Talks on the Path of Occultism - Vol. III

Commentary on

The Light on the Path

by

Annie Besant  and  C.W. Leadbeater

FOREWORD

THIS book is merely a record of talks by Mr. C. W. Leadbeater and myself on three famous books—books small in size but great in contents. We both hope that they will prove useful to aspirants, and even to those above that stage, since the talkers were older than the listeners, and had more experience in the life of discipleship.

The talks were not given at one place only; we chatted to our friends at different times and places, chiefly at Adyar, London and Sydney. A vast quantity of notes were taken by the listeners. All that were available of these were collected and arranged. They were then condensed, and repetitions were eliminated.

Unhappily there were found to be very few1 notes on The Voice of the Silence, Fragment I, so we have utilized notes made at a class held by our good colleague, Mr. Ernest Wood, in Sydney, and incorporated these into Bishop Leadbeater's talks in that section. No notes of my own talks on this book were available; though I have spoken much upon it, those talks are not recoverable.

May this book help some of our younger brothers to understand more of these priceless teachings. The more they are studied and lived, the more will be found in them.

ANNIE BESANT

PART I

LIGHT ON THE PATH

CHAPTER  1 INTRODUCTION

A.B.—Light on the Path is one of a number of different occult treatises which are in the care of the great Teachers and are used in the instruction of disciples. It is a part of The Book of the Golden Precepts, which contains many treatises which were written in different ages of the world, but have one characteristic in common, that they contain occult truth, and have therefore to be studied in a different way from ordinary books. The understanding of these treatises depends upon the capacity of the reader, and when any one of them is published to the world only distorted views of its teaching will be acquired, if it is taken literally.

Definitely intended for the quickening of the evolution of those who are on the Path, this book puts forward ideals which people of the world are rarely prepared to accept. Only as far as a man is able and willing to live the teaching, will he be able to understand it. If he does not practise it, it will remain a sealed book to him. Any effort to live it will throw light upon it; but if the reader makes no effort, he will not only gain very little, but he will turn against the book and say that it is useless.

4                 TALKS  ON  THE  PATH  OF  OCCULTISM

This treatise falls naturally into certain divisions. It was given to the Western world by the Master Hilarion, one of the great Teachers belonging to the White Lodge —a Master who played a great part in the Gnostic and Neoplatonic movements, one of the great persons who made attempts to keep Christianity alive. His incarnations have run very much in Greece and Rome, and he takes special interest in guiding the evolution of the Western world. He obtained the book as we have it, without the notes, from the Venetian Master, one of the great Teachers whom H.P.B. spoke of as Chohans.

Fifteen of the short rules that you find in the first part of this book, and fifteen in the second part, are exceedingly old, and were written in the most ancient Sanskrit. To these short sentences which are used as a basis for the instruction of the disciple, the Chohan added other sentences, which now form part of the book, and are always to be read along with them, to supply complementary ideas without which the reader might be led astray. All the rules in both parts of the book, except the thirty short aphorisms, were written by the Chohan who gave it to the Master Hilarion. The following table shows the fifteen short rules in Part I as they existed in the exceedingly ancient manuscript; the number at the beginning of each is the original one, but the number at the end is that which appears in the modern book.

This does not refer to color but is a term used for the Brotherhood of Perfected Men (ed.).

INTRODUCTION

It will be noticed from the above table (which covers only Part I of the book) that rules 4, 8, 12, 16, 20 and 21 are absent from the list. That is because they do not belong to the most ancient part of the book. Those rules and the preliminary and concluding comments are the portion added by the greater One who gave it to the Master. In addition there are notes, which were written by the Master Hilarion himself. The book as originally published in 1885 contained these three portions: the aphorisms from the ancient manuscript, the additions of the Chohan, and the notes of the Master Hilarion. All these were written down by Mabel Collins, who acted as the physical instrument, as the pen that wrote it. The

6       

Master was himself the translator of the book, and he impressed it upon her brain. His was the hand that held the pen. Then there subsequently appeared in Lucifer under the title of " Comments " a few articles which were written by Mabel Collins under the influence of the Master, and which are exceedingly valuable, worth reading and studying.

Now, taking up the book itself, we first find the following statement:

These rules are written for all disciples: Attend you to them.

A distinction is made here between the world and the disciples; this is not a book intended for the world in general. The word disciple is to be considered in two senses—the uninitiated and the initiated. In reading the book carefully we can trace the two distinct lines of teaching clothed in the same words; each sentence contains a double meaning, one intended for the more and the other for the less advanced. We will try to trace them out when we come to the preliminary statements. The second part of the treatise appears to be intended entirely for the initiated disciple, but this duality runs through the first part.

Many persons not yet approaching discipleship entirely misunderstand these rules, and often criticize them as holding up an ideal which is hard and wanting in sympathy. This is constantly the case when an ideal is presented which is too high for the reader. No person is helped by an ideal, however noble in itself, which to

                                         7

him is not attractive; it is a practical lesson for dealing with human beings that we should put before them only such ideals as may attract them. With all books of this kind that which a man gets out of them is what he brings to them; his understanding depends upon his own power to answer to the thoughts which they contain. Even material things exist for us only if we have developed the organs which can respond to them; hence at the present time there are hundreds of vibrations playing upon us to which we are incapable of giving heed. Sir William Crookes once illustrated this very well when he was trying to show how circumscribed was our knowledge of electricity, and how great therefore was the possibility of progress in electrical science. He said that it would make an enormous difference to us, would in fact revolutionize our ideas, if we had organs answering to electrical vibrations instead of eyes sensitive to light vibrations. In dry air we should not be conscious of anything, for it does not conduct electricity. A house made of glass would be opaque, but an ordinary house would be transparent. A silver wire would look like a hole or tunnel in the air. What we know of the world thus depends upon our response to its vibrations Similarly, if we cannot answer to a truth, it is not truth for us. So, when dealing with books written by occultists we can only catch their thought in proportion to our own spiritual advancement. Any part of their thought which is too subtle or too high simply passes by us as if it were not there.

8                  

Much more can be got out of this book by meditation than by mere reading; its greatest value is that it gives directions to our meditation. Pick out a single sentence and then meditate upon it; stop the working of the lower mind and awaken the inner consciousness which conies directly in contact with the thought. One may thus get away from images of the concrete mind to a direct perception of the truth. Meditation thus enables one to obtain in the brain a large amount of the direct knowledge of the truth which the ego has acquired in his own worlds. Still, a man who meditates, but does not read or listen to a teacher as well, although he is sure to progress on the spiritual plane, will do so only slowly. If he had had the additional advantage of reading or listening, he would advance far more rapidly. The lecture or study can tune the brain of the student so that it will obtain more knowledge through meditation. But for a man who only listens or reads, and does not meditate, hardly any advancement is possible, and progress is exceedingly slow. Both should be combined ; much meditation and a little hearing or reading will carry a man far indeed.

C.W.L.—On the title-page of the first edition of Light on the Path, published in 1885, it is described as: " A treatise written for the personal use of those who are ignorant of the Eastern Wisdom, and who desire to enter within its influence." But the book itself begins with the statement that these rules are written for all disciples. The latter description is surely the more accurate one, as the history of the book will show.

                                      9

As we have it at present it was dictated by the Master Hilarion through Mabel Collins—a lady well known in Theosophical circles, who at one time collaborated with Madame Blavatsky in the editorship of Lucifer. The Master Hilarion had in turn received it from his own Teacher, the Great One who among Theosophical students is sometimes called the Venetian. But even he was the author of only a part of it. It has passed through three phases; let us set them down in order.

It is but a small book even now, but the first form in which we have seen it is smaller yet. It is a palm-leaf manuscript, old beyond computation; so old that even before the time of Christ men had already forgotten its date and the name of its writer, and regarded its origin as lost in the mists of prehistoric antiquity. It consists of ten leaves, and on each leaf are written three lines only, for in a palm-leaf manuscript the lines run along the page, not across it as with us. Each line is complete in itself—a short aphorism—and the language in which they are written is an archaic form of Sanskrit.

The Venetian Master translated these aphorisms from Sanskrit into Greek, for the use of his Alexandrian pupils, of whom the Master Hilarion was one, in his incarnation as lamblichus. Not only did he translate the aphorisms, but he added to them certain explanations, which we shall do well to take along with the original. For example, if we look at the first three aphorisms, we shall see that the paragraph marked 4, which follows them, is clearly intended as a commentary

10      

on them; so we should read it thus: " Kill out ambition; but work as those work who are ambitious. Kill out desire of life; but respect life as those do who desire it. Kill out desire of comfort; but be happy as those are who live for happiness."

In the same way rules, 5, 6 and 7 form a group, followed by 8, which is a comment by the Chohan—and so on far into the book. These groups of three are not put so by mere coincidence, but intentionally. If we examine them we shall find that there is a certain bond between the three in each case. For example, the three rules grouped together above point to purity of heart and steadiness of spirit. One may say that they indicate what the man must do with himself, what is his duty to himself in the way of preparation for work.

The second set of three aphorisms (numbers 5 to 8) states that we are to kill out all sense of separateness, desire for sensation, and the hunger for growth. They indicate man's duty to those around him socially. He must realize that he is one with others. He must be willing to give up selfish and separate pleasures. He must kill out the desire for personal growth, and work for the growth of the whole.

In the next set of three (numbers 9 to 12) we are told what to desire—that which is within us, that which is beyond us, and that which is unattainable. These are clearly a man's duty to his Higher Self. Then follow aphorisms (13 to 16) on the desire for power, peace and possessions. Those are all desires which fit us for the

                                        11

work of the Path. The next group of rules (17 to 20) tell the aspirant how to seek the way.

The rules now numbered 4, 8, 12, etc., are explanations and amplifications by the Venetian Master. They, with the original aphorisms, formed the book as it was first published in 1885, for the Master Hilarion translated it from Greek into English and gave it in that form. Almost immediately after it was printed, he added to it a number of most valuable notes of his own. For that first edition those notes were printed on separate pages, the backs of which were gummed so that they might be attached at the beginning and the end of the little book which had just passed through the press. In further editions, those notes have been inserted in their appropriate places.

The beautiful little essay on Karma which appears at the end of the book is also from the hand of the Venetian Master, and was included in the book from the first edition.

The archaic Sanskrit manuscript which was the basis of Light on the Path was also translated into Egyptian; and many of the explanations of the Venetian Master have more the ring of Egyptian than of Indian teaching. Therefore, the student who can enter to some extent into the spirit of that old civilization will find it a great help to his understanding of this book. The conditions which surrounded us in ancient Egypt were radically different from those of the present day. It is almost impossible to make people understand them now; yet if we could get back into the mental attitude of those

12               

ancient times we should realize a very great deal which now, I am afraid, we miss. We are in the habit of thinking too much of the intellect of the present day, and are fond of boasting of the advance we have made beyond the old civilizations. There undoubtedly are certain points in which we have advanced beyond them, but there are other matters in which we are by no means at their level. The comparison is perhaps a little unfair, however, because as yet ours is a very young civilization. If we go back three hundred years in the history of Europe, and especially the history of England, we find a state of affairs which seems very uncivilized indeed. When we compare these three hundred years, including the one hundred and fifty years of scientific development which have played so large a part in our civilized history, with the four thousand years through which the Egyptian civilization flourished practically unchanged, we see at once that ours is a very small affair. Any civilization which has lasted as long as four thousand years has had an opportunity to try all sorts of experiments and to obtain results which we have not had yet, so it is not fair to compare us at our beginning with any of the great civilizations at their zenith.

Our fifth sub-race has by no means reached its highest point or its greatest glory, and that point when reached will be a definite advance upon all other civilizations, especially in certain respect: It will have its own characteristics and some of them may seem to us less pleasing than those of the earlier civilizations, but on the whole it will be an advance, because the successive races

                                     13

are like the tide when the waves are coming in. Each conies in and recedes, and the next one conies in just a little further. They all have their rise and climax, and their decay. With us the tide is still rising, so we have not yet the settled order in certain respects that they had in some of the older civilizations. We are, unfortunately, far as yet from the realization of unselfishness—from the feeling that the community as a whole is the chief thing to be considered and not the individual. That was attained in some of the older civilizations to an extent which would make it seem to us now a kind of Utopia, but on the other hand we are growing into possession of powers which those older peoples did not possess. There was a short period in the early history of Rome when " none was for the party and all were for the State ", as Macaulay put it. Pythagoras, speaking to the people at Taormina, told them that the State was more than father and mother, more even than wife and child, and that every man should always be ready to give up his own thoughts, feelings and wishes for the sake of unity—for the res publica, the original of ' republic ', the common weal or well being of the whole, to which every one should be willing to sacrifice his personal interests. In England, too, in the days of Queen Elizabeth, there was a period of such true patriotic feeling and activity.

I do not mean that in ancient Egypt or in ancient Greece, or anywhere else in the world, all the people were unselfish. Not by any means, but all educated people took a very much wider view, a much more

14

communal view of life than we do. They thought very much more of the State and much less of their individual welfare or progress. We shall attain to that too, and when we do we ought to realize it more fully than any of the ancient races, and also bring to it some development which the older races had not.

If, then, we could get back into that old Egyptian outlook, we should understand Light on the Path very much better. The student will do well to try to produce that attitude in himself in his study of it, so that it may help him to put himself into the place of those who studied it in the olden times.

It is easy for some of us who have undergone the training that enables us to remember our past lives. I remember my own last incarnation in Greece, where I took part in the Eleusinian Mysteries, and another life much earlier in which the great Mysteries of Egypt, of which some remnants still exists in Freemasonry, figured largely, and that enables me to get more good out of such books as this than I could without such memory. Even impressions from the past, giving a sense of atmosphere, are a great help. Egyptian or Indian, there is no more precious gem in our Theosophical literature—no book which will better repay the most careful and detailed study.

As already explained, Light on the Path was the first of three treatises which occupy an unique position in our Theosophical literature, as they give directions from those who have trodden the Path to those who desire to tread it. I remember that the late Swami T. Subba Row

                                     15

once told us that its precepts had several layers of meaning—that they could be taken over and over again as directions for different stages. First, they are useful for the aspirants—those who are treading the probationary path. Then they begin all over again at a higher level for him who has entered upon the Path proper through the portal of the first of the great Initiations. And yet again, when Adeptship has been attained, it is said that once more, in some still higher sense, these same precepts may be taken as directions for one who presses onwards to still higher achievements. In this way, for the man who can understand it in the whole of its mystic meaning, this manual carries us farther than any other. These books which are definitely written for the quickening of the evolution of those who are on the Path put forward ideals which men in the world are usually not prepared to accept. Even among students there may be some who wonder at the form in which the teaching is given. The only way to understand it is to take it for granted and try to live it. In At the Feet of the Master it is said that it is not enough to say that it is poetic and beautiful; a man who wishes to succeed must do exactly what the Master says, attending to every word and taking every hint. That is equally true of this book. The man who does not try to live according to the teaching will constantly come up against points in it which will ruffle him—with which he will find himself quite out of agreement; but if he tries to live it, the sense in which it is to be taken will eventually dawn upon him. Any honest effort really to live the

16

teaching always throws light on it, and that is the only way in which this priceless pearl can be appreciated. In such books there is a great deal more meaning that the actual words convey. Therefore to a large extent each man gets out of them what he brings -to them—he brings the power to assimilate a certain part of their message and obtains only that part. Merely to read these books, even to study them, is therefore not enough; it is necessary to meditate over them as well. If one takes the passages that sound a little difficult—the cryptic, mystical, paradoxical statements—and thinks and meditates over them, one gets a great deal more out of them, although often one can hardly express it.

I try to express what occurs to me with regard to these different points, what they have meant to me, but I am conscious all the time that I am not at all fully conveying my meaning. I know, very often, I cannot express the whole idea that is in my mind; when I put it into words it sounds quite commonplace, and yet I can see for myself a vast amount of higher meaning. I see that perhaps with my mental body. The same thing is true at each level. In addition to what we can realize with the mental body, there is still more that can be realized only with the causal body and through intuition. Whatever we express, there will always be something deeper still budding and coming to flower within us. That man is only an expression of the Eternal, and that nothing that is out of the Eternal can aid us, is true, and it is the truth upon which the three writers of this book constantly insist.

CHAPTER 2 THE FOUR PRELIMINARY STATEMENTS

Before the eyes can see they must be incapable of tears.

A.B.—This is the first of four statements which describe the four qualifications preliminary to the Path proper. They describe true sight, true hearing, true speech and true standing in the presence of the Master, that is to say, true ability to serve mankind under his direction.

This and the following three statements are intended for two classes of disciples. In the first class are those who are on the probationary path, and are therefore being taught to get rid of all that we speak of as the personality; these preliminary instructions are intended to show them that they must begin by eliminating the lower self. In the second class are those who are already initiated. Something more is demanded from them. They must get rid of their individuality, the reincarnating ego, so that at the end of the Path their life will be entirely under the direction of the Monad.

18

We shall see therefore that each of these four statements can be taken as affecting the personality or the individuality, and according to the position of the student who is trying to live out their teaching will be the point of view from which he will understand them.

It is worth while to notice and remember that these statements can be taken from two quite different points of view in another way also. These teachings come from Masters of the White Lodge,1 but exactly the same statements are made by those who follow the black magic of the dark side of life, whom we sometimes speak of as the Brothers of the Shadow or of Darkness.1 There are two ways in which the eyes may become incapable of tears, and according to his motive will be the path along which the aspirant will go. One way is that of the man who aspires to become a disciple of the dark side; he will take this statement as teaching complete indifference to pleasure and pain by means of hardening the heart and avoiding all sympathy. Anyone who tries to become incapable of tears by killing out all feeling will be going towards the dark path. The man on the other way is becoming incapable of tears only as far as his own personal sorrows are concerned. His own lower nature does not move him, but he is fully awake to the feelings of others. Only at his peril can a man become indifferent to the sufferings of others.

1Readers are reminded that terms "white" and "dark "do not relate to color, but to the light and dark sides of life.

THE  FOUR  PRELIMINARY  STATEMENTS

We may contrast the two ways in a table:

19

The fundamental difference between the two ways is that the first tends towards separateness all the time, and ends up in a condition of absolute isolation, while the second aims constantly at union, and ends in a state of perfect unity.

The aspirant on the white path has gradually to eliminate everything in himself which can receive from the outer world anything which he feels as pain affecting himself, anything which shakes him through his personality, any sorrow or trouble of any kind which works upon him as concerning his personal self. He must reach a point where he is incapable of feeling sorrows for his own separate interest. In fact, he is to aim at making his kamic sheath entirely a vehicle of the Higher

20

Self, with no independent life of its own. It is to have neither attractions nor repulsions, neither desires nor wishes, neither hopes nor fears—the whole of that is to be eliminated. This should not convey the mistaken idea that the sheath is to be destroyed; but it must cease to respond on its own account to impressions from the outer world. Only the separated life must be killed out, but the sheath must be kept for use in the service of humanity.

This change that the disciple must make in his own character is definitely shown in the constitution of the sheath. In the ordinary disciple it is constantly changing its colours; but when it is purified and all the separate life is purged away it remains a colourless and radiant vehicle, only affected by the reflections that come from the inner life; it has then no colour of its own, but only that which is thrown upon it from the Higher Self, it resembles the appearance of the moon on water—a pearly radiance, in which there is a certain play which can hardly be called colour. This change takes place very gradually in the astral body of the disciple while he is working at the difficult task of making himself responsive to all the sorrows of his fellow-men, but more and more indifferent to all which affects himself. It would be very easy for him to kill out every feeling, but to become increasingly sensitive to the feelings of others and at the same time not to permit any personal feelings to come in, is the much more difficult task set before the aspirant. As he goes on with the work, however, he will find that his selfish emotions quietly

21

disappear   as   they   become   converted   into   unselfish emotions.

The disciple may test the quality and genuineness of his sympathy by looking to see whether or not he feels it when the suffering of others is not intruded upon his notice. If you see a person suffering, or if you come across a case of gross ill-usage, no doubt you feel pain, but do you feel the same pain when the person is not before your sight ? Our sympathy is an exceedingly poor thing if it is excited only by the sight of suffering. Send a person out into a great city like London, and he may be terribly affected by the suffering that he sees around him; but take him away from it all and he will soon forget the miseries he has witnessed and will become perfectly happy. The disciple has to learn to live as if the whole of that suffering were present before him all the time; to relieve it must be the motive of his work.

No one has reached the stage where he is responsive to the great cry of pain, spoken of in The Voice of the Silence, unless his motive in life is to help humanity whether the suffering be before his eyes or not, for that is the real motive-power of a disciple. The best way to get rid of personality, to grow indifferent to one's own personal joys and sorrows, to become incapable of tears, is to let the mind think upon the sorrow of the world and the ways of helping it; that causes the personal self to be seen in. its true place beside the larger self of the great orphan humanity.

22

When the disciple passes through Initiation and begins to develop the buddhic consciousness, this incapacity for tears takes on a new character. He then begins to understand the word evolution, to realize that in man it means the unfoldment of the higher triad; then he begins to see the real use and object of all the suffering and pain. He gradually becomes incapable of tears because he understands the value of the suffering to those who are undergoing it, because he sees that when pain comes to a man it does so as an absolute necessity for the higher development of his soul. It is true that theoretically the man might have avoided that suffering if he had acted wisely in the past, for it is the result of his past karma when it is not produced by his present follies; but the practical aspect of the matter is that the man has been foolish, has elected to learn through this kind of experience instead of through wisdom, because he has not always chosen to follow the best he knew, and now he is suffering, and the pain is bringing him wisdom for the future, and is thereby promoting his evolution.

Realizing this, the disciple reaches a condition in which he may be described as full of the most perfect sympathy but without regret. The sense of regret conies in only when the consciousness is unillumined by the buddhic life. When the buddhic consciousness is felt, the disciple's sympathy increases enormously, but his regret disappears, and as he rises higher this wider view makes him incapable of-tears, because in the face of the bitterest suffering to which he is learning to respond and

23

to feel in himself, he feels also its object and end. He can share in the suffering to the full, but without the slightest wish that it should be anything other than it is. The absence of any wish to get rid of the suffering before it has done its work, can only exist when the consciousness has buddhic illumination. That is the condition which has been described as the Christ state. The law is good and the will of the Supreme is perfect, and the suffering works for a perfect end; therefore the disciple is filled with content and satisfaction; he feels the suffering, but of grief and sorrow he feels none at all.

When the disciple reaches this stage his consciousness has become part of the life of the world. If he thinks of himself as " I " it is as part of that " I " in which all other " I "s also exist. Now there is for him nothing which is outside or separate from himself; he identifies himself with the one great life in whatever stage it may be, whenever it is in need of help. He entirely loses the sense, which is so common in the world, of some people being outside; he is in all and with all.

This realization of union makes an enormous difference to the help that the man is able to give to the world. When he is helping any person he feels his troubles as his own, not as the difficulties of another, separate from himself. He sees them exactly as that person does; therefore instead of assisting him from the outside he is helping him from within. There is a world of difference between the help given by one from the outside and that which is given from within: the former

24              

is a temporary and adventitious aid, but the inside help adds to the power of the man's life.

The disciple can reach this state only because he has cultivated sympathy, has learnt to identify himself with the joys and sorrows of others, has made his own life a life common to all. Without that, this loss of separate-ness would be unattainable. The only incapability of tears that he has to know is that which makes him indifferent to the things that touch the personal self, but leaves him keenly alive to all that affects the other souls around him.

C.W.L.—Dr Annie Besant has explained with regard to the first four statements in this book, beginning " Before the eyes can see they must be incapable of tears," that they may be taken in quite a wrong way, and are then as acceptable to the black magician as to ourselves. He would understand them to mean that he must kill out all feeling, build himself into a shell and shut the sorrows and the troubles of the world outside it. That is exactly the opposite of the teaching given to the pupil on the white path, who is taught to increase his power of feeling until he attains perfect sympathy with the sufferings of his fellow-men.

We hear a good deal about the black magicians, but I fancy that few people know much about them. I have met many specimens of the genus, and can therefore claim to know something of their nature and methods. Some of them are very interesting people, but by no means desirable acquaintances. There are many different types who are classed under the general title of black

25

magician. For instance, the Negroes in South Africa and in the West Indies, and probably the Aborigines of Australia, practise a good deal of petty black magic. It. is a very poor thing; even they themselves admit that it does not work on white people. One has heard of certain cases in which they have succeeded in making white people exceedingly uncomfortable, but one must add that it was made possible by the kind of life those people led. Such magic depends for its success largely upon the fear of the people upon whom the incantations are laid, yet it is a real enough thing in its feeble way. These primitive people have certain drugs, they know how to hypnotize, and they have power over some low-class earth-spirits and similar entities. They contrive to cause sickness to a man, or in his family, or among his flocks and herds, or to blast his gardens and fields so that they will not bear crops; though in the latter case they are not above aiding their magic sometimes by saltpetre as well.

There is another set of people, somewhat more dignified, who are pursuing occult power for their own ends. They have learnt a certain amount of occultism—sometimes quite a good deal—but they are using their power selfishly. They often contrive to gain money and position by such means, and to maintain themselves in that position until they die. After their death they sometimes make an attempt to carry on the same general line, but it meets with indifferent success, and their plans break down; every thing sooner or later fails them and they fall back into a condition of considerable

26

misery. A life such as that means quite a definite step back for the ego.

Yet another and more advanced type of black magician does not desire anything for himself. He does not seek to obtain money or power or influence or anything of that sort, and that at once makes him very much more powerful. He leads a pure and self-controlled life, just as some of our own people might do, but he has set before himself the goal of separateness. He wants to keep himself alive on higher planes, free from absorption into the Logos; he looks with horror upon that which for us is the greatest felicity. He wishes to maintain his own position exactly as it is, and furthermore he claims that he can do it, that the human will is strong enough to withstand the cosmic will up to a certain point.

I have met men like that, and Dr. Besant, who is always trying to save even the most unlikely souls, has set herself once or twice to convert people who have got themselves into that condition, so as to bring them round to our way of thinking—though not with very much success, I am afraid. She sometimes says to them. " You know what the end will be. You know quite enough of the laws of nature, and you are sufficiently intelligent to see whither your path is leading you. It is quite certain that in the end you must collapse. When this manvantara ends, when this planetary chain is over you will be absorbed, whether you will or not, into the Logos at higher levels, and what will be your condition then?"

27

" You do not actually know that," they reply, " yet we admit that that appears to be what will happen. But we tell you frankly that we do not care. We are well satisfied with our present position; we are able to maintain our individuality against any effort to draw us into the Logos for a very long time, even till the end of the manvantara. Whether we can hold it after that we do not know, and we do not care. Whether we can or not, we shall have had our day."

That is an arguable position, and the man who adopts it may be not exactly a good man, but he need not be a bad man, in the ordinary sense of the word. He certainly has a great deal of satanic pride in his composition, but he is not necessarily spiteful nor evil-minded with regard to other people. Still he is absolutely unscrupulous. Anyone who happened to get in his way he would brush aside with far less consideration than we should give to a mosquito. But te a man who did not stand in his way he might be quite a good friend, and there is not necessarily any active evil in his composition. He is not at all a monster of evil, but he is a man who has struck out a line for himself and is following it at the cost of all that to us means progress. That is all we have a right to say against him. We are confident that he will end in great disaster; he is not so sure of that, and in any case he is willing to face it.

As a rule these people are sufficient unto themselves, and they distrust and despise everybody else. That is always characteristic of anyone who is on the dark path; he is right and everybody else is wrong. He looks down

28

on everybody else. People talk sometimes about a black brotherhood. There is no such thing. There could not be any true brotherhood among them, but they do occasionally join together in face of an imminent peril or when something threatens any of their plans. At best it is a very loose alliance, formidable only because of the tremendous power that some of them possess. It does happen now and again that the work that some of our Masters are doing for the evolution of the world crosses their tracks, and then they become formidable enemies. They cannot touch our Masters— I think that must be very irritating to them—but they sometimes get hold of one of their pupils, and so cause them a little trouble or some disappointment, if we can suppose that a Master would feel disappointment. The reason of all the warnings given to us to beware of these people is that we shall find them trying sometimes to mislead us. Madame Blavatsky, who knew a great deal about them and had a wholesome respect for them, rather gave the impression that they were tempting demons who exult in evil for its own sake. This would be true only of those at a lower level; the more powerful of them would consider it quite undignified to exult in anything; but their plans, which are always entirely selfish, may sometimes involve a great deal of harm to certain people. They are as calm and self-contained and as passionless as any disciple of the Master; in fact, they are more so, because they have killed out all feeling intentionally. They would not injure a man merely for the sake of doing harm, but, as

29

I said before, in pursuit of some end of their own which his existence interferes with, they would not hesitate to sweep him out of their way. Those whose work it is to assist people astrally sometimes come across their victims, and in that case the man who tries to help often brings down upon himself also the determined opposition of the black magician.

To return to our main topic. It is very difficult to learn to respond to feelings, and yet not permit one's personality to show itself in any way—to be in perfect sympathy with the feelings of others, and yet have none our own. Many people are very much disturbed by the sight of the suffering of others, but if they do not actually see that suffering they forget it. Many of the richer people in a city like London, for example, when taken to see the terrible misery in the slums, are very much affected, and will at once do all they can to relieve the particular cases that they see: yet the same people will go off to their hunting and fishing and pleasure, and absolutely forget that there is any misery. In that case the sorrow is only partly for the other person's suffering; it is largely merely the personal pain of having that suffering intruded on their notice. That kind of sympathy is a poor thing—it is not real sympathy at all.

When we fully realize the suffering of humanity we gradually lose sight of our own. We forget that we have personal sufferings because we see that the sufferings of humanity are so great, and we realize that that which falls to our lot is after all only our part of the general burden. A man who can get into that state of mind has

30

already very largely transcended his personality. He sorrows still for humanity, but no longer for himself; he has become incapable of tears as far as his own personal joys and sorrows are concerned.

It is not an easy matter to regard the sufferings of others accurately. Dr. Besant and I some years ago investigated the question of the influence of pain upon different people undergoing what from the outside would be regarded as the same physical suffering. We found that in an extreme case one person was suffering perhaps a thousand times more than another, and that in ordinary life one might quite often feel pain a hundred times more than another. If one shows signs of suffering and another does not, it must not be assumed that the latter is necessarily braver or more philosophic. It may not be the case. We looked into the question of the amount of suffering which was inflicted on different people by the ignominies of prison life; to some persons they meant practically nothing, to others the most intense mental and emotional suffering. So it is futile to say: " I do not feel such and such a thing, and therefore other persons ought not to feel it either." One does not know to what degree or in what proportion others are feeling. I have found that many things which do not matter in the least to me may nevertheless cause serious pain to others; whereas it has been quite the reverse as regards other things, such as unpleasant sounds, for example which often cause suffering to those who are developing their finer senses. I have seen Dr. Besant in a condition of positive agony when a great ammunition

31

wagon went clanging by the house where we were staying in Avenue Road, in London. This does not mean, of course, that she lost control of her nerves. She has often explained that while the disciple must increase his sensitiveness he must also control his nervous system, so as to bear without flinching whatever pain or disturbance may come to him.

Before the ear can hear it must have lost its sensitiveness.

A.B.—The disciple must become entirely indifferent to the opinions of others about himself, as far as his own feelings are concerned. If they think and speak well of him he is not to be elated; if ill, he is not to be depressed. Yet at the same time he must not be indifferent to the opinions of others as they affect the people who hold them. He is not, therefore, to be careless with regard to the impressions which he makes upon others, for if he repels them by his conduct he loses his power to help them.

The disciple, in the course of his progress, develops his psychic powers, and so becomes conscious of what others are thinking about him; he is then living in a world in which he may hear everything said about him, and may see every criticism in the mind of another. He reaches this point when he has risen above all criticism, and is not affected by the opinions of others. Some people are very anxious to develop clairvoyance before they have reached this stage, but if they realized

32                

this fact the astral consciousness which they so much desire would lose its attraction.

C.W.L.—It must not be thought that the developed person who hears uncomplimentary remarks about himself and is profoundly indifferent to them deliberately nerves himself against the feeling of irritation, and says: " That is all very dreadful, but I refuse to care; I will not pay any attention to it." He passes, no doubt, through a stage like that, but very soon he reaches a state where he absolutely and utterly does not care, when it is just like the twittering of birds, or like the cicadas whistling in the trees—they may be a nuisance, but that is all. He does not pick out one particular cicada and listen to its tone alone, nor does he single out the thought or the word of any one person who is saying something silly.

We must all try to reach that stage. We are constantly putting it before people, because it is the attitude of our Masters into whose " world " we are trying to go. They may very properly think: " How can we hope to attain to the attitude of these Great Ones?" Of course, no one can do it immediately, but we ought to be aiming at it and trying to get as near to it as we can, and one of the ways of doing that—a method which is really quite easy—is just not to mind in the least what other people say.

When we have reached that attitude the next step is to think of the bad karma these people are making in thinking or speaking wrongly about us. We may then regret it for their sake, and for that reason it is well that

33

we should endeavour not to give more cause than we can help for foolish and depreciatory remarks—not in the least because they matter to us, but because they make bad karma for the people who indulge in them.

Before the voice can speak in the presence of the Masters it must have lost the power to wound.

A.B.—The disciple must lose everything in himself which can give pain to another. In the earlier stages he has to learn to eliminate from his speech all that can give pain—not merely harsh criticism or unkind language, but every form of word that hurts another by implying disparagement or drawing attention to a fault in his character. It is true that some people are in a position in which it is their duty sometimes to point out his fault to another; but it is a mistaken view that he is justified in inflicting pain while doing so. When the fault is pointed out in a perfectly friendly manner, the element of wounding is not present. Whenever the speech wounds it is due to some imperfection in carrying out the duty; the would-be helper has failed to identify himself with the person addressed; he is giving advice only from the outside, and therefore it hurts. If he had unified himself with the other person, and tried to help at the same time feeling as he feels, he would have brought out the other person's emotion in a sympathetic way; through the consciousness of his sympathy the other would have had his nobler and wider side awakened, and then the advice would not have been wounding. If it is your duty to criticize another and you find that

34

it wounds him, look into yourself to find the imperfection that caused the wound. If we are to lose the power to wound, the separate individuality must go; when we feel ourselves as one life, it becomes impossible for us to inflict suffering upon anything, as it is part of ourselves. The way to reach that point of evolution is to begin by gradually purifying the speech, taking the more salient faults first.

C.W.L.—Anyone who wishes to approach the Master must already have given up the desire to wound others by his speech. But there is still the possibility of wounding unintentionally and unconsciously, on account of want of sensitiveness. As we go further and raise our consciousness to a higher level we shall more and more understand how things strike others. Those who have been practising meditation for many years will notice that they have become more sensitive, have made a certain amount of progress towards unity, and therefore they understand the people about them just a little better than those who have not made such an effort. We hear someone make what we think an unfortunate remark, in all good faith and without noticing that there is anything wrong with it and that they have wounded somebody. We who have sharpened our senses just a little by thought and study and the endeavour to live the higher life feel instinctively how the third person will take that remark. We can see that it is an unfortunate one, and wish it had been put in some other form.

A Master could not possibly say anything that would hurt another. He might find it necessary to give

35

something in the nature of a rebuke; but he would manage to put it in such a way that the man would not be wounded by what he said. Sometimes a disciple finds it in the line of his duty to act sternly, and he is tempted, through his own feeling of sympathy, to avoid the task. But if the Higher Self asserts its dominance he will, if it is absolutely necessary, speak sternly, but also calmly and judicially, and without indignation.

Before the soul can stand in the presence of the Masters its feet must be washed in the blood of the heart.

A.B.—This sentence has behind it a very long occult tradition, which has been given out to the world in many ways. It has to do with the teaching of sacrifice, which still appears in different religions in various forms, though they have generally lost its true meaning. The expression used here is connected with what is sometimes called the blood-sacrifice and the blood-covenant, of which the strangest traces are to be found among the tribes which are descended from very ancient races.

