in an air cushion so the shutting might be softened and delayed, and
meanwhile His presence be appealing to the man.

Refusing to obey God was equal to hearing without being willing to listen.
It was the same thing as looking with that reluctance that won't see, and
then doesn't see. Hearing and seeing lie deeper than ears and eyes, down
in the purpose, the will, the desire of the heart. Unwillingness dulls,
and then deafens the ears. It blurs, and then blinds the eye. An earnest,
loving purpose gives peculiar keenness to the ears, and opens the eye of
the eye. Ears and eyes are very sensitive organs. If their messages be not
faithfully attended to they sulk and pout and refuse to transmit messages.
It is a remarkable fact that habitual inattention to a sound or sight
makes one practically deaf or blind to it; and that close attention
persisted in makes one's ears and eyes almost abnormally keen and quick.
Love's ears and eyes are proverbially acute.

One may be so wholly absorbed in something that he absolutely does not see
the thing on which his eyes are turned. He does not hear the sounds that
are plainly coming to his ear because his thought, back of that his heart,
is elsewhere. Hearing, seeing is with the heart back of ears and eyes. God
is spoken of as silent. Yet His silence may be simply our deafness. The
truth is He is speaking all the time, but we are so absorbed that we do
not hear. He is ever looking into our faces with His great, tender, deep
eyes, but we are so wrapped up in something else that the gaze out of our
eyes is vacant to that Face, and with keenest disappointment, so often
repeated, He gets no answering glance.

Let anybody in doubt about the strict accuracy of this do some
experimenting on himself, either with outer things or regarding God. Let
him obey the inner voice in some particular that may perhaps cut straight