The Detroit times., 1917-01-31
You.
~ on. FRANK CRANE
Copyright. 1915. b. frank Crane)

You are not your body, tho you are
mysteriously bound up with il.
lou are IoI your brain, tho thru it you
function.
You are not your possessions, whether
you be millionaire or shop-girl even tho
they may initiate on shrink your con-
seriousness.
You are not just n fragment Of your
mother and father, n continuation Of your
ancestors. They may affect you, but you
are essentially as new a creation as Adam
was.
You are not merely part Of your en-
vironment, clerk in the shipping depart
ment, n brakeman on the railway, one
of the towns smart set. teacher in
school number eleven. cog, bolt, a pin
in a vast machine. You are You, and in
heavens balances outweigh all organize
tons.
You are not member Of the Baptist
Church, a sand-grain in the heap called
nation, an integer in the complex entity
of the human race; you are not Ger
man or an Englishman, a white man or q
black, a sinner or saint. You are You.
and all these things are your efflores-
cences, certain ideas and relations that
have budded out from you.
You are AL There are no stars In
heaven. That is Maya. They are in
your mind.
There are no oceans, cities, hills, and
rivers these are but marked in the land
scape of your consciousness.
Who are you. anyway?
You are ghost. No man ever saw
you, ever will see you, even as mo man
hath seen God at any time"
You are force, as perplexing as cleo
tricity. rs actual yet as battling as gravi-
tation, as potent and as indefnable a.
heat.
While you dwell with this body it d.
gests. assimilates, exercises, is pleased.
and panied. When you go away it rots.
While you are with this brain it thinks,
remembers, imagines. When you 60
away it operates no more, ii is no better
than putty.
Where did you come from? Nobody
knows, tho some guess. Out Of the vast
Nowhere hidden realms of the Unborn.
all about Us as the circumambient ether.
Where are you going to? Nobody
knows, tho many guess. Back TO that
infinite Nowhere. into which lives pour
daily. hourly. as an unceasing cataract.
Why are you here? To work and to
love-
To work-that is the forthputting Of
what energies you find in your bodily and
mental machine. In proportion as you
express yourself, and learn what forms Of
activity are good and what harmful, you
receive the wage of existence, which il
happiness.
To love-that is the normal action Of
the pure You. You are not alone All
about YOU are similar yous. Your happi-
ness is not drawn from yourself alone.
You arc inextricably tangled in the web
of souls s. len you love. the stars in
their courses fight for you" you taste
cosmic JOY, you are introduced into the
secret OF the universe.
When you do not love you are dere-
lict.
All can do is 10 read your signs. in
terpreting them as best can. ! look not
at your eyes, but thru them. to You.
clasp not your hand. but You. some
where warming within the palm.
hear your words. but listen ever to
YOU behind the words, seeking Me.
! love You. not your body, not your
mind, not your clothes. not your virtueA
not your possessions or position or name.
And when your vestments all shall
have been laid away under the sod. that
You that love shall live on. and some
where, some day, meet this Me, that
found his argument for immortality in