In looking up past lives we came across an incident which may be told to illustrate the idea behind the blood-sacrifice and covenant. Very long ago he who is now the Master Morya was a great king; he had an only son who was H.P.B., who as a boy was placed in charge of the captain of the guard, who was Colonel Olcott. One day, when the boy was alone with the captain, some conspirators who had plotted to slay him rushed in and would have killed him, but the captain threw himself in

36

between and saved the boy at the cost of his own life. The youth was only stunned, but the captain lay upon him dying, and as the blood poured from his death-wound he touched it with his finger art placed it on the feet of the king. The king asked: " What can I do for you who have given your life for me and my son ? " The dying captain replied: " Grant that your son and I may serve you in other lives for ever." Then the monarch said: " For the blood which has been shed for me and mine, the bond between us shall never be broken." In the course of time the king became a Master, and the bond between them remained and ripened into that between Master and disciple, and it will remain for ever unbroken. In sacrificing the life of the body the captain made a tie which gave him the true life which the disciple gains from the Master.

I mention the story because it illustrates a great truth; just in proportion as we are strong enough to sacrifice whatever to us is the life, to pour out the life-blood of the lower at the feet of the higher, is the life really gained, not lost. All evolution of young humanity is made by the voluntary sacrifice of the lower life to the higher; when that sacrifice is completely made, it is found that life instead of being lost is made immortal. The outer sign of the sacrifice helped persons to understand the principle more readily, and drew attention to the fundamental truth that it is only when the lower life is sacrificed to the higher that it finds its own true fulfillment of evolution. On that truth the sacrifices which are found in many religions were originally based; that

37

is how what is called the blood-bond is really made. The lower life is sacrificed for the higher life, and the higher accepts the lower and lifts it up by the bond that is never broken.

The disciple must wash his feet in the blood of the heart. He must make a complete offering of everything that he loves and values, of what seems to him his very life; but he loses this only to find his higher life. It is not usually an actual shedding of blood that is required, though that does become necessary sometimes; it is symbolically the shedding of blood always so far as the pupil is concerned at the time, because he feels the loss. He does literally sacrifice what to him amounts to life, and it looks as though he were giving it up completely, without any future possibility of regaining it. The great testing of the completeness of the disciple's sacrifice is made in order to discover whether the soul is strong enough to throw itself voluntarily into nothingness, to draw out the heart's blood completely, without any hope of reward. If the disciple is not strong enough to do that he is not ready to stand in the presence of the Master. But if he can completely throw away everything that he knows as his life, then all the testimony of the past and the truth of the law declare that he will find that life again in a life stronger and higher than that which he laid down. It is only when that sacrifice is made that the disciple finds himself in the higher life, standing in the presence of the Masters. Then the degree of his strength is the extent of his power to make the sacrifice without feeling it.

38

C.W.L.—The meaning of this sentence is that the man who wishes to stand in the presence of the Masters must have sacrificed the lower self to the higher. The feet of the soul, the personality on earth, must be washed in the heart's blood of the emotions before the higher life can be gained.

That is a general law of life. The little child takes great pleasure in playing with its toys; soon it grows up into boyhood, and the lower playthings have been outgrown and put aside, in order that proficiency may be gained in the higher kind of sports. When the youth goes to college he will many a time perhaps give up a game in the fresh air, which he would very much prefer, in order to work at his books. At other times he will put aside something he would very much like to read, in order to slave at Greek verbs or other apparently uninteresting and not very useful studies. If he goes into training for a race, or for rowing, he has to sacrifice the enjoyment of good dinners, and live in a frugal and rigid way until the race is over.

On the occult path many pleasures connected with the outer world are seen to be a waste of time. There may be cases when it is a real effort to part with them, when there is a call from the higher life, and the aspirant responds to that call at a certain amount of cost to the lower nature. Then he must cast aside the lower in order to have the higher; but later on the attraction of the lower will have disappeared entirely. When a man once fully realizes the higher, the lower simply ceases to exist for him, but in many cases he has to cast aside

39

the lower before he really enters into the glory and the joy and the beauty of the spiritual life.

I have known many whose opportunities were good but who shrank back just at that point, and failed because they were not ready to give up all that they had previously enjoyed, and apparently receive nothing in return for it. Sometimes a man is afraid to let go of one thing until he can grasp the other, and so he holds fast to the lower; but it does not satisfy him, because he has glimpsed the higher. To give up everything at the Master's call—one wonders whether one could do it; one always thought and hoped that one would, but when it comes to the point can you do it fully and cheerfully ? Many have worked for years and years, and wonder why they do not attain, why they are not among those whom the Master is able to draw very close to himself. The reason is always the same; it is the personality in some form that keeps them back. This giving up of everything is not a thing to be done with constant backsliding —giving up one day, and grasping and trying to keep the next—nor is it to be done with pride, with the pose: " I have given up everything." That is quite the wrong attitude; it should be done as a matter of course, and cheerfully. The person who is going to succeed will feel that there is nothing else for him to do but to make the great renunciation when the moment comes.

CHAPTER 3 THE FIRST RULE

Kill out. . . .

A.B.—The expression " kill out" appears at the beginning of the first six short rules. It is important not to misunderstand it. There are two ways of getting rid of or killing out an evil thought, an evil habit or an evil act. Let us consider the thought first, because when that has been removed the other two very easily follow. Suppose an evil thought comes into a man's mind. He finds that it tends to repeat itself. Then his first inclination is generally to fight with it to throw his energy against it and violently turn it out, just as he would deal with a physical enemy. He wants to get it out of the mind, so he takes it by the shoulders and flings it out.

That is not the best way. It ignores the great law, which works throughout nature, that action and reaction are equal and opposite. Take a ball and throw it against a wall; it will rebound and strike you, gently if you have thrown it gently, but with great force if you have flung it violently. The same principle is true everywhere. Suppose you turn a thought out of the mind

                                41

with violence; there will be a decided reaction. The recoil will give you a definite sense of exhaustion, and the thought may come back to you with increased force. The strength that you have put out has then taken form as thought, and has come back to you again, and you have to repeat the struggle. In that way a man may in some cases fight for weeks and months and even years, and yet be none the better for it. Still, in time it is possible to kill out evil thought by this means, though with it you will also kill out a large amount of your own force and energy, of your thought-power, so that a certain hardness and lack of responsiveness of some area of the mental body will be the result of the struggle.

The other way of killing it out is to substitute for the bad thought a good thought of exactly opposite nature. You first deliberately study the matter and decide what is the opposite, the exact antithesis, of the evil thought. You formulate the new thought quietly in your mind, and then, at the very moment when the evil thought comes into your mind, you substitute for it the opposite good thought. Thus for pride you might substitute kindness, for anger affection, for fear admiration, and for low material desires thoughts of purity, dignity, honour, and the like; or you might dwell with devotional thought upon the mental image of the Master as having the good quality, and forget yourself in thinking of him.

The human mind cannot concentrate on two separate things at once; so when you give your attention to the good thought the result is that the evil thought is

42

expelled without your directing any force towards it. Thus no mental energy is wasted, no vitality is lost. The good thought soon gains strength, and the mind becomes impervious to the attacks of the bad thought, and irresponsive to its kind; so you have practically killed out the evil by intensifying and vitalizing the opposite good. It is as if we sucked the life out of the bad thought, and left it a mere shell. Bad thoughts are most effectively killed by such devitalization.

We have thus two ways of killing out; the former on the line of death, the latter on that of growth. One is the plan which is chiefly used by those who are beginning to tread the left-hand path, who are turning against the way of the divine Will. The other is that of evolution in accordance with the divine Plan. We are free to choose which we will follow of these two great roads. All the things of the world are in evolution, moving on one or the other of these paths.

Those parts of the world in which Ishvara is developing His Image have a certain free will, which consists in their being able to work with the divine Will or away from it as separate individuals. Those who work with Him ultimately tread the right-hand path, but those who deliberately choose the separated self are preparing themselves to tread the left-hand path. Speaking generally: all that leads to isolation tends to turn a man's direction to the left, and all that tends to unity towards the right. People of the left-hand path kill out sympathy, affection and love, because they find that those qualities bring misery, and also stand in the way of their gaining

43

power. The killing out process is generally taken therefore by those who want to gain power and the other things that they consider desirable in this life, for the firm establishment and the enjoyment of the separated self, careless of the good of the whole, entirely bent upon their own individual progress and gain. They will kill violently all that side of their own nature the response to which would be an obstacle in the path of power. They will kill out affection also, because it is an avenue of pain, and it is far easier to become indifferent by killing out affection than by becoming more and more sensitive.

But the way we have been taught is that of union, the path in which the disciple becomes responsive to every cry of pain, as was so emphatically taught in The Voice of the Silence.1 The disciple must intensify his life, not minimize it; he must submit to the law, not fight against it. Then of course the law will be with him. His method is something like that art of wrestling which is taught in Japan, in which conquest is gained by yielding to one's antagonist; the man constantly yields to his opponent, but at the critical moment he turns in such a way that the force of his antagonist tells against himself. This is the nature of the yoga of the right-hand path; of it Shri Krishna says in the Gita: " In this there is no loss of effort, nor is there transgression." 2

C.W.L.—Many people, when they are told to kill out a desire, start making what may be described as a violent raid upon it. They want to kill out a certain

1 Ante., Vol. II, pp. 137-45. 2 Op. cit., 11, 40.

44

evil quality, so they set themselves very strongly, angrily almost, against that quality. One result of this is that one stirs up whatever forces exist, inside and outside, which are tending in the opposite direction, into the most violent opposition possible, and the consequence is a serious struggle. If a man is sufficiently determined he will come out conqueror in the end, but in many cases he will waste a large amount of his own force and energy and thought-power, and leave himself much exhausted and depleted.

I can testify that the method of substitution works very much better, for I have tried both. It is a sort of moral ju jutsu whereby you employ the force of the hostile power to help you. You do not so much attack the foe as concentrate all your attention on the opposite virtue. If for example, a man is inclined to be readily upset and disturbed, he should not fight hard against that, but instead should think constantly of calmness, of peace and philosophy. Presently that thought will become established by habit, and he will find that the old worry and lack of calmness have passed away without his making a desperate fight. If he surrounds himself with thought-forms such as "Do not be irritable," and so on, they are still of the colour of irritability, and they react undesirably on him. But if he thinks strongly, " Be calm, be gentle, be peaceful," he sets up vibrations appropriate to and productive of peace and harmony. We do not want to set one vice to fight another vice, but we want to ignore all these things and work up the opposite virtue; by doing that the effect

45

will be just as good and we shall achieve it with far less trouble.

We say: " Kill out desire," but not, " Kill out emotion." l The higher emotions must be encouraged always, and the stronger they are the better. Especially is this true of love and devotion, which one should deliberately cultivate. When a man feels a great rush of such an emotion as these his aura expands; his astral body becomes perhaps ten times its normal size in the case of the ordinary person, and much more than that when the man really knows how to use his higher vehicles. When the great paroxysm of feeling is over the aura contracts again, but not exactly to what it was before; having been much stretched it remains at least a little larger than before. The first effect of the expansion is a rarefaction of the astral body, but it very speedily draws in more astral matter to fill the larger space, so as to make it up to about its normal density.

The astral body is definitely needed in order that by means of it one may be able to sympathize with people, and also because of its function as a reflector of the buddhic body. In the case of a developed person there is no colour in his astral body except what is mirrored from the higher planes; it only reflects and shows the most delicate tints of colour. 2

There are three ways in which the higher Self is connected with the personality.3 The higher mind is

1 See also ante., Vol. II, pp. 139-40.

* Ante., Vol. Ill, Chap, on The Four Preliminary Statements.

' Ante., Vol. II, p. 333.

46

reflected in the lower. The buddhi or intuition is reflected a stage lower than the mind, in the astral body. There is also the possibility of connection between atma and the physical brain. The last is the most difficult to understand; it shows tremendous power of will, which moves without consideration of the means by which its object is to be achieved. It is the method of the first ray, to which Dr. Besant belongs. She has that great power of deciding that something shall be done, without stopping to consider the methods to be employed until afterwards. We do not know the limits of the human will. It has been said that faith may remove mountains and cast them into the sea. I do not know whether there would be any particular purpose to be served in doing that, if it can be done, but I have certainly seen very wonderful results accomplished by the human will, and I do not know where the limits of that power are set. Incredible things are done, more especially on the higher planes, by the mere action of will. When I had to take up the study of materialization, for example, according to my way of progress I had to learn exactly how it was to be done—a complicated process involving a good deal of knowledge of the different materials to be brought together and how they could best be arranged. But I have known a person, who knew nothing whatever about it, to drive straight in by the tremendous force of will and produce the same result, without gathering together all the complicated things that were necessary, and without in the least knowing how it was done. Such will is one of the divine powers latent in all of us, but in

47

very few does it ever come to the surface and produce such a result without a long course of careful training. I think that for most people the easiest of the three ways of making connection with the higher Self is to bring together the higher and lower minds, by passing from concrete to abstract thought, or from analysis to synthesis. But I have seen cases in which a person has been able to reach the buddhic consciousness without disturbing the relations between the mental and causal bodies at all. When it can be done, I have heard on high authority that this unification of the buddhic and astral bodies is the shortest of all roads to the goal, but the capacity to do it is gained only as the result of much suffering in previous lives. Those for whom that is the line raise themselves by the intensity of their love of devotion into the buddhic vehicle and effect a junction there, before they have developed the lower mind to anything like a level where it can work in with the higher mind, and before they have developed the causal body itself. Of course these two bodies must be developed, they cannot be overlooked; the aspirant will work upon the lower mind from the astral body, developing it and learning whatever has to be learnt, on account of his love and devotion. The pupil loves his Master so intensely that for his sake he will learn what is needed, and will thus develop whatever intellect is necessary. He also acts upon the causal body from above, and pours into it the buddhic conception, and so forces it to express that as far as it can do so in its own way.

48

I.   Kill out ambition.

A.B.—We now turn to the first rule, dealing with ambition in particular. The undeveloped man is strongly held by the attractions of the senses; he desires physical luxury and bodily enjoyment. He does not feel ambition, which is the desire for power, until the mind is highly developed and the intellectual power has grown strong. The note of the intellect is " I ". It causes the man to feel himself separate, and that invariably leads him to wish to exercise power, because that desire is the self-assertion of the individual soul. He feels himself superior to all around him, and that shows as a desire for physical authority. From that comes the temptation to seek and grasp social and political power. In the political and social sphere ambition is the great moving force; for the man who by his intellect has gained influence over his fellow-men, stands out as their leader and this is a position which is incense in the nostrils of the proud and superior man.

Then the man begins to despise outer power over the bodies of men, and there comes into his mind the realization of a subtler form of power, which he now seeks to obtain. He no longer wants to lay down laws with physical authority; he has the subtler longing to dominate and rule the minds of men. That is intellectual ambition—the ambition to be a leader of thought. It is not an ambition which would move anyone who had not a largely developed intellect.

49

Still later, when that desire has been outgrown, ambition reappears in a yet subtler form, when the man passes on into the spiritual life. He thinks of the spiritual progress as made by himself for his own sake, because he wants to grow and understand and progress; the old ambition is really still holding him, and it is more dangerous because it is higher and subtler. That is why in the note to this aphorism the Master makes the remarkable statement that the pure artist, who works for the love of his work, is sometimes more firmly planted on the right road than the occultist who fancies he has removed his interest from self, but who has in reality only enlarged the limits of experience and desire, and transferred his interest to things which concern his larger span of life. The occultist is no longer confined to the ambitions of his present incarnation, yet his ambition may not be dead. He no longer cares to be a law-giver or ruler of mankind, nor even an arbitrator in the thoughts of men; but he desires to be high in the spiritual world. He realizes that he is going to live life after life, and his ambition extends to the whole span of that greater life. He is still longing to be first, to be separate, to be what others are not. Yet that too must be overcome.

When one speaks to those who desire to be part of the universal life, the very first thing that one must tell them is to kill out that which makes for separateness. There would, however, be no gain in putting such an ideal before the ordinary man. He cannot leap at once from the worldly life into a spiritual life in which he is in full

50

activity, but nevertheless doing nothing connected with the personal or the individual self. If you tell an ordinary man of the world to kill out ambition, and if he does it, the effect will not be a desirable one, for he will fall into lethargy and do nothing.

Suppose a man is further on than that, is on the probationary path; how should he read this rule about ambition ? Most wisely by applying the word kill to the lower form of ambition; he should in fact understand it to mean transmute. He should get rid of ambition for the things of the world, but put before himself something higher for which he can be ambitious. That would be the desire for spiritual knowledge and growth. At this stage a man does not get rid of ambition totally; he enters an intermediate state, and will make great progress if he puts before himself as his goal the attainment of spiritual knowledge and the object of finding the Master and ultimately becoming a Master himself. Really these are all ambitions, but they will help him to shake off many of the lower shackles which enwrap his personality.

This quality of ambition which the disciple has to kill out had its uses in his earlier evolution. It was a means to make the man's individuality firm and steady. In the earlier stages he grew by his isolation. It was then requisite for the evolution of the physical and mental bodies that there should be competition and fighting; all those stages of combat and fight were necessary in order to build up the individual, to make him strong so that he could hold his own centre. He had to have a place defended from outside aggression, in which he could

51

develop his strength. He also needed such worldly position as ambition seeks, just as when you are building a house you need scaffolding. Ambition had many uses in the earlier stages—to build up the walls and make them denser, to strengthen the will, and to help to raise the man step by step. A man in whom ambition predominates also kills out sexual and other lower desires, because they hinder him in his intellectual growth and his search for power, and thus he dominates his lower passions. In the early stage man thus needs ambition as a means of growth.

You would not say to the man of the world: " Kill out ambition," because ambition stimulates him and draws out his faculties. But when as a disciple the man is to grow into the spiritual life, he must get rid of the walls that he built round himself in earlier stages. As after a house is built the scaffolding must be taken away, so the later part of the man's evolution consists in rendering the walls translucent, so that all life may pass through them. Therefore these rules are for disciples, not for the men of the world.

C.VV.L..—Ambition in the undeveloped man shows itself as the desire, let us say, to gain wealth so that he may satisfy his craving for physical luxury and bodily enjoyment. Later on, when he develops intellect, he becomes ambitious for power. Even when a man has transcended the ambition for power and the prizes of this world, and is working selflessly for the benefit of humanity, there still remains very often the ambition to see the result of his work.

52

Many people are devoting their time quite willingly and quite earnestly to doing good work, but they like others to know it, and to say what good and useful people they are. That also is ambition; mild certainly as compared to some other kinds, but still it is personal, and anything that is personal stands in the way of the disciple. The lower self has to be eliminated entirely. It is hard to do it because the roots are very deep, and when they are torn out the man is left bleeding, and feeling as though all the heart were gone out of him.

When we have got rid of the desire to see the result of our work, we still have the desire for recognition in a higher form. We still, perhaps, are ambitious for love; we want to be popular. It is well and good for a man to be popular, to draw the love of his fellows, because that very fact is an additional power in his hands. It enables him to do more than he otherwise could, also it surrounds him with a pleasant atmosphere which makes all sorts of work easier. But to desire that in the sense of being ambitious for it is also a thing which we must avoid. We may rightly be happy if love comes our way; that is well and good—it is good karma; but if it does not, we must not be ambitious for it. We cannot seize upon a person and say: " You shall love me, you shall appreciate me." If his feelings run that way he will; if not he cannot, and to pretend would be worse than all.

We have to rise above all these stages of ambition which are still found in the ordinary world. We must give for the joy of giving, whether it be work, or substance, or love or devotion; whatever it is we must give

53

freely and heartily, and never think of any return; that is the only real love, not the sort of love which is always saying: " How much does so-and-so love me? " The real attitude should be: " What can I do to pour myself out at the feet of the one whom I love ? Of what service can I be? What can I do for him? " That is the only feeling that is worthy of so grand a title. All that we know perfectly well, but we must put it into practice. It seems to be difficult, sometimes, to do that, because there is still a remnant of the lower self to be removed.

For the ordinary man—may be even for the one who is approaching the Path—I think it would perhaps be well to qualify this rule to some extent, and say: " Kill out the lower ambitions." It is not advisable to set before the man, who is just beginning, a standard of conduct which he can only hope to reach after many years of effort. If a man has worldly ambitions he cannot be expected at once to drop them all and have nothing to fill their place; that would be scarcely possible for him, and it is even doubtful whether so sudden a change would be good for him. He must first transmute his ambitions. Let him, if he will, at first desire knowledge earnestly, desire to make advance in occultism and progress in unselfishness; let him desire to draw near to the Master, to be chosen as a pupil.

Most of us have desires of that sort, but we call them aspirations; the change of name seems to connote a total change in our attitude, but of course they are still desires. We shall reach a stage when even those desires will

54

disappear, because we shall be 'absolutely certain that progress depends on our own efforts only; then we shall no longer desire anything. The Master once said: " Do not desire a thing; desire is feeble. Witt! " l Do not think of some quality you want to develop: " I should like to have it," but say: " I will have it," and go and develop it. That is the only line for a man to take, because these things are absolutely in his own hands to do or not, as he chooses.

It is a case of transmuting at first. The desire for spiritual growth is a thing that those who are approaching the Path should no longer be encouraging in themselves, but there is that intermediate stage when it is very natural. We who are students ought to be getting to a stage at which we take our spiritual growth for granted, and fix all our energies on trying to help others. At first a man does need a personal motive; then he gradually comes to forget himself and to make his advancement for the sake of the Master, for the sake of pleasing him, and eventually he learns that he is simply a channel for the great divine forces, and that he must be a good channel and must have no anxiety whatever about the result. His one care then is that nothing on his part shall hinder his being an expression of the Divine—as perfect an expression as is possible for him. He does not worry in the least about it; he does not desire that his force may be used in this direction or that; he is simply a tool in the hands of God, that he

may be used as and how and where God wills. 1 Vol. I, Part V, Ch. 1: Liberation, Nirvana and Moksha.

55

Of course, we can attain that attitude only by degrees; but we should set it before ourselves as the state of mind at which we should aim. We must begin by forgetting ourselves, by rigorously weeding the self out. What if we are not gaining the advancement which we think to be due to us after so many years of thought and study, or what if the people whom we help are not grateful for being helped—generally they are not—all that does not matter.1 Let us forget ourselves and do the work and let us be entirely indifferent as to any return. Karma will look after that; we need have no fear. The great laws of the universe are not going to be altered in order to do an injustice to any one of us, we may be quite sure. They will work with equal balance; justly they work, even though it be after many days. Forget yourself; that is the first and the last word of advice on the occult Path—-there is no other way. However hard it may seem it has to be done, and has to be done perfectly.

We come now to the first note of the Master Hilarion, which is attached to the first rule. I will take it bit by bit. It begins:

Ambition is the first curse; the great tempter of the man who is rising above his fellows. It is the simplest form of looking for reward.

That is rather a curious way of putting it, but it is obviously true. The first temptation that comes to a man who knows he is rising a little above the rest in some way is to think of himself as a great man, and this

1 Vol. I, Part III, Ch. 2: The One Good Desire.

56

leads him to resolve that he will rise still further, so that he may enjoy the pleasure of his pride even more.

Men of intelligence and power are led away from their higher possibilities by it continually.

How true that is no one can know who is not clairvoyant. Those who are pupils of the Masters necessarily, I suppose, have the habit of regarding all the people they meet more or less from the point of view of their possible discipleship. One sees a man who is in some ways obviously a good man; the first thought that comes into one's mind about him is: " How near is he to the point when he can become a pupil of the Master?" To us it is the greatest reward, the most precious piece of advancement that can come to any man, that he should reach the stage where he is worth taking in hand by one of these Great Ones, so that his future evolution may be assured. Attainment is after that merely a matter of time and, of course, of perseverance and much hard work.

Though it is quite true that for every human being progress is merely a question of time, for many human beings it is clearly a matter of so very much time that they may be taken en bloc, so to speak, dealt with in the mass; but the moment that a man conies near to the stage when conceivably a Master might take him in hand, he also becomes an object of very keen interest to the pupils of the Master, and their desire is always to try to help him to the point where definite contact may become possible. It should always be remembered that

57

it is merely a question of the man's deserts in the matter; there is no favouritism of any kind. The moment it is worth the Master's while to expend as much energy as would be required to teach that man he will do so, but it is only worth his while when he will be able to do more work through the man than lie himself could do with the same energy devoted to other work.

We meet a large number of people who seem as though they were not far from that point. They are so good in one way or another, and some are so hopeful all round, that it seems to us that surely with a very little more of the right direction of their energies they would be fit for discipleship—and then we are disappointed to find that it all comes to nothing and they spend their lives in the ordinary way. Most especially I have noticed that with boys and girls, among whom it has always been my lot to have to look for hopeful cases. There are many young people who are quite near the point where, if their energies were just turned in the right direction, they would make very good subjects indeed for such progress, and yet they fail to grasp the opportunity. They get drawn into the competition of ordinary school life, and are swept into a world of lower thought. It is not bad thought, I do not mean that—though that may happen sometimes—but they are swept into a sort of whirlpool of comparatively worldly thought. The goal put before them is generally that of success in some material way—to become great engineers or great lawyers, or to succeed at the head of some mercantile house.

58

Not only is a worldly career expected of them by their parents, but the general trend of public opinion also influences them in that direction, and it is very hard to escape from the effect of public opinion. It is pressing upon us all the time in all directions, and so it conies about that these young people, who seem so nearly ready for the higher thing, seldom reach it. Instead they take up a very estimable and useful career, but it is just not that higher thing. I have followed up some cases that seemed to me specially likely, and I have found that the same thing has sometimes occurred to egos for a number of incarnations. For a dozen or twenty incarnations they have been very nearly ready, within measurable distance of taking that great step, but each time they have turned aside from it, and practically always it has been worldly ambition that has led them away from their higher possibilities.1

When the Master Hilarion says that men of intelligence and power are continually led away from their higher possibilities by ambition, I think he must have had cases in mind very similar to those which I have just described, because those to whom the higher possibilities lie open must necessarily be men of intelligence and power, not mere ordinary men. He does not say that ambition ruins their lives, but only that higher possibilities exist for them from which it leads them away. It is surely not bad for a boy that he should wish to be a great engineer, a great lawyer, or a great doctor. These are all fine professions, but there are other things which

1 Vol. I, Part II, Ch. 3: Right and Wrong.

59

are even more useful, and if he could see and choose the more useful line it would surely be better for him. We cannot say that the worldly work is bad, but only that there is better work. When one says better work one is not depreciating any of those professions or their value to the world; one means that most well-educated men with ordinary capacity could take up those duties and make more or less of a success of them, whereas only those who have a history behind them from the occult point of view can take up with success the narrow and difficult path of occult training. Those who follow it can do more good even than the man who wins high distinction along any of those other lines, so when there is a child who wishes to take it up, who obviously would be able to do so, no one should stand in his or her way.

Yet it is a necessary teacher. Its results turn to dust and ashes in the mouth; like death and estrangement it shows the man at last that to work for self is to work for disappointment.

The man who attains that which he has so long and so earnestly desired, often finds later that it is not quite what he hoped it would be. Men who scheme to obtain power and high position find that the power is to a great extent illusory, that it is hampered in all directions, as in the case of Lord Beaconsfield, which I mentioned before. It is possible that he might have done more good by giving all his energy to the pursuit and spread of occultism. His works are not very much read,

60

nowadays,   but  his  occult  knowledge  shows   through them as, for example, in his wonderful tale of Alroyd.

But though this first rule seems so simple and easy, do not quickly pass it by. For these vices of the ordinary man pass through a subtle transformation and reappear with changed aspect in the heart of the disciple.

For the disciple there are special temptations, special difficulties. The ordinary man is proud, perhaps, of certain things he can do. The pupil of the Master knows full well he must not be proud of any advancement that comes to him. Indeed, knowing the Masters, he cannot well be proud, for all sense of pride falls away from any man who really knows them. He may be able to do many things that others cannot do, but yet he is constantly, by the necessity of the case, in the presence of one or of many who can do quite infinitely more than he can. And so pride, to do them justice, is not often found in the pupils of the Masters. Yet the whole thing is very subtle. The pupil, if he is not careful, will find that he is proud of not being proud; proud to find how humble he is in spite of the wonderful things he can do and think and say. Or he may try to elbow himself to the front among those who are serving the Master, because in his pride he thinks that he can do the work best and that his presence at the top is essential. But Madame Blavatsky said in her First Steps in Occultism: " No one can think, ' I am better or more pleasing to

1 Vol. II, p. 292.

61

the Master than my fellow-disciples ' and remain a pupil of the Master." And Dr. Besant once said: " One of the first rules for an occultist is to be as unobtrusive as possible so that his personality will attract the smallest possible attention."

Those who are students of occultism, but not yet pupils, may more easily fall into the error of pride. It is a great difficulty for those who develop psychic powers. They find that they can see so much that others cannot; so much is open to them that is unknown to others, that they begin to feel themselves superior to their fellow-men, and very often that leads to rather disastrous results. When we find psychics who show great pride, I think we may generally take it for granted that they are not as yet trained people, that though they are developing the higher faculties they have not yet come into contact with the Master, because the absence of pride is a sure sign of one who is learning his lesson properly.

It is easy to say: " I will not be ambitious "; it is not so easy to say: "When the Master reads my heart He will find it clean utterly."

That is quite a different thing. We can so easily persuade ourselves that we are not ambitious, that we are never selfish, never irritable. We can persuade ourselves of many things, but the Master sees with the all-seeing eye that discerns the facts and not the gloss and the glamour we throw over them when we look at ourselves.

62

The pure artist who works for the love of his work is sometimes more firmly planted on the right road than the Occultist who fancies he has removed his interest from self, but who has in reality only enlarged the limits of experience and desire, and transferred his interest to the things which concern his larger span of life.

Cynical people might remark that the true artist in that sense is unknown, but that is not so. I have had a great deal to do with artistic circles both in England and in France, and though there is much jealousy and want of generous appreciation among artists in general, yet I also surely have known more than one artist who did live and work for the love of his art and not for gain. Because he so worked, he often threw away many obvious chances of worldly advancement, thinking that to take advantage of them would involve disloyalty to his art. A man who is willing to do that for the sake of his art has already made some progress on the way to getting rid of the lower self. There may be a higher form of selfish ambition at the back of it, but at least he has gone a long way in eradicating the mere lower self when he has lost the ambition for worldly wealth and success.

There is a stage at which the occultist has quite conquered all desires connected with the personality, has risen above all the ordinary ambitions of men, but still has ambition for his separate individuality or ego, and is thinking generally of its progress instead of the good he

63

can do to others. So it may well be that an artist who did altogether sacrifice the thought of self, even though he knew nothing about occultism, might have his feet more firmly planted on the right road than such an occultist.

The same principle applies to the other two seemingly simple rules. Linger over them, and do not let yourself be easily deceived by your own heart.

The Master here refers to Rules 2 and 3, which we shall deal with in the next chapter. These tell us to kill out desire of life and of comfort. He warns us to be cautious with regard to all three, for the mind is extraordinarily, even quite diabolically, clever at making excuses for us, at finding all kinds of reasons for doing what we want to do. We may not think of ourselves as particularly clever or intellectual, but if we look back over the excuses we have invented for doing things we have wanted to do, we usually have to admit that we have shown amazing capacity in the direction.

For now, at the threshold, a mistake can be corrected. But carry it on with you and it will grow and come to fruition, or else you must suffer bitterly in its destruction.

C.W.L.—This is the end of the Master Hilarion's long note to Rule 1. The more a man advances on the path of occult development, the deeper he will bury any fault which has not yet been eradicated. Suppose it be selfishness, the greatest and most common of all faults,

64

because it lies at the root of so many others. He may have got rid of all its outer evidences, and may imagine himself to be entirely free from it, and yet the fault itself may still be unconquered. The further he goes on the Path the more deeply it will be hidden. In the meantime he is gradually raising the strength of the vibrations of his vehicles so that all his qualities, whether bad or good, must be greatly intensified. If there is an evil quality the existence of which may be quite hidden, both from the man himself and his friends, it will be growing stronger and stronger, and inevitably some time it must break through and show itself. Then just because he has made considerable advance it will produce a much more serious disaster than would have been the case at an earlier stage, and he certainly will suffer a good deal in its destruction.

A.B.—The man on the path must do his work thoroughly. On the threshold mistakes can easily be corrected. But unless the disciple gets rid entirely of the desire for power while he is in the early stages of his spiritual apprenticeship, it will become stronger and stronger. If he does not weed it out where it is based in the physical, astral and mental planes, but allows it to take root in the spiritual plane of the ego, he will find it very difficult to eradicate. Ambition thus established in the causal body is carried on from life to life. The physical, astral and mental bodies die, and he gets new ones, but the causal body does not die till the end of the kalpa; so let the pupil beware of permitting spiritual ambition to touch the causal body and build into it

65

clement of separateness  which more and more encase the life.

Work as those work who are ambitious.

A.B.—I have taken this sentence out of its place in the book, where it occurs at the beginning of Rule 4, and brought it in for consideration here, where it specially applies. It is the comment of the Chohan upon Rule 1. In each case we will take the rule and then the comment that the Chohan gave in explanation of it. Put them together, and you get the sense. Thus you read: "1. Kill out ambition, but work as those work who are ambitious. 2. Kill out desire of life, but respect life as those who desire it. 3. Kill out desire of comfort, but be happy as those who live for happiness."

Desire for power, life and happiness forms the motive power of the world. These are the prizes that Ishvara holds out before all beings, and the result is the evolution goes on. All the struggles that a man makes for these things bring out his qualities and cause him to evolve. Suppose the whole of this is suddenly removed —a man loses all ambition, all desire for life and for happiness. That represents a stage through which men pass before the longing for the spiritual life awakens fully in them. It is called vairagya, and is the result of satiety.1 The man has enjoyed power and has found that it does not bring happiness; he has worked for it and grasped it, but has found that the effect of it on the inner

'Vol.  I,  Part  I,   Ch.   7:   The Four   Qualifications.     Part  III, Ch. 1: The Removal of Desire.    Vol. II, pp. 56, 264-5, 314, 324.

66

ego is only disappointment. It is not what he expected, and it does not bring satisfaction. Take the case, for example, of the late Emperor of Russia, who stood at the summit of human power, was thoroughly tired of it, and heartily wished himself free of it. It is not an uncommon thing in history that a man who wields absolute power gets a fit of vairagya and abdicates his position.

The result of that is a collapse, a lessening of all the motives that had animated him up to that point. Then the man droops down, and says: "Why should I exert myself any more? I do not want power; why then should I work ? I do not want life; why then should I continue to live? I do not want comfort; it gives me no satisfaction; why then should I do anything to gain it? "

The question for us is: How may such a man be stimulated into renewed activity so that he may continue to grow and may finish his evolution; how may he be aroused from his state of collapse ? Only by attracting into activity the divine life in him, that lives by giving, not by taking. He is now at the critical point in his career. If he is still to cling to the separated self his future lives will be full of weariness and disgust. Is it possible to awaken in him the desire of the true life, which consists in pouring oneself out in service, not in indrawing into selfish idleness ?

In his present state the man is a worthless creature in the world, useless to himself and everybody else. Before he reached this condition he was a force that helped the general evolution of the world, because he was affected by those things which attract normal men and enable

67

them to evolve. Into this condition of perfect collapse and uselessness into which he has been plunged by the loss of ordinary lower motives, there comes a special appeal—an appeal which meets him on the three points where he had lost his motive.

It is to the man in this condition that the command comes: " Work as those work who are ambitious." That is joined to the first teaching: " Kill out ambition," that taken alone would lead to lethargy. The separated self being killed, the man has now no motive for work, so the cry comes: " Work as those work who are ambitious." Then comes the second command: "Respect life as those do who desire it," and the third: " Be happy as those who live for happiness." These are the three new commands that are to begin the new life, the three new motives that replace the three old ones. The man is lying there as dead. The life of the form is dead. Now he has to waken up the life of the consciousness; that will be done by these three appeals. He has to begin to work again, but now it must be the spiritual man who lives and works, while the personality acts like a machine. He has to live more than ever he did before, though the desires for life, happiness and power have all been extinguished. This is the answer to his question: "Why should I work? "

If a man does not find the answer, he will remain in the dead condition and will grow no further. It is the point known to students of mechanics as a dead point, the point of equilibrium, in which there is no force to push him on; the higher forces have counterbalanced

68

the lower ones and destroyed his former selfishness and ambition, but are not yet strong enough in him to send him forth full of energy and purpose in their cause. That equilibrium is not the object of evolution. What new motives can be put before the man so as to arouse him from this state and make him active? There is only one which can stir the soul from within—his identifying himself with the life of Ishvara in the world, and acting as a part of that life instead of with the desire for the fruit of action.

