One of the laws of the mind we have already stressed is that what we
attend to largely determines what we are, or shall be. The interests
which secure our consideration may be the passive result of emotional
life, the things which naturally appeal, which give us sensations that
the mind normally heeds; or they may be the active result of our will
which has forced application upon the things which reason advised as
worth acquiring.
We found that the beginning of health of mind consists in the directing
of thought toward the health-bringing attitude. We have seen how quickly
the normal mind can be diverted from the undesirable by a new or
stronger emotional stimulus. We found that the sole appeal to attention
in the baby-life is through the emotions, and that it is natural
throughout life for the mind to heed and follow the interesting; which
is only another way of saying that thinking follows where emotion leads,
unless volition steps in to prevent. The supreme test of the will's
power is its ability to hold the train of thought in the line that
reason directs, when feeling would draw it elsewhere.
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