The Human Engine and the Life Current

The human body is the earthly tenement of the mind or soul. In its construction and operation is very like a mechanical engine.

Every mechanical engine is built on the plan that will best enable it to perform as intended. Some are so small that their mission is to become the interior works of a watch.

Some are built to propel a locomotive at high speed.

Others are built to power some gigantic manufacturing establishment.

In each case, the plan of construction and size varies in accordance with the work to be done.

The engine is only a shell, a thing of great possibilities. It is entirely useless and inoperative until the driving or propelling force is applied to it.

This driving force can be:

• steam
• water-power
• compressed air
• electricity, or
• mainspring, as in the case of the watch.

In whatever way the compressed energy or driving power is generated, it is made available only by combining a large number of primary elements and forces.

With steam, water is necessary, a boiler to hold it, fire to heat the water, a place in which to burn the fire, and fuel with which to build it.

All other driving forces are in the same way made up from distinct and separate elements which, combined, will produce their particular kind of power.

The driving force only wastes itself in the air if it has no engine to operate.

The human body is the human engine. It is built for specific purposes. But it is entirely useless without the proper driving force behind it.

In its first stages of growth, the human body is a mere piece of protoplasm.

It is not until the dawn of mind and the awakening of intelligence manifest themselves that the hu-man embryo becomes a human being. We all know that life, the vital spark which enters our body and sets in motion the organs of mind and sense and makes us live, comes into us from a source outside of ourselves.

The child before it is born is truly a human being. But it is alive only as any other organ of the mother’s body is alive, viz.= it acts in a mechanical way and has motion.

This unborn child while in the process of formation, is getting ready to live, to think, and act, but until the vital spark of intelligence is projected into it, it does not really live.

Just as the nose will become the future organ of the sense of smell, the ear of hearing, the eye of sight, so the lines in the hand are prepared and in the hand, ready to receive the spark that will set the entire machinery in motion.

When the vital spark of life has entered the body, as we believe through the ends of the fingers, and causes the nose, eyes, and ears to perform their functions, it at the same moment causes the hand to do its part.

The unborn child does has not life in the fullest sense. The corpse has not life which has departed. You or I cannot impart life to either, neither can they impart life to themselves.

There is some omnipotent force outside of us all that gives life and takes it without consulting our wishes.

Some have called this force:

• Buddha
• Ether
• Electricity
• God
• the influence of the Planets

Whatever the name, the result is the same. This is called a life current that runs through the human body, coming from an outside source.

When the child is born, before it has given the first cry or breathed air, the fingers extend with a quick, spasmodic jerk.

• They stand perfectly straight and rigid.

Following this involuntary motion of the hands, the lungs take in air and the child cries.

Shortly after, the child feels hunger. The hand goes at once to the mouth.

The brain is acting and directing her servant, the hand, which seeks to carry food to the mouth.

Thus from the first moment of life, the hand takes its place as the brain’s servant. At the moment the child’s fingers extend and become straight and rigid, I believe that life awakens the mind and habilitates the senses.

It is projected into the child through the ends of the rigid fingers. But I do not ask you to believe in any name for this outside force.

As months roll into the first year, less sleep and less feeding are necessary. As years increase and mind develops, the trend of its thought begins to manifest itself.

During all this time the brain is unfolding. The hand is changing from the fat little sensual hand of the baby, and taking whatever shape is distinctive to the type to which the child belongs.

Up to 12-14 years old, the hand is as unformed as the character of the child.

But as this age marks the transition from the child to the adult, soon after it is passed the character and hands will begin to assume the proportions which are to guide it in the future.

This is the time when a scientific estimate of the child’s character would be of inestimable value to a parent.