There is no better commentary on this sentence than that which you will find in the third discourse of the Bhagavad-Gita, where reasons are given why a man should work after he has lost the common motives, the desire for the fruits of action:

But the man who rejoiceth in the Self, with the Self is satisfied, and is content in the Self, for him verily there is nothing to do;

For him there is no interest in things done in this world, nor any in things not done, nor doth any object of his depend on any being.

Therefore, without attachment, constantly perform action which is duty, for, by performing action without attachment, man verily reacheth the Supreme.

Janaka and others indeed attained to perfection by action: then having an eye to the welfare of the world also, thou shouldst perform action.1

That which is described here is a still higher stage than that of the man of whom we are now thinking. We have been considering only the beginning of that Path which leads to this full realization of the Self. But the motive which is given here applies to him; he has

1 Op. cit., iii, 17-20.

69

realized the emptiness of the non-self, and is in a position to respond to the appeal of the one Self. He is prepared to work with the motive of benefit to the world. Such a man may now think of trying to gain spiritual knowledge not in order that he himself may thereby become wise and great, but because it will help the world; he is gradually making that his object—something outside his own individual self.

Finally he will drop that motive of lofty desire also, and only wish that he may be an organ of the higher, and may do that which Ishvara wishes. Then he will learn that he is not even to desire spiritual knowledge, nor even to become a Master, but simply to become an instrument for the higher Life. Thus being active as they who are ambitious, but with the motive of being a channel for the higher Life, the man will get rid of the last vestiges of ambition. His energy is now merged in the Will of the Logos; that becomes the motive for his working.

In the verses of the Gita quoted above Shri Krishna explains how a man should work in order to reach the Supreme, to realize the presence and power of the Divine. Then he goes on to show that such attainment and realization lead to fuller activity than any ever known before. He explains that it is the active work of Ishvara that sustains everything:

There is nothing in the three worlds, O Partha, that should be done by Me, nor anything unattained that might be attained; yet I mingle in action.

For if I mingled not ever in action unwearied, men all around would follow My path, O son of Pritha.

70               

These worlds would fall into ruin, if I did not perform action.1

He works for the welfare of the world, for the turning of the wheel of the universe, and the sole motive of His activity is that the world may grow and develop till the cycle is completed.

Shri Krishna then goes on to show the reasons for which a man should work—for the benefit and maintenance of the world and of mankind. No longer identifying himself with the separated forms, he has to identify himself with the one Life which is carrying on separated lives in order to bring them to perfection. Thus identifying himself with the one Life he should work entirely for the welfare and maintenance of his fellows and of the whole world—that everything moving and unmoving may reach its appointed end, may become that which is in the thought of Ishvara, although in manifested life they have not reached that point. The whole universe of Ishvara exists perfect in His thought, and gradually in many stages He works that thought out in matter. Those who realize this as part of His life must work as He works for the complete manifestation of that thought, that is, in order to turn the wheel of life till the turning is complete.

It does not follow necessarily that the man who has this true and spiritual motive believes in God or thinks about Him. But in any case he feels and responds to the divine Life in the world, and serves it with utter devotion. Such, for example, was the case with my old friend Charles Bradlaugh, who did not believe in God as

1 Ibid., iii, 22-24.

71

understood in his time, but was nevertheless always ready to face suffering and danger, to lay his own body in the ditch if it could thus be useful as a bridge over which others might walk to a higher life.

Yet those who have thus felt the Will of Ishvara so that it has become their motive in life must not unsettle the minds of others who are not yet able to feel this and are acting from desire. Shri Krishna goes on to say:

As the ignorant act from attachment to action, O Bharata, so should the wise act without attachment, desiring the welfare of the world.

Let no wise man unsettle the mind of ignorant people attached to action; but acting in n harmony with Me let him render all action attractive.1

The spiritual man must throw himself into the work of the world and set an example, because the standard which is set up by the wise will be followed by others. A man who is looked up to by the mass of the people sets a standard by which activity will be carried on by the others; if he becomes indifferent to action they will also fall into indifference. Though his indifference may come from a higher motive they do not know that, and it is quite a natural thing for them to mistake his motive. In them indifference would grow out of tamas, and that would prevent their further evolution.

A man might say: " I don't want results here or in swarga. Why then should I try to help other people along the road which leads to those enjoyments; why should I try to make them active on those lines that I deem to be useless, that they may gain what is worthless ?

1 Ibid., iii, 25-26.

72

why should I throw my activity on the side of giving that which is undersirable ? " The answer is perfectly clear. Those fruits of action are absolutely necessary for the mass of the people. Unless they desire these pleasures of the world, these comforts and ambitions, these things which move them to action, their evolution will be stopped. If they do not want enjoyment here, then swarga may be their motive. Somehow they must be encouraged to move, grow, evolve. If you persuade them that these things are useless they will not evolve.

It is therefore important for the evolution of mankind that an example should be set of work done thoroughly and perfectly well. It is never done perfectly well while we are men working from desire. Though in that case the man may show an admirable example of energy and perseverance there will be the taint of selfishness in his work, which will make his example imperfect. He may work with great accuracy, but he is working for himself. He is not really doing his best, because he is not thinking entirely of the work, but partly of a result for himself.

The Lord works perfectly so that the world may go on. We should, then, work in the same spirit. We must work better than the best worldly man, because our motive is that of service of God and man, and not our own gain. We will work for the cause of humanity. We will not run about to find activity for the sake of being active. Many men work thus for the enjoyment of action, because unless they are busy they do not feel alive, but are bored. That condition is one very far removed from the man who is content in the Self. He

73

is never bored, never searching for an outlet in activity. He works because it is his duty, and has no desire for activity when there is no duty. Thus he realizes inaction in action. In the fourth discourse of the Gita, Shri. Krishna remarks on action, wrong action and inaction:

" What is action, what inaction? " Even the wise are herein perplexed. Therefore I will declare to thee the action by knowing which thou shalt be loosed from evil.

It is needful to discriminate action, to discriminate unlawful action, and to discriminate inaction; mysterious, is the path of action.

He who seeth inaction in action, and action in inaction, he is wise among men, he is harmonious even while performing all action.1

Even the wise people are confused, it is said, as to the limits of each of these things. The right action is duty, that in which the man is expressing the life of Ishvara in his own place. In that he is to be a channel or agency, working with the knowledge, accuracy and completeness that the man who is not ambitious shows. If you take his work and put it beside that of the man who is ambitious you will see that it is equally well, nay, even better done, because it is done with absolute self-surrender and perfect balance.

If you find a man who is not working in that way, having lost desire for the fruit of action, but who is doing less than he ought to do, is working with less energy, less interest and less punctuality because he has no longer personal motives, then you see one who has not learned the duty of action before he took to inaction. It was said to me regarding certain people: " These men are

1 Ibid., iv, 16-18.

74

beginning inaction before they have done action—by intellectual recognition of the worthlessness of the fruit of action before they have reached the point where they could work unselfishly. They are neither good men of the world, as they have stopped doing that, nor are they spiritual men throwing their energy into the evolution of mankind."

There are two lives which a man may live who has reached the condition where the fruit of action does not affect him. He may retire to the jungle to live in seclusion or he may be busy amid the affairs of men.1 If he is sufficiently evolved to work energetically in the mental or in the spiritual plane, that life of physical inaction may be the best; that man is helping the world much more than he could do amid the bustle of the world. Yet such a man will often be sent back by his Master to lead his last life in the world. He will then live a life untainted by action, will show in the world the example of true action, will lead a life of perfect activity with all the energy that the most ambitious man can show.

When a man is living the spiritual life in the world it is not possible usually to tell by external means whether he is moved by desire or by duty. But there is one test which never fails by which one may always judge one's own motive. How are you affected when the fruit of action is before you ? If the slightest element of ambition enters into a man's work he will show disappointment if it fails or elation if it succeeds. If there

1 Vol. I, Part V, Ch. 2: Love in Daily Life, Ch. 6: Service.

75

is no suffering for him in his failure, no element of personality has entered into his work; for if he has been working because Ishvara works, for the welfare of mankind, he will know his failure is not the failure of Ishvara, but that the failure is part of His Plan. From the standpoint of Ishvara failure is impossible, and often in human life failure is quite as necessary for ultimate success as success is necessary for ultimate success. His people may be sent sometimes to play the part of the failure so as to become stronger, to realize that where there is failure there is also success.

Whether a man is really working as part of His Life will be shown by his perfect contentment whether he succeeds or fails. If that contentment is perfect, without a shadow of dissatisfaction, he has been working absolutely for the maintenance of mankind; then the work does not bind him and he has solved the problem of inaction in the midst of action. He has learned the use of the vehicles and the gunas, without identifying himself with them. In ordinary cases the gunas work the man, but the man on the Path works the gunas. Most men are carried about by the energies of nature; they work as those energies are active. But the man on the Path takes those energies as instruments of labour and, standing behind them, utilizes them. The ambitious man is driven by the gunas when he thinks that he is working, but the man who has transcended them is directing them along the road of evolution traced by Ishvara, and does not identify himself with them. This is thus taught in the Gita.

76

Having abandoned attachment to the fruit of action, always content, nowhere seeking refuge, he is not doing anything, although doing action.

Hoping for naught, his mind and self controlled, having abandoned all greed, performing action by the body alone, he doth not commit sin.

Content with whatsoever he obtaineth without effort, free from the pairs of opposites without envy, balanced in success and failure, though acting he is not bound.

Of one with attachment dead, harmonious, with his thoughts established in wisdom, his works sacrifices, all action melts away.1

So the man who finds himself at the point of balance, of indifference, must discover some means to increase the higher influences within himself, so that these may spur him into this life of spiritual action. He must use meditation; he must try to utilize whatever emotion he may possess; he must deliberately take every opportunity of service. He must move even without the desire to move, and even against the desire not to move. He must move. If he can find anyone for whom he has reverence, whose example inspires him to activity, that will be a great help to his getting over this transitional stage, where otherwise he might drop out of evolution for the time being. If the desire to please someone whom he admires should arise in his mind, he may use that to urge himself on until he is in a position to feel the impelling force of Ishvara's Life, and thus use the emotion to carry him over and out of his condition of collapse.

C.W.L.—Having put aside ambition for himself the man is then told to work as those work who arc

1 Op. cit., iv, 20-23.

77

ambitious. There are usually three stages through which men pass. There is, first of all, the work for worldly result. Then comes the stage when the man begins to work, still for a result, but for a heavenly result. That is put very much before us by the different churches. We are to give up this world to live for ever in heaven; we shall stand nearest to God's throne, and so on. Most people pass through these stages of working first for the worldly result and then for the heavenly result. Some of them somewhat improve upon that second idea, because they work in order to please their Deity. Many Christians, for example, work for the love of Jesus, and that is admirable because it is unselfish; it is a higher stage than to work for a personal result, even though it be a heavenly one.

There is still a higher stage, that of doing the work for the work's sake, but most people do not understand that yet. Many artists do; there are artists who work for the sake of art in whatever their line may be. As one great poet said: " I do but sing because I must." He meant that he must express that which came through him as a message to the world. Another, feeling the same thing, said that he valued his poems not because they were his own, but because they were not. So there are some who work for the sake of art—not for themselves or for their own renown, not to please other people, not even to please God as that idea would be commonly understood, but because they feel the message coming through them and they must give it. That is a high stage to have attained.

78               

Then there is the highest stage of all, when a man works because he is part of the Deity and as part of Him he desires the fulfillment of the divine Plan. People sometimes delude themselves and think they are working for that when they have still a considerable flavour of the lower ideas about them. We can always test ourselves with regard to that—best, perhaps, when we happen to fail, which occurs at times to all of us. As our Dr. Besant has often explained, if we are. really working definitely and knowingly as part of the Deity, as part of the whole, we are not in the least disturbed by any failure that comes to us, because we know that God cannot fail. If for the time being a certain activity appears to be a failure, that is in the scheme and so is a necessary thing, and therefore is not really a failure. Nothing can be a failure from His point of view, so we are not in the least distressed. The only question would be as to whether it was our fault; but if we have done our best and the thing is still a failure, we know that all is well.

Such considerations as these must not, however, cause us to become negligent or indifferent to time. It is part of our work to convert others from the doctrine of inertia to the path of service, and even one such gain means that some distinct advantage has been achieved for the world. Whatever is best certainly, but only when we have done our best. If there is anybody who has failed to do his best in his share of that work, then whatever is is not best, because it might have been better. It is only when we have done absolutely all,

79

that we have the right to take refuge in that. " Well, I have done everything I can. If after all I am not successful, I bow to a higher power than mine." I am very sure that that which has been done is after all not lost, and whatever happens to all these people in the end is really what is best for them.

It may be only an illusion but it is a very powerful one—that high philosophical view that whether you get anything now or in a million years does not matter. I feel it matters to me; therefore I think it must matter to other people, and if we could get them to take the earlier opportunity of advancing, we should be doing a very great thing for them. What difference it makes in the long run to the Logos in whom all this is moving, I cannot tell, but it is very likely His wish that we should evolve and if He wishes that to be done, then also He must wish that it should be done as soon as may be. We are clearly carrying out His will if we try to press onward along the Path which leads to full unity with Him, and if we help others along that Path, so I cannot see that it is all the same whether people enter the stream in this world period, or this chain period, or wait till the next. I shall do all I can to help people to enter it in this one.

Perhaps another test would be as to whether we are willing to take any work that is His work—whether we are willing to help high and low alike. To Him there is neither high nor low in the matter of progress, though some part of His scheme may be at a higher and another part at a lower point in that progress. It is

80

very much like the turning of a wheel; some part of it is approaching the top as it turns, but all of it alike is moving along as the wheel turns. Our work is to help the whole forward, to push any part of the wheel. The life at all levels is the divine life; it is more unfolded at some stages than at others—more unfolded in the human than in the animal, in the animal than in the vegetable, in the vegetable than in the mineral—but the life is the divine life everywhere, and if we are helping forward any part of that we are helping the divine plan. That which is higher or lower is the form in which the life is cast; the form permits of greater or lesser unfoldment, but the life is one life. That certainly must be part of His point of view, which is very different from our outlook—the idea that all life is in reality the same; there is no high nor low from that point of view, because the whole is moving together. That does not alter the fact that there may be some in whom the life is more unfolded, who are capable of giving greater assistance, and others who may be capable only of a lower grade of assistance; the point is that those who find that what they can do best would commonly be called lower work should not be in the least disheartened, because they also are pushing the same wheel—they are helping the unfoldment of the same divine life.

CHAPTER 4 RULES 2 TO 4

2.   Kill out desire of life.

Respect life as those do who desire it.

A.B.—We have already to some extent considered this aphorism and the next. The same general principles that apply to the killing out of ambition yet the working as those do who are ambitious apply to these two aphorisms also. The disciple must get rid of the desire for personal life—everything which energizes the personal self and responds to the gratification of his personal desire. He must no longer rejoice in the mere pleasure of expanding his own life by taking into it more and more of the outside things.

All over the world men are to be seen in eager search for a fuller life; they grasp it with many varieties of greed, struggling and fighting for more and more of everything that appeals to their hot and untutored imaginations, and thereby bringing about great quantities of personal and social trouble. But the disciple must get rid of that desire to increase and expand his own individual and separate life. He must enter into the higher life, and have only the desire to be wherever

82

in the universe he is wanted at any time as an expression of the one life. There are many things to do in this universe. When all desire for separate individual life has been transcended, and all personal preferences are gone, the need of the time guides the choice of the spiritual man. Wherever help is wanted is the place of work for such a liberated soul; he cares only to be an instrument, wherever the instrument may be wanted. His life is to him only useful and valuable as it is part of the Universal Life.

The man who has lost his desire of life arrives at a point of danger—he may regard life as worthless for all, because the things that it offers are worthless to him. He may take up an attitude of contempt towards the world and his fellow-men. He may look down upon and despise them as foolish people, may speak of them contemptuously, and consider their motives paltry. That attitude towards them is very natural, but it is full of danger, and fundamentally evil. It shows that he has not realized the Self, though he may have realized the non-self as such. If he looks down upon any life, however undeveloped, he forgets that that manifestation is a part of Ishvara, and to him therefore the message is necessary and urgent: " Respect life as those who desire it."

If he asks why he ought to look upon it with respect, the answer is: because it is divine. It is a stage in which Ishvara is working, a stage which to Ishvara is quite as important as the higher stage in which he now is. When we speak of high and low we speak from the standpoint of evolution and time—the succession of

83

changes which make up time. That is not the way in which Ishvara regards His world; to Him there is nothing great nor small, hateful nor dear. Everything is at a stage on a road on which all are traveling to the same goal; the lowly is just as necessary for the scheme of evolution as the form we usually call higher. So the disciple must not fall into the blunder of despising and disregarding any life, because, it is in what we call a low stage of evolution. Each thing in its place is right and good. The recognition of that fundamental truth means that a man must love his fellow-men, must learn to care for them as part of the Universal Life in evolution.

Granted that a man in a low stage is foolish, sensual, idle, exceedingly unattractive; his lack of attraction lies in the form, not in the Life. We are blinded by the form. Because our looking down upon another, our turning aside from him, is a sign of our superiority, there follows a feeling of superiority, which breeds contempt. But the truth is that the only thing in which we are superior is the evolution of the form. The essence is the same; his possibilities are equal to ours, and looked at from the centre he is as we are. The man who is on the Path tries to see things from the centre as well as from the circumference. He must therefore respect Life, and realize that the Life of Ishvara is the only Life; the form is that in which Ishvara chooses to manifest for a certain time, and if it is good enough for Ishvara it is quite good enough for us.

In the universe there must be form in all stages of growth. No one is higher or lower; all are equal.

84

There is difference when we ourselves are in process of evolution; but no difference when we have outgrown it. When we have given up interest in it and thrown aside all question of form and fruit, then we can respect Life in all its manifestations. The partially evolved man, bound up by the forms, is willing to help those who are comparatively near himself and who can repay his trouble. He will not be inclined to help those who are low down. But the man who helps from the standpoint of Ishvara helps all. His duty is to help them wherever they are. His activity is to be the activity of Ishvara. He helps those who come in his way, whether they be high or low, and he respects the Life in each of them, and helps that where help is required. He does not allow himself to be confused by the fact that the whole of the Life is not present in the man. He knows that the work of Ishvara is carried on so that that life may be brought out, and he works to unfold it into manifestation. He is not led astray by thinking that to be in the Self is everything. He works for manifestation, respecting and loving Life. And so he utterly avoids the danger of contempt, which would otherwise hinder the unfolding of the Life in himself producing a wall of separateness.

There is in this an immense difference between the way in which Life is regarded by an ordinary man and by one who lives in the Eternal. The latter sees the Life in its full possibilities, those possibilities to him being in view now, even though undeveloped; for he lives in the eternal, and when Life is looked at from

85

that standpoint it is seen in the beauty of its fulfillment. Below that state we see it only in a particular stage, in time and not in eternity, and therefore we do not respect it as we ought to do. But the liberated soul who lives in eternity sees it as it is, and although he looks at the stage at a particular time in which it has arrived, he cannot feel repulsion, because he knows that that stage is perfectly normal.

The practical outcome of it is that the higher a man stands the more is he tolerant of all Life, and the greater is his compassion with all, approaching as it is the compassion of the Logos Himself. As a man destroys in himself the desire of Life, that is the desire of the separated self, and yet respects Life as those do who desire it, he begins to acquire that sense of eternity which enables him to respect life in whatever way it may be manifested. For him then any contempt for those who are below him becomes impossible; he recognizes each in its place as an expression of the Perfect Life.

C.W.L.—Here, as in the case of the former rule, we may take the teaching at two different levels. Undoubtedly the beginner has to kill out the desire for one kind of outer life rather than for another, such as would interfere with the work to be done. A man who becomes a pupil of the Master must be absolutely willing to do whatever is put in his way, to go here or there, to leave this thing or that, and have no feeling about it. If he thinks: " I am doing this kind of work and I am doing it well, and I want to keep on doing it," he may come to harm because he is becoming conceited. Suppose he

86

is taken away from the work he feels he can do and is put to something which is new to him; he must accept it with perfect cheerfulness. The change may be made because this other work is more necessary, or because, since he has learned to do that one thing, he must now learn to do something else.

Quite outside the special training of the pupil, we frequently find that the evolutionary forces work in that way. Every man likes to do what he feels he can do well, but the evolutionary forces want to develop the man all round, and very often they take him away from what he can do and put him to something else that he cannot yet do well, because they want him to develop some new power. If at first he cannot do it, he must work at it until he can. That is the way that evolution in general works, and the same thing applies to the training of the pupils of the Master. If they can do a thing well they may be kept at it for some time, but then quite suddenly they may be sent along some other line, and they must be equally willing to do that other work also. So, certainly, the desire for one kind of physical life more than for another will have to be killed out.

At the higher level the same thing is true with regard to the life of the ego. The disciple knows, if he looks back on past incarnations, that his ego has come along certain lines, but he has developed certain qualities and can, from the point of view of the individuality, do well along those lines. He may be suddenly taken away from them. The individuality, the ego, must accept

87

that which comes to it in the course of its training, and there also we must be free from any feeling that this work or this way is better than that. This is brought home to us when we meet with people of other rays or types. We feel that our ray and type is the best one. In theory we would admit that the others must be just as good as our own, but very few of us can feel really hearty sympathy with them. Thus, for example, one who has been working along philosophic or scientific lines might find it a little trying to have to turn his activities to art or ceremonial service. It is difficult to turn our sympathies round and let them flow freely along another line, but that is one of the things we must learn to do if necessary.

As soon as a man feels unity he gains the dispassionate view of things. All lines of work are then, in effect, the same to him—not that he can equally easily take up all, but he sees that they all lead to the same point. The undeveloped man never understands this. Always he thinks that the man taking the higher standpoint is cold and hard and unsympathetic; that is because the lower man is thinking of himself and is wanting all sorts of personal satisfactions, whereas the other man is thinking only of the work to be done and is putting all his energy into that. When once the Plan of work of the Logos dawns upon a man's horizon he sees that to the exclusion of everything else, and throws his energies into it, and whatever is best for that work he tries to do, even as regards the smallest detail of every-day life.

88

TALKS   ON  THE   PATH  OF  OCCULTISM

He hitches his wagon to a star. He puts before himself ideals very high and very remote from the ordinary understanding, and it is quite inevitable that the people who still look on things from the personal point of view will misunderstand him. If he suffers because of that misunderstanding, there is still a little personal touch in that; he still wants to be understood, but even that he must give up. He must give up hoping that his efforts will be appreciated, and realize that it does not matter whether they are appreciated or not. All that matters is that the work shall be done. If people will not give us credit for our work, no matter; let it be done as perfectly as possible. We shall have the appreciation of the Master—that much is sure—but even that must not be our reason for doing it. Our reason for doing it is that it is God's work and as we are one with Him what He wills is our will, what He would have done it is our highest pleasure and privilege to try to do.

When we realize that all Life is divine Life, of course we shall respect all the manifestations of it. We, who see partially, do not always respect life in all its forms and in all its manifestations. We see that many of them would be eminently undesirable for us, and therefore there is a tendency to regard those particular manifestations with contempt. That is always a mistake. We see a great deal around us which from our point of view is going very wrong, and often it really is going wrong. All the expressions of selfishness and greed and uncontrolled desire that we see in the world are certainly

89

wrong in the sense that it would be very much better if they were different. It is not at all a mistake for us to think that, because it is a fact; but when we allow ourselves to feel contempt for the people who are at that stage, we are going further than we have any right to go. Their state of development accounts for these manifestations, and they are very often the only expressions possible for them at that stage, and it is through them that they will learn.

When we see a man showing selfishness and greed and lack of self-control, we say: " What a pity! " Yet it is a pity only in the same sense that we might say that it is a pity that a little child of four has not grown up to be a man. If we allow ourselves to be uncontrolled, or to show greed and selfishness we might feel a sort of contempt for ourselves, because we know better, but it would be wrong to feel that for any other man. If it seems that he ought to be doing better, probably he has not taken advantage of his opportunities; then we should feel sorry for him and try to help him, when we can, to see the better side, the higher possibilities, but it is the greatest mistake to draw away from him, though we cannot always help feeling repugnance towards the things that he does. For example, if a man gets drunk it is because he is at that stage. Therefore it is possible for him to yield to temptation of that kind instead of making a stand against it, as he ought to do. In many cases he has tried, perhaps, but he has so far failed. All that we can do to help him should be thoroughly and entirely at his disposal, but

90

we must not feel repugnance for him. It is the old Christian idea; we may hate the sin but we must be sorry for the sinner, otherwise we are doing worse than he, because we are losing the sense of brotherhood and destroying our power to help.

The one Life is behind all and we must respect it even in manifestations which we dislike and feel to be undesirable. We must never forget that it is divine. It is difficult to remember that sometimes when the things that are done are so very ungodlike; nevertheless we must try. It is the old idea of the hidden Life, which was taught to us in the Egyptian mysteries thousands of years ago. The hidden Life was in every man, and however deeply it was buried and however little it showed forth, we were always to remember that it was there, even when we could not see it. The hidden light in us could not shine upon and evoke the hidden light in another at once, but if we were sufficiently patient and sufficiently forceful we must call forth a response, sometime and somehow. In these days we put the teaching in somewhat different terms, but it is equally tr uenow as then.

The man who lives in the Eternal sees what will be as well as what now is, and when he looks at a manifestation of Life, which is eminently undesirable he says: " Yes, at present, from the point of view of time, that is what I see it to be—a low and unworthy manifestation; but the divine Life in it will some day blossom out." Many people do not think how very illusory a thing the present is. No sooner have we thought of it than it has passed. We say: " Such and such a

                                  91

thing is in existence at present," and while we are uttering the words that present moment has become the past. In reality there is no such time as the present; it is a kind of knife-edge between the past and future; it is merely a term which we use for convenience—the thing itself is shifting every second of time. We must read the future into the present, and see what will be. If we could only get out of these bodies and these brains for a few moments into an altogether higher life and look down upon it, we should understand this matter exactly. We should see that by thinking of that future we make it more easily attainable for the present. If we look at a man who is definitely sinning, and think of his sin, we fold that sin more closely about him, but if we look at him and think of the future, when he will have risen out of it, we open the way to that future for him, and bring it more within his reach.1

3.   Kill out desire of comfort.

Be happy as those are who live for happiness.

A.B.—In the early stages of growth a man puts out all his efforts of brain and body in order to gain the means which will make him comfortable; the desire of comfort forms the motive of the majority of mankind. It is a very useful stimulus to bring out certain qualities of man. It teaches him that he must control his body, that he must dominate his lower nature, and that he has also to develop his bodies, so that they many subserve his purposes of enjoying comfort in them.

1 Ante., Vol. I, Part V, Chap. 3: Gossip.

92

The desire for comfort gradually disappears as the things that attract the man rise higher and higher in the scale. A man may get rid of desires for physical comfort and enjoyment by throwing his interest into the mental life, for example. At first there will be a sense of effort, a certain feeling of pain and loss; but the man prefers the mental to the physical pleasures because he knows that they will last longer. Then as he practises self-denial, he finds that the feeling of loss becomes less and less as the joys of the intellect attract him more and more, until the lower desires do not attract him at all.

At first there is deliberate self-denial at each stage, and then comes the loss of the power of attraction in the physical object of the desire. Later on, the same change will come with regard to the joys of the intellect. When the man is looking up to the spiritual life his great attraction for intellectual things will gradually diminish, and he will be less and less attracted by the enjoyment of the powerful intellectual force; he will deny himself the joys of the intellect and rejoice in those of the spirit; he will withdraw himself from the intellect and fix his consciousness on the spiritual level.

The destruction of the desire for comfort also brings its danger. This is the third great danger. The first was inactivity, the second was contempt, and the third is the tendency not to be happy, but to be neither happy nor unhappy, neither one thing nor the other.

How shall the man become happy? The answer is: by realizing that the Self is bliss. It is said in the Brahma Sutras that Brahman is Bliss, Brahman is

93

Ananda. The man has now to realize this. He is no longer moved by pleasure nor by pain. They have ceased to attract him; they came from contact between forms, but he has reached equilibrium. He is therefore likely to sink into the condition of being neither happy nor unhappy. But he must learn to be happy as those are who live for happiness.

It is the bliss of the Self, that deep abiding bliss, the sense of contentment and joy. which is an essential part of the spiritual life, and the most difficult part of that life to realize in consciousness. It is a very marked fact about the great mystics and saviours of men that the side of sorrow has shown itself very much in their lives. Jesus was a man of sorrow. Gautama, the Buddha, left his splendid palaces and gardens and loving friends to seek the cure for the sorrow of the world. The same is true when we look on the lives of all the great leaders of mankind. Sorrow touched them very deeply. But they were not overcome by the sorrow. In those men there was an abiding joy, and the sorrow is profoundly exaggerated by the man who looks upon them from outside. As grief hovers over them, as anxiety, harass-ments, troubles, worries, and woes rain upon them from all directions, naturally they are judged by men to be sorrowful. But that does not follow. They are not worried, harassed or distressed by these things, however much they may attend to them, and may do whatever may be necessary for the sake of the world. Underneath it all there is the heart of peace. Therefore you always find them saying: " My peace remaineth."

94

The disciple feels the sorrow of the world. That he cannot escape; it will throw a shadow over him—an unavoidable shadow. The whole of the world's sorrow has to find its echo in him. He feels sorrow, and continues to feel pity for the ignorant and the suffering, for their rebellion and revolt. At the stage we are considering there is danger for him—that he may cease to feel for others; then just in proportion as he ceases to feel he loses his utility. The Great Ones feel helpless pity for those under the sway of karma; pity because of their own inability to help them, for there are places where they cannot help, where men must go through their experiences by themselves. Despite the knowledge that it should be so, and despite their absolute contentment with the Law, they are standing aside and watching it work; still there is this pain and sympathy—pity, which has in it a certain element of sorrow.

That will always remain as something of a shadow. In losing the power to sympathize a man would lose the power to help. Just as his life flows into the ignorant he feels the pleasure and pain of the ignorant, and he lightens their trouble by feeling it himself.

With all this pressing upon him it is ever necessary that the disciple should be reminded that the Self-is bliss. He must keep the heart of joy, must deliberately cultivate in himself the spirit of contentment and happiness. One way to do this is to practise meditation upon the divine bliss—deep, intense bliss, not equalled by anything belonging to this earth, because it is the very essence and nature of the Self. A man can develop that

95

aspect only by the deliberate cultivation of joy and contentment, and by looking at the world and recognizing that evil is avidya, unwisdom. In the midst of sorrows he is to be happy; he must teach himself that pain is in the vehicle while the life is ever joy.

C.W.L.—This rule does not mean that people may not be comfortable, though many have taken it in that sense. Yogis, hermits and monks have taken similar statements in other scriptures in that way, but it is absolutely wrong and foolish. Some monks in the Middle Ages wore hair shirts; and some Indian yogis sit on spikes and sleep in the hottest weather in the midst of a circle of fire, all with the object of making themselves uncomfortable. That is the result of choosing one text and running it to death. It is particularly stated in the Bhagavad-Gita that those who torture the body torture the Divine One seated in that body, and their way is not the way of progress.1 So this rule does not mean that we may not be comfortable, but simply that we must never let our desire for comfort stand in the way of any work which we have to do. If to do what ought to be done will cause us great discomfort, we must not on that account refrain from doing it.

To make ourselves unnecessarily uncomfortable only puts difficulty in our way. People talk much about the virtue of suffering and the extent to which progress is made through it; but if we look at the cold facts we shall find that the progress is made after the suffering is past. It is not actual suffering itself which causes the

1 Op. cit., xvii. 6.

96

progress, but in many cases that wakens a man to conditions which otherwise he would not have sufficiently noted. It sometimes weeds out of him qualities which made progress difficult for him, but it is only after the suffering is over that the progress is made, because only then is he in a fit state of mind to attend to higher things.

We must not think that there is any virtue in making ourselves uncomfortable. On the contrary, when the physical body is comfortable we are much better able to think of higher things. Yet I have known people who would persist in doing it. For example, in India, where meditation is best understood, it happens to be the custom to sit cross-legged. I have known scores of white people who would weary themselves out and even cause themselves pain by trying to follow the Indian custom in meditation, not understanding that that is merely an outer detail and the Indian only adopts that position because he has been accustomed to it from childhood. It is exceedingly futile for people who are not accustomed to it to force themselves into what is to them a position of discomfort. Patanjali's direction is to take a posture " easy and pleasant ".

There are two objects with regard to the position of the body during meditation. First, it should be comfortable, so that one can easily forget it, for that is what one wants to do. Secondly, it should be such that if in meditation we leave the body—which may happen at any time—it will not hurt itself. In such a case the effect on the body will be as though we had fainted.

97

The Indian who is sitting on the floor simply falls backwards, and no harm is done. When we meditate we shall do well, therefore, to sit in some sort of armchair, so that we may not fall out of it, if the body loses consciousness. The recumbent position is not good if it increases the tendency to sleep.

There are joys of the emotions and of the intellect, and many people who would despise the idea that their physical comfort mattered to them in the least, are yet exceedingly unhappy when they are not emotionally comfortable, that is to say, when they imagine that they are not getting the response they deserve to their emotions. Many people are painfully sentimental and expect the rest of the world to be equally so, and are much hurt because it is not. They pour out what they call affection, but it is often tinged with selfishness. They will create all kinds of disturbance, and even do things which harm those whom they profess to love, all for the sake of what they call the return of their affection. They do not understand that there are different types of affection, and that it may be absolutely impossible for the person concerned to return it in their particular way. This difficulty comes from the insistence of the desire for emotional comfort, which should never be permitted to interfere with our own progress or that of those whom we love.

In the same way there is intellectual comfort. People want, others to think exactly as they do, so that they may rest mentally content, without disturbance. Constantly we come up against that difficulty. There will be some

98

promising young person deeply interested in Theosophy, for example, who wants to join the Theosophical Society, but his parents vigorously oppose him. They would not be intellectually comfortable if they thought that their son or their daughter were adopting a line which they could not share. They feel sure that they are right and that there can be no real wisdom outside the limits of their own particular opinions. Therefore if a sop or a daughter thinks differently from them they are quite outraged, not realizing that the fact that an ego happens to be born in their family does not necessarily mean that he is of the same temperament as themselves.

Each ego has his own way, his own power of appreciating the truth; he must receive it along his own line. For others to try to force him to take it along their line, which is not his, is a mistake; the whole inner Self revolts against it. The result, in hundreds of cases, when children have been intellectually pressed, is that they fall away altogether from their parents' beliefs. Again and again, for example: the son of a clergyman ends as an atheist, because the father and mother have unwisely tried to force him to think along their lines. This harm is done only because they themselves want to be intellectually comfortable. The disciple must always be careful that his desire to be emotionally or intellectually comfortable does not make him interfere with other people's rights, and that he does not let it stand in the way of duty or of help that he might give.

It is essential that we should be happy, as the Chohan says here, although certainly we do not live for happiness.

99

I think many forget the duty of happiness. They do not regard it as a duty, although most emphatically it is that. It is a necessary part of progress. The person who is always mournful and depressed about what is happening is making no progress, and it is well that he should understand that. As I have said before, it is necessary that we should become more and more sensitive, because unless we bring ourselves into that condition we cannot answer in a moment to the slightest signal from the Master. It is unquestionably difficult to be very sensitive and at the same time radiantly happy, yet that is what we must be. There is a great deal that calls for the deepest sympathy, and it is difficult to feel sympathy with those who are suffering, without also feeling sorrow; yet, as I have explained, the Master sympathizes far more than we can, but certainly does not feel the sorrow as sorrow.1

There might be very much less suffering and very much less sorrow if the people to whom the sorrow and suffering are coming now had lived quite differently in other lives, perhaps thousands of years ago, but considering that they lived as they did, that which is now happening is the best that can happen for their progress. We cannot help being sorry that it is not better, but ,our sorrow is not for what is going on now, but for the previous happenings which made this necessary. Possibly that sounds a little cold, but when we understand how utterly the result is part of the cause, we can see that what is happening now is actually part of the causes

1 Ante, Vol. II, p. 329.

100

which the people themselves set in motion long ago, and it could not be other than it is while the divine law of cause and effect is operating.

All this suffering can only be altered now by bringing in new forces. We can sometimes relieve sorrow and suffering to a certain extent. Whenever we do that, it is not in the least that we abrogate the working of the law, it is not at all that everything does not flow in harmony with that law, but that we introduce a new force which also comes within the operation of the law, and mitigates much which, otherwise, would have been the effect of what went before. But though we can sometimes relieve and help, it is, as I explained before, quite difficult for many of us to get always into the attitude of being perfectly sympathetic and yet recognizing the necessity of the suffering, though we can do it quite well in certain things. Suppose some friend whom we love very much has to undergo a surgical operation. Of course we are sorry that it should be so, but it does not occur to us to say that it ought not to be so, because we recognize that the operation is intended to do good, and we trust that its result will be an improvement in his health. Therefore however sorry and anxious we may be, we regard it as an unfortunate, a regrettable, necessity. All sorrow and suffering are nothing but that—operations to remove dangerous growths.

Much of the sorrow of the world can be avoided, because a great deal of it does not come from the past but is the result of men's present foolishness. They take things in a wrong way. For example, we frequently

101

allow ourselves to be hurt or offended or worried. That is not karma from the past. In many cases seven-eighths of the trouble which comes to people is not from without at all; it is due entirely to the way in which they take their experiences. The karma that comes to us from without is only a small amount, but we magnify it very greatly; that is our present fault, and it can be remedied.1 Most people who live for happiness seek to attain that happiness in various ways: by surrounding themselves with the people with whom they feel happy, by going where they expect to find enjoyment, and so on. That the disciple should not do, because he ought to be in the position of being perfectly happy in himself, without reference to particular outer conditions. That is difficult for us, because, through many lives we have been very largely the sport of circumstances. If we observe people we shall find that most of them are in that condition still. The majority of people in the world make very little effort to change the conditions in which they find themselves. If they find themselves depressed or readily offended and therefore unhappy, they should set to work to change those conditions. Instead of doing that they grumble about those who offend them, and say that it is quite impossible to get on with such people. Yet those others are probably people very much like the rest of the world. Our happiness depends upon how these people are taken, upon our attitude towards their attitude. If

1 Ante., Vol. I, Part I, Ch. 1: The Occult Path and the Interests of the World; Part IV, Ch. 1: Control of Mind; Ch. 4: Cheerfulness; Vol. II, pp. 141,218,244.

102

our study of occultism has brought any fruit we will say: " I do not mind what position they take up; that is their business, not mine; my business is to take care that I am not offended and worried, that I preserve a peaceful condition, whatever these other people do or think."

One may say that it is very difficult to do that, if other people are aggressive or insulting. But is it not obvious that the effect produced by the insulting and aggressive attitude depends upon the way in which it is met ? If we allow ourselves to be affected by it, a great deal of disturbance is set up. • We on our side show something of the same nature, and • to the onlooker it would seem that some of that aggression is justified. But if we are perfectly calm, the man who abuses us puts himself in the wrong, and the outsider can see that we are not in the wrong. Of course, we should not remain calm in order to appear in the right, but we should adopt a philosophical attitude, because we do not feel these attempts to attack us or to interfere with us; and thus we can be happy.

That seems a sort of negative happiness, to avoid pain or suffering. We can do a great deal more than that; we who are trying to live according to the precepts of occultism—students of the inner life—must be doing something of the world's work. Assuredly no one can see the Plan of the Logos, and the work that is to be done to carry out that Plan, without trying to do as much as he can for it, and the fact that he is engaged in that work keeps a man busy and happy. We should have no time for depression, no time to worry about all these outer

103

things. If we are all the time busily engaged in pouring out good thought, in sending strong wishes, strong currents of goodwill to all around us, we are fully occupied, and are happy in the work itself.

It is sad to see the way in which people all about us are constantly talking about doing things " to pass the time " They do this or that for the sake of having something to do. It is both ludicrous and pitiable, because the world is full of opportunities to do good and noble deeds, and these people are not even looking for the opportunities. They are just trying somehow or other to amuse themselves, that they may get through the time—a most extraordinary attitude to take.

The student of occultism finds that he cannot get time enough to do all that he would like to do. All those who are really willing to work are overwhelmed with work; there is always more to be done than they can possibly do. Dr. Besant works indefatigably from early in the morning until very late at night without any rest, and hers is a very different thing from the ordinary man's idea of work. Some men who are in business are certainly closely occupied the whole time, but most people's idea of work is to do a little and have a rest, and then take the matter up again and spend a little more time at it. They would call that very close attention to work. That is not the way in which she works. Even while she is listening to some story that is being told to her, she will continue writing and still know every word of what one is telling her, and be perfectly ready at the end of the story to give help or advice. She loses

104

no single moment. She is always prepared, if she happens to be waiting at a railway station, to take out a little dispatch box and begin writing articles or letters at once. It is not given to every one—and think of the age which her body has now reached—to do that, especially as a great deal of the work is of a very searching character, and calls for quick decision in many different directions. People who are paid for work do not do it in that way. It is precisely because all that she does is done for the love of it that she is able to do so much. Certainly she is happy in her work, always ready to meet people with a friendly smile, and is thus a great inspiration to all those who come into contact with her. We would do well to follow in her steps as far as we can, remembering always the duty of happiness. If we are not happy, then we are not doing enough; it is a sure proof that we are wasting time. We should get to work and do something, and at once the unhappiness will vanish, because there will not be time for it. The interest in the work is so keen and the amount to be done so great, that we shall find ourselves thinking of that, and we shall have no time to think of anything in the nature of unhappiness.

Seek in the heart the source of evil and expunge it. It lives fruitfully in the heart of the devoted disciple as well as in the heart of the man of desire. Only the strong can kill it out. The weak must wait for its growth, its fruition, its death. And it is a plant that lives and increases throughout the ages. It flowers when the man has accumulated

105

unto himself innumerable existences. He who will enter upon the path of power must tear this thing out of his heart. And then the heart will bleed, and the whole life of the man seem to be utterly dissolved. This ordeal must be endured; it may come at the first step of the perilous ladder which leads to the path of life: it may not come until the last. But, O disciple, remember that it has to be endured, and fasten the energies of your soul upon the task. Live neither in the present nor the future, but in the Eternal. This giant weed cannot flower there: this blot upon existence is wiped out by the very atmosphere of eternal thought.

C.W.L.—This is the remainder of Rule 4, the Chohan's comment on the first three rules. The giant weed is the heresy of separateness—the idea of the separated self—which is truly the source of evil. We are directed to kill it out by stages. We are told first to unify the lower and the higher self, that is to say, to merge the personality in the individuality. For most of us the personal self is still so near that it tends to shut out the higher things. We have to work our way through that and gradually to transcend it, to get entirely rid of all selfishness. Then we have to begin upon the individuality.

Now, the individuality, the ego, is a very wonderful thing—complex, exceedingly beautiful and marvelously adapted to its surroundings, a glorious being indeed; yet eventually we must realize that even that is only an

106

instrument that we have created by the working of many ages for the sake of the progress of the Monad. Because we have had to develop the idea of the separated self in the earlier stages of our progress, the giant weed, or the seed of it, is in the heart of everybody. That has to be killed out at one time or another, yet only the strong can tear it out from themselves at the beginning of their development. The weak must wait and let it go on growing while they are developing sufficient strength to kill it out. That is unfortunate for them, because the longer it is allowed to persist the more closely it becomes intertwined with the nature of the man. Those who can summon the courage to tear it out now will make rapid and much surer progress. Terrible as the struggle is to get rid of this separated self at any time, it will be thousands of times more difficult if we leave it until the later stages of our progress. Until it is finally destroyed we shall be subject to all kinds of difficulties and dangers from which we can escape only by getting rid of it here and now. Obviously, therefore, it is best to kill it out in the beginning.

All systems of occult teaching agree in advising students to try from the very beginning to get rid of this illusion. The difficulty in the way, apart from the habit of thinking of ourselves as separate, is that this idea has been the source of all our strength in the past. When the ego was first formed as an individual he was distinctly weak. He had been, until then, part of a group soul, and the idea of separate identity was not strong in him. It had to be intensified through the savage life.

107

The man's strength gradually grew from the feeling, " I am I" In the earlier days it would be: " I am a great fighter and a swift runner; I am a mighty headsman; I can lead armies; I can guide men; I can make them do as I will." Later on, it would express itself on a higher level as: "I have a mighty intellect; I can trust myself; I am proud of myself; I am a great man; I can think more strongly than other men and therefore I have power over their minds, and can sway them to do this or that." It is through the sense of separateness that we have learnt to be self-reliant.

Later there comes a stage when self-reliance means reliance upon the Higher Self. The man no longer relies either on the skill of his hand, the fleetness of his foot and the strength of his muscles, or on his intellectual powers, but comes to realize that there is a strength of the spirit which is greater far than all these outer manifestations, and when this stage is reached he soon begins to see that the strength of his spirit is the strength of the infinite that lies behind it, because it is one with God Himself. Thus our self-reliance at last becomes reliance on Him—on the mighty Power behind. We are He, and in relying on God we are relying on ourselves, because each of us is a spark of the Divine> and the Godhead is in us. We only need to realize that and to unfold it, and then the self on which we rely becomes the great Self which is the All.

This idea of the separated self is ingrained in us and is part of the very ego which is the one permanent thing about us as far as we know. We have still to learn that

108

there is the Monad; that will seem the true Self when we have laid aside the individuality. Yet when that time comes we shall see far more clearly than we do now that those Monads are only sparks of the Eternal Flame. We know it now theoretically, and true realization of it will come to all in due course; it has come to some already. I have explained before that when the consciousness is focused in the highest part of the causal body it is possible to look up the line that joins the Monad and the ego. Looking up that line into the Monad of which we know so little, and beyond it, we can see and know with a definiteness and certainty that no words can express down here, that all we have thought of as the Self and as belonging to us, is not we, but He; that if we had any intellect, any devotion or affection, it was not we at all, but it was the intellect, the devotion, the love which is God, which was showing itself forth through us.1 When a man has had that experience he can never be quite the same again; he cannot come down again in the same way to the personal point of view, because he knows with the certainty that convinces. Some experience like that is needed to counteract the result of the development of the separated self which at present is a great trouble and causes us much sorrow and suffering by obscuring our view of Life. We are in this curious position that our self-development is due to the idea of separateness up to a certain point, and it is only when we have reached that point that it becomes an evil, and we have to get rid of it. Humanity has 1 Ante., Vol. I, Part II, Ch. 2: The Life of the Bodies.

109

now reached a stage where it ought to be realizing that. That is why the duty of unselfishness is impressed upon us so strongly by all occult and high religious teaching. Humanity as a whole needs that. It is still in the selfish stage, trying to grasp this and that for itself. The whole of our strength must be turned against that tendency.

At the same time we must try to be very tolerant about it. We often feel impatient with the rampant, the brutal selfishness found everywhere, but that is useless. These unfortunate people are only carrying on now what was necessary for their development thousands of years ago: We should help them, if possible; we should always be gentle and tolerant, but very firm as to the necessity for getting rid of this point of view. Some of us find it helpful to try to realize the progress of humanity as a whole and to make a practice of thinking of ourselves as part of it. We try to act on the advice given by one of our Masters who once put it thus: " If you succeed in taking a step of some kind, if you succeed in making definite advancement, you should not think: ' I have done this, I am really getting on.' The better way to put it is: ' I am glad that this has happened, because humanity through me is just that much nearer to finding itself—that much nearer to the final goal which God means it to reach; humanity through me has taken this step, and the fact that it has done so means a very little advance for every other unit." One may thus think of the whole of humanity, as a man thinks of the whole of his family, as a unit, from the baby to the old grandfather, and so considers the welfare of all.

110

We are told that we should live neither in the present nor the future, but in the Eternal. He who lives in the Eternal is the Logos, the Deity. He, living in the Eternal, sees the future as well as the present, sees the fulfillment of all these things. If we could raise ourselves up into His point of view we should be able to live in the Eternal as He does. That is not a thing that we can achieve to-day or to-morrow. We must fight our way towards it. A divine dissatisfaction is a necessity for our progress towards it. We must never be satisfied with the condition we have reached; that .would at once mean stagnation. We must always aim at doing better and better, and by living in the future we shall learn how to do that.

At the same time, while we are always reaching forward, always striving upward, it is a mistake to allow ourselves to feel discontented or worried with regard to transitory happenings to the temporary condition of ourselves and others. It is wiser and better to project ourselves into the future and live in it. We should say: " I am at the moment such and such a person, with certain faults and failings. I am going to transcend these faults and failings. Let me look forward to the time when they will no longer exist." It is a great thing to live for tomorrow and not for yesterday. The world at large is living for the centuries which lie behind it and is clinging to old prejudices. We should look forward to the future and live for that.

Keep your thought hopefully on the future, not regretfully on the past. The present is very largely an illusion;

111

so we are not really dissatisfied with what we are doing, but with what we have just done. If we want to get on we must keep our eyes in front of us. To look behind is not the way to make progress. If that course were persisted in on the physical plane we should not go far without meeting with an accident, and the same thing is true in these higher realms also. The more we think over it the clearer it becomes that in the three aphorisms we have just been examining, viz. " Kill out ambition, kill out desire of life, and kill out desire of comfort", all that moves the ordinary man to exertion has been absolutely cut away.

A man's life is first of all directed by the desire to keep himself and his family alive, " to keep his head above water "; he has always the ambition of rising to higher levels; he wishes for greater comfort for himself and for his family. These are precisely the mainsprings which move the ordinary man, and it is obvious that if all of them should be absolutely removed from him, he would be left supine—he would be left without any reason to bestir himself at all; he would be like a log. He would say: " If I am not to have ambition of any sort, if I am to cease to desire either life or comfort, why should I do anything? Why should I move at all?" He would be left without any adequate motive for exertion of any kind, and all progress for him would be at an end. It is obvious that for him the killing out of these things would have a bad effect.

Even the man who is nearly ready to tread the Path, who has ceased to feel any interest in lower things,

1 12

reaches a stage when there is danger of his falling into a state of inaction. Intellectually he is absolutely convinced that all these lower things are not worth pursuing, and because they have ceased to attract him he does not feel inclined to put forth energy in any direction. That is an experience which comes to nearly every one in the course of his evolution, and is a very real trouble to numbers of people. They have got rid of the lower and not taken on the higher. They are at a transition stage between the two; they have not sufficiently realized the unity for that to be the great motive power in life, but they have realized enough of it to know that the desires of the separated self are not worth following. So they remain in a condition of suspended animation. It is for some students a very great difficulty to rouse themselves out of this state. Nothing is worth while; nothing has any longer any interest for them. They want to die and be done with it.

The only way for a man to get beyond that unsatisfactory condition is to go a little further, and then he will begin to see that there is a higher and truer life which is infinitely well worth the living. He will find that when he has glimpsed the divine scheme he wants to throw himself into it—he cannot do otherwise. In identifying himself with the One Life, and acting as part of that Life, he finds the one motive which can stir him to action. When he takes that one step further and begins to realize the Life of the Self, then instead of wanting to fall into annihilation and to be done with everything, he will long to possess more and more energy

113

in order to throw it into this glorious work. The motive power of the One Self will stir him to far greater activity than ever before, because it is infinitely more powerful than any lower motive, and the man who works with it to fulfill the high purposes of the Deity will gain infinite happiness and infinite peace.

CHAPTER 5 RULES 5 TO 8

5.   Kill out all sense of separateness.

Yet stand alone and isolated, because nothing that is embodied, nothing that is conscious of separation, nothing that is out of the Eternal, can aid you.

A.B.—This teaching is specially given in this book, intended for the disciple, because he has to learn to stand utterly alone. Nothing that is embodied, that is out of the Eternal, can aid him. All help that comes from the embodied is secondary help and may fail him in the moment of his greatest need. The biographies of the great Christian mystics show it to have been an invariable characteristic of their lives that they felt forsaken by every one, and had to stand absolutely alone. The same truth comes out also in the Christian Gospels, which contain in the symbol of the life of Jesus an account of the experiences through which every soul must go in the stages of discipleship. There are there two scenes which are connected with this statement: the first is that which is spoken of as the agony of Jesus in the garden of

115

Gethsemane, when He found that His friends and followers could not watch with Him even for a little time, and He learned that He must go on alone; the second was the cry from the cross: " My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me? " These experiences are connected with the fourth great Initiation, when the man is thrown back upon himself and learns to rest upon the inner Self alone, to realize that he himself is only an expression of the Eternal in the outer world. There is always a danger that in this last great test the disciple will break down.

A double task lies before the disciple. He must kill out the sense of separateness, but he must learn to stand alone in order that he may be strong with the strength of the divine within himself. He must be like a star in heaven, that gives light to all but takes it from none. He can learn that only from the experience of isolation. Yet the sense of isolation is illusory, for he is in the Eternal. The illusion is due to the breaking away of all the forms before the realization of unity—of being the Eternal—develops in the consciousness.

This aphorism with its comment also contains other important thoughts. There is a stage at which the aspirant must stand aside from the body of men, because of his weakness, not of his strength. Sometimes a man is so near the condition of other men around him, who still lead the lower life that he has left, that he feels that by keeping company with them he is likely to be dragged down into their vices. At that time the sentiment of repulsion is useful; and although it does

116

show that he is in a lower stage of development yet he will do well to follow it and avoid their company.

When a man speaks with horror of a certain vice you may be sure that in the near past he has been in the grip of it. In the recent past there has been a fight against that vice, and his inner consciousness, from which nothing disappears, now warns him against it. There is a stage when a man has risen higher, when he need not seek such isolation from those who are still sinning. But so long as that is not the case, so long as he is liable to fall into vice on account of an impulse from outside, a man's safety lies in his running away from the temptation, until he is strong enough to go amidst that vice without being attracted by it. Only when a man has got beyond the power of falling into attraction by vice will he usually get over his horror and repulsion.

Then he has come to the stage at which he ought to think of the sinner as in need of his help. The very thought of his own past faults will now enable him to help others. We cannot help them as long as we ourselves are liable to fall, but only when we are neither attracted nor repelled, when we recognize our identity with those who are struggling. We then remember that the sin of the world is our own sin—the profound truth that no man can be perfectly clean while another remains unclean. While a man remains part of humanity its life is his; to escape from that, he must go outside humanity. The vice of any man is our vice, until he also has got rid of it. Upon that truth the saving of the world entirely turns.

117

That should  be the thought of any disciple if he should find himself under special temptation. He should realize that he must not yield to the temptation, because in his fall there is a fall for the whole of humanity. Such knowledge ought to be sufficient to keep him from evil.    Suppose you attempt to realize in consciousness the life of humanity, and then try to conquer a particular  weakness;   you will then feel that your own conquest is not a conquest for yourself, but for all. The whole of humanity is helped because one part of it has struggled and  conquered.    This idea will very often give you great strength.    It is indeed worth while to struggle for the sake of the whole, if not for your own personal self. C.W.L.—People sometimes make these instructions harder for themselves than they need be, and perhaps also a little unreal, by exaggerating them.    We have to face the fact that there is separation down here on the physical plane.  We may feel as completely fraternal as we can, but the fact nevertheless remains that in space our physical bodies are separate. Sometimes people want to deny that fact; they try to carry the idea of non-separateness to such a point as to make it unreasonable. That can never be right in occultism.  Occult teaching is always the very essence of reasonableness and common sense, and whenever anything is put before us which is obviously unreasonable, we may feel sure  there is a mistake  somewhere.    In  some   cases   it   may  appear unreasonable because we are not in possession of all the facts, but when the facts are all before us and the statement still has an unreasonable appearance, we are

118

justified in doubting it and waiting for further enlightenment.

Though our physical bodies are separate in space there is really less separation than there appears to be. We all react upon one another to such an extent that no man can in any sense really live to himself alone. If one physical body has a certain disease, all the others near are liable to contract it. If the astral body is diseased in the sense of being, let us say, given to irritability, envy, jealousy, selfishness and so on, it is also infectious, because it radiates out its vibrations, and other astral bodies in the neighbourhood must be to some extent affected by such radiation. When, for example, people sit together at a meeting their astral bodies interpenetrate to a considerable degree, because the astral body of an ordinary person extends about eighteen inches around the physical body—in some cases still further— so that, although they are still quite separate, they must react considerably on one another. The same is true of the mental body, and even our causal bodies are separate in space and in condition. So we must understand this killing out of the sense of separateness in conformity with the facts of nature.

There is no separateness on the buddhic plane. There consciousnesses do not necessarily merge instantly at the lowest level, but they gradually grow wider and wider until, when we reach the highest level of the buddhic plane, and have fully developed ourselves through all its different subdivisions, we find ourselves consciously one with humanity. That is the lowest level at which the

119

separateness is absolutely non-existent; in its fullness the conscious unity with all belongs to the next plane —the nirvanic.

Suppose that all of us could develop the buddhic consciousness within ourselves simultaneously. Each one would realize that he had risen to that level, and that his consciousness included that of all the others, but he would still feel that inclusive consciousness to be his consciousness. None of us would have lost his sense of individuality at all, only in it he would include very much more than he had ever done before. He would feel himself as manifesting through all these others as well. Really what we are experiencing is the one consciousness which includes us all, the consciousness of the Logos Himself.

It is on the nirvanic plane that we realize most intensely that all that we thought to be our consciousness, our intellect, our devotion, our love, were in reality His consciousness, His intellect, His love, His devotion, manifesting through us somewhat as a light might shine through a lens. That realization does not come fully to the man in the buddhic world, but it does so come to him in that next above.

In the Stanzas of Dzyan it is said, referring to man: " The spark hangs from the Flame by the finest thread of Fohat." l That, I believe, is applicable at various levels; for us it may be taken to mean that the ego hangs from the Monad by the finest thread, and that thread runs through the buddhic plane. The finest

1 The Secret Doctrine, Vol. I, p. 66.

120

thread of which you can think is all that represents the ordinary man at these buddhic levels. As soon as he turns his attention to higher matters—when he is regularly thinking of them and aiming at them—that thread begins to thicken. It gradually becomes more and more like a cable, and later on it appears as a funnel, because it widens out up above (I am speaking of it now as one would see it clairvoyantly), and comes down into the causal body, which is a thing of definite size for the time. Later on the causal body itself is enlarged by the inrushing of forces, and the funnel becomes very much larger, widening out at the bottom as well as the top. At the first Initiation (for many, this experience comes before that), the man abandons the causal body and plunges into the buddhic plane. At that time, as I have explained before, the causal body absolutely vanishes—the one thing that has seemed permanent through his long line of lives, since he left the animal kingdom, disappears.1 When that occurs this funnel shapes itself into a sphere. There are more dimensions there, so that I cannot actually describe it, but this is how it appears to one who is able to see it.

After a man has taken the first Initiation the sense of separateness is one of the failings which have to be entirely conquered before he can take the second. It is the first of the ten sanyojana or fetters which he has to cast off on his way up the steps of the Path. It is made possible for him finally and irrevocably to cast it off by the experience which is part of that first Initiation. He

1 Ante., Vol. I, Part II, Ch. 2: The Life of the Bodies.

121

gets then merely a touch of the buddhic consciousness. It does not mean necessarily that he can go back into that condition of consciousness whenever he will, but at least he has experienced it, and having once felt the unity, he knows that it exists even though he may be incapable of re-entering it without the aid of the Master. He knows, therefore, that the sense of separateness is an illusion. It is practically impossible for us down here in the physical body to grasp that really. We constantly speak of it and we try to persuade ourselves that we feel it, but as long as one is in a physical body and until one has had that higher experience, frankly I do not think one can feel it. We persuade ourselves of it intellectually but really to feel it is a different thing.

When a man begins to function on the buddhic plane, he enters it at its lowest level, but he is unable at first to make the most even of that lowest sub-plane. He will feel an intensity of bliss which no words can express, and an extension of consciousness which by contrast with anything which he has ever felt before, will no doubt give the idea that the whole world is included. Nevertheless it is not so at all. When he is sufficiently accustomed to this higher level to analyse it, he will find that the extension of consciousness, though a very great one, is by no means as yet full or universal. Gradually he extends the sphere which he can effectively occupy. It is somewhat like the way in which an army occupies a conquered territory. He establishes himself first, and then gradually extends that part over which he has definite power, until it includes the entire

122

country. He then proceeds to try to push his consciousness into the next sub-plane; but even after he has worked his way through sub-plane after sub-plane until he reaches the highest, he has not necessarily built the buddhic vehicle. The man who has the buddhic consciousness within his reach by meditation or by effort can always raise himself into that condition. The man who has definitely built a buddhic vehicle has that consciousness all the time in the background of his lower physical, astral or mental consciousness. That is another and separate achievement and a difficult one, because to do that the causal body must be eliminated, must be destroyed as a separating wall.

One whose consciousness works on the buddhic plane during meditation finds that although he is one with all the wonderful consciousness of the plane, yet there is a little circle of emptiness shutting him out from the rest. This little barrier is, of course, the causal body. In order that the buddhic vehicle shall be developed, even that must disappear. Then the man feels the reality of unobstructed Life in a way impossible to describe down here. Madame Blavatsky expressed the idea as a circle with its centre everywhere and its circumference nowhere—a very beautiful and expressive description.1 Of course it is a paradox, but all things that can be said about these higher conditions must necessarily be paradoxical.

When the unity is fully realized the man feels, however paradoxical it may sound, as though his vehicle at that

1 Ante., Vol. II, p. 67.

123

level filled the whole of the plane, as though he could transfer his point of consciousness to any place within that plane and still be the centre of the circle. It is an experience which is quite indescribable. Along with that feeling, permeating and accompanying it always, is a sense of the most intense bliss—bliss of which we can have no conception at all on these lower planes— something vivid, active, fiery beyond all imagination. Most bliss down here, at the rare moments when we feel anything deserving of the name, consists chiefly in the absence of pain. We are happy and blissful down here when, for a moment, we are free from fatigue and pain, when we can relax and feel that we are taking in pleasant influences. That is rather a negative feeling. The bliss of the buddhic plane is the most intensely active, vivid feeling. I do not know in the least how to express it If you could imagine the most intense activity that you have ever felt and then replace that vivid and strenuous activity by a feeling of bliss, then somehow raise it—spiritualize it—to an altogether higher plane, to the nth power, it would convey some idea of what that feeling is.

It is an active reality which is quite overpowering in its strength. There is nothing at all passive about it; one is not resting. Down here we live lives of so much strain and strenuousness that rest is always a very prominent part of any ideal we may have; but there it is not in the least a feeling that one is resting or wanting to rest. One is a tremendous incarnate energy whose expression is to pour itself forth, and the idea of rest or

124

the need of rest is entirely outside one's consciousness. What to us here seems rest would seem a kind of negation up there. We have become one with the expression of the divine power, and that divine power is active life. People talk of the rest of nirvana—but that is from the lower point of view. It is the intensity of power that is the real characteristic of this higher life— a power so intense that it does not show itself in any sort of ordinary movement at all, but rather in one vast resistless sweep which might look like rest when viewed from below, but which means the consciousness of absolute power. It is impossible to express all this in words. When we have achieved this we have finally conquered the giant weed—the great enemy, the sense of separateness. It is the hardest task, on the whole, that is before us, because it involves everything else.

It is only after the buddhic body is fully developed on all the seven sub-planes that the man has the full fruition of the whole plane, a complete power of identification with the whole of humanity, so that he can learn through that relation what all these people think and feel. Before that buddhic consciousness is gained we may labour to reduce the sense of separateness and it may be done with great success intellectually, but we still remain outside, in the sense of not understanding others. They will still be an absolute mystery, for man is the greatest of mysteries to his fellow-man. We may come into very close relations with people for quite a long time, and yet not really know them inside. It may be that until the buddhic level is reached no man ever really knows any

125

other man thoroughly.1 When a man reaches that condition he is able to pour himself down into the consciousness of others and see what they do and why they act in that particular way. There all things are within him instead of outside, and he studies them as parts of himself. It sounds impossible down here, but that is something of what he feels. All the joy of the world is his joy; its suffering is his suffering. When he chooses to put himself down through any one of the million tentacles—the consciousness of other people with which he is one—then he can and does experience all which that person is experiencing. In this way all the world's suffering is within his reach, but he knows with absolute certainty that it is a necessary part of the plan and has no existence on those higher levels. He is in no way less sympathetic with it, yet he knows that " Brahman is Bliss," and that to be one with the divine is a state of perpetual inner joy. It is only when one gains that development that one can fully help others.

When a man touches that consciousness he has for a time withdrawn from these lower physical levels where he can be perturbed or upset, and he is himself part of the divine joy. When he comes back again into his mental, astral and physical bodies he may permit little troubles to annoy him. This ought not to be so; but still there is a great gap between the higher life and that lived in the physical body, where small things can still be very irritating. The possibility of being momentarily annoyed 1 Ante., Vol. II, p. 67.

126

by something on the physical plane remains even when a very high level has been reached, but it is then merely superficial. The things from which people really suffer in this world are those which they feel to be hopeless. No one can ever have any feeling of hopelessness after he has touched that higher consciousness, because when we are absolutely certain that the reality is always joy, we know that all suffering at lower levels is only temporary, and that even that would not come to us if we were nearer to perfection.

The power of identification is gained not only with regard to the consciousness of people but with regard to everything else on the buddhic plane. Everything is learnt from the inside instead of from the outside. If we wish to study any subject, any organism, the working of any law of nature—it does not matter what—up to and including the consciousness of the causal body we have to study it from without, looking out at it. In the causal body we are able to examine it with an enormously widened consciousness, with the power of knowing vastly more about it than we could possibly know on lower planes. But when we get to the buddhic plane the difference is a fundamental difference. That which we are examining has become part of ourselves. We examine it as a kind of symptom in ourselves. It is difficult to put into words because down here we have nothing exactly like it, but this looking at things from within instead of from without does give one a very great advantage. It is so different in its characteristics that we are probably justified in saying that that is the

127

first glimpse we get of the way in which the Deity looks at His universe, because He must have exactly that experience—that that at which he looks must be part of Himself because there is nothing which is not part of Him. Therefore His consciousness must be this buddhic consciousness raised to the nth power, and with all the insight and glory and splendour of which we can have no idea on any plane as yet. One can understand very clearly why that world is spoken of as the real, and all these lower ones as the unreal, because the difference is so great and the attitude is so entirely changed that any other way of looking at things does seem unreal, even ridiculous when once one has learned to see them from the inside.

It is not so utterly impossible as many students think to attain to that higher sight. A reasonable number of people have succeeded in this incarnation, here and now, in gaining it. It is certainly within reach of those who will try hard enough, if they are willing to follow the rules—willing to adopt the utter selflessness which is required, because so long as there is anything personal in the disciple's point of view he cannot make any progress with this buddhic consciousness, which depends on the suppression of the personality.

The idea of separateness shows itself in certain ways in daily life, and it is well to watch against those manifestations. One way in which people show it very much is by their desire for power over other separated selves. One half of the world is everlastingly trying to interfere with the other half. This habit is so ingrained in us that

128

we do not notice it; we usually regard it in the light of good advice. About one case in two thousand may happen to be that, but in most of the others we are simply asserting our separated self by endeavouring to impress ourselves upon the other people.

Physically, we try to make other people do things our way and to give way to us; we are perpetually trying to get them to adopt our particular plan, whatever it may be.    Because it is ours it is the best plan in the world and we want to force it upon every one else.  We find the same thing at the intellectual level.   People try constantly to force their opinions and their ideas upon others.    When a man has developed a keen intellect he begins subtly, slowly, to want to dominate other people by means of that intellect.   Just because his thought becomes keener and stronger than that of others he tries to mould their thought by his.    It is well and good that we should want to share with others all that we know; that we should set before them what we have found so good for ourselves.    But as a rule that is not the idea which exists behind this desire to dominate other minds. It usually co-exists with a certain amount of contempt for the other people.    We think:   " These people are like sheep; we can sweep them along; we can make them think what we like."    It is to a large extent true that a man who  has learned  to   think,  as we should  be learning by meditation and study, can dominate the thoughts of others very easily; but we should not do it, because anything like domination is bad for the other man's evolution and not good for our own.  So even this

129

desire for intellectual domination must be resisted.    It is part of the vice of separateness.

When we have got rid of that there is still a higher possibility along that line—in the realm of the spiritual we may also try to make people take our path. That is at the back of all endeavour to convert people from one religion to another. It is perhaps not quite fair to put it in that way, because Christianity at least starts with the gigantic delusion that unless people believe its particular shibboleths they will have a very unpleasant hereafter, therefore its attempt to convert others comes to have the colour of altruism. It assumes: " Orthodoxy is my doxy and heterodoxy is your doxy," and: " What I believe is true and you must come into line with it." When we have developed spirituality, when we have learned many things that others do not know, it is right and proper that we should preach our gospel, that we should wish to tell others what we have found and give them every opportunity to follow us into these realms of higher thought; but if that wish is tinged with a desire to dominate them—a desire that is often found along with many good qualities—there is still a touch of the old separated self about it, and the " giant weed " is not finally uprooted.

We must also get rid entirely of the wish to dominate others because so long as a man is working for the separated self he belongs to that great mass of separated selves which is such a terrible burden in evolution. The moment he begins to realize the unity, he ceases to be

130

part of the weight which has to be lifted and begins to be one of the lifters.

To stand alone and isolated means that one must not be dependent on anyone outside oneself, because no separated person or thing can really ultimately be of use to us. Help must be found within ourselves. The Master can help us all the time in our efforts, but even he cannot do the actual work for us. He is constantly suggesting things to us, pouring help into us in every way, but at every step it is we ourselves who must do the work. As we go on we must learn to stand apparently entirely alone, without the Master's direct help, but that is an illusion because no one can ever really be separated from the Master, or from the Deity of whom that Master is a part. Still, we must act as though we were alone, and at certain stages in our evolution we shall feel absolutely alone; yet if we can bring the intellect to bear upon it, though it is a difficult matter under such circumstances, we at once recognize that we never can be really alone. We are part of God and cannot cease to be so, because if we did we should altogether cease to be, we should be unconscious.

We are part of something which can never cease to be, and therefore the idea of loneliness is an illusion, though it causes great pain and suffering. On the physical plane a man is often least alone when he thinks himself most alone; when he is in the midst of a crowd the higher things can touch him less easily, therefore he is more separated from them. But when these separated selves are not so close around him the influences of the

131

non-separated Self can play upon him much more fully, and so it is really true to say that the man is least of all alone when he thinks or feels himself most alone.

It is hardly possible to form any conception of the awful feeling of being absolutely alone in the universe— a point floating in space. That is the condition called avichi, which means " the waveless state ". It is a condition of consciousness in which a man appears to himself to stand outside the vibrations of the Divine Life, and is said to be the most terrible experience that can come to a man. That is the end of the black magician, who for many lives has striven definitely and determinedly for separateness, who has directly set himself against the unifying forces of evolution. The pupil of the Master must learn to sympathize even with the black magician who suffers from avouch; therefore once in his development a man must experience that state of consciousness. He touches it only for a moment but he can never forget it, and henceforth he will always be able to understand the suffering of those who remain for ages in such a condition as that. When for us that moment comes, we should remember that whatever is, is God, and that we cannot be separated from Him even though we feel that we are—we must realize that it is a final illusion which must be conquered.

