LITTLE BY LITTLE we have approached this the most important part of our work; and we will now proceed to enter into the depths of it in order that the progress may be marked and decided in its benefits. We strongly advise that you read again the two preceding lessons in order that this subject may be well understood; and also to help you obtain the utmost advantage from the present and coming lessons. Learn what tensing really is when applied to the development of magnetism.

By the present use of the word we refer to that quiet form of increase in the development of energy that never reaches its limit of power. It is gentle, but not lax. It is firm, but not set. Between the extremes there is opportunity for a long range of increase without too great firmness. If we can make this clear we shall be able to get you started right in the present period; and that will mean much to you.

We have met students who have failed, and we can always tell in advance why they have failed. A gentleman called upon the author some years ago and said, "I have not made as much progress in the development of magnetism as I ought, although some of my friends have done remarkably well." We replied, "It is possible to write down the cause of your failure before you explain anything in detail," and we wrote and scaled a brief statement which we gave him. Then we asked him to perform the tension movement a half-dozen times. This he did. We said, "The cause of your failure is in that envelope.

Open it." He did so, and read, "You tense too suddenly and reach the limit of force. Both these faults or either of them, will stop all progress."

A tense condition of any faculty supplies energy, but it must have the power of magnetism back of it, just as a live electric wiremust have a battery or generator to supply its force. It could be alive and yet weak. Tensing calls into action the magnetic stores of the body, even increases them, and cooperates with the dead-still processes in producing both quantity and power.

GRAND PRINCIPLE The magnetic touch is always tense.

The first test of a person of magnetism is in the hand. If it is cold there is either a withdrawal of vitality for the time being, or the individual is lacking in magnetism. Warmth alone is not sufficient. It is necessary, but not all that is required. When you clasp the hand of one who possesses this quality, the effect is not marked in any way except by a slight muscular interest. The tight grasp is set and valueless, while thelax touch is dead. No one likes to take a cold and flabby hand.

There are men and even women who delight in hurting the hand by giving a tight squeeze every time they welcome an acquaintance. This is physical, and not in good taste. To set the muscles for vigorous pressure is just as far from magnetism as is the lax hand which weak persons adopt from necessity. Marital affection is the quickest generator of magnetism, in a temporary way, that is known. Even the ancients, fourthousand years ago and less, knew that warm lips and warm hands were two of the evidences of love. Nature ordains this to be so, for she compels the two sexes to attract each other, and gives them the power to win, to enchain, to enthrall, in order that the race may be perpetuated. Yet in many cases this is a blind magnetism. The loveless hearts, or those that never felt the power, are non-magnetic.

The delights of friendship are generally thrown away by impetuous or careless individuals. What is the use of grasping thehands as if they were tools of ice, or selling them as in a vice? Neither gives pleasure. One is affectation or weakness; the other is physical and emotionless. The true lover never hurts the hand of his sweetheart; the latter never gives light grip. While timidity may vibrate the hand and make it tremble, there is a series of inner, finer waves of pulsation that are in no way related to the former, just as the ocean may roll and toss in a storm, while its billows transmit the vibrations of sound and the still tinier pulsations of light, all at the same time. The feelings in a human body are variously expressed, but the magnetism of love always tenses the body and proves itself in touch, voice and sight.

If in your own life or in the experience of others you wish to know the truth, and separate the real from the sham, apply this rule, and watch the results. When the hands clasp each other weakly, there is a negation of the avowals that have been uttered by the tongue or pen; when they are set in their clasp, there is the affirmative evidence of pretence, the attempt to seem in earnest. If love—genuine, honest love—prompts the greeting, the touch is at first as light, but soon holds the hand in a slowly increasing pressure that never clasps tightly. The interchange of opposite magnetic currents is the most delightful sensation in the world. It is because of this great law of human life that the book of "Sex Magnetism" has been written. It has done, and is doing today, more good than any other work or school of special education, for which reason it should be placed within reach of all persons without cost but under proper conditions.

As we write there is an old couple, as they call themselves, although the man is not sixty and the woman not much over forty, sitting in a room across the way watching the November fires die in the western sky. They hold each other's hand as sweetly as the tenderest lover of nineteen; none too old to evince the keenest interest without impetuous display. Look at the maiden and her fiance; they meet and greet with a handshake that is perfunctory because they may not be altogether alone. But when time and place are theirs they yield to each other a far different tribute; it may be the good-bye of the evening, or the more prolonged farewell of the visit. Their eyes meet with deeper glance, moist with fervor; large, full eyes charged with the expression of kindred emotions. They know instinctively that the lip are the agents of speech, that words are idle vows, but that the tokens of speech coming from the very source itself arc deeds of exchange that may be impressed with the seal of approval; and, in a delicacy of approach that drifts like a golden vapor nestling against the silvery moon, he bends over the uplifted face, while a pressure of the arm obliterates their identity, and the crimson bloom mounts her fair cheeks and paints roses in a garden of lilies, Thecold-lipped reader of this page will shudder at our descriptionand think it strange. Without magnetism there is no sentiment in life, no poetry, no sweetness, no charm, nothing butthe plainness of mechanical existence. There is no better way of developing the power of magnetism than the touch of the hand through the ordinary greeting, Avoid the two extremes. Remember that the lax hand is worthless, and that the set grasp is insincere, if not an automatic fault. Do not think that mere firmness is all that is required. Tensing is an increasing approach to a rigidity that is never reached when the increase cannot be maintained, a limit is found and that is non-magnetic. Nothing better indicates progress than this power, and progress never stands still. It is in the first delicate growth toward firmness that the body, the arm and the hand evince magnetism. Experiments can be made all day long with decided results. It is hardly necessary to add that nothing unusual in your conduct should attract attention, for it would at once end the usefulness of the practice. By this is meant that any form of practice should be so conducted that it will not be noticed by another person. But there are phases of your life that will command the interest of others; and these relate to your general changes from what you were to what you have become. Thus the person of a month ago is now so much improved that others mentally comment on the fact. An employer said of his clerk, "Something has happened; a new personality is evident." The young lady in society of a short time ago is not the young lady of today. But no one has seen the transformation taking place.

All these methods may be adopted as habits. They will require attention to begin with, but this will soon blend into theordinary occurrences of the day, and will take no time after they are well established.