Potentate

“ I often compared myself to them, and finding that my chief superiority consisted in power, I soon persuaded myself that it was in power only that I was inferior to the chiefest potentates of the earth. ”

“ Act, action, actuality, perfection, determination express the various meanings of actus; potency, potentiality, power, capacity, those of potentia. In general, potentia means an aptitude to change, to act or to be acted upon, to give or to receive some new determination. Actus means the fulfilment of such a capacity. So, potentia always refers to something future, which at present exists only as a germ to be evolved; actus denotes the corresponding complete reality. In a word, potentia is the determinable being, actus the determined being. ”

“ Have we not the word potency? This word exactly answers our purpose. It is not only the exact equivalent of the Latin potentia, but is also the immediate relation of the terms potential, potentially, potentiality, which are already admitted in common philosophical language as expressing capability, passiveness, and liability. These latter words are only subordinate members of a family, of which potency is the head. Therefore, to convey the notion of potentia passiva, we have a more appropriate word than "power," and nothing compels us to employ the absurd expression of "passive power." ”

“ Thy God has commanded thy strength; that is, whatever is done for thee, or whatever strength thou hast to help thyself, it comes from God, his power and grace, and the word which he has commanded; thou hast no reason to fear while thou hast strength of God's commanding, and no reason to boast while thou hast no strength but what is of his commanding. ”

“ Then in the next place, let us consider whether those who are called holy principalities began from the moment of their creation by God to exercise power over some who were made subject to them, and whether these latter were created of such a nature, and formed for the very purpose of being subject and subordinate. In like manner, also, whether those which are called powers were created of such a nature and for the express purpose of exercising power, or whether their arriving at that power and dignity is a reward and desert of their virtue. ”

“ But a person, called the Holy Spirit, living in me—shall I make it very definite by saying, living in my body?—that is power. If restrained by sin, or disobedience, or ignorance, or wilfulness of any sort, then power restrained, held in check, not evident. If utterly unrestrained, given free sway and control—ah! then power manifest, limitless, wonderful, all exercised in carrying out God's will in, and with, and through me. ”

“ The same adjective is used of grace (ch. ii. 7) , and of love (ch. iii. 19) , and it is intended to express the superabundance of that power [Pg 105] which was put forth in the Resurrection and is now exercised on our behalf. Then the four words used for power are particularly noteworthy: “power,” “energy,” “strength,” “might.” Each conveys an aspect of this great spiritual force. “Might” is power in possession; “strength” is power as the result of grasping, or of coming into contact with the source of that power; and “energy” is a power in expression. ”

“ If you are not delivered by a higher power than you have known yet, you will never be saved.” The word higher power struck me to the heart, and brought a ray of light, which shewed me, that notwithstanding all my works, I was without God in the world. ”

“ We may open it to let the whole full tide run in, or we may close it till a mere dribble reaches us. For the strength which is strength, and not merely weakness in a fever, is a strength derived, and ours because derived. The Apostle gives the complete version of the exhortation when he says: 'Finally, my brethren,' that Omega of command which is the Alpha of performance, 'be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might.' Let Christ's strength in. ”

“ But what then is force and strength which is merely such, if not corporeal force and strength? Dost thou know any power which stands at thy command, in distinction from the power of kindness and reason, besides muscular power? If thou canst effect nothing through kindness and the arguments of reason, force is what thou must take refuge in. ”

“ Learn to realise the exceeding greatness of the power that will clothe your weakness. 'Lift up your eyes on high, and behold who hath created these things, for that He is strong in might, not one faileth.' That is wonderful, but here is a far nobler operation of the divine power. It is great to 'preserve the ancient heavens' fresh and strong by His might, but it is [Pg 80] greater to come down to my weakness, to 'give power to the faint,' and 'increase strength to them that have no might.' And that is what He will do with us. ”