We all have to stand alone and isolated because each of us must learn to depend upon himself and to realize that he is God, that the divine spark in him is in truth part of the All. Until we can do that we are not entirely reliable for the higher phases of the Master's work. In

132            

the meantime, for all our ordinary work in life, whether physical, astral or mental, the knowledge that the Master envelops us and is close behind us all the time is a very great strength and comfort. We do our regular work each night on the astral or mental plane, as the case may be, and in doing it we know always that the power of the Master protects us. If at any moment we encounter something enormously stronger than ourselves which threatens to overwhelm us, just as on the physical plane a great storm or earthquake might do, we always know that we can draw indefinitely, infinitely, on his power. Even that the disciple must learn to do without, when the time comes, but only in order that he may become as strong a centre as the Master himself.

Do not fancy you can stand aside from the bad man or the foolish man. They are yourself, though in a less degree than your friend or your Master. But if you allow the idea of separateness from any evil thing or person to grow up within you, by so doing you create karma, which will bind you to that thing or person till your soul recognizes that it cannot be isolated.

C.W.L.—This is the first part of a long note by the Master Hilarion. Of course we all hold in theory that humanity is a mighty brotherhood and is really a unity. The Master here admits that there are degrees in this unity, and that there are therefore degrees of separate-ness, that we are to some extent more separated from the bad and the foolish than we are from our friend or

                               133

our Master. The idea of the brotherhood of man is often twisted to imply the equality of man, which it really cannot mean. In any family of many brothers there must be considerable differences of age among them, and there must similarly be differences of soul age among these members of the greater human brotherhood. Again, just as in the physical family it is the business of the elder to help and train the younger, so in the family of humanity must the elder protect the younger and help them in any way they can. Brotherhood implies variety; it requires this difference of age, and also that many people shall be doing different kinds of work.

One of the finest symbols of brotherhood that I have come across was a vision of one of our members of an Eastern temple supported by many hundreds of pillars. He said: " All these pillars are helping to support the temple, and they are therefore symbols of individual souls who form a part of the temple of humanity. Some of these pillars are on the outside, are seen and admired all the time. They also face the sunshine and the rain. Others are far away in the interior of the forest of pillars, never having the sun shining directly upon them at all, never being admired by people as they pass. Some of these pillars are in places where the worshippers gather round and sit leaning against the plinth of the pillar all day long. Other pillars are in less approachable places, but each one is an integral part of the temple and is doing its work. That is like the brotherhood of humanity. Some people may feel that they are doing a great deal; others may never know of a single opportunity of

134

help that comes to them, and yet they are all bearing their part and are just as much pillars in the temple as those which are more prominent in the public eye."

Many of our students are eager to claim unity with the Master and the saints, and not so anxious to claim unity with the criminal, the drunkard, the inefficient, the sensual, the cruel. But since humanity is one, we must be one with the less evolved people as well as with the greater; in the one case there is a part of ourselves towards which we must reach up, but in the other case there is a part of humanity which we must try to help. How can we help them ? First of all by thinking in the right way about them. If we shrink from them with horror, if we hate them, we are making their path more difficult. If we allow the natural and justifiable feeling with regard to the evil that is being done to influence our attitude towards the person who does it, we are making an error. It is scarcely possible to avoid that sometimes, but we can always to some extent reason ourselves out of it.

Doctors meet with cases of the most loathsome and horrible diseases—-which in many an instance the man concerned has brought entirely upon himself. But no doctor who is really earnest in his work thinks of that when the patient is before him. He does not shrink from the man with horror, but regards the disease as an enemy that has to be fought and conquered. That is a very good example of the attitude that we ought to be able to adopt when we have to deal with a degraded person. Undoubtedly the probabilities are that we could

135

not produce very much effect upon an absolutely degraded drunkard, whose will is almost gone; but to shrink from him in horror or to feel contempt is not the way to help him. In the same way when a man commits a terrible crime we may have the greatest possible horror of the crime, but not of the criminal. It is difficult for us to separate them, but we have to do it.

There is another curious little point about that. The things which horrify us most are those to which we have a certain leaning ourselves—from which we are conceivably in danger. When one is absolutely free from the slightest tendency towards a particular crime one looks down on it without horror; but if one feels oneself filled with horror at a particular human failing, he may take it that it is a fault which has been a real danger to himself not long ago—perhaps a life or two back.

When we go among evil influences we sometimes have to surround ourselves with a shell in order to keep them off. That is often the best policy, since we are still very human; but to have to do that is to a certain extent a confession of weakness.1 The absolutely strong man walks straight into the middle of all these perils, certain that they cannot affect him, but that would not be a wise thing for all of us to do. Our force is limited and by making a shell we can save ourselves from using up a certain amount of it unnecessarily. A man who is perfectly sure of his own power can walk unharmed among all sorts of dangers, because he is sure of himself. Perfect strength destroys all shrinking. We draw back

1 Ante., Vol. I, Part V, Ch. 6: Service.

136

from a case of infectious disease because we are afraid we may catch it; if we were certain we were immune from that disease the idea of catching it would not occur to us.

The idea that we must not think of ourselves as separate from the wicked or the foolish man does not necessarily imply that we must always be in close association with such people, though contact is sometimes useful. There are many good people who endeavour, in a great city like London, for example, to help the poor by going to live among them in the slums. Some of our students hold the opinion that that is also our duty with regard to the wicked and the foolish people. That is not always the best way to help them. We may learn from the Masters' conduct in that respect. The Great Ones do not come down and live in the slums of our great cities. Why do they not do so? For one reason, They would be unable to carry on their work for humanity. It would take nearly all the time of the Master to clear a place where he could work at all, and the amount of work done would be reduced to perhaps one hundredth part of what it would otherwise be.

So with us; it is not in the least necessary that we should put ourselves into the worst conditions. On the contrary we can often help more effectively by not hampering ourselves in that way. If a man finds himself in a peculiarly unpleasant crowd, perhaps filled with some savage feeling or outburst of passion, he can throw a shell round himself and so protect himself from the evil influence, but he cannot do very much with that

10

RULES   5   TO   8                               137

crowd while he is occupied in doing that. On the other hand, if he were away from it he would be able to pour more force upon it. Even then, if a crowd of undeveloped men is under sway of some crude passion, very little can be done with it from higher planes, because the force poured out could hardly affect it while it was in that state. Therefore we need not enter evil surroundings unless we see clearly that we can do definite good there, although we must do the best we can if we find ourselves in such an environment. I have heard, for example, of preachers who have gone into drinking saloons and started a religious service, and there have been cases where such a bold move as that was actually successful. There would, of course, be many occasions when such a procedure would end in a fiasco. In these things, as in war, a very bold and apparently rash move may occasionally turn out well, but usually more can be accomplished by working in a reasonable way.

Remember that the sin and shame of the world are your sin and shame; for you are a part of it; your karma is inextricably interwoven with the great Karma.

We do not realize that down here, but on reaching the buddhic plane we see that it represents a real truth. There we feel: " I am part of that which humanity cannot avoid; something exists in it which is a shame to me" and we feel it so because we as part of humanity have caused it. On the other hand we have our share in every good that has been done. When one man has

138

taken a step forward we feel it as a triumph for all; through him all humanity has come a little nearer to its goal.

And before you can attain knowledge you must hare passed through all places, foul and clean alike. Therefore, remember that the soiled garment you shrink from touching may have been yours yesterday, may be yours tomorrow. And if you turn with horror from it, when it is flung upon your shoulders, it will cling the more closely to you. The self-righteous man makes for himself a bed of mire. Abstain because it is right to abstain, not that yourself shall be kept clean.

This passage, with which the Master Hilarion's note concludes, has often been misunderstood; some people have interpreted it to mean that each individual at some time must have committed all possible sins. It does not mean that, because the wise man does learn something from the experience of others. When we have seen a person burnt by putting his hand in the fire we need not put our own hand into it also before we are sure it is not a good thing to do.' So we need not commit all possible crimes in order to make up our minds about them. We have all at some stage of evolution risen from a primitive human condition and have passed through the various stages of life between that and our present condition, but there is no reason to assume that we did badly in each stage. There is some reason to suppose that most of us

1 Ante., Vol. II, pp. 106.

139

in the course of our long series of lives have sampled the different types of mistakes which it is possible for a human being to make, but we certainly did not go through every detail. When one form of a particular evil is touched, that, I think, stands to the wise soul as experience of a wide range of similar mistakes.'

Then there is another consideration. Every man when he reaches the buddhic consciousness looks out through that and experiences all that others experience. We think of the glory and the wonder of the buddhic consciousness because it brings us into union with the Masters. We must not forget that it also brings us into harmony with the vicious and the criminal. Their feelings must be experienced, as well as the glory and the splendour of the higher life. So when we are able to touch the buddhic plane we may gain experience of the lower and more unpleasant aspects of life by entering into the consciousness of the people who are going through those particular phases. We do not require to do this as a lesson, because we already know by the hypothesis that these are things which are impossible for us. But we must have sufficient experience to be perfectly sympathetic, or we cannot give help to others. The perfectly sympathetic person knows intuitively the difficulties and temptations of others, and so is full of love even for the erring one. By sympathy he makes the " soiled garment " his own. When we have finally abandoned separateness and realized unity we shall find that we are merged in the divine Life, and that the attitude of love is the only

1 Ante., Vol. II, p. 106.

140

one which we can adopt towards any of our fellow-men, whether they be higher or low.

6.   Kill out desire for sensation.

Learn from sensation and observe it, because only so can you commence the science of self-knowledge, and plant your foot on the first step of the ladder.

A.B.—The disciple must observe the working of sensation in himself, so that he may gain some self-knowledge from it. He can attain to such knowledge only by the deliberate study of his own thoughts. The first effect of trying to study your -own thoughts is to stand away from them, to separate them from yourself. The very fact of your studying them has drawn your life away from them, so as to destroy for the time being the identification of yourself with your thoughts which habitually exists. A man does not identify himself with the object of his study, with the thing at which he is looking. It is a saying among the followers of Shankaracharya that subject and object can never be the same. So the very effort of study weakens the forms and in that mere act you are gaining freedom.

Closely allied to this advice is the instruction to test experiences, the object being that the man may experience the condition of being no longer affected by them. When a man is observing his own sensation, in order to learn from it, he may experience that sensation, but at the same time he may do with it something higher—he may measure this force without yeilding to it. There

141

will come times too, when the disciple who is practising this observation of sensations will find that dormant sensations in himself are being re-awakened.

All of us have reminiscences of the past, which may be said to hang about us as our dead selves, and are liable to be revivified from outside. They may come to life again by contact with other men's thought-forms along the same lines, or they may be awakened by the deliberate action of some power which is working for our purification, or is testing us either from the dark or the white side. Suppose a man has that dead self vivified; he will then feel what is usually called the force of temptation. The disciple, having studied the way in which these things work, recognizes what has happened; he measures the power of the resuscitated thought and says to it: '' You are not my living Self; you are merely my ' I ' of the past—so get away from me."

Sometimes in a moment of temptation it is helpful to recognize that it is merely your past that has been revivified, and then you are right to say: " This is not I." Then you look on it as outside yourself, as no part of your being or activity, and you know that it cannot hold you or stain you.1 The patient confidence that arises from this knowledge has a great element of strength in it. You know that you are drawing nearer the time when you will not even feel this temptation. Presently it will not have the power to affect you at all.

In the deliberate process of weighing, measuring, and observing his own past feelings and thoughts, the disciple

1 Ante., Vol. II, p. 154, 315.

142

is killing the very last possibility of life in that dead self. The Voice of the Silence means this, when it says with regard to desire: " Take heed lest from the dead it should again arise." The old feelings and thoughts are done with, not when they are merely buried out of sight, but when the very last fragment of them is worked out to the end, when the man looks at them and sees with perfect clearness just what they are and that they are no part of himself. In this quiet study he then kills them beyond all possibility of recall to life.

C.W.L.—We have first to learn to observe the working of sensation in ourselves from outside. So long as We are being swept away by it we cannot learn anything from it, because we are then slaves to it, but if we can rise and look down upon it, and think of it as something belonging to our past we are then in a position to observe and study it.

Waves of sensation are flowing all over the world and we have to learn to understand them so as to be able to help others, but of course we can do that only when we are no longer swayed by them. Doubtless it is largely a matter of temperament, but for many it is one of the greatest difficulties that sensations and emotions swirl about them, and as yet they do not understand fully how to control them. It is like standing in the breakers and trying to master them. A man cannot govern a thing which knocks him over again and again and sweeps him away; but people do not realize that emotion is really not an external force like that, but that it is within

143

oneself and may be brought perfectly within one's control if one understands how to do it.

The way is to get a firm grip on it in the very beginning. A wave of anger, depression, jealousy, or any of these passions will start in a moment and grow rapidly into a very big thing. It comes up so suddenly and people are so accustomed to regard it as the self that they do not for the moment recognize it, and so do not at once pull up and stop it, and say: " This is not I; I decline to be swept away; I stand firm." If we remember to do that in time the emotion disappears promptly. Most people make the resolve not to be overcome when they are quite calm, but unfortunately when the wave of sensation arrives with' a rush upon them they do not at the moment want to resist it. The soul inside is not immediately awake to the danger, so it allows itself to be swept away and to be identified with the emotion or sensation. We must therefore learn to catch it exactly at the moment of its coming, for if we let that slip it is a very difficult matter, when the sensation is in full blast, to check it suddenly, though sometimes another person can do it for us. Afterwards, when we remember, we regret it. The practical thing to do is to try to control the sensation each time a little sooner, and if we can suppress it once before it gets into its swing, the probability is that we shall be able to do so invariably after that.

It is difficult at first only because the man as a Self has abdicated his rights on so many previous occasions that he has got out of the habit of asserting them. But

144

if he will once assert them at the critical moment he will find that he can do it again and again, because the elemental that is the cause of the difficulty will begin to be afraid, will begin to realize that he cannot sweep everything before him. At first he is quite confident, like a dog that rushes at a man, barking and snarling because he thinks him to be afraid; but if the man does not turn and run away the dog hesitates and begins to be a little doubtful about the enterprise. The elemental has not the intelligence of a dog. He may or may not know that we are stronger than he, but if he does not, it is only because we have not asserted ourselves. We should let him know that we are his master; when once he feels that, he will hesitate at the very beginning to start his wave. Check him at the beginning, and there will be no further trouble.

We have to learn from sensation by observing it in others also. In this way we come to understand human nature. We can see how other people make fools of themselves under the influence of emotion, and seeing how bad it looks in them, and how much harm it obviously does them, we learn to repress any touch of the same thing in ourselves. It is naturally much easier to see things in others than in ourselves, when we are standing outside as spectators. We should not, however, look at other people in order to criticize them and pick out their faults, but only to see what we can learn from them. When we see them distinctly not living up to their best and highest, because of some passion or emotion or some feeling of repugnance, we

145

can make a mental note of that, without feeling in the least that we are better than they, and we can think: " Might not the same thing have happened to me? Let me see that it shall not happen." Thus without getting into the habit of criticizing, which is always bad, we can learn from the mistakes of other people. When we see another person come to grief, however sorry we may be for him, there can be no harm in thinking: " Let me not fall over the precipice too; it is enough that one person has done so."

Great waves of sensation flooded the world during the war. Among them was a tremendous amount of repugnance and hatred against the powers with whom we happened to be at war. I am not in the least meaning to defend the atrocities committed by those powers. I know that they occurred, because I have myself, astrally, seen a very great deal of them, that filled me with shame for humanity. I do not for a moment wish to deny those facts, to gloss them over, or to excuse them. But there was also great danger and harm in the strong rush of feeling against those who committed the crimes. The people responsible for the atrocities were those who committed them, and the individuals by whose orders they were done—not the whole nation. Assuredly a great many things were done by Englishmen in the past with which we should not like to identify ourselves —and that has been the same in every nation. We must not let ourselves be carried away into injustice in thought any more than into injustice of speech or of action.

146

Our enemies intentionally went to work deliberately to stir up hatred against us. That may, perhaps, have been effective for the time, as one of the tricks of the campaign. They may have found that it paid in getting recruits and money, and so on; but it was a serious moral mistake. By it they put themselves quite con-clusively in the wrong, as far as all higher aspects of the matter were concerned. But there is danger in such a case lest we should feel hatred too. One has to be absolutely determined in the fight against evil, to carry it through to the uttermost, and yet be entirely free from anything like a thought of hatred. Remember how the Lord Buddha said: " Hatred never ceaseth by hatred." On the contrary, it is always stirred up by it.

When one hears of terrible atrocities perpetrated upon women and children, one cannot but feel intense indignation. There is no harm in feeling indignant against such evil-doing. It is a terrible thing, and all right-minded people will and should denounce it decidedly, without any sort of palliation or excuse; but it would be a great mistake to hate the unfortunate man who commits the crimes. He is to be pitied much more than blamed. It is not our business to blame him, but it is our duty to make it impossible for him to do these things again. Our attitude should be that which a man would take towards some wild beast that is attacking his children. He would not dignify it by hating it, but he would put it out of the way. We should be exceedingly sorry for the unfortunate people who did such things, because we see what the karma of it must be.

147

It is a terrible thing that women and children should be massacred, more terrible, perhaps, for the relations than for the victims themselves, but it is worst of all for those who commit the crime; it is they who are most to be pitied, because their suffering in the end will be very far more terrible.

As far as lies in our power we will take steps to prevent what has been done from being done again, but we must have no sense of hatred. It is a case of noblesse oblige. We stand quite infinitely above the sort of person who does that kind of thing; we are ages past him in evolution and development; we stand as far removed from him as he stands from the animal kingdom, and since that is so we ought to show our higher development by not sharing that passion of hatred.

We can study the effects of sensation only if we dissociate ourselves from it, if we stand outside and try to control the feeling and to learn from it. We must not be swept away in any such maelstrom of popular feeling, but we must try to see where it is wrong, and do what we can to put it right. Many people, who are under the influence of that sensation of tremendous passion, think of us as rather apathetic, and cold; it is even possible that they sometimes think of us as lacking in patriotism if we refuse to hate. Of course that is not logical, but then people are not logical when under the influence of these great waves of hatred. We can explain to them that patriotism does not call on one to hate other countries, but they sometimes do not see that we can love our own country without being obliged to hate another.

148

Our attitude towards these things is very much that which we should take towards the troubles of little children. A child breaks a doll and is in a tempest of tears and a passion of regret over it; we do all we can to sympathize with that child, but we are quite philosophical, we do not share the passion of regret. We are not in despair because a doll is broken or because this or that small matter may have happened in the school-life of the child. We realize that there is a future, and that as compared to that future all these little matters are only temporary and not of great importance, although they are tremendously so to the child. We should be failing in our duty if we did not give the sympathy, but we should be foolish if we felt as much as that child felt—we should ourselves be acting in a childish manner.

It is exactly the same with the man who is learning to adopt a philosophical attitude. He sympathizes with the people who are so passionately upset over these things, but he himself is not disturbed. Just as one says to the child: " Oh, well, never mind, it will be all right by and by," so we should like to say to those who are surging under these emotions: " If you would only believe it, everything will come right and all will go well." If we say that, we are considered unsympathetic, but it is absolutely true. We often find it difficult to avoid wonder as to how people can be so blind, We see them surging wildly about things that do not matter in the least. They are often people with splendid possibilities, but they do not see them, and they allow themselves to be overwhelmed by mad surges of desire. We

149

did. the same thing ourselves thousands of years ago, perhaps. Therefore we learn to be patient, understanding that it is a stage in evolution, though a very undesirable stage. So those of us who are still in danger of yielding to emotions of that sort must pull ourselves up and say: "Twenty lives ago this was perhaps excusable, but now, the time for it is past." If in every-day life we see a man of mature age throwing away all his time in pleasure we know that that may have been all very well twenty years ago, but now he ought to be thinking about the more serious things of life. In the same way we ought to have risen to a level where our emotions are the higher emotions, where we have the one great idea of the work that God wills us to do.

7.   Kill oat the hunger for growth.

Grow as the flower grows, unconsciously, but eagerly anxious to open its soul to the air. So must you press forward to open your soul to the Eternal. But it must be the Eternal that draws forth your strength and beauty, not desire of growth. For in the one case you develop in the luxuriance of purity; in the other you harden by the forcible passion for personal stature.

A.B.—In the later stage of growth the disciple will feel himself opening out into the Eternal and realizing its beauty more and more. The wish to grow that he may be greater than his brother then becomes impossible for him. Before that stage is reached he is still in danger, because of the greatness of what he has

150

already achieved. If he thinks of his growth as belonging to the separated self, and feels that he is himself becoming great, he is likely to fall. The only way to avoid that danger is to get rid of the wish to be great, to yield not to the desire for growth for one's own sake. For when he is on the higher plane of human growth the disciple must be indifferent as to whether he grows or not, but must care only for the divine Life and the divine Will, and think only of the joy that that can bring to all who welcome it into their lives.

C.W.L.—We are to grow as the flower grows. Why? Because the flower grows unselfishly, absolutely altruistically. It grows not to display itself, but in order that its race may become greater by its death. It exists not for the sake of obtaining fruit for itself, because the fruit does not come until the flower is dead. Its entire growth is not for itself, but for other plants yet to come. So it is not by thinking of ourselves, but by striving for the good of others that we must press forward. The one great idea—that of helping in the work of the Logos—must draw us on. We must work for the attainment of all virtues and powers simply in order that we may be of more use in His service; by forgetting ourselves in unselfish work we grow as part of the whole and so " develop in the luxuriance of purity ".

CHAPTER 6 RULES 9 TO 12

C.W.L.—As far as we have gone in this book we have had the negative side of things before us. We have been told to kill out certain desires, but now we come to the positive side and learn what we may, and indeed must, desire. It may strike us as curious that we should be told to desire anything. Those who have studied the Indian books will remember that this is a point on which even the Upanishads differ. One Upani-shad deprecates desire of all kinds; it argues that even to desire the right must be avoided, because we must be absolutely without any preference for this or for that. Another of those great scriptures directs that we must have the desire for progress, and says that when all other desires are conquered but the desire for the growth of the soul then there is for a man no more possibility of grief. We can reconcile those two statements if we take the first one to mean that if we have the desire to cooperate in even the higher work of the world as a separate self, thinking of ourselves and of the great things we can do, there is still a tinge of the idea of separation; but if we are able to think of ourselves as a part of humanity

152

and as earning our advance on behalf of the humanity of which we are a part, and there is no longer any thought of self, then we have raised and purified our desire into an aspiration which is altogether desirable.

9.   Desire only that which is within you.

For within yon is the light of the world—the only light that can be shed upon the Path. If you are unable to perceive it within you, it is useless to look for it elsewhere.

The thought expressed in this comment is common to all religions, though they put it in different ways. We get it in Christianity, but as a rule only the Christian mystics seem to have understood it. We have it in the beautiful verse:

Though Christ a thousand times in Bethlehem be born, But not within thyself, thy soul shall be forlorn; And on the cross of Calvary He hangeth but in vain, Unless within thy heart it be set up again.

It is easy to see what that means. If a man does not believe in his own inherent divinity there is no hope of progress for him, because he would then have nothing within him on which he could work; nothing within which would lift him to anything higher; but if he knows that there is within him the wonderful Christ principle, then he recognizes that to unfold that divinity is only a question of time, and that his share in the work is to bring his outer vehicles into harmony, so that this inner glory may shine through. That is the meaning of the words: " Christ in you the hope of glory." The hope that we have within us is this divine spark; the man

153

who refuses to believe he has that within him places an insuperable obstacle in his own path, until he realizes his mistake.

It is indeed true that salvation can be gained only through the Christ—not a man who lived and died, but the Christ principle within us.1 Within us is our saviour. This is the true Christian doctrine, in support of which we might quote many texts. All the ways in which the modern presentation of Christianity has—if one may put it so—gone wrong and made itself ridiculous, arise from the misunderstanding of that great idea. It should always be remembered that Christianity started with the beautiful Gnostic philosophy, but the ignorant among its followers refused to include in their scheme of religion anything which was beyond their comprehension, or anything which took years of study to learn. So they cast out the great Gnostic doctors as heretics. They applied to religion that unwise method of coming to a decision, the majority vote, with dire results.

Originally Christianity had a most beautiful statement of philosophy—the one philosophy that lies behind all religions. When the Gospel story, which was meant as an allegory, was degraded into a pseudo-historical account of the life of a man the religion became incomprehensible. Consequently all the texts which really refer to this higher side of things have been distorted, and of course, they will not fit in with the truth which lies behind the idea. Because Christianity has forgotten much of its own original teaching, in these days it is

1 Ante., Vol. I, Part I, Ch.. 4: The Preliminary Prayer.

154

customary to deny that it could ever have possessed any esoteric teaching. There is, however, sufficient evidence to convince the unprejudiced student that this higher knowledge did exist and was well known to the apostles and Church fathers. I cannot go fully into that at present; suffice it to remind the reader that Origen, the greatest of the Church fathers, asserts the existence of this secret teaching. He draws a distinction between " popular irrational faith " which leads to what he calls "somatic Christianity," and the "spiritual Christianity." By " somatic Christianity " he means that faith which is based on the Gospel history, and adds that it is a very good teaching for the masses, but that the spiritual Christian has the Gnosis, and therefore understands that all the incidents related therein—the birth, the baptism, the illumination, the crucifixion, the resurrection, and the ascension—happened not once only in one place, but are steps in the spiritual life of every Christian man as he progresses.1

Modern orthodoxy still bases its beliefs on the ignorant faith of the undeveloped multitude, and persists in disowning what now remains of its once magnificent heritage, in the shape of a few priceless fragments of the Gnostic teaching. Having lost the higher interpretation it makes a desperate effort to present the lower one in a comprehensible form, but that cannot be done. Students of Theosophy have the knowledge which enables them to interpret all these strange doctrines, and to see sense and beauty even in

1 See ante., Vol. I, Part V, Ch. 5: Superstition.

155

the crude utterances of the street preacher, because they understand what he would mean if only he knew a little more about his subject.

So what we are to desire is that which is within ourselves all the time; we shall not find it elsewhere. This very same idea was presented to us long ages ago in ancient Egypt. There they centred all their ideas of religion in " the hidden light " and "the hidden work ".l " The hidden light " was the Light that is in every man, and " the hidden work " was that which would enable him to manifest it, to bring it out in himself and then to help its development in others. That was the cardinal point of their creed—that the Light is there, however much it may be overlaid: and however hopeless it may appear, our work is to withdraw the veils and let the Light shine forth.

People often make the mistake of looking for it elsewhere. They say: " We want the Masters to help us; we want the Masters to raise us." But I say, with the greatest reverence and respect, the Master cannot do that, the Logos Himself cannot do it. The Master can tell us how we may raise ourselves. The process is exactly analogous to the development of strength in the muscles. No one can do that for another, but if he has the knowledge he can tell how to do it for himself, and that is all the help one can have from outside. Another person can tell us that he followed certain rules and exercises and found that they brought good results. The Master or the advanced pupil can

1 Ante., Vol. I, Part V, Ch. 6: Service.

156

also undoubtedly pour upon us force which makes our work easier, but that is all. It is the same all the way through. If we do not feel within us the power to respond to the beauty and glory of nature, that beauty and glory will pass us by. If we cannot see God within ourselves, it is useless to look for Him outside. When we have realized ourselves as part of Him, then will the God within respond to the God without, and we shall begin to be really useful in His work, which, after all, is our chief object in life.

10.   Desire only that which is beyond you.

It is beyond you, because when yon reach it you have lost yourself.

C.W.L.—That again is a statement which has its parallel in the Christian teaching. Christ Himself says quite plainly: " He that findeth his life shall lose it: and he that loseth his life for my sake shall find it." 1 That happens over and over again at various stages. Consider the man of the world living his ordinary life, which is very largely a life in his emotions—in some cases in quite the lower emotions. As soon as he begins to understand the higher side of things he realizes that there is something higher and nobler than that. But he finds also that unless he is willing to put aside that lower and coarser life, he cannot really grasp the higher; he must lose the lower in order that he may gain the higher.

At the next step the man comes to live in his mind to a large extent. He realizes that to be swept about by

1 S. Matthew, 10, 39.

157

tides of passion is, after all, ignoble, and that the mind should select and dominate the emotions and allow only such as it approves, for the sake of progress. Presently he gets beyond that, and finds that the mind also is not fully satisfactory, but that there is a higher life than that of the mind. So gradually he begins to live in the ego, and to look at everything from that standpoint, which is a very great advance. But eventually even that is not enough for him. He realizes that there is a unity which lies beyond that stage, and so he begins to have some experience of the buddhic plane, and when he touches that nothing below it will ever again satisfy him.

Even that wonderful buddhic consciousness will, in its turn, be transcended. Beyond it is the consciousness of the atmic plane—nirvana. Above and beyond that again is the Monad. Those who are not yet Adepts see the Monad manifesting as a triple spirit on the plane below its own, but on the attainment of Adeptship the Monad and the ego will have become one, and they will be conscious as the Monad- the Divine Spark.

At each of these stages we feel that we have grasped the truth, and entered upon the real life, but presently we realize that there is something still higher, as high again as that was beyond our previous experience. All the way up we have to drop the lower before we can really gain the higher. That is to say, we have to lose the life we know before we can reach the higher life which we hope to attain. At each stage, as we reach it, we find that we have lost the self which we have known

158

previously, because we have transcended it.    We have lost it in finding a higher self.

It is written in the books that we become one with the Logos, merged in Him. Now, that final result we know nothing of, but this much some of us can say from our own personal experience, that many such mergings at different levels take place in the progress of the soul, and in each of them it seems that we become utterly one with the highest which then we can reach, yet never through all that do we lose anything of our true Self. When we rise, let us say, into the buddhic consciousness, and lose the causal body, we have lost the lower life, but that was never more than a very inadequate manifestation of a small part of us. All that we have gained through the. long series of lives is still there. What we have shed is only the outer form in which our various qualities expressed themselves. We have the qualities still, on a higher level, shining forth with greater brilliancy, but the form in which they were cast has gone. Because people so constantly identify the life with the form, to many it seems that should they lose that form there would be nothing left. On the contrary, nothing that has been gained is ever lost.

11.   Desire only that which is unattainable.

It is unattainable, because it for ever recedes. You will enter the light, but you will never touch the Flame.

C.W.L.—This does not mean that the higher life at which we aim is unattainable, but that when we have

159

reached one height we always see another peak beyond. We shall draw ever nearer and nearer to the Divine, becoming one with Him at level after level, but the Flame, His true consciousness, we shall never touch. There are many stages on the way, and they grow more and more indescribable in their beauty as we rise. To whatever height we raise our consciousness, into whatever ineffable glories we can rise, we always see something more glorious still beyond. The Flame ever recedes. So far as any knowledge that we have goes, that chain of increasing glory and beauty is endless. Perhaps it is not much use speculating upon that. The Lord Buddha said long ago that it was profitless to speak of the beginning and the end, because " Veil after veil will lift, but there must be veil after veil behind."

I wish I could bring home to every one, as utterly and as vividly as I myself feel it, this absolute certainty of the progress that lies ahead, of its wonderful glory and beauty and power and wisdom and love, how from step to step it rises and becomes ever more and more indescribable down here, and more and more glorious and beautiful and true above. The road to it lies through unselfishness. Only when we rise out of the lower self into the higher life, into the wider universal Self does the way open, and there is no limit to the glory and the splendour which man may then attain.

CHAPTER 7 RULES 13 TO 16

13.   Desire power ardently.

C. W. L—The comment of the Chohan on this is:

And that power which the disciple shall coret is that which shall make him appear as nothing in the eyes of men.

The power that makes us appear as nothing in the eyes of men is the power of self-effacement in the work —of doing it without wanting any credit for it. Many people want to be in the forefront. That is often regarded as merely a sort of harmless vanity, but it means that they have not yet forgotten the lower self.

The disciple does not seek credit for anything he does; he seeks to get the work done and so long as it is done he cares not at all whether he or somebody else has the credit for having done it. If he has to put himself forward and draw people round him he does so, but not because he wants the credit of it. He knows it is always far better to keep in the background if possible.

It is always best not to think of results at all, but to do the best we can and forget ourselves. All occult teaching leads back to that one fundamental fact—forget

161

the lower self and get to work. Some people are constantly thinking of their own \ progress. It is at least better to think of making spiritual progress than to desire worldly wealth, but it is still selfishness, only in a more refined form. My own experience would lead me to say that the very best way to get on is to forget all about one's own progress and simply devote oneself to the Master's work.1 If one does that the rest will follow. It is the old truth stated in the Gospel: " Seek ye first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness; and all these things shall be added unto you." 2 That is utterly true; these other things come. When we are not looking for progress we suddenly find that we have really made some, and that also is well. When a man first sees what life in the causal body is really like he also realizes how very useful he could be at that level, how many lines there are along which his activity could pour itself out, and he may well be disposed to ask: " Is it not better that I should do this new and splendid work which I see opening before me? " I have myself made a practice of seeking the advice or wish of the Master whenever what seemed to be grand opportunities opened up, and yet there was a possibility that it might be even better still to renounce them. I would say: " Master, what do you wish me to do? " Often his reply would be: " It is a matter for you to decide." Then one can only use one's own best judgment. No rule can be laid down in such cases. I should

1 Ante., Vol. I, Part III, Ch. 2:  The One Good Desire, Vol. II, pp. 360-1.

• S. Matthew, 6, 33.

162

still be disposed to try the higher; but it must be remembered that we are cautioned again and again: " Do not let desire for your own development stand in the way of any useful work that you can do. Your development will come in due course." I have always followed that plan, and I think that it is the safest attitude.

Through the work done in that spirit of self-forgetful-ness we gain the power which shall make us appear as nothing in the eyes of men. Let us, if necessary, welcome humiliation because it all helps to put the personality out of sight and that is what is most needed. When opportunities come, we must take them, but always we should think: " It is not my work; it is the Master's work." It does not matter which of those who follow the Master has the privilege of doing any particular piece of work for him. Our business is to watch that we may lose no opportunity of doing any part of his work.

We should understand that there is nothing small or great in his work, but that anything, however small, done and offered to him is as important in his sight as that which is a far greater achievement in the world's eyes. We are a little apt to want to do what we think is the greater work. That is because we do not see that all parts of the work are equally necessary. Realize for a moment how he must look down upon the whole from his stupendous elevation of wider power and knowledge. All these pieces of work will look very tiny, but all fit into their places.

All the problems of life which seem complex, if not incomprehensible, down here, become far simpler when

163

looked at from a higher plane. The same thing is true of much lower levels. When one examines microscopic creatures such as live in a drop of water one finds complex and beautiful forms of life. The further one goes into these infinitely small matters the more one discovers their amazing complexity. One wonders how even to the Deity Himself these worlds could possibly be a simple thing, and yet they are, for when we look from even such higher points of view as we are able to gain, we can see that it is the permutations and combinations of the seven forces of the One Life which produce all these wonderful results. The factors involved in the production are few and simple; therefore the higher one rises the more one can understand, and that which down here seems impossible to grasp proves quite within reach when viewed from higher levels.

We may reverently and reasonably assume, I think, that the Logos can hold the whole of His system simultaneously in His mind, and without any difficulty see what is being done in every remotest ramification of it. The whole system in all its multiplicity must be immediately self-evident—something one could put down on a sheet of foolscap, as it were. To the Manu and Bodhisattva the work of moulding and guiding the races of men, which seems to us so complex and even confused, must be quite clear and straightforward.

Our business is to serve the Master in our small sphere. The detail is our care, not his. What he wants is that the whole work shall go well, and anything that we can do to make it do so is our share in

164

it. Those who stand nearer to him in thought and have by such association grown somewhat into his attitude in regard to it, are always eager to do anything, however simple, which may seem of use. We can write a little letter, perhaps, which will change the current of a man's life, or we may deliver a lecture and try to change the opinion of some hundreds of people, and not succeed; the little letter is just as real a piece of work. There may be some of us who are so busy that we cannot do anything personally. In that case we are probably earning money, and so perhaps we could give some money to enable others to do that work. There are a great many little ways in which every one can work. It is no use waiting for a big opportunity with the idea that when it comes we shall be ready to take it. We are very much more likely to be ready if we get ourselves into the habit of always doing the little things that we can do now.

A man who works without any regard to his own interests and is always willing to remain in the background is inevitably misunderstood by the world. People understand and admire a man of strong will, who sets out to make a name for himself, to make an impression, and pushes his way to the front. Such a man has succeeded, from their point of view; he has shown the world that he is a strong man. The occultist may be in reality much more forceful, but he would not show his power in that way. He seeks generally to efface himself. He realizes that one of the greatest qualifications is to know when to get out of the way, to know when to let the divine power do its work without spoiling and hindering

165

it by putting himself in the way of ,it. It seems so simple, and yet the fact that there are hundreds of workers who cannot do it shows that it is really a great difficulty.

The man of the world is apt to regard the occultist as a person of no particular will-power, as one who is always ready to give way. So he is, as regards the minor details of life. He lets others have their way in things which do not matter, and is even willing to be managed up to a certain point; but when it comes to a question of principle, he takes a firm stand. He cares nothing about what people say. People who talk and speculate about others are wrong in nine cases out of ten, so what does it matter what they happen to think about us ? As Tennyson says, " Let them rave." Of course, I do not mean that we should utterly ignore all worldly conventions. In the early days some of our members felt that it was right to appear different from other people in the matter of \wearing evening dress, and so on. We need not outrage the customs of society in this way. Moreover, it seems to me that if we wish to recommend our beliefs we must avoid offending the world unnecessarily. It is not good policy to set ourselves violently against other people's ideas. When there comes a point in which no principle is involved we must give way, merely because there is no sense in flying in the face of the usages of the world.

In all matters of principle we must take a firm stand. For example, strict vegetarianism is with us a principle, because we believe it to be best in every way, not only

166

for ourselves but for all the world around us. It is a little inconvenient when we go out to dinner or when we are travelling, but we let such trifling inconveniences pass, and keep to our own point of view. But in a vast number of other things, which really do not matter, it saves trouble to yield to the ordinary customs of the time. As regards our dress—to take another instance. The dress of modern man is peculiarly ugly, uncomfortable and unhealthy, but it saves trouble to adopt it. If we set ourselves against it, however much more rational, aesthetic and beautiful our costume might be, we should attract unwelcome attention, and should probably be regarded as more or less insane. It is not worth while. It is better not to make ourselves unduly conspicuous by opposing things which do not matter. But when a principle is involved we must hold steadily to what we think is right.1

If we could get into an absolutely impersonal attitude about all work it would help us very much. Ruskin speaks of that with regard to art; he says that while self-praise and conceit are vulgar beyond words, undue self-depreciation is only another form of vulgarity. We should aim at the condition of mind in which we are able to view the work from the outside, and to say: " Be it mine or yours, or whose else it may, this also is well." We must be able to praise a good piece of work when we see it, not because it is ours or our friends', or because it bears a great name, but just because it is good, putting aside absolutely the question of who did it. I 1 Ante., Vol. I, Part II, Ch. 3: Right and Wrong.

167

am afraid we do not always do this. Our reason for quoting something is not always because it is fine and beautiful, but because Madame Blavatsky said it or Dr. Besant wrote it.

There is, however, a side to that which is quite right and true. When people meet with a statement about something which they do not know and cannot verify for themselves, it is a matter of importance to them who said it. They may say: " Dr. Besant makes this statement; I have great reason to believe that she knows all about this matter, consequently I accept her statement." After all, that is no more than we do in regard to science. There are many facts in science which we have no means of proving for ourselves, but because certain eminent men have investigated these subjects and have come to certain conclusions we accept them. But when we consider a beautiful ethical statement, it does not matter whether it comes from the Bible or the Bhagavad-Gita, the Koran or the Vedas; we should accept it for its worth. It is then a question of the felicity of the expression and the beauty of the idea.

Just as we accept things, or try to do so, for what they are worth, so we must try to value our own work at what it is worth, and not think that, because we have done it, it must necessarily be well done. Most men who can do anything very well know also the imperfections of their work. When a thing is good we should gladly admit that it is so; when we see faults in our own or in anyone else's work we should not hesitate to say: " I do

168

not agree; I think so-and-so might be better done." It is well to get into the attitude of mind that does not care whence a thing comes if it is a good thing, and also does not hesitate to put aside the evil, even when it comes from oneself.

That is difficult, truly, because when that is perfectly done it means that the man is looking down from the ego upon this lower world. Even the use of the lower mind will give much of that power, although we get it perfectly only in the causal body. The lower mind can exercise discrimination, and if we use it from the higher standpoint and do not allow it to be clouded by personal feeling, it is a very fine and beautiful thing when fully developed. We are rather proud of our intellectual development in this fifth sub-race of the fifth root race, which emphasizes this discriminating work of the lower mind, but what we call intellect is only a very small thing as compared with that which is to develop in the course of the next round, which will be that really devoted to intellect. We are proud of the achievments of the lower mind, and not without a certain amount of reason; it has done wonderful work in science and invention. But only those who are able to look forward into the future and have also seen the Masters, who are men of the future, realize what we shall be perhaps in the course of a few thousands of years. I can bear witness that our highest intellectual activity now is but child's play compared to what it will be in the future, so it is clear that there is a splendid vista opening before us.

169

What the ordinary person calls his mind is exclusively the lowest part of it. In his mind there are four subdivisions, consisting of matter of the seventh, sixth, fifth and fourth sub-planes of the mental plane respectively, but practically he is using matter of the lowest or seventh sub-plane only. That is very near to the astral plane; therefore all his thoughts are coloured by reflections from the astral world, and so they are much mixed with emotion, feelings and desires. Very few people can deal with the sixth sub-plane as yet. Our great scientific men certainly use it a good deal, but unfortunately they often mingle with it the matter of the lowest sub-plane and then they become jealous of other people's discoveries and inventions. If they can rise to the fifth sub-plane they are already getting much more free from the possibility of astral entanglement. If they can raise themselves to the fourth sub-plane, which is the highest part of the mental body, they are then in the very middle of the mental plane, and next to them is the causal body. They are then far away from the possibility of having their thoughts affected by astral vibrations.

We can understand how these things work. A vibration is most easily received by that which is in tune with it. If a man feels very angry he is liable to stir up the emotion of anger in the astral bodies of other people around him. That will also disturb their lower thought; but it will not affect their higher thought, if they have any—most people have not as yet. One of the things we as students are trying to do in our thought and meditation is to awaken the higher parts of the mental body

170

and bring them into working order. Those who meditate regularly on the Masters and on the things connected with them, must be using the higher part of the mental body to some extent, and the more it is used, the more will our thought be unaffected by desires, passions and emotions. But since most people do not get so far as that, the great mass of thought in the world is very much coloured by desire, and most thought-forms that we see are loaded with astral as well as with mental matter.

We all live much too close together, with the consequence that even while other people may not be thinking of us they affect us. Of course we in turn affect them, and we should always definitely try to affect them for good. If we set ourselves to be a centre of uttermost peace and love we shall very greatly help all those around us, but while we are centres of desire and emotion and selfish feeling we make development impossible not only for ourselves but for all those near to us, and that is a very serious matter. Every aspirant ought to take to heart the fact that he is preventing the progress of others if he gives way to this personal desire.

The power of self-effacement is impossible of attainment until we have utterly weeded out all personal desire. We talk of our devotion to our work and to the Masters; surely that is not too much to do for their sake. Even if a very great effort is necessary we ought to be willing to make it for the sake of these Great Ones who have done so much for us, through whom all the Theosophical teaching has come to us. It is not a question of affording them gratification by doing these things—though surely

171

they cannot but be pleased to see the progress of those whom They are trying to help—but it is also common sense. If we want to help in evolution, the first and most necessary thing to do is to take ourselves in hand. We must gain that control over the lower self which makes us appear as nothing in the eyes of men. Be it so; many of the great forces are working unseen. We may be among those forces, as such we can afford to appear insignificant in the sight of the world.

14.   Desire peace fervently.

The peace you shall desire is that sacred peace which nothing can disturb, and in which the soul grows as does the holy flower upon the still lagoons.

C.W.L.—This short aphorism is closely connected with the foregoing one. The power which we are told to desire leads to peace; unless we have power over self we can have no peace.

Only when we have gained peace can we give it to others; to be able to do that is surely one of the greatest and most beautiful of powers. Most people's lives are full of worry and anxiety, of jealousy and envy. All the time they are just a swirl not only of emotions, but also of unsatisfied desires. Many of those who take up the study of occultism, that is the study of the reality which lies behind, still expect to be able to go on living that kind of life. Even some of those who are supposed to have been students of occultism for years, and are trying to draw nearer to the Masters, apparently cannot yet give

172

up their desires. They make no serious attempt to get rid of all their foolish and disturbing emotions, and then they wonder why they do not make progress and why others seem to pass on in front of them. How can they expect to advance until they have left all these things behind them? Until we are quite free from such disturbances it is absolutely impossible to make any real higher progress. If we want to set up communications with the Master, we must have perfect peace within.

It is said that struggle is a necessity for progress. It is certainly true that there is a long stage in the evolution of the soul when it is in a constant state of struggle and strife. On looking back into the past we can see that progress was then more rapid in a life of storm and stress than when the conditions were easier. In that rough-hewing of the character all the troubles and difficulties which men encounter and the opposition which comes in their way no doubt teach them something; they learn their lessons from them. But at the higher stage at which the disciple has arrived that state of struggle is no longer of value. For growth of the higher kind, perfect peace is necessary. A Master once wrote: " The law of the survival of the fittest is the law for the evolution of the brute; but the law of sacrifice is the law of the evolution of man." Many people think they will get peace when their mad desires are satisfied, but they find by experience that it is not so. They then begin to think what a sad thing it is that they have yielded to them, and they realize that they ought to have risen above them. There is no peace to be gained by the satisfaction

173

of desire. Peace is to be attained in one way only: by putting aside the lower desires and developing the power which makes us " as nothing in the eyes of men."

It is said here that the holy flower grows upon the still lagoons. It is only in still water that the lotus can unfold itself to its best; it cannot do so if it is buffeted about by wind and storm. It is only in peace that the soul can unfold. Storms of passion and desire are just like storms that beat down the flowers on the physical plane. All developments of the higher kind are like very delicate flowers, and if they are subjected to violent storms of passion they become crushed out, and disappear. People who are always in royal rages, who constantly brood over all kinds of foolish personal matters, who are always thinking about their own feelings and are filled with jealousy and envy of others, cannot develop all the fine and delicate fronds and tendrils that mean progress.

People in general have very little scientific idea of what occult progress, real evolution, means. Their methods of education alone show that they do not understand it. There is a certain amount of the evolution through which we have gone—up to about the level of the savage and a little higher than that—which we may consider as fairly definitely established; that is to say, we could not very well fall back below that point under any circumstances. But the growth that comes beyond that—beyond the almost animal part, or at any rate the lower and emotional part, of man—is a question of exceedingly delicate development of many sorts. The

174

things which differentiate the highly cultured and artistic person from the quite coarse and undeveloped person are all of a very subtle nature—matters of long and slow and careful growth; they are tender shoots of great promise, which have hardly as yet blossomed forth, and have certainly not yet reached what they shall be in the future. The first blast of unfavourable conditions destroys that finer growth. The rough and tumble of modern education, in which children are frightened and sometimes even ill-treated, has the effect of crushing out all the delicate bloom of culture and refinement which souls that have come into these child bodies may have been acquiring for a very long time past—perhaps for twenty or thirty lives. In consequence the children become very much like primitive savages. They are often full of fear and hatred and a great sense of abiding injustice, and all the finer development which really marks the difference between a later and an earlier sub-race is swept away.

People do not in the least realize what they are doing when they destroy these things, as they so often do. I constantly see boys and girls who belong perhaps to ordinary parents, but are themselves quite promising; if they were taken in hand and brought along in the right way, they would make distinct progress in this life. But their surroundings are utterly unsuited for such development and all the finer growth is lopped off and beaten back, and they go through life as quite ordinary people. I have seen cases where the same thing happened over and over again in as many as perhaps fifteen or twenty

175

lives; the progress that might have been made in the first case was not made until the twentieth. Probably the accumulated karma of living a little better in a quiet way in each of those lives made it necessary at last that the ego should be given better surroundings, and then he got his opportunity. But so far as we can see that same development could just as well have been made twenty lives before, if only the environment had been a little better.

It is a sad thing for the people who repress those delicate touches. I suppose there is no greater crime than the repression of those who are trying to make progress. That is one of the things which the Christ meant when He spoke of the sin against the Holy Ghost which should not be forgiven either in this world or in the world to come. That word " forgiven " is, however, a mistranslation—" to abandon", " to put aside", gives a better idea of the meaning. What is meant is perfectly clear. The sin against the Holy Ghost is the repression of the divine spirit in man; it produces a karmic result which could not be put right in this dispensation— neither in this world-period, nor perhaps in the next, so serious is it.

Many people commit this crime against themselves as well as against their children. They do not give the higher part of themselves an opportunity to grow. Children are often able to see nature-spirits and other beautiful things which older people cannot see. There is no reason why the older people should not see them j if their sensitiveness had not been destroyed by the

176

sort of life into which they have so often been plunged. Sometimes later on in life with great difficulty they begin to recover the power, not only of clairvoyance, but also the power to appreciate all that is artistic and beautiful, all the subtle shades of feeling and perception that mean culture and real education.

The things which affect the higher progress are all exceedingly delicate—so carefully, so exactly balanced, that the least touch in the wrong direction will throw them back for weeks and months. It is possible to throw back the growth of months in a single day. Therefore very much depends upon surroundings. One cannot always calculate upon obtaining again the same surroundings, so the occultist always strives to make the utmost use of whatever conditions he has at any time, while he is also watchful that none of them shall drag him down. One of the Puranas says:

Without a body no one attains the object of the soul; therefore should one take care of his body as a treasure, and perform good deeds. A village or a field or possessions or a house, or good and bad pieces of karma may be obtained again—but this body never again.1

People sometimes say: " I cannot do much in this life; I shall try what I can do in the next." It is always well to keep before us the idea of the next life and what we can do in it, but it is not safe to depend too much on that, because the karma behind each person is sure to be more or less mixed and it sometimes asserts itself in waves. We may have karma at a certain time which will give us good surroundings. It does not follow that

1 Garuda Pur ana Saroddhara, xvi, 17, 18.

177

in the next life we shall have conditions equally good. On the whole the probabilities are that our karma will flow on in much the same groove, but on the other hand there might be a block of unpleasant karma which the karmic authorities do not think the man strong enough to bear this time, and in the next life they might let that loose upon him, so that he might not get such good opportunities.

It is eminently wise to take all the opportunities available in this life. If we do that, and thus show the Lords of Karma that we are taking advantage of them, that will seriously influence the incidence of karma upon us in the next life. It will constitute a sort of claim for good surroundings. It is not wise because we have many opportunities in this life to assume that we shall have them again in our next life. We may or we may not. I do not like to hear people say: " I am too old to do anything in this life." If we make good use of what we have, and advance ourselves as far as possible, we create a condition of affairs in which it would be difficult for the karmic deities not to give us opportunities again; we can make such karma along a particular line that we may take the kingdom of heaven by storm—we can force the Lords of Karma to so arrange our Karma that the opportunity must come because the causes we have set in motion cannot work themselves out except along a similar line. Most assuredly it is well to make full use of every good opportunity that comes to us, lest by chance by neglecting it we might make a difference of a few thousand years in our evolution.

178

A few thousand years are as nothing in the long life of the soul, but we do not want to be delayed in that way. In the Lives of Alcyone we find, for example, the case of one young man who had remarkably good opportunities in connection with one of the great Masters in a temple in Egypt.

He foolishly wasted his time, threw away his opportunities and lost them. The Master said then that he would always be ready to take him again when he came back. It is only in this life, six thousand years later, that he has come back. That carelessness lost him a good deal of time. Think of what might have been done in that six thousand years, if he had taken the offer. At that time the Master who made it had not yet attained Adeptship. Certainly if the pupil had accepted, he might have now been very far on the road to Adeptship himself. It cannot be a matter of indifference whether a man takes such a step as that six thousand years earlier or later. The man who took it so much earlier would have all the work of intervening years on the very highest levels to his credit—it seems impossible that it can be the same thing.

I do not know how far in the counsels of the Eternal what we call time matters. There is a point of view to which one may rise in which past and present and future all seem one eternal now, but even in that eternal now there are some things which are more opened and others which are less opened, and therefore the acceptance or the neglect of an opportunity must make a difference, though there may be some

179

way in which a mistake of that kind may be adjusted in the future, in which somehow the man's regret that he did not succeed may be a force enabling him to work doubly well to try to overtake the past. One can only guess at it, only attempt to imagine how such a thing would work; but there is very distinct reason to suppose that there will be a position in which the past can be rectified.

It envisages itself on higher levels in a way something like this. We say the past was so-and-so and we cannot alter it. That was how it was when we were at it. How do we know what it is now that we have passed away from it ? That past still exists; it is the present to someone else somewhere. That idea is difficult to understand. On the physical plane, we know that we see an object; we know of it by the light which comes from it. The light which showed us something yesterday is now many millions of miles away, and it is now showing that same thing far away; our yesterday may be the present for someone else as far as the message of that light is concerned. Whether that analogy holds good I do not know, but something like that seems to be true. The past is somehow progressing.

Looking down from the higher plane on the life down here is something like standing on a mountain and watching a railway train moving in the valley below. The train has passed certain points as far as the people in it are concerned. The points are passed, but they are still there. The trees and animals they saw at those points are still alive. The past is still active, but because they

180

are not in it any more most people imagine that their share in it is done with. I am not sure of that. I do not think that it is very profitable to try to understand that point, because one cannot make any coherent sense of it down here. But I believe that the past is not irrevocable, and that when we in our turn reach the stage where we can look down upon it all, it will appear very much better than our present memory of it would indicate, because somehow all that past also is moving onward as part of the divine reality of things, and that also will become glorified and will blossom out into what it should have been—I cannot pretend to say how. Still the idea is a stimulating one—the possibility that the things which we have failed to do, the mistakes which we have made, may not be so in the end, though they are so to us now. It is an idea which is difficult to understand down here, but I am sure there is some truth behind it.

15.   Desire possessions above all.

But those possessions must belong to the pure soul only, and be possessed therefore by all pure souls equally, and thus be the especial property of the whole only when united. Hunger for such possessions as can be held by the pure soul, that you may accumulate wealth for that united spirit of life which is your only true Self.

C.W.L.—The possessions which we are to desire are qualities which shall be of use to all humanity. Every victory we gain is to be gained for humanity, not for

181

ourselves. The desire to possess must be one to possess with all others—a desire that all shall share the same inheritance. That is the old story of impersonality in another form. We see that beautifully illustrated in the lives of the Masters. I remember long ago feeling considerable wonder as to how it could be that the Masters appear without karma. They are even spoken of in some of the sacred books of the East as having risen above karma. I could not understand it, because karma is a law just as much as gravitation is. We might rise as far as the sun itself, but we should not get beyond gravitation; on the contrary we should feel it very much more strongly. It seemed to me just as impossible to escape from the law of cause and effect, since under its operation every person receives according to what he does. If the great Masters are all the time doing good on a scale which we cannot in the least hope to equal, and yet they make no karma, what then becomes of the stupendous result of all their outpourings of energy ?

Presently, after studying the problem, we began to see how it worked. If I describe what karma looks like clairvoyantly, it will perhaps help to make the matter more intelligible. The appearance of the working of the law of karma on higher planes is something as follows. Every man is the centre of an incredibly vast series of concentric spheres—some of them quite near, others reaching to a prodigious distance into the far empyrean. Every thought or word or action, whether good or bad, selfish or unselfish, sends out a stream of force which rushes towards the surfaces of these spheres.

182

This force strikes the interior surface of one or other of the spheres at right angles to it, and is reflected back to the point from which it came. From which sphere it is reflected seems to depend upon the character of the force, and this also regulates the time of its return. The force which is generated by some actions strikes a sphere which is comparatively near at hand and flies back again very quickly, while other forces rush on almost to infinity and return only after many lives— why we cannot tell. All we know is that in any case they inevitably return, and they can return nowhere but to the centre from which they came forth.

All these forces thrown out from the man must recoil upon him so long as he projects them from himself in that way. However, every man has an interior connection with the Deity which is not through any of these concentric spheres, but through the centre itself. By turning within he can reach the Logos himself, and so long as he sends all the force of his thought and desire in that way, it is not reflected back to him at all, but goes to reinforce the great outwelling of divine power which the Deity is always sending through His universe, by which He keeps it alive. His force wells up in the centre; it does not come from without. If we look at a number of physical atoms clairvoyantly we shall see some drawing in force and others pouring it out. They must receive that force from somewhere. It does not go in at one side and out at the other; it wells up in the centre apparently from nowhere but is in reality coming from some higher dimension which we cannot see. Thus

183

the communication with God lies in the very heart of things, and the man who turns his eyes always upon the Deity, and thinks only of Him in the work that he is doing, pours all his force along that line. It disappears so far as he is concerned but, as I said before, goes to reinforce the divine strength which is always being outpoured everywhere. There is no personal result for the man on lower planes, but with every such effort he draws nearer to the divine Truth within him —becomes a better and fuller expression of it and so it would not be true to say that he obtains no result. In a universe of law nothing could be without result, but there is no outward result such as would bring him back to earth.

That, I think, is what is meant when it is said that the Great Ones escape from the law of karma. They spend the whole of their mighty spiritual force upon doing good in the name of humanity and as units of humanity, and so they escape from the binding of the law. Whatever result there is comes to humanity, not to them. The karma of all the glorious actions of the Master is not held back that he may receive the result; it goes to humanity as a whole.

It is in that spirit of impersonality that we also should perform action. If we do anything, even a good action, thinking: " I am doing this; I want the credit of this," or even if we do not think of receiving the credit for it, but only think: " I am doing this," like the Pharisees of old, we shall have our reward. The result will come back to the personal self, and it will bind us back to

184

earth just as surely as though it were an evil result. But if we have forgotten the personal self altogether and are acting merely as part of humanity, it is to the humanity of which each is a part that the result of the action will come. The more truly we can act without thought of self the nearer we shall be drawing to the divine heart of things. That is how the Logos himself looks upon everything. There could be no thought of self for him; He acts always for the good of the whole and as representing the whole. If we act thinking only of him, then the result will flow out in his divine force and will not come to us as anything that will bind, but rather as something which will make us a greater and greater expression of him, and will raise us more and more into the peace of God which passeth all understanding.

CHAPTER 8 RULES 17 TO 19

17.   Seek out the way.

C.W.L.—The three short aphorisms to which we have now come are closely intertwined, and both in the comment by the Chohan and the notes by the Master Hilarion they are practically taken together. For this reason it is hardly possible to arrange them in separate groups as has been done hitherto, and so I shall take them in the order in which they appear in the book. It is evident that we have come to a very important part of the teaching, because there is a longer comment from each of these Great Ones than on any of the previous sentences.

The Master Hilarion's note to the seventeenth rule begins as follows:

These four words seem, perhaps, too slight to stand alone. The disciple may say: " Should I study these thoughts at all, did I not seek out the way?" Yet do not pass on hastily. Pause and consider awhile. Is it the way you desire, or is it that there is a dim perspective in your visions of great heights to be scaled by yourself, of a great future for you to compass? Be warned. The way

186

is to be sought for its own sake, not with regard to your feet that shall tread it.

The spirit in which we should approach the Path is beautifully expressed in these words. All the way through the personality must be put aside, and one must work from the point of view of the Higher Self. To do that is to seek the way. We have already seen that even when the man has left ordinary ambition behind, he finds it again and again in subtler forms. His ambition now is to reach a higher level; he has made up his mind to desire no longer anything for the personal self, to put whatever power he has entirely at the service of the Great White Lodge.1 He thinks only of being a good instrument, of bringing himself into such a position in relation to the Master that his forces may play through him with as little hindrance as possible.

All forces coming down from higher planes naturally meet with great constriction when they come to work on a lower plane. The force which comes through any disciple can never be more than a very small part of the influence which some Great One may send through him. That must be so by the very nature of the case, but one who makes himself, with all the imperfections that naturally cling to us on the physical plane, as perfect an instrument as possible for the Master's force, can do very useful work. The object of the disciple is to let as much as possible of that force flow through him, and to discolour it as little as he can.

1 This is a traditional term not related to colour (Publisher).

187

The force is poured through him in order that he may disseminate it, but he is not expected to be a mere machine in its distribution. He does lend to it something of himself, something of his own colouring; that is intended and expected, but it must be in perfect harmony with the Master's attitude and feeling. That is possible because the pupil becomes one with the Master in a very wonderful way, as I have explained in The Masters and the Path.1 It is not only that all that is in the consciousness of the pupil is also in the consciousness of the Master, but that everything that takes place in the presence of the pupil is also in the Master's consciousness—not necessarily when it is happening, unless he chooses, but quite certainly within his memory. If the Master happens to be busily engaged in some of his higher work for the moment, it does not necessarily follow that he is attending to a conversation which the pupil is carrying on at the time; but we have startling evidence that sometimes he may be, because occasionally he interjects a thought or a remark, and corrects something that is being said.

As I have explained elsewhere, any feeling which the pupil allows himself to have will react upon the Master; if it were such a feeling as annoyance or anger, the Master would shut it out in a moment; naturally the pupil does not want to give him the trouble of doing that, though, perhaps, if one may say it with all reverence, it is not a very great trouble. Possibly the Master does this very quickly, in a single thought, but yet one

1 Op. cit., Ch. V.

188

does not wish to cause even that trifling interruption of his work.

Naturally also the pupil wants to avoid the shutting off of himself which necessarily happens at the same time; therefore he tries, as far as he may, to prevent any undesirable thought or feeling from entering his consciousness. He would keep away from a noisy crowd or from any place with exceedingly bad magnetism, unless he had to go there to do the Master's work. In that case he would put a shell round himself and see that no unpleasantness reached the Master. Still, purely physical things in the consciousness of the pupil are also in the consciousness of the Master. If, for example, the pupil is startled by a sudden sound, it gives him a little shock. That little shock is communicated to the Master. He cares nothing for it; he puts it aside, but the fact remains that it is communicated, and that shows how close is the tie. A pupil who is wise tries to avoid any kind of shock; he is generally rather a gentle and quiet sort of person, for that reason.

It is one of the distinguishing marks of the pupil that he never forgets his Master, or the presence of his Master. So he does not allow within himself, if he can help it, except by inadvertence, any thought or feeling that he does not want recorded in the Master's thought or feeling, and he even tries to avoid, as far as may be, exterior disturbances which might also be of a kind that would cause him to be temporarily shut off.

The delight to the pupil of that close union with the Master is intense. The joy of being in touch with so

189

glorious an intelligence with such splendid emotions, or rather powers—because such things as devotion, love and sympathy, in a Master cannot be called emotions; they are great powers—is wonderful, beautiful beyond words. The more the pupil lays himself open to those higher influences the more do they flow into him, and the more does he become like the Master whom he serves. It is a matter of steady growth, but this growth is much helped by the constant flow of force between the Master and the pupil.

This union is a kind of foretaste on a lower scale of the higher unity that comes when the buddhic consciousness is fully developed; but short of that development I think there is nothing so close as the relation between pupil and Master. Those who want to be in the privileged position of a pupil should already live as far as they can in the way they will feel it incumbent upon them to live when they do become pupils. The more we can bring that general calmness and serenity of action, feeling and thought into our lives, the more nearly we shall be fit for the closer association when it comes. Unquestionably the way to deserve such a privilege is to live as though we had it even already. I 'know people often think that the small external things do not matter. They sometimes say: " Oh, perhaps such-and-such a thing keeps one back in evolution, but it cannot matter very much, it is such a small thing." I have heard that said about meat-eating and smoking. But we are not in a position where we can afford to neglect the slightest thing that is of help. The undertaking before us is one of considerable

190     

magnitude, and it is no easy task.    That being so, it is not the part of the wise man to neglect even the smallest help.    And these things are not small in reality. The Master further says, in his note:

There is a correspondence between this rule and the seventeenth of the second series. When after ages of struggle and many victories the final battle is won, the final secret demanded, then you are prepared for a further path.

The seventeenth rule in the second part of the book, to which the Master refers, runs thus: " Enquire of the inmost, the One, of its final secret, which it holds for you through the ages." That means that just as now we must seek out the Higher Self, when we have reached that higher level we must seek out the one, the Monad. The final secret is always how to do more and higher work. Many persons seem to think that rather a dreary prospect. There are large numbers of people whose great desire is rest; there is so much strain and stress and overwork all about us that they look forward to complete rest. That is a point of view which belongs exclusively to the physical body. On higher planes we are never tired.1 I have known people who have remained in the astral world for a number of years waiting for a body which the Master thought suitable. In one case a man had to wait twenty-five years, in another, twenty. Both were devoting themselves absolutely

1 Ante., Vol. I, Part III, Ch. 2: The One Good Desire, Vol. II, p. 216, 347.

191

without cessation to the Master's work for the whole of that time. Certainly neither of them had the slightest sense of fatigue, nor was he in any way less eager to work at the end of that time. So if there be such a thing as fatigue on the astral plane, it must be far removed beyond any time with which we have to deal.

When the final secret of this great lesson is told, in it is opened the mystery of the new way—a path which leads out of all human experience, and which is utterly beyond human perception or imagination. At each of these points it is needful to pause long and consider well. At each of these points it is necessary to be sure that the way is chosen for its own sake. The way and the truth come first, then follows the life.

A.B.—When the liberated soul has completed the stages of progress to Arhatship, and is passing onward to the first of the great Initiations beyond, he makes a choice from a variety of paths open to him. They are of the sacred number of seven—he has seven ways of choice before him.1 People often say that at that point there can be only one possibility—that a man must choose to be a Master—the underlying idea being that if he decides rightly he will choose to return to help the world. Such a decision recommends itself when humanity itself is thought of, but I must remind you that this is a hasty conclusion. A hint is thrown out as to the nature of the choice, where the note says: " At each of these points

1 Ante., Vol. II, p. 217, 375.

192

it is necessary to be sure that the way is chosen for its own sake." The words " own sake " give the key. The choice is to be made for the sake of the way only. The fact that there are more ways than one, ought to prevent our laying down the law as to our choice; still more should it stop any person from using the words: "If he chooses rightly," as if any one could choose wrongly when the soul is liberated.

Yet an idea—a very subtle one—runs through us, that we can dictate the choice. We sometimes find ourselves choosing for our own future—for the far off future—what to be and what to do; and that is really the lower consciousness choosing for the higher. This subtle tendency runs through our life. Part of our consciousness feels itself as the "I", and naturally inclines to choose the path of the future as it looks at it, forgetting that it is thereby choosing for the higher consciousness, in whose hands alone the choice really lies. Making up your minds as to what is to be done at the close of the Arhat stage, would be like a child choosing his profession in life. His selection, not being guided by knowledge, would certainly not be one that his mature judgment would approve. A young child can have no choice as to his career in the future, and it is the same in these matters. The higher ego will choose, without regard to the lower; indeed, the lower will perish before the choice comes. All that is important to put before the lower, then, is the idea of service—-of its being made an instrument to serve. Unless it does this it becomes an obstacle to the higher consciousness. Remember it can throw obstacles in the

193

way of that  consciousness; as  has  often been said,  it crucifies the higher ego.

Another thing to remember is that we cannot judge of any stage of consciousness that we have not experienced, and of which we do not know the relative value. When thinking of a higher condition of consciousness that you have not experienced, there is no possibility of your being able to form any judgment about it. When you reach that state the universe alters for you, bringing about a change in your nature, and causing you to know how such consciousness can act. You must experience this change before you can know. So in forming any opinion as to a path in the future, it is a case of judging a state of consciousness of which you have no knowledge, and your judgment is worthless.

Looking at it from a higher standpoint, there is but one thing that decides our choice, and that is the necessity of the world at the time. Where a place is empty, where help is needed—there are the things which decide the choice. Out of the different ways before him, the purified soul will go where help is wanted. Self-determined, he takes that course where help is needed by the Hierarchy, for the expression of the Will of the Logos. I was told by a Great One that it was a blunder to think that choice could be made at all down here; that the choice is always made to give the help which is wanted for the expression of the Will of the Logos.

One group of workers stands for help in the world. Only when reinforcement is needed amongst Them, only when a channel is wanted, would the choice turn to the

194

world's work. I have emphasized this because it was given as a warning to myself, not to let my thoughts turn from useful activity to other lines of work not yet given us to do. In the Bhagavad Gita we are warned that the dharma of another is full of danger—our work lies where our dharma lies.

C.W.L.—The path which leads out of all human experience is the path of the Adept, which opens up before him with a choice of seven ways, as we have already seen. I have heard many members say: "Oh, of course there is no question at all about what we should choose; we should remain to serve humanity." It is wiser not to waste our strength in such decisions, because as a matter of fact we do not know anything about it. It is like a little boy making up his mind what he will do when he is a man. He wants to be a pirate or an engine-driver. We know as little now about the conditions that will determine our choice as the little child does of those which will determine his future. No one of the seven paths can possibly be in itself more desirable than another, though they all lead to work of different kinds.

Quite surely the idea that will be most prominent when the time of choice comes will be: " Where can I be of most use? " What we might perhaps safely prophesy of our action is that we shall say: " Here am I, Lord; send me wherever help is most wanted." But even so it may well be that as we unfold we shall develop some special aptitude for one or other of these lines, and thus it will be obviously best for the whole system that we should be used in the line where we can do most good.

195

Whenever a higher level of consciousness is reached, our view of the world is so much widened that it becomes an entirely new thing to us. When we reach Adeptship we shall have an immeasurably wider horizon. We shall understand exactly what we are doing because we shall be able to see the solar system as does its Maker, from above, instead of from below; we shall see the pattern that is being woven, and what it all means. Every additional step, every extension of consciousness brings us nearer to seeing the meaning of everything, so as we go on we become less and less likely to make mistakes and to misunderstand, but the perfect knowledge can only be that of the Adept, whose consciousness has become one with that of the Logos of the system, even though it be only as yet in one of His lower manifestations.

In any case, that choice is in the hands of the Monad, so we certainly need not trouble ourselves about it now. There is always a possibility that the Monad may have decided all that even now, and when such a choice is made the lower representatives or parts of him will simply fall into their place when the time comes, whatever ideas they may previously have been forming. All that is important for us to put before the personality now with regard to such choice is the idea of service. If we can get it to understand that idea of always watching to serve, it will very readily become a perfect channel for the ego, and that will influence the individuality in turn to be a perfect channel or instrument for the Monad. Service is the highest ideal in life; did not the Christ

196

Himself say:   " Whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant " ? l

18.    Seek the way by retreating within.

19.    Seek the way by advancing boldly without.

C.W.L.—To seek the way by retreating within means in the beginning to seek out and follow the guidance of the Higher Self. As has been explained before, the first stage on the way is the unification of the personality with the ego. Later the ego becomes a perfect expression of the Monad, and the man is then ready for the Asekha Initiation. Beyond that the Adept is striving to raise the consciousness of his Monad into the consciousness of the Logos. It is always himself at higher and higher levels that he seeks.

Whenever a man at any stage tries to pour devotion up into a higher level, such a flood of the divine power descends upon him that it quite overwhelms his effort, and the effect is not so much that he has reached up, as that power has been poured down on him. The same thing happens between the pupil and the Master. The pupil sends out his love towards the Master, but it is surpassed by the response of the Master's love, so that to him it seems that he has received a vast flood of love, though in the first place it was his action that made the downpouring possible.

Such, at a higher level, is the pouring down upon the Adept of the Holy Ghost, the power of the Third Aspect of the Logos, symbolized in the " cloven tongues, like as

1 S. Matthew, 20, 27.

197

of fire " of Pentecost.1 Thus in due course the Adept becomes one with the Third Aspect of the Logos manifesting on the nirvanic plane. His next step is to become one with that Aspect which is represented by the Christ in the bosom of the Father. Later on, though I know nothing about it, I am quite sure that he will draw ever nearer and nearer to the Deity of our Solar system. We shall ever approach the Light, but we shall never touch the Flame. Not that we shall not rise one day to the height where He stands, but He does not stand still to receive us. He also is evolving, and therefore we shall not touch the Flame, though we shall ever draw nearer and nearer to it. The wonderful bliss of that experience cannot be described down here, because it is all of a nature which has no counterpart in the lower world.

In every man there is much to be found by seeking within. The personality, which most people think of as themselves, is only a very small fraction of the man. We are much larger people than we show ourselves to be. The ego can only put down one small part or facet of himself in a particular incarnation and even if that part is manifesting perfectly it is only a small part. A great man is a fine and beautiful thing to see, even down here, but we may be sure that the whole is very much greater than the part which we can see. No one personality could express all the multiplicity of possibilities which lie within the ego, which has within it the essence of the experience of all the lives it has led. The highest and very best of us down here might be taken as a fair

' Acts, 2. 3.

198

average sample of the qualities we should discover in the ego if we were able to see it.

We get these samples sometimes, and should try to understand them as such; we often find, for example, quite an ordinary person showing great heroism when a sudden emergence arises. A workman will sacrifice his life to save his fellowman. Now the possibility of doing that shows that the man inside is really at that level. Whatever is the highest a man can touch is in reality the man himself, because he could not touch it, could not think it, if it were not himself. All the lower expression -the storms of passion, the baser feelings—belongs to the personality. They should not be there—that goes without saying—but they are not the real man. If sometimes he touches great heights, that is the level at which he ought always to strive to keep himself.

The high and noble things for which a man yearns must be to some extent developed in the ego, otherwise he could not be longing for them down here. The people who do not wish for such ideals are those in whom those particular qualities do not exist even in germ. If we yearn for higher things they are in us not as a mere possibility but a living fact, and it remains for us to live at our highest level and in that way reach one still higher.

The whole object of the ego in putting himself down is that he may become more definite, that all his vaguely beautiful feelings may crystallize into a definite resolution to act. All his incarnations form a process by means of which he may gain precision and definiteness. Therefore specialization is our way of advancement. We come

199

down into each race or sub-race in order that we may acquire the qualities for the perfection of which that sub-race is working. The fragment of the ego which is put down is highly specialized. It is intended to develop a certain quality, and when that is done the ego absorbs it into himself in due course, and he does that over and over again. The personality scatters something of its special achievement over the whole when it is withdrawn into the ego, so that he thus becomes a little less vague than before.

The ego, with all its mighty powers, is very much less accurate than the lower mind, and the personality, valuing above all the discriminating powers of the lower mind which it is intended to develop, often comes in consequence to despise the far higher but vaguer self, and acquires a habit of thinking of itself as independent of the ego.

Though the ego is vague in the earlier stages of its evolution and is therefore unsatisfactory to that extent, there is in him nothing that is evil—no moral defect. There is no matter in the causal body which could respond to the lower vibrations, but wherever there is a gap in its development there is always a possibility that the lower vehicles will run into some sort of evil action. It sometimes happens in such a case that when an emergency arises the astral elemental takes possession of the man and he madly stabs another man, or, being in great need of money, he finds himself in some position where he can obtain it dishonestly, and succumbs to the temptation. The ego is then not sufficiently awake to

200

step in and prevent the action, or perhaps he does not understand that the passion or greed of the astral body-may force the lower self into the commission of a crime. When we find evil turning up unexpectedly in a man's character we must not think that it comes from the Higher Self. Yet it comes from a lack in the Higher Self; because if the ego were more developed he would check the man on the brink of the evil thought, and the crime would not be committed.

To seek the way by retreating within means for us that we must always endeavour to live up to our highest level, so that we may be able to bring down more and more of the treasures which the ego has garnered during innumerable incarnations. But while seeking thus to realize the Higher Self we must remember that we must also seek the way by advancing without. We cannot afford to be ignorant of what is outside us, and we must do our best to study and to become acquainted with the world and what is going on in it.

CHAPTER 9 RULE 20

20. Seek it not by any one road. To each -temperament there is one road which seems the most desirable. But the way is not found by devotion alone, by religious contemplation alone, by ardent progress, by self-sacrificing labour, by studious observation of life. None alone can take the disciple more than one step onwards. AH steps are necessary to make up the ladder.

A.B.—Rule 20 is the comment by the Chohan on the three short aphorisms 17 to 19, which were considered in the last chapter. It tells us that a man has not to develop only on that line where he finds the least resistance, but must unfold his powers on every line before he reaches the universal goal of usefulness. His aim is to be a perfect instrument of the Good Law, and no man can become that unless he grows along every line. Each type or temperament must therefore supply what is lacking in itself before perfection can be achieved. Humanity reaches the goal not by devotion, nor by religious contemplation, nor by self-sacrificing labour, nor by observation and deep thought alone. Ultimately we shall

202

all need to have all these things, but while on the way people are limited by their temperaments, and for a long time to come the work of each disciple in helping humanity is likely to be limited chiefly to one of these ways.

It is clear why we must master all the ways. As men advance they must draw nearer together, must become welded into an organic whole. So if a man possessed great power of religious contemplation, but very little of the other powers it would be of little use for him to come into contact with a man possessing chiefly the quality of self-sacrificing labour. He could not meet him on that ground, and that would limit his usefulness. So it is desirable that while the disciple is striving to perfect himself on his special line of work, is seeking to learn everything about something, he should at the same time not neglect to learn something about everything, so as to be able to make full contact with people of different temperaments with whom he must work.

The key-note is balance; we must be able to work to some extent on all lines. Toleration also is wanted, that we may be able to help all. We must see each man's way as right for him—as one of the roads leading onwards it has to be recognized as good. We must have respect for all types of people, and until we are able to help them all ourselves we should try to guide those whom we cannot help, to others who can help them, and not disparage the roads on which they are going, and seek to turn them into our own.

C.W.L.—People are almost always lopsided in their development. Some are strong in devotion, some in

                                203

intellect, some along the line of work. Each man, according to his temperament, is taken naturally along the line which is easiest for him, yet he must not forget that all-round development is necessary before he can reach Adeptship. The Adept is above all things an all-round man, and if we are putting him before us as an ideal, we must do what we can to develop ourselves in various directions. It is a fine thing to be full of devotion, but we must have knowledge along with it, because the man who is merely blindly devoted is of little use. The converse is true of those who advance by intellect. They must also take care to acquire devotion, otherwise their intellectual development will lead them astray. It is better to develop along one line than not to develop at all, but while every man should pursue his own line, he should nevertheless remember that there are other lines. Often the tendency is to criticize other paths, and to feel that they may be less useful than our own. They would be less useful to us, perhaps, but are not at all so to those who are following them. Wherever we may be at present in our development we shall certainly have to become balanced, so if now we appreciate only the idea of work we shall nevertheless presently have to realize the position of the man who advances by wisdom, and again that of him who progresses by devotion, and not allow ourselves to think them less immediately useful than we are. I am afraid that the people who advance by devotion are often a little intolerant of those who wish to study and to work. They sometimes say: " All that you are doing belongs to the outer plane or to the

204

purely intellectual side of things, whereas the heart side of everything is always the more important, and if you neglect that you can make no real progress." It is perfectly true that the heart side must be developed, but nevertheless there are those who advance best through definite work, and others who cannot evoke from themselves the best that is within them without careful study and full understanding.

Men sometimes feel drawn to the higher life, and devote themselves to contemplation only. There are occultists who hold that to be the best way, at least in the early stages. A man might say: " I must first develop myself in order that I may be able to serve. When I am an Adept I shall serve perfectly; I shall make no mistakes." But there is work to do at all levels, and the man who has qualified as an Adept has to work at very much higher levels than any we can reach; therefore if we wait until Adeptship is attained before we are willing to work for the world, a great deal of the lower work will in the meantime be left undone. Our Masters are working chiefly on the nirvanic levels, on the egos of men by the million. They are doing at that higher level what we could not do, but there is a very great deal to do on the lower planes which we can do.

People have sometimes been disposed to think that the Masters ought to be doing this lower work, that they should, for example, be working with individuals down here. I have explained before that they do not do that, except in the comparatively rare cases of those who they see will very shortly repay them for their effort.

                              205

It is so entirely a case of what is best for the work that no sentiment of any sort enters into the matter at all. They will work with a pupil if he can do good work in return, and if the amount of energy spent in teaching and guiding him will produce more result in that way in a given time than would be produced by the same amount of energy expended along higher and wider lines; that is, only if the man is apt to learn, and prepared to do a great deal himself whenever opportunity offers. Up to that point their interest in him would be what one might call a general concern.

There is much work to be done at these lower levels, and it is a fact that a great amount and variety of it has not been done previously. New ways of service are constantly being opened up as mankind advances in brotherhood. Our Masters had many pupils before the Theosophical Society came into existence, but most of them were Orientals, chiefly Hindus and Buddhists, S ufis and Zoroastrians. The trend of the Oriental mind is not quite the same as ours. I think without offence we may say it is less practical in some directions than ours, and the majority of Indian pupils have occupied themselves chiefly with their own studies, of which they had an immense amount to do, and only when they had advanced a considerable way on that line did they then turn aside to help others. They had not the incentive that we have for the work of the invisible helpers. Nobody in India— not even a coolie—is quite as ignorant as the average Christian about after-death states, so there is not the

206

same need for rescuing them from the delusions created by the idea of eternal hell. As soon as our students began to see what astral work involved they realized that there was a crying need for help. Here were people by the thousand suffering intensely from a nightmare, a sort of bogey, which they had made for themselves simply on account of foolish teaching. A sight of that kind urges one at once to make some effort to relieve all that distress, consequently the work of the invisible helpers began, and increased like a rolling snowball. Every one who is helped sets to work to help others, so it has happened that in about thirty-five years, since the work was regularly taken in hand, the effect produced has been very great indeed.

A man. may reach great heights by attending only to his own development, but along that line he will not reach Adeptship. The man who waits to attain Adept-ship before he serves the world will never be an Adept. He may escape into nirvana, or obtain liberation, but because he has not realized what the Logos wants of him, he will presently be overtaken by numbers of less advanced and less talented people who have realized that one important thing. Then he will have to give up his life on higher planes and come back to learn what he has not learnt before—that humanity is one, and that a man who does not realize that fact cannot scale the loftiest heights of progress.

But, as is said here, self-sacrificing labour alone is not sufficient to gain for the man the highest development. He also needs to develop his devotion, and above all to

                              207

develop his power of response to the inner light, because without that he will not be a perfect instrument. Without that he might be working away most energetically, but would be unable to respond to the touch, the hint from above, sufficiently quickly. He would need, as it were, to be pulled round energetically, instead of requiring just a gentle touch, which is all that should be necessary, and so would cause more trouble to his Master in training him. He must also learn something of the great plan" because, glorious as the work is, the man cannot do it perfectly unless he has knowledge. Therefore he must make a definite effort in the way of study to attain that. Much knowledge comes in actually doing the work, but there is every reason for us to take advantage of the accumulated experience of our forerunners and learn whatever we can by study, so that our work may be better done.

The vices of men become steps in the ladder, one by one, as they are surmounted. The virtues of men are steps indeed, necessary—not by any means to be dispensed with. Yet, though they create a fair atmosphere and a happy future, they are useless if they stand alone.

A.B.—Here both vices and virtues are called steps. This broad view cannot harm students, and is indeed necessary for the disciple, but it would be right in the world to take the narrow view, for vice must mean vices, and virtue must mean virtues, to undeveloped people. The broad view would confuse their ideas of morality;

208

they cannot apply principles with understanding, and think of the moral bearing of each action, so they must have a list of things that are bad, for their avoidance, a set of religious and social commandments for their guidance. It would be a mistake to upset the popular view of vice and virtue, although it permits many actions the disciple has outgrown.

But esotericists should learn to understand what they both mean, as manifestations of the Divine. The way to regard it is to think of every soul as a divine being, as a centre of outgoing energies pouring into the world. The life of man consists in the expression of the life of atma, and it finds expression outwards. In die earlier stages of its evolution there was nothing to be called vice or virtue, but simply an outrush of energies, very largely along lines which the standards achieved by society to-day would not approve It is true that from the beginning of our human career most of us, especially those who had individualized at a high point from the animal kingdom, were in a position to use our intelligence to some extent, and so were able to learn many things by observation of others. But it remains a fact that nevertheless all of us in earlier stages must have done many things which would now be accounted evil. Those experiences taught us to do better, so they were steps or means of progress. And they also helped to make it possible for us to understand and help others who are going through such experiences now. All types of experiences are equally necessary; we could not know even partly what they are without every kind of expression,

                              209

and should never be able to help other people if we did not understand.

In former times we may have been murderers or drunkards; if these things have been our particular experience, we now know them as wrong because we did them before we knew better, and found that their results brought suffering. At a further stage we learned that such things delay our progress, and are therefore wrong, but without some experience we should never have realized this consciously. No amount of advice could have given us the vivid knowledge we have gained from experience. Having learnt our lesson along one line we never again under any stress of temptation make that particular mistake. You would never be safe if there were any possibility of your falling. You must have conscious knowledge of these things; the typical thing you have to know, the fundamental experience you must have, if you wish to be safe and helpful.

C.W.L.—Here again the Chohan reminds us that the object of occult training is not to produce merely good men, but great spiritual powers who can work intelligently for the Logos. Moral goodness is certainly a prerequisite, but it is useless alone.

When a man begins his evolution in the quite primitive stage he has no ideas of right and wrong, so we could hardly speak of him as having vices and virtues. The savage is after all nothing more than a centre of outrushing energy—the irresponsible kind of outrush of which we see so much in the lower kingdoms. A creature like a fly has a very tiny body, but it is a

210

mass of energy which is terrible as compared with its size. Imagine an entity of our own size endowed with as much energy in proportion and as little idea of what to do with it—it would be a terrible, wild thing, a source of danger to all around.

The savage has that kind of energy. It bursts out in fighting and in lusts of all kinds, which are certainly vices from our point of view, although we are hardly justified in regarding them as such in him. He does not murder from any sort of unholy, vitiated pleasure in murder, as has happened with people of higher development. He certainly has a kind of pride in being able to dominate and kill other people, and in that way he works off a vast amount of energy which, many thousands of years later, will be directed into useful channels. He has to learn how to handle that energy; how to let it run through him without doing hurt to himself or others, but that is a matter of long training and development, and of gaining control of the vehicles by the ego.

We see the same thing at a very much higher stage working out in case of an immensely powerful man, an American millionaire of the old type, for example, who made a great amount of money very often by ruining other people. He was doing a very wicked thing, but he was developing tremendous powers of concentration and generalship. Having learnt in that position how to do all this and how to manage his fellow-men, he might perhaps in another life be a general of an army. Very likely at first he would use his generalship as Napoleon did—for his own advancement and to gratify

                                    211

his ambition. Later on he would learn to use his powers for the service of his fellow-men. In that way it is clear that the very vices of men are steps on the way to something higher and better. The advance from vice to virtue is very largely a matter of learning to control our energies and directing them aright. We begin to transmute our vices into virtues when we realize that the energy which is going so to waste and doing so much harm might be applied for good purposes. Each time an evil quality is finally conquered, it is changed into the opposite virtue, and so becomes a definite step raising us higher in evolution.

The whole nature of man must be used wisely by the one who desires to enter the way.

A.B.—The word " way " here means the real spiritual life. Man is a spiritual being, so in living the spiritual life he is being his true self. If he would tread that way he must use all his faculties and powers, the whole of himself. What man is in his essence, that he becomes in truth—a manifestation of the divine. When the disciple is at a certain stage he is told: " Thou art the Path." Before this time his Master is to him his Path— he sees the divine manifesting in the Master; but when the divine in him manifests, he himself is the Path. He becomes the Path in proportion as he advances. Therefore the whole nature of the man is to be used wisely. When that is done the divine fragment, with the help of the thing which he has created for his own use, may unfold its latent powers into active and positive life.

212

The words " divine fragment " are not used merely as a poetic phrase; they contain a truth we cannot afford to forget, which any other words would be inadequate to express. The same idea is found in the Catechism quoted in The Secret Doctrine,1 where the Guru asks the pupil what he sees. He sees countless sparks, which appear as though detached; the ignorant look upon them as separate, but by the wise they are seen as one Flame. Such a fragment, inasmuch as it is a centre of consciousness, is a point without magnitude; it cannot be separate. All centres are fundamentally one, since there is only one ultimate sphere, one universe. But the mystery of the unity of being cannot be understood below the nirvanic plane; it cannot be expressed in the lower worlds, and all attempts to symbolize it must be imperfect.

The divine fragment is the Monad, which is reproduced in the triple spirit on the nirvanic plane. There atma is threefold, and it puts down one of its powers into the buddhic and another into the mental plane. It contains the possibilities of the Logos, but is at first quite incapable of expressing them. Atma pouring itself forth appears in Manas as the individualizing principle, the " I " making faculty that gives rise to individuality in time, as the opposite to Eternity. It draws round it matter to express itself on the upper manasic plane, and thus creates as its vehicle the causal body, which lasts throughout the long series of human incarnations. That is the body created with pain, by means of which the man purposes to develop.

1 Op. cit., Vol. I, p. 145.

213

Think of Atma as pouring itself forth on to the third plane downwards, the manasic plane. It draws around itself matter of the highest level of that plane, and forms the causal body. That body is then its vehicle for the expression of the manasic aspect of itself on that plane. It is manas working through the causal body. This manas becomes 'dual in incarnation. It reaches down into the lower levels of the mental plane and forms there a vehicle—the lower manas—which in turn builds the astral body. In its turn that provides the force which builds the etheric and physical bodies. Each body on its own plane is a means for gathering experience, which when suitable is handed on to that which formed the vehicle; so after the personal incarnation is over the lower manas hands on to the causal body all the experience that it has gained, and the personality perishes. The causal body takes whatever experiences are of a nature to help its growth, and they remain with it through all its future incarnations.

The causal body also has a relation to what is above it. What happens on the inner or upper side of that vehicle is the passing on into the third aspect of atma of the essence of all experiences which may have entered into it; what is thus poured into the manasic aspect of atma renders it capable of acting without the causal body —that is, without a permanent vehicle which limits it.

The student who thinks this out, will find that it will throw light on the perishing of the individuality. The same idea appears in the Hindu and Buddhist scriptures. The causal body is the individuality, that which persists

214

throughout the cycle of incarnation. It comes into existence at a certain period of time; it has to perish at another period. It is born and it dies. As the Gita says : " Certain is death for the born." T This is true not only in the outer world, but in the widest sense; as there is birth of the causal body, so must it perish. It is the thing which the divine fragment has built for himself with much pain. It is the " I " to the disciple. In some the " I " is thought of as even lower, in the personality, but this is the " I " which has to be reached at the beginning of the Path. It is finally transcended at the close of the Arhat stage of growth, at the real liberation. Up to that time it is diminishing and changing in character as the Arhat grows. It will ultimately be found to be a defective " I ", not the real " I " at all, but at this stage of human evolution any attempt to describe its future condition would be misleading.

The disciple rightly puts before himself, as his aim, the realization and purification of the individuality. It is a thing created for the use of its creator. Sometimes it is technically called a creature; then we hear of the man—the true man—meeting his creature. So also the individual, the creature, meets his own creator. This meeting occurs only in a high stage of evolution. When a man meets his creature he is perfect and transcends individuality.

The creation of the individuality takes place at a lower stage; the man is busy building it up for a very long time. The less evolved members of humanity are for a

1 Op. cit., II, 27.

                                   215

long period shut up in their lower vehicles—that is necessary for their progress, before the individual is fully built —so the causal body remains an unconscious shell for a long time, while activities are busy in the personality. Think of the ages taken in building the physical vehicle; think of the rounds and the stages that the pitris went through on the moon chain before becoming fit to pass into human evolution. There is an immense difference in the time that human beings take in building the individual, though all take long. The building goes on more rapidly in the higher stages under the inspiration of the more evolved ego than in the lower stages; when the intelligence reaches a high stage it is utilizing higher forces and learning not to waste them, and then the building goes on with immense rapidity. This gives us great encouragement; for in looking back to the moon chain and thinking of the time we have taken to advance, it would seem very long if it had to be repeated, but looking forward we see that progress may become almost incredibly swift.

The divine fragment can do nothing by itself; all its development must come by contact with outside forces, and through the vehicles—it cannot grow without them. As H.P.B. said, spirit is senseless on the lower planes. It cannot bring forth any power without a vehicle of expression on the plane in which it has to act. Further it can only have control of the vehicles when they are perfected. The work of bringing the vehicles to perfection develops the powers of the spirit to perfection, so the two developments, go on together. And when

216

that work is complete, spirit has in itself the power to disintegrate its individual vehicles the moment it leaves them, and to reintegrate them in a moment when it chooses to do so.

Think of the perfected Spiritual Beings. Only while they were evolving at and below our human stage were vehicles necessary for their growth, but when such a one, having drawn all the experiences of that evolution into his essence, wishes to manifest, He can at any time create what he wants for manifestation, and after having utilized the forces of the plane, can withdraw the vehicle again. When speaking of the Planetary Spirits, H. P. B. mentions that they have come through humanity. They could not appear as helpers if they had not through the human stages drawn up into their essence the experience necessary. Thus Beings exist who may not be manifest, but who can manifest themselves, by drawing from their essence the experience They require and creating a vehicle in which to work.

It is not difficult to understand how the vehicles are for their " own use ". As we advance we rise above the bondage of each vehicle manifesting outwardly, and learn to use it only for the higher work, without any consideration of self. Doing this as far as the physical body is concerned should be the disciple's daily practice. The physical body must be mastered so that it cannot throw its own reflection upon you; it exists only for you to use, and you must learn to control it completely, so that it cannot compel you to attend to any experience that you do not want. It should be only an instrument

                                   217

for use; you are training it to hand on its experience to the ego. There will come a time when you no longer want to hand on any experience at all; then the " I " takes what it wants for its own purpose. This is a high condition to reach, for it is the stage of the Adept.

In The Secret Doctrine it is said that a Master's body is illusory. That means only that the physical body cannot affect or disturb him. The forces playing around cannot influence him through it, except in so far as he allows them; they cannot throw him off his centre. H.P.B. has also said that a Master's physical body is a mere vehicle. It hands nothing on, but is simply a point of contact with the physical plane, a body kept as an instrument needed for the work he does, and dropped when done with. The same thing is true of the astral and mental bodies. When the causal body becomes an instrument only, the individuality perishes, atma having acquired the power of manifesting its third aspect on the mental plane at will, and no longer needing a permanent vehicle thereon.

C.W.L.—This statement seems at first sight to contradict some of the earlier ones. For example, we were told to kill out desire—to kill out various parts of ourselves. It is said in The Voice of the Silence that the pupil must learn to slay the lunar form 1 at will—to get rid of his astral body. The words " at will " give us the key to the expression. We must not destroy the astral body, because if we did so we should become

1 Ante.,  Vol.  I,   Part I. Ch. 2: Initiation and the approach thereto, Vol. II, p. 128.

218

monsters, with great mental development but without any sympathy. Many people find emotion a great trouble to them because it overwhelms them, but they must try not to destroy it, but to purify and control it. It must be a force which we can use and not something which overwhelms us. We must not kill it out, because without it we could never understand emotion in others, and we could therefore never help people who are along that line; but it must be refined and all self must be weeded out from it.

In the same way the intellectual people must not destroy intellect, but must bridle it and guide it. It is quite true that intellect like devotion may run away with people. They do not always realize that; they say that the intellect in itself is a guarantee against anything extreme, but I am afraid it is not. Many people make a kind of god of intellect; they say: " Our reason is the only thing we have to guide us and we must always follow that out to its logical conclusion." That would be quite true if all their premises were always right to begin with, but usually they are remarkably deficient. They are generally considering the physical side of the problem only and leaving out of account the far more important hidden side, and therefore their conclusions are inevitably wrong.

As I said before, we must be balanced; we must learn to see all sides of a question, and we must endeavour to avoid developing any one quality, however good, to such excess that it is altogether out of proportion to all the other qualities, because often the most admirable quality may become dangerous if it is taken in that way apart

                                   219

from the whole. The man who possesses keen intellect is much to be congratulated because of that intellectual development, but all the more if he has that should he be careful that the other side, that of love and sympathy, is not neglected nor forgotten.

In exactly the same way those who possess the power of love and sympathy must see to it that they develop the intellectual side of their natures, so that they will not be led away by their sympathy into foolish action which \will not help, but hinder. A person with the keenest sympathy but no knowledge is often perfectly helpless, just as many a man would be in the presence of some sad accident, lacking the knowledge which a doctor would have. Many people, though full of sympathy and anxious to help, do not know what to do, and the efforts which they make, if ignorant, may be just as likely to do harm as good. Very clearly, there is the need of knowledge as well as emotion.

Emotion is the driving force in our natures. It is said in the old Indian books that the emotions are the horses, but the mind is the guide; the mind takes the reins; therefore we need to develop both. We must have our horses, because they are the means of progress, our storage of force; but we must also have reasonable guidance, or else they will run away with us. All that is perpetually inculcated in all occult study, yet it cannot be said too often, because people forget. There are always those who develop one side only and are sadly lacking in the other, and that is one of the ways in which even an advanced person may come to grief.

220

Each man is to himself absolutely the way, the truth, and the life. But he is only so when he grasps his whole individuality firmly, and by the force of his awakened spiritual will, recognizes this individuality as not himself, but that thing which he has with pain created for his own use and by means of which he purposes, as his growth slowly develops his intelligence, to reach to the life beyond individuality. When he knows that for this his wonderful complex, separated life exists, then, indeed, and then only, he is upon the way.

C.W.L.—The way—meaning the true spiritual life— can only be found after the experience of building up the individuality. The expression used here by the Venetian Master—that complex thing which man has built with much trouble and pain for his own use—is true of the individuality, and again, of each personality. The individuality itself is so built by the Monad; it builds in turn its various personalities, but all for the use of the higher, and for that alone; the mistake all men make is that of identifying themselves with the lower nature, and allowing it to delude them into supposing that it is the " I ", instead of which the " I " is in reality the Monad far behind, which is using all these vehicles.

The whole evolution of man can be stated as a withdrawing into himself, but always bringing his sheaves with him, never returning empty-handed. This process of handing up the result of experience by the lower to the higher is going on at all levels

                                   221

all the time. There are many ways in which we are doing that in everyday life, only we do not think of it in that light. For example, we know how to read; we gained that power in this incarnation by passing very slowly through a long process of learning. Now we can take up a book and understand its meaning at once, without having to think of being able to read. We have forgotten the details of that experience, and it would be of no value to ^.s to remember them. Some of us have learnt to read music, and can play it off at sight, but at first when we were learning we had to look carefully at each note and then look down at the piano to find it. Now the fact that we had to pass through all that labour is forgotten. We do not need to remember all the separate music lessons in order to be able to play, which was the object of the whole process.

It is just the same with the memory of past lives, People who believe in reincarnation often have a sense of resentment at the back of their minds, because they do not remember that for which they are now suffering, even while they are ready to admit that it is the result of wrong doing in the past. That feeling is perhaps quite natural but it really does not matter in the least; the soul does know, and has made a note of that which has brought the evil result, and will do all it can to influence the personality so as to prevent the same mistake from occurring again.

People think it would simplify their lives if the personality could remember all those past incarnations. In some ways it might, but I think that if in the personality

222

we had the full remembrance of all our past lives before we had reached Adeptship, it would do more harm than good. In the first place, we have not the power to weigh all these things calmly. We should find it distinctly depressing to look back at the ghastly crimes we had committed in the past lives. I have long ago learnt how to look back at my own past lives, but it is by no means a pleasure to do so. There are certain beautiful actions, some fine incidents in the past lives of everyone, and one is able to look back with a certain degree of pleasure on those, but we have found that in looking back upon a past life the thing that immediately strikes one most forcibly is the number of opportunities which one did not see. Here, there, everywhere, we were surrounded by opportunities, and we cannot help feeling amazed that we took advantage of so few of them. It was not, usually, that we failed to take them because we did not want to do so; our intentions were good, though rather feebly good, perhaps, and if we had seen the opportunities we should have taken them. Now we look back and wonder at our own blindness. We say: " If only I had taken this or that course of action certain results would have followed, and by this time I might have reached Adeptship." But we did not. When we rise to that level the power to look back will be useful to us, but with the amount of intellect and free-will we have now it would certainly not be an unmixed pleasure. Let us consider the general principles involved. The whole of this scheme of which we are a part is intended to further the evolution of man, therefore there can be

                              223

no doubt whatever that if it were best for him that a personality should remember all his past lives, most certainly that would have been so arranged. As that has not been done, we should at least have faith enough to see that it is best as it is. When a man has the power to look back he also gains with it a wider insight and a more balanced view of things, and by that time he is so imbued with the certainty of justice in the scheme that if he cannot see exactly how a result followed from its cause he will say: " Well, I do not see the reason for this, but I am sure I shall do so presently." It would not occur to him to think that he had been unjustly treated. The person who is always talking of being unjustly treated and is perpetually accusing high heaven of neglecting him, does not understand the rudiments of the case. We know the law is absolutely just—as just as the law of gravitation—but it does not follow that we can always tell exactly how it will work itself out.

As I have said, the ego makes a note of that which produces evil results. Warned by past experience, he tries to influence the personality before it becomes so strong, so definite and decided that it will not be guided by the vaguer touch from the ego behind. It distinctly thinks that it knows best along its own line. Very often it declines to be helped from above, and so the ego cannot influence it to the full extent that he would like. But he tries to gain control, and as we go on we shall feel this higher self more and more endeavouring to take the reins. If we will identify ourselves with him,

224

we shall find that then he can do very much more for us. His chief difficulty is the fact that the average personality identifies itself with the lower vehicles and rather resents his interference, but if it can be persuaded to identify itself with him, then at once the whole difficulty is very much lessened.

When in addition to this there is complete control of the astral and mental bodies, progress may be swift indeed. Normally, when the ego wants to deal with one thing through his lower vehicles they persist in bringing in a hundred others, in sending in reports which are not asked for and not desired by the ego. Control of the mind has to be gained so that it will report to the ego only what he wants to know. Then, when the ego turns some problem over to his mind, and says: " Think that out and give me the information I want," the controlled mind obeys perfectly, whereas under similar circumstances the average mind reports a hundred things which are useless to the ego, because all sorts of wandering thoughts break in and assert themselves.

The system of yielding up the results of the lower work, but not the detailed experience, is going on all the time until we attain Adeptship. As the ego develops, the first decided change that the man makes is to draw up the intellect, the manas, to the buddhic level; he still remains triple, but instead of being on the three planes he is now on two, with atma developed on its own plane, buddhi on its own plane, and manas level with buddhi, drawn up into the intuition. Then he discards the causal body because he has no further need of it. When

225

he wishes to come down and manifest on the mental plane again he has to make a new causal body, but otherwise he does not need one.

Much in the same way those two manifestations on the buddhic plane—the buddhi and the glorified intellect which is intuition—will be drawn up presently into the nirvanic or atmic plane, and the triple spirit on that plane will be fully vivified. Then the three manifestations will converge into one. That is a power within the reach of the Adept, because He unifies the Monad and the ego, just as the disciple is trying to unite the ego with the personality.

This drawing up the higher manas from the causal body, so that it is on the buddhic plane side by side with the buddhi, is the aspect or condition of the ego which Madame Blavatsky called the spiritual ego. It is difficult to work out the comparisons in detail with the state through which the Christian mystics described themselves as having passed, because they approach it from so different a point of view, but that condition seems to correspond with what they used to call " spiritual illumination "—that is, the state of the Arhat. It is the unfolding of the Christ principle. We speak of the birth of the Christ principle when there is the first stirring of the buddhic consciousness in the man, but when it is said the Christ is fully unfolded within him, I think it must mean this state.

When people once reach some of these higher levels the rate of their progress is very greatly increased. I remember once being asked in India whether a man's

226

progress on the Path might be measured by arithmetical progression. I replied: " I think when once progress is definitely started it is very much more like geometrical progression." That was rather doubted. The Indians seemed to feel that that was an extreme statement, so I asked the Master Kuthumi whether geometrical progression would be a fair statement of the progress of one who had entered upon the Path. " No," He said, " that would not be a fair statement. When once a person enters upon the Path, if he converges all his energies upon it, his progress will be neither by arithmetical nor geometrical progression, but by powers." So it would not be in the ratio 2, 4, 8, 16, etc., but as 2, 4, 16, 256, etc. That throws a very different light on the matter, and we begin to see that what is before us is not so impossible and not so wearisome as it sometimes seems. We have taken all these thousands of years to reach our present stage, and it does not seem a great achievement when we consider the time spent upon it. If our future evolution were to be equally slow the mind would fall back appalled before the contemplation of the aeons needed for us to reach the goal. It is encouraging to think that when we definitely begin to tread the Path we make progress with very great rapidity indeed.

I suppose that the average good person is devoting a hundredth part of his mind to making himself a little better. Many people are not doing even that. We who are studying and trying to live by the principles of occultism have gone further, and are beginning to devote a reasonable part of our time to it. When once the stage

227

is reached where all our force and thought is concentrated upon this great task we shall go ahead by leaps and bounds; however backward we are now, when we can devote all our powers to the work to be done we shall be able to do it much more perfectly than now seems at all possible.

Seek it by plunging into the mysterious and glorious depths of your own inmost being. Seek it by testing all experience, by utilizing the senses in order to understand the growth and meaning of individuality, and the beauty and obscurity of those other divine fragments which are struggling side by side with you, and form the race to which you belong. Seek it by study of the laws of being, the laws of nature, the laws of the supernatural; and seek it by making the profound obeisance of the soul to the dim star that burns within. Steadily, as you watch and worship, its light will grow stronger. Then you may know you have found the beginning of the way. And when you have found the end its light will suddenly become the infinite light.

A.B.—In this comment we again consider the triple method of seeking the way.

A division may be made for purposes of classification, by taking the laws of nature as covering the world of phenomena, the world of observation, the laws of super-nature as those of the higher manas and buddhi, and the laws of being as those of the real existence of nirvana.

228

By the laws of nature we then mean the laws which work on the physical and astral planes and the rupa sub-planes of manas.

The laws that are above these, but below those of " being," may be called the laws of supernature. This includes both the arupa planes of manas and the buddhic plane. That is the region where life expresses itself more than form, where matter is subordinate to life, altering at every moment. There is nothing there to represent a definitely outlined entity. The entity changes form with every change of thought; matter is an instrument of his life and is no expression of himself; the form is made momentarily—it changes with every change of his life. This is true on the arupa plane of manas, and also in a subtle way on the buddhic plane. It is true also of the spiritual ego, which is buddhi plus the manasic aspect of the One, which was drawn up into buddhi when the causal vehicle was cast aside. That state is called by Christian mystics that of spiritual illumination; it is the stage of the Arhat, of the Christ in man.

The word supernatural is commonly used to cover anything that cannot be explained by the common experience of the world. Anything that appears irregular or out of accord with the laws of nature has been so ticketed, much to the confusion of thoughtful people. There is a wide-spread revolt in the world against all that is called supernatural; people feel that there cannot be anything supernatural, because there is no irregularity or disorder in nature, no region where law does not exist.

229

The law is working everywhere and it is one. " As above, so below " is the universal truth. One nature is expressing itself in different ways, but is itself the same always. But when we come to what is here called supernatural, we arrive at a state beyond all that can be touched by the senses—even using the term in its fullest meaning. We pass altogether beyond everything which is phenomenal, into the spiritual worlds themselves.

The plane of atma, beyond that, is nirvana, the region of being, where all is reality, where true consciousness resides. We are to seek this way by study of our inmost being. Not until we can reach the nirvanic plane in higher meditation can we get a touch of true atmic consciousness; but it may be sought for. We begin to search for it by trying to realize its existence. Think of it as in a region where all is reality, where all limitations have vanished, where unity is recognized. In meditation try to imagine it, try to figure it to yourself. You can only do so by a series of negatives. You think: "Is it phenomenal? It is not so. Is it intellectual? It is not so." You seek it by eliminating what it is not. You then say: " It is not a thing that the senses can perceive; it is not what the intelligence can imagine; it is not found even by the illuminated intelligence, with its vast extent," and so on.

It may be asked: " Why seek it by what it is not, if you can have a touch of atmic consciousness? " Frankly-speaking, it is not atmic consciousness you get in the brain, but a little vibration from the manasic aspect of atma differing from any other vibration in the manasic

230

consciousness. Vibrations started on higher planes are different from those that begin on the manasic plane. When a person attains to the highest stage of the Path proper—the fourth or Arhat Path—then," in meditation out of the body, he can pass into samadhi and reach the atmic consciousness in nirvana.

C.W.L.—This twofold triple division, of the methods by which we are to seek the way and the laws which correspond with those methods, is illuminating and without a doubt intentional. Plunging into the depths of one's inmost being leads to the study of the laws of being—the laws of that plane which lies beyond all that is manifestation for us, that is to say, nirvana. The higher planes are, of course, still planes of manifestation, and even what lies beyond them is not really unmanifested, but it is so to us, at our present stage. Only by study of the laws of being shall we be able to fulfill the real purpose of plunging into the depths of our inmost being, which is to " make obeisance to the dim star which burns within ". Clearly that is a very high stage in development—when we look for the atma and follow only that.

The testing of all experience corresponds with the study of the laws of nature, that is to say, the laws of the phenomenal world, those which work on the physical, astral and mental planes into which the personality plunges. Then we are to learn to understand the individuality by the study of the laws of the supernatural, by which evidently are meant the laws of those worlds in which the ego, as such, moves, that is to say, the laws

231

of the buddhic plane and the higher part of the mental plane. Of course there is nothing supernatural, but that word is used here evidently in a somewhat technical sense. Through all the planes it is the one Life which expresses itself in different ways, and there is no break of natural law and order in the whole scheme; only when we come to a region beyond anything that any of our physical, astral or mental senses can touch, are we reaching up into something beyond the nature which most of us know, where other and wider laws operate. I think it is in that sense that the Chohan uses this word " supernatural ". Beyond the sphere of these senses we pass into a region above the phenomenal, to what the Greeks called the noumenal world, which is the source and cause of the phenomenal worlds.

So the meaning of this passage appears to be that when we thoroughly understand the personality we shall have grasped "the laws of nature"; when we are seeking to understand the individuality, we shall be dealing with the " laws of the supernatural," and when, beyond that, we try to realize the atma, we shall be studying the " laws of being ".

The differences at these levels are sufficiently great to warrant such a classification. On the physical plane everything depends very much upon its form, and that is also true in the astral and lower mental worlds. At the level of the causal body, though it is not quite true that we are without form, at least the forms are different and more direct. The thought of the causal body is like a flash of lightning darting directly to its object; instead

232

of making a definite separated form, it is simply an outrush, straight to the object, of the impulse which the thought has given.

When we rise above that to the buddhic we reach a condition which, as I have explained before, can hardly be described in words. There the thought of each person is a pulsation of the whole plane, so that every person at that level enfolds within himself the thought of all the others and can learn from it and can experience through it, as it were. One cannot hope to make it very clear: one can only suggest.

It is well for us to try to understand those higher states. Almost the only way in which we can do this is by the method adopted in the Hindu books, which is always a negation. They do not describe a state of consciousness; they gradually eliminate all the things that it is not. After doing that, if we can manage to retain a sort of sublimated essence of the thought of the thing, we are coming a little nearer to what it really is.

The followers of the Buddha often asked:

" What is nirvana? " or sometimes they would say: " Is nirvana, or is it not? "—that is to say, has it an existence, or has it not? The Buddha on one occasion answered: " Nirvana is; beyond a doubt it exists, and yet if you ask me if it is, I can only say that it is neither a state of being nor of not-being in the sense in which you understand those words." Perhaps even he could not make it clear to us at our level. In our own far smaller way we have the same kind of experience. I can bear witness that when one develops the buddhic

233

consciousness and uses it, much which we now cannot make clear becomes absolutely plain; but the moment one drops back from that condition of consciousness one can no longer express that which one has understood. That it is not readily to be expressed is shown by the fact that the Buddha himself, so very much greater, was yet unable to put it into words to be understood down here, except by negatives.

CHAPTER 10 THE NOTE ON RULE 20

A.B.—The Master Hilarion adds the following note to Rule 20.

Seek it by testing all experiences; and remember that when I say this I do not say: "Yield to the seductions of sense in order to know it." Before you have become on Occultist you may do this; but not afterwards. When you have chosen and entered the Path you cannot yield to these seductions without shame. Yet you can experience them without horror: can weigh, observe, and test them and wait with the patience of confidence for the hour when they shall affect you no longer.

In the earlier stages of human evolution the ego is not sufficiently developed to know right from wrong. But the moment he has learned to distinguish between them, to know them as different, morality begins. When, for example, he begins to understand the difference between destroying life and guarding it, there is for him the birth of morality on that line. The kind of experience which taught him that knowledge is then not wanted any longer. But though the man no longer needs

235

to test that experience, there is still sometimes a rush of the senses, compelling him to some wrong action, and that afterwards causes him to suffer, because he recognizes that it was wrong to yield to it. The saying of the pseudo-occultist, that a man may do wrong in order to gain experience, is never justified. When an act is done while a man is unconscious of its being wrong he is gaining necessary experience; but when there is knowledge that it is wrong, then each yielding means a fall, and keen suffering must follow.

The condition of yielding under stress of circumstances lasts for many lives; even after a man has entered on the Path the conflict with the desires of the senses often continues. Before one can make rapid progress there are long stages of conflict between the wish that works through the astral and mental bodies, and the knowledge that its gratification is a hindrance to the higher life. The conflict on the lower stages is long, and when it passes on into a higher stage, and arises when mental images are mixed up with the desires of the senses, temptations become more subtle, for the mind idealizes the sense-objects, refines the grosser impulses, and presents desires in their most alluring aspect. Another stage comes when the aspirant is on the Path proper, for even there the keen force of old temptations is sufficiently strong to assail him. It is in this connection that we have the statement in the Master's note, which shows the disciple how he may utilize them; he can weigh, observe, and test these seductions, waiting patiently for the time when they shall affect him no longer.

236

When the centre of consciousness has separated itself from the body of desire and moved to the manasic plane, a considerable advance has been made. The man no longer looks on the body of desire as himself, but as merely a vehicle. Yet its vibrations can still affect him, for it has a life of its own, and sometimes it is as if the horses had run away with him. That is the stage spoken of in the Kathopanishat, when the driver has reined in the horses and they are going quietly, but are still liable to rush away now and then. The disciple knows when they have run away by the excitement of the senses. It is a stage of great trial. The whole nature of the man is shamed and pained by the degradation; he cannot yield without suffering. In his normal condition of consciousness the senses do not attract him, he does not feel the temptations of the body, which are really astral. Yet times come when he does feel them. This happens because the old mould of desire is not broken up, and it has been vivified from outside. The channel has not disappeared, though it is wearing out, and the danger exists that it may suddenly be filled from the outside, and then the desire-form is revivified. Astral influences cause vibrations in it strong enough to affect the man's consciousness again; left to itself it would not affect him; but he comes to place, time or person on account of which strong influences from outside vibrate through him and revivify this old form.

They are to be recognized as coming from outside, not from himself, so the disciple ought to understand what they are. With shame, degradation and horror he

237

feels this thing, and wonders how he can feel it. The answer is that there is a stage in growth when seductions coming from the senses may be experienced but need not be yielded to. The man then passes them by. He says: " I feel you; I recognize you; I weigh you; but I refuse to be moved." That is the meaning of the passage in the Kathopanishat, where it says the man has come to the point where he can hold the horses in. He can hold the senses under control. It is the last lesson with regard to the temptation of the senses. When it is learned, their power over the man has passed for ever. Never again will they have the power to affect him; it is the last struggle with them, and when it is over the soul has escaped.

When that time of struggle comes, and it will come to every one, after the centre of consciousness is moved on to the manasic plane, it is an immense help to realize its nature and to know how to deal with it, to be able to say: " It is not I; it is simply a vibration from the lower nature sent out to me; I reject it; that is my answer, " The moment you repudiate it, the sense of horror goes; you refuse to feel its influence. When you have done that, you can test yourself, and see what part of your nature it is working upon. Then you will wait with patience for the time when you will feel it no more. You trust in the law; you sit down and patiently wait, and presently it will be unable to set up any vibrations; the senses cannot make you respond to them. You say: " I can wait patiently for the time when I shall not feel this thing. It is a dead form revivified that I feel, and

238

it will soon be broken up and will fade away." There is nothing left but to wait so—perhaps for months or for years. The victory is won when you are able to do that—the mould is broken. Recognition of your patience gives the last blow to shatter it, and never again can it affect you, unless you turn your back upon the goal, which seems an impossibility.

There is one other thing for which this experience is valuable; until you have passed through it you cannot help the person who yields. You cannot help any human being unless you are above him, and yet you cannot lift anyone unless you understand what he is feeling. There is a stage where you yourself are in the grip of desire; you cannot then help others who are in the same difficulty. Later, you escape. You repel desire, and reach a point where you cannot understand why another man should fall into temptation; not understanding his feelings, you cannot help him; you can point out the evil to him, but you cannot give spiritual help. You cannot pour strength into him because you are outside him, and as you are not feeling with him you feel a shock of horror. When you get that horror you are useless. You can never help anyone from whom you are repelled; it is better to leave him alone when you feel like that. You must be able to feel with a person in order to help him.

Even though you can feel with a person you cannot help him if he makes a wall about himself; in such a case, it is better to drop him for a time, for help given from the outside is of no use. You may have to give

239

up trying to help a person on the physical plane, but you need not stop doing so from the inside. To help from the inside requires more courage than to do so from without. It is far more gratifying to give outside counsel and advice; it is much more satisfying to the lower nature than giving inside and unseen help.

Another thing—if you can help a person, do not be turned away by the opinion of someone else that he does not deserve help, nor by his own idea that you are not helping him. H.P.B. was sometimes condemned by her own pupils. They said harsh things of her, but she was good and strong, and did not repel them, but went on helping them from the inside, leaving them to think what they would. By helping from the inside we wear away antagonism. When you have felt antagonism, antipathy of mind, to others, possibly even to your own teacher, as you do sometimes, you perhaps blame them. Where you have felt a wall you have thought it was their wall, but later on you realize that the wall was an illusion—a thing you had yourself created on the mental plane. When going through this stage we have built wall after wall, and have suffered by the existence of the walls, until we threw them down.

There is a still higher stage, which is difficult to explain. There are men who make a link between the Great Ones and the mass of humanity. As was said of Jesus, they feel the sufferings of men and their temptations and yet they are without sin. It is the stage where the person is in an absolutely pure desire-body; all dead matter has been cleared away from it, and only the

240

power of reflecting images is retained.    The man is incapable of sin.

Suppose such persons did not exist; there would be no link between humanity and the Great Ones. They preserve a link, and in their perfect purity they feel in themselves the sufferings of others. This stage comes immediately before that of the Master; it is the last stage of the Arhat. A Master cannot suffer pain, his consciousness is so perfect; he can image past experiences without suffering. The experience is to him a perfect image, without pain. But in the advanced condition of the stage before that, though the man cannot sin, and the personality is pure, it yet transmits a sense of suffering.

In exoteric books this stage is sometimes confused with that of the Masters, and a feeling of suffering is attributed to them. It is in the stage before that that there is suffering, where those in the stage of Arhatship are sharing the work of the Master, without having lost the susceptibility of feeling pain. The Master transcends all suffering. The Arhats take part in building the " guardian wall," but they build it with pain. People are apt to apply to the Master what is true of higher disciples only, who are still in a stage where sin is transcended, though the power to surfer is left.

At the lower level we may sympathize with friends until we lose all sense of difference, and we must suffer if we sympathize thus deeply. Until ahamkara is transcended sympathy and suffering must go hand in hand. If we go out of this stage too soon we lose our power

241

of sympathy; that is one of the temptations on the Path. Great Ones fall back even when they have reached the last stage, because if they lose suffering altogether, they lose sympathy, and if sympathy is not perfect, the wall of separateness is not thrown down.

But do not condemn the man that yields; stretch out your hand to him as a brother pilgrim whose feet have become heavy with mire. Remember, O disciple, that great though the gulf may be between the good man and the sinner, it is greater between the good man and the man who has attained knowledge; it is immeasurable between, the good man and the one on the threshold of divinity. Therefore be wary lest too soon you fancy yourself a thing apart from the mass.

A.B.—Here we are told that we must not condemn the man who yields to temptation. When you have passed through the stage of trial, there is no fear of your condemning anyone. When temptations are transcended, and you think of the time when you still felt them, you will not condemn the man who yields.

The difference between the virtuous and the vicious man is comparatively little: both are struggling in the early stages, and when looked at from either side the difference is small. But when a man has attained knowledge and has seen the meaning of virtue and vice, he has made an enormous step. When he sees virtue and vice only as the pair of opposites, he has transcended knowledge; he stands on the threshold of divinity, and

242

the difference is immeasurable. We have the warning here that if we too soon think ourselves apart from the mass there will come the temptation to despise those below us, and then we shall fall. A person who has reached divinity looks down on no one; he can feel with all, and is one with the lowest.

When yon have found the beginning of the way the star of your soul will show its light; and by that light you will perceive how great is the darkness in which it burns. Mind, heart, brain, all are obscure and dark until the first great battle has been won. Be not appalled and terrified by the sight; keep your eyes fixed on the small light and it will grow. But let the darkness within help you to understand the helplessness of those who have seen no light, whose souls are in profound gloom.

A.B.—When we look up to the region of atma and worship the light within, we shall see the light as it grows stronger. When you first see that light you get a touch of consciousness by which you see the darkness in which it burns; the contrast shows it to you. It is then that darkness within that will help you to understand the helplessness of those who have seen no light. It is for them that real compassion is necessary. There is no need to feel suffering for people after they know that there is light. Compassion is needed for those who do not know that they are in darkness, but are immersed in trivial things, and yet think themselves wise. Their darkness is so great that they really do not know what

243

causes them so much suffering. They are the people to whom the Great Ones send compassion.

Those who have seen even a little light are making progress in things of which men in the world have not caught a glimpse. When once the light is seen this kind of compassion is not wanted. If such a man is seen to be suffering, it is recognized that he is breaking down the wall quickly, and that it is good for him that he is able to do it.

C.W.L.—When we begin to have knowledge of the existence of the soul, we realize a great fact of which the vast majority of mankind knows nothing. Most people—even so-called religious people—have no certainty of the existence of the soul. Most of them are living entirely with a view to this world. They may hold a theoretical belief in the immortality of the soul, but the things of the world are more important to them and their lives are only in comparatively few cases guided by this belief.

That the " star of the soul " may show itself we must first be sure of the existence of the soul, we must know it as within ourselves. When we have set our affections on things above, when we know certain truths within ourselves and nothing can shake their reality for us, the star is beginning to show its light—there is a faint reflection of it. By that tiny gleam we see how densely ignorant we have been and still are; that is the first feeling we get when we gain a little more knowledge.

" The first great battle " is the battle with the senses. In his steady fight against them the man has arrayed

244

himself against his lower nature, and has won through. When the gleam of light comes we see how dark the way has been, how all our actions, and even our affections, have been without that direction which makes them real. The little light makes all seem hopelessly wrong; it makes us feel helpless, but we must not be appalled by the sight.

Blame them not. Shrink not from them, but try to lift a little of the heavy karma of the world; give your aid to the few strong hands that hold back the powers of darkness from obtaining complete victory.

C.W.L.—We must be careful not to misunderstand this passage. The few strong hands are the Great White Brotherhood. The struggle is not against the devil as the Christian puts it, nor must we think of the black magicians as holding the powers of evil. It is the overpowering strength of matter which is meant here by the powers of darkness. Our help in the effort to overcome them is needed and is calculated upon—it is part of the scheme.

There are only a few strong hands helping at present because our humanity has as yet evolved very few Adepts. The Logos has based His plan on the idea that as soon as there are those who understand it they will co-operate with it. That is shown by the fact that up to the middle of the fourth root-race, indeed, even a little past that time, all the great offices in connection with the evolution of the world were held by people who did

245

not belong to our humanity. Some came to us from Venus, others from the Moon. These were great Adepts who were really free, who might have gone off altogether into higher realms. But after the middle point of evolution we ourselves were expected to develop our own Teachers, and the Lord Gautama Buddha was the first of these. It is clearly intended that we not only furnish the very great officials, such as the Buddhas and Christs, but also that all of us at our very much lower level should be intelligently co-operating, and trying to push on evolution as much as we can.

Then do you enter into a partnership of joy, which brings indeed terrible toil and profound sadness, but also a great and ever-increasing delight.

A.B.—This means that we have come into relation with those whose life is bliss, but side by side with that experience there is still sadness because we feel the darkness people are in. You have sadness for people, because you are not yet at the point to say, when you see suffering: " Yes, it is well." At this stage there comes a subtle feeling about pleasure and pain that does not exist in the lower world; you feel the more keenly until the light has become perfectly clear, because the light shows up the darkness. Yet an increasing delight will come, by recognition of the law. More than that, no being is unhappy in the fundamental depths of his consciousness, because all are parts of the divine life, which is happiness itself. More and more as he progresses does

246

the disciple contact those depths, until at last he realizes, to use the words of the Gita, that he was grieving for those who should not be grieved for, that the wise grieve neither for the living nor for the dead. Why should one grieve for a being who is fundamentally happy ?

The disciple enters into a partnership of joy, but this very partnership brings toil and profound sadness, because he oscillates from one condition to the other. He must learn to feel the inner joy, and yet not lose touch with the lower principles of others, in which their sorrow is felt. He must feel that too, but must not be overwhelmed by it. The Path is as narrow as the edge of a razor, but we are to maintain perfect equilibrium upon it, while the pairs of opposites play upon us. One great function of the Master is to preserve our balance. The pupil will be swaying from one side to the other. When the gloom comes the Guru will send to him remembrance of the partnership of joy: when he tends to lose complete touch with the sorrows of the world the reminder of sorrow will come.

For a long time the disciple is subject to these oscillations. We should not attain perfection unless we experienced the different things separately, before we reached equilibrium. It is the experience of mankind that we have to learn one lesson at a time, that we may give it full attention. The disciple who is treading the path is thrown from one side to the other, until he learns to keep the balance. Sometimes an entirely causeless gloom comes down, and he finds himself deep in the shadow. He finds no reason for it; he only knows that

247

it is there—a gloom that he cannot shake off. If he has learned the lesson rightly he will accept that quietly and patiently, and will not try to escape from it. He will then learn sympathy and patience, and other lessons which can be learned in the gloom, not in the light. Accepted in this spirit the period of gloom is not such an unwelcome thing, for all the worry and trouble have gone out of it. We should take the lessons, and learn without suffering. People do not suffer so much from gloom as from images. Like a child afraid of the dark, we fill the darkness of the soul with shapes of horror. The darkness is simple darkness and nothing else; it contains nothing more than the lessons which it has to teach us, and all the phantoms will, in time, disappear. The darkness can never crush us; at first it paralyzes us with fear, but at last we learn its lesson.

At the last Initiation, that of the Master, the atma is seen as a clear light, a star, and when it spreads out, at the last breaking down of the wall, it becomes the infinite light. Before that the Arhat can feel the underlying peace of atma when in meditative mood, but constantly he returns to the sorrow. But when a man rises to the atmic plane in full consciousness, and the buddhic consciousness merges into that, there is but one light seen. This is beautifully put in The Voice of the Silence: " The Three that dwell in glory and in bliss ineffable, now in the world of Maya have lost their names. They have become one star, the fire that burns but scorches not, that fire which is the Upadhi of the flame."

248

While the man was in the causal body, he saw the Sacred Three as separate, but now he sees them as the three aspects of the triple atma. Buddhi and manas, which were " twins upon a line " in the buddhic consciousness of the previous stage, are now one with atma, that star which burns overhead, the fire which is the vehicle of the monadic flame. Then says the Teacher: " Where is thy individuality, Lanoo, where the Lanoo himself ? It is the spark lost in the fire, the drop within the ocean, the ever present ray become the All and the eternal Radiance." He who was disciple is now a Master. He stands in the centre, and the triple atma 3, radiates from him.

C.W.L.—You enter into a partnership of joy, but it brings also terrible toil and profound sadness, says the Master's note. All of that is true, but it is also true that the ever-increasing joy counterbalances the sadness.

Every student who has developed his faculties fully is, by the hypothesis, a sympathetic man; he must pass through a period of sadness and almost of despair, because of all the sorrow and suffering which he sees. Because people are backward in evolution and are not yet reasonable, there is in evidence much more of suffering and sorrow, of anger, hatred, jealousy, envy and the like than of high virtues, so that there is a preponderance of unpleasant vibrations from, humanity. This shows itself in the astral world, so that any man who becomes fully developed astrally becomes at the same time aware of the sorrow and trouble of the world—aware of it only in a vague way, but it is ever present with him as a

249

weight resting upon him. Constantly individual instances of the astral sorrow and suffering which happen to occur in his neighbourhood also press strongly upon him. In addition any catastrophe involving a great deal of sorrow to a large number of people distinctly influences the astral atmosphere of the world.

The student has to learn how to receive that without being weighed down by it, and that takes a considerable time. He gradually learns to look more deeply, and as time goes on he begins to see that all this trouble is necessary under the circumstances which men themselves have created. The suffering that comes is a necessity because of their great carelessness and laxity. If men had been a little more careful a very great part of it could easily have been avoided. I have mentioned before that the real suffering brought to us by karma from past lives is perhaps a tenth of that which comes to us, and the other nine-tenths is the result of our own wrong attitude here and now, in this life. In that sense there is a vast amount of entirely unnecessary suffering. But the other side of the shield is that while people persist in taking the wrong attitude, in thinking and acting foolishly, under the eternal law suffering must come upon them; in an indirect way that is distinctly good, because it is bringing them to a sense of their own folly. The pity is that they need so very much reminding, that they cannot at once take the hint and alter their attitude—so much suffering might be saved if that could be. This seems to all of us who have studied the matter very easy to see. I cherish a hope, therefore, and I think 17

250

a well-founded hope, that the suffering of the world will diminish very rapidly as soon as the common-sense view of things is accepted by a fairly large minority of people. They will come to see that they are making their own trouble for themselves, and in process of time they will refrain from all that is undesirable, purely from the common-sense point of view. Members of the Theosophical Society ought to be displaying before the world an example of the Theosophical attitude towards life, but there are many of them who, although they know these truths, find it hard to put them into practice. That is only natural, but at the same time one does feel that many of them might take up the new ideas a little more quickly, and it is certain that things of this sort do spread in a definite sort of ratio. One man can state a view and make a little impression; ten men can make more than ten times the impression; a hundred men can make vastly more than a hundred times the impression that one man could, unless he happened to be a rare genius. We have some thirty thousand members in our Society; I think if all of them were really taking this higher philosophical view of life, and were thereby obviously avoiding a great amount of suffering, they would form a powerful and striking example. In that way we could help a vast number who as yet do not know anything about the higher side of things.

When we begin to see that what is being done is always the best—the best under the circumstances for everybody—our sorrow is no longer of the same kind as before. We are just as sympathetic towards others, but

251

we are no longer overwhelmed by their suffering; we sympathize with them but do not share their feelings. The Masters are profoundly sympathetic with people who are suffering, and yet we could not say that they themselves share in that suffering, because of their insight. As I have said before, a Master is never sad, never depressed. It has seemed to me sometimes, however, as though even they could be disappointed with people. I do not know that I ought to say even as much as that, but I know this, that they make very strong efforts sometimes to bring about certain results, and yet those results, through the failure of their instruments, are not brought about. I do not know whether they foresee from the beginning that those efforts will fail. I cannot but feel that in many cases they do, but yet they make them precisely as though they expected them to succeed. For example, much work was done before World War I in an attempt to avoid it. That effort failed, but whether the Adepts who inaugurated it knew from the beginning that such would be the result I do not know. They worked at it as though they expected it to be successful.

Madame Blavatsky in many cases offered people opportunities in a similar way. Sometimes she made every endeavour to persuade them to take them, when she knew from the beginning that they would not do so. I well remember one occasion on which some people came to her to make enquiries. They seemed to me obviously unsuited for any Theosophic knowledge or work, since they were not at all in the frame of mind in

252

which it would be of use to them. She spoke to these mere casual strangers, and told them about quite intimate things which she hoped to do in the Society. They were rather sneering people, who did not seem in the least worthy of such confidence, and when they went away the Countess Wachtmeister said: " Madame, why did you tell those people these things ? It seems certain they are not the sort of people to whom it would do any good. They will only go away and sneer, and perhaps do us harm." Madame Blavatsky replied: " Well, my dear, some karma has brought them to me, and I must give them their chance, and do all I can for them." She thought that to take them to some extent into her confidence in that way was giving them a chance. I cannot tell, and she could, how near they may have been inwardly to taking it, but on the surface their attitude was the conventional sneering attitude. We never heard any more of them, but they had had their chance. Some past karma had evidently given them the right to the opportunity, and though it meant nothing to them then, it may possibly help them a little towards taking it when another such chance comes to them.

On this occasion Madame Blavatsky carried out very fully the idea of not blaming people who are in darkness. She knew that the more self-satisfied they were the more they were to be pitied. It is useless to blame anybody for being what he habitually is, because that is his level in evolution; that is as far as he has got. If he falls below his average level we may reasonably say: " You know, that is wrong; you ought not to have done that,"

253

and it may possibly help him not to do it again. But the level where a man habitually is shows where he is in evolution, and however far back he is there is nothing to be gained by blaming him. It would be as foolish as to blame a child of five years old because he is not yet ten.

Then again, those very people who frequently exhibit the least pleasant characteristics have in them the potentiality of the high and noble things as well, and sometimes these come out in a great burst when an emergency arises. As I explained before, there are men whose ordinary lives are certainly at a very low level, yet in some great emergency they may show an unselfishness which enables them to throw away their lives for the sake of a comrade. Man always has the god within, and it shows out sometimes when we least expect it. Because it is there, it is always possible to appeal to it. We cannot always reach it, because it is so deeply buried, yet in most cases we are able to catch a glimpse of it in some way.

The sight of the suffering of the world also brings, it is said here, terrible toil; once having seen this vast mass of backwardness and misery we cannot help working all the time to alter it. There is nothing else to be done. We can never go back into the world and be careless of the existence of the suffering and sorrow when once we have really felt it. Yet behind the toil is a great and ever-increasing delight. This comes from the recognition of the law; we see the meaning of suffering and the good that is to come out of it. Note the

254

words: " You enter into a partnership of joy." That is the real beauty of this higher life. We come into partnership with the greater people. We feel ourselves to be working for and with them, and that is of itself so great a joy that it supports us through work which otherwise we might feel it impossible to carry out.

CHAPTER 11 RULE 21

21. Look for the flower to bloom in the silence that follows the storm: not till then.

It shall grow, it will shoot up, it will make branches and leaves and form buds, while the storm continues, while the battle lasts. But not till the whole personality of the man is dissolved and melted—not until it is held by the divine fragment which has created it, as a mere subject for grave experiment and experience—not until the whole nature has yielded and become subject unto its Higher Self, can the bloom open. Then will come a calm such as comes in a tropical country after the heavy rain, when nature works so swiftly that one may see her action. Such a calm will come to the harassed spirit. And in the deep silence the mysterious event will occur which will prove that the way has been found. Call it by what name you will, it is a voice that speaks where there is none to speak—it is a messenger that comes, a messenger without form or substance; or it is the flower of the soul that has

256

opened. It cannot be described by any metaphor. But it can be felt after, looked for, and desired, even amid the raging of the storm.

C.W.L.—The blooming of the flower is the development, the unfoldment of the soul. The worst feature of sorrow arid suffering down here is the feeling that one is helpless. People engage in all sorts of struggles, and in many cases think they are predestined to fail. They will say: " I have heard of certain people making rapid progress, but there is no chance for me." They are hopeless about it because they do not know. We can never again have that feeling when once the soul has unfolded itself, because we know. We shall still have struggles and troubles and difficulties, but we know for certain that as souls we are invincible.

As is said here, it is in the silence and the calm that the soul grows. People tell us, and I think that they often emphasize it quite unduly, that the soul grows through suffering. Put that way the statement is not quite correct. It is by making mistakes and correcting them that the soul learns how to grow, and suffering invariably comes as the result of the mistakes; but as I have explained before, the growth does not take place during the suffering, but afterwards. A person may be very much better after a surgical operation, but the improvement does not take place while the operation is being performed. In like manner while people are in the throes of all sorts of terrible difficulties they are not

257

growing, but by the way in which they meet those difficulties they may be learning to grow after they have surmounted them. It is in the silence which follows the storm that the flower grows. It is possible that plants may develop strength within themselves by enduring a storm, but growth can come only when the buffeting of the storm is over. We must have gone through the turmoil of battle before we gain that great reward of victory, the real unfoldment of the soul, which brings with it a calm certainty which nothing again can ever shake.

The whole world is crying out, as it were, for that certainty about the higher things. So eager are the people that any charlatan who professes to have direct knowledge is at once assured of a following. Any teacher who is in earnest always draws people round him, because the religions of the world have failed sadly to give any real satisfaction. The weak point of most religious teaching in regard to all the subjects is that it does not explain; it simply lays down the law—perfectly good law—such as " Thou shalt not kill," but it does not explain in detail why all these things are wrong. For example, as regards anger and evil thought, nothing is taught as to the wrong done in that way so long as it does not show itself either in speech or in action. Yet Christ spoke plainly enough on matters of that sort. He declared emphatically with regard to the seventh commandment that a man who looked in the wrong way upon a woman had already committed the sin in his heart, but there is no record of His having given any

258

explanation as to the way in which the thought-form acts, which would have made His teaching on that point far more comprehensible.

The first step towards gaining direct certainty about spiritual or superphysical truth is that which is in effect the first step in all occult progress—the dominating of the personality. When we have achieved that, peace comes at once, and we then find we have been living in the midst of an atmosphere of peace and did not know it; because we ourselves made a little storm around us, for us the peace was not, even though some of our neighbours may have been living in it all the time. When this soul faculty, this certainty, is attained, nothing ever seems the same again, because then we can no longer have any sense of hopelessness. That which we merely believe may fail us at a critical time, because the basis of belief which satisfies a man at one time does not always satisfy him at another, when perhaps he is under tremendous strain. But this certainty always satisfies. When once we have seen and known for ourselves, even though that sight and knowledge may fall away from us and we may no longer be able to cling to them, we can always say: " I have seen; I have known; just now I am not able to see or to know, but I have seen, I have known, " and that certainty carries us through.

Indeed, when we have had this direct experience we find it very difficult to think ourselves back into the condition in which we were before. It changes our whole attitude towards everything in the world. Happenings

259

which seemed of great importance before are seen to be of much less significance; now that we know the great inner truth of the life which really matters, the outer life which does not matter takes its proper place. Yet we have to remember that most people whom we meet are still where we were before we had that expansion of consciousness, and it is sometimes a little difficult not to lack sympathy with them, because they are pursuing will-o'-the-wisps. We forget that until yesterday we were doing the same thing.

The silence may last a moment of time or it may last a thousand years. But it will end. Yet you will carry its strength with you. Again and again the battle must be fought and won. It is only for an interval that nature can be still.

The actual moment of complete unfoldment may take place at any point of a man's career; that is to say, when the time comes for the soul to unfold it can do so whether it has a physical body or not at the time; the silence would last only a moment, or only a very short time, here on the physical plane, but it might well last a thousand years if the man were in the heaven-world. It will come at some time to all, and once attained it can never be lost. Yet it is only for a moment that nature can be still, because evolution is steadily going on, and to stand still is not to evolve. It has been said that in occultism no man stands still, that he is always either retrograding or advancing. I do not know whether that is actually so, but it is quite certain that if he is not

260

advancing he should examine himself, and try to find out why. There ought to be steady and continuous progress.

We come now to the Master Hilarion's note on Rule 21.

The opening of the bloom is the glorious moment when perception awakes; with it comes confidence, knowledge, certainty. The pause of the soul is the moment of wonder, and the next moment of satisfaction—that is the silence.

The opening of the bloom is a gradual process. Even while the bud is still tightly shut it is slowly swelling under the influence of the sun and rain and the manifold influences that play upon it. The actual bursting of the bud is comparatively sudden, but the growth is continuous. The growth has been progressing before that it will go on after. To take another analogy: the growth of the chicken has been taking place inside the egg before, and it continues after, the breaking of the shell; there is a particular point when the shell is broken that is for us the dramatic moment, though it is really only part of a steady growth. It is the same with the growth of the soul.

This passage refers also to a particular stage in the disciple's life. It describes the feelings of the man when the first great truth of Initiation is put before him. People are apt to think that the things that will be taught at Initiation are many and various. I violate no pledge in saying that the great truths are not all given

261

at the same time. At each stage one single fact is communicated—a fact that changes the face of the earth for the man, in the same way that the knowledge of reincarnation and karma has changed our lives. One would expect that, having a new fact put before him, it would be necessary for the Initiate to grow into it and prove it. It is not so. The moment the man has the truth he recognizes it at once as true: he needs no proof. Then comes the moment of wonder; he marvels at the beauty and perfection of it. Only later does he see that this is not everything. Later vision brings more into view, but for the moment it is perfection. He wonders also that what is so obvious has escaped his notice before. Then comes the moment of satisfaction that is the silence.

Know, O disciple, that those who have passed through the silence, and felt its peace and retained its strength, they long that you shall pass through it also.

Certainly they do, because those who have unfolded the faculties of the soul know the whole system, and see it all in action before them, and because they see it, they yearn that every one shall see it. They realize that part of that plan is that we should all help. Therefore they desire that every one as soon as possible should be brought to see that his duty is to assist, that that is the real work of the world. We all have subsidiary work to do; we have our part to play on the stage of the physical world, and we must play that part as well, as nobly, as we can; it does not matter what it is, it matters only

262

that we should play it well. But we must remember that behind that is the real soul-life, and that is the thing of greatest importance.

We live in an atmosphere where the means are taken for the end. Most of our education is built on that plan. For example, people are taught geometry and mathematics, but are never shown that these lead to a comprehension of how the great Architect has constructed His universe. So long as we take them as ends in themselves they lead nowhere in particular; but if we follow them up as did the ancients who invented them, we shall find they are of great use. Pythagoras taught the value of numbers and of geometry, but he taught it to the physical, that is, to those who were learning the secrets of life. They learnt them in order to comprehend life better, and it is from that point of view that we should study all things, not merely to make material and commercial calculations.

Therefore, in the Hall of Learning, when he is capable of entering there, the disciple will always find his Master.

There has been a great deal of misunderstanding about those words, " the Hall of Learning ". They are used also in The Voice of the Silence. The three halls mentioned there may be taken in more than one way, as I have already explained.1

Mabel Collins, who wrote down Light on the Path, took the hall of learning in a very literal sense as an

1 Ante., Vol. II, p. 89 ss.

263

actual building. She speaks of having astrally entered this building and seen some of these precepts written there in golden letters on the wall. She may be perfectly right in making this statement. This experience may belong to the particular method by which she was taught, and those who taught her may have had such a temple. I do not know whether that is so; I can only say that I have never seen it. But it is quite obvious that much of what is said here about the hall of learning clearly refers to the astral plane, where the aspirant at first learns most of his lessons. Few men have yet developed the astral body fully; most are still learning how to use it; therefore a great deal of work is being done at that level. Men are also gradually developing the mental body, but are not yet able to use that as a vehicle even after death. Anyone who has developed the faculties of the mental body and can look at dead people, finds them each shut up in a shell of his own thought, with certain avenues open from that shell—but only a very few, and only to a very limited degree. The dead man lives in that shell, and not in the mental world at all. That is why he is perfectly happy with his very limited ideas. Undