarmed him, and brought him into Court. When asked why he yielded to an unarmed man, the criminal said, "I saw something in his eyes that meant business, and I knew it was useless to defy him."

We have seen so many thousands of instances of the use of the tense eye in controlling others that a volume larger than an unabridged dictionary would not hold the histories of them with the circumstances leading up to such use, and the advantages that followed. Later on we will show what can be accomplished in this line of influence. In this lesson it is our purpose to establish the acquisition as a permanent habit. It is one of those things that can never be lost after it has once been firmly rifted on the nervous system. When you have attained it and have learned to use it, it will always respond to the merest of the will.

Making use of the helps that are borrowed, as stated, from other lessons and from the careful reading of this whole work, we sum up the lesson by repeating the formula which is as follows:

1. There must be an aroused emotional feeling.

2. There must be a mental control of that emotion.

3. There must be present a great thought driving the emotion as the power in an engine drives the wheels of motion.

The great thought that we have quoted is one of the most vital of all ideas, as it contains a summing up of history in a very few words. When words are barren of ideas they are weak and wearying. When ideas are barren of words, they are like jewels in frail settings. The man of few words, if what he says is important, holds more influence over his fellows than the man of many words that clothe the same thought; but the man of few words that are barren of ideas, is dull, stupid and a bore.

Mental vision is the eye of the mind back of the physical eye.

Here it is employed to see what happened in history when Caesar had his Brutus. The whole scene can be made to pass in review in less than one one-hundredth of a second. Then the eye of the mind shifts to another great crisis in human affairs, when Charles the First had his Cromwell. What happened then?

Now the warning is given that George the Third,—what?

In uttering these words, the body should remain fixed and wholly immovable; not a twitching of a finger, nor the batting of an eyelid. Stand facing a mirror, and look into your own eyes until they burn with your gaze, and the reflection burns back to you. Let the voice be low in tone, low in musical pitch, but spoken naturally; and repeat the words with the vital centers of the preceding lesson and the vital muscles of the same lesson, all in perfect position.

While combining these natural habits as one unit, hold the entire body tense under the instructions given in the Department that is devoted to that subject in a later part of this book.

In one trial you will find that you have tensed your eyes and have given them an unusual brilliance. After a few trials this glow will appear very distinct in a room that is absolutely dark.

One more quotation will be furnished you here in order to fix and complete this study of the tense eye. In the Patrick Henry words we selected the one thought in all history that was most charged with fire. We now pass to the drama and select a thought that stands out as the greatest ever uttered in that profession. It is from the play of Richelieu. He was Prime Minister of France, and had for his ward a beautiful girl named Julie. The king desired her for immoral purposes. In that period, any person who was guilty or innocent who was pursued and in danger of being arrested or captured, could secure perfect safety by entering the precincts of a church, as it was dangerous to follow. No soldier dared follow. When the messenger came to arrest Julie and take her to the king, there was no church at hand where she could flee and be safe. So Cardinal Richelieu constructed a mental church into which he thrust her, and thereupon defied the king's officer with the following words:

"She shall not stir! Mark where she stands! Around her form I draw the awful circle of our solemn church! Set but a foot within that holy ground, and on thy head—yea, though it wore a crown, I'd launch the curse of Rome!"

The mental picture is that of Richelieu in the center, the king's officer forward obliquely on the right of the Cardinal, and Julie forward obliquely on the left. While he gazes on the officer with tense eyes, he draws the imaginary circle about Julie on the floor without removing his fixed gaze from the officer.

It is an old rule of power in speech that the shorter the words if they are filled with vital ideas, the more magnetism they convey. In the final or climax part of the above utterance, it will be seen that the last seventeen words are all monosyllables.

Make use of the same directions that we have given for the Patrick Henry quotation, and apply them to the Richelieu quotation. Repeat this in a fixed attitude, looking at the imaginary officer until he seems to stand before you in the flesh, and so proceed slowly, carefully and with the firm determination of mastering both the officer and the king.

Before this book is closed we will show you the many great victories that may be won by the tense eye.