“ And although the breath of all this mighty and immeasurable power, and the vigour itself produced, so to speak, by its own existence, proceed from the power itself, as the will does from the mind, yet even this will of God is nevertheless made to become the power of God. ”

“ Command, word and action are in the grasp of His power. "Everything is made captive in the Grasp of His power, and verily this is easy and practicable unto Him." He is the doer of that which He desireth, and the accomplisher of that which He wisheth. ”

“ You shall not receive power yourself, so that people shall say: “How much power that man has. You shall not have any power whatever, but you shall receive the power of the Holy Ghost coming upon you, He having the power, that is all.” ”

“ Protect me, O my Lord, from every evil that Thine omniscience perceiveth, inasmuch as there is no power nor strength but in Thee, no triumph is forthcoming save from Thy presence, and it is Thine alone to command. ”

“ Many of us believe exultingly that the “All power” which is given into the hands of our Master includes the power of upright standing, strength, and beauty for every bruised human reed. That this is so, we have evidence in plenty, beginning with ourselves. ”

“ Potestates are powers which have power over the accursed spirits, that they may not tempt the hearts of believing men so much as they desire. Principatus are authorities which have charge of the good angels, and they by their direction fulfil the divine mysteries. Dominationes are interpreted, lordships, because the other hosts of angels obey them with great subjection. ”

“ We have seen that from the standpoint of our lives there is need of power, as well as from the standpoint of the Master's use of us among others. Jesus' promise and insistent words make plain the necessity of our having power if His plan for us is not to fail. His words about the price of power have set many of us to doing some honest thinking and heart-searching. And we have gotten some suggestion, too, of the meaning of that word power, and of the personality back of the word. ”

“ Therefore He is the efflux of the glory of God in this respect, that He is omnipotent—the pure and limpid Wisdom herself—glorified as the efflux of omnipotence or of glory. And that it may be more clearly understood what the glory of omnipotence is, we shall add the following. God the Father is omnipotent, because He has power over all things, i.e., over heaven and earth, sun, moon, and stars, and all things in them. ”

“ Go forward bravely in the conscious power of your own potential spirit, dominant and dauntless. Armed with the majesty and mystery of your mediumship, all obstacles shall yield, and naught shall prevail over you!' This prophetic command, so thrilling, so imperative, touched and stirred my inner self ”

“ If power, they shall have all power to fulfill their will, as God to fulfill his. For, as God will have power to do what he wills, through himself, so they will have power, through him, to do what they will. ”

“ Spencer or any one else deny that, whatever sanction the human and relative conception of "power" draws from the inner certainties of our own sensations, that same, or a still higher, sanction can also be claimed for the conception of an infinite and eternal "Wisdom"? ”

“ In the first place, when you conceive a powerful God, master of hearts, and changing at his pleasure the rebellious wills of men, is it not true, that you at the same time conceive a power regulated by wisdom, that is to say, which doth nothing but in conformity with that order it hath established? Now, the presumptuous sinner attributes to God a blind power, which acts indiscriminately. ”

“ Here again, innumerable small efforts of attention will accumulate into mastery, and a mastery worth winning. For a concrete example, take the gradual conquest of each day, the effort to live that day for the Soul. To him that is faithful unto death, the Master gives the crown of life.
11. The gradual conquest of the mind's tendency to flit from one object to another, and the power of one-pointedness, make the development of Contemplation. ”

“ Where we may endeavour to drive or even to lead in vain, influence, with subtle tact and potent sway, may, like a gracious Divinity, become an unseen but pervading power, restoring, controlling, directing those who come within her realm. ”

“ Habit takes precedence of power, according as it implies a disposition to nature: whereas power always implies a relation to operation, which is posterior, since nature is the principle of operation. But the habit whose subject is a power, does not imply relation to nature, but to operation. Wherefore it is posterior to power. Or, we may say that habit takes precedence of power, as the complete takes precedence of the incomplete, and as act takes precedence of potentiality. ”

“ The surprising strength and endurance exhibited by lunatics and delirious persons often show that the amount of power which can be commanded by the will under an ordinary stimulant by no means equals the latent strength. ”

“ We see them now as representing the cravings of the intellect and the emotions for the only end of all quests. The disciplined will—the “conative power”—with all the dormant faculties which it can wake and utilize, can come to the assistance of one of them. ”

“ I, on the contrary, find something very satisfactory in the thought, that man has the power of framing such props and such weapons out of the most trivial materials, indeed out of nothing, merely by the force of his will, which hereby truly deserves the name of omnipotent. ”

“ Let us, then, waive for the present the notion of “pure potency,” and turn our attention to that of “real potency,” that we may see what kind of reality the first matter must be, when the “first matter” is identified with the matter actually existing under a substantial form.
The matter actuated by a form is a real potency, and nothing more. It is only by stretching the word “being” beyond its legitimate meaning that this real potency is sometimes called a real being. ”

“ And this change—this conversion, if you will—comes sometimes, it may be, despite ourselves, but comes—remember this—comes most often in answer to some act of obedience, to some surrender of self-will on our part. We may complain; we may demur; we may distrust. We have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing; but we recognise the authority of the Divine voice, and we force ourselves into compliance—"nevertheless, at Thy word." ”

“ Hence we come to the conclusion that every created being, for the very reason of its having been educed out of nothing, retains potency, as the stamp of its origin, in its essential constitution. All creatures, then, are essentially potential, and therefore imperfect; as potency means perfectibility. ”

“ I would, by Thy power and Thy might, soar to such heights that nothing whatsoever would have the power to keep me back from the manifold evidences of Thy transcendent dominion, nor would any earthly scheme shut me out from the manifestations of Thy Divine holiness. ”

“ Further, we offer our activities to God when we fall back upon Him as our one power, and say, 'Perfect Thy strength in my weakness.' He that goes out into the world to do his daily work, of whatsoever sort it is—you in your little sphere, or I in mine—in dependence upon himself, is sure to be defeated. ”

“ You may command me to the utmost extent of my power, but—"
"Then let me see an apparition."
"But I must first be certain that you do not require it from mere curiosity. Though the invisible powers are in some degree at my command, it is on the sacred condition that I do not abuse my authority." ”

“ Feel that higher power is always with you; deeply desire higher power to direct you, and open consciousness so completely to the limitless life of higher power that you actually realize that you live, move and have your being in the infinite power of the Most High. ”

“ It is no power, but power is its modification, therefore it is higher. Now you will see that the result of the proper exercise of the will, first with motive for an object and then without motive, is that the will-power will attain a much higher state. ”

“ What men wanted was to be checked by superior intelligence, by superior knowledge, by superior force too--yes, by force held in trust from God and sanctified by its use in accordance with His declared will. ”

“ I will go in the strength of the Lord God, not sit down in despair, but stir up myself to and exert myself in my work and warfare, will go forth and go on, not in any strength of my own, but in God's strength—disclaiming my own sufficiency and depending on him only as all-sufficient—in the strength of his providence and in the strength of his grace. ”

“ But it is when associated with exalted genius, and under the action of the potent principles above mentioned, that this moral energy conveys an image of power, which approaches, nearer than anything else on earth, to that of a divine intelligence. ”

“ Now there are in existence two great powers: one is of God, including all the heavenly host—the angels and celestial beings who dwell in the presence of God and partake of His glory, holding power and authority from Him to go forth and minister according to His command. ”

“ On the other hand, we never contemplate human nature in a more noble or dignified position, than when, under the dispensation of Divine, and consequently indisputable power, it yields a willing and prompt obedience. ”

“ The parts of his body, the power he exerts, especially when he is set upon, and the comely proportion of the whole of him, are what God will not conceal, and therefore what we must observe and acknowledge the power of God in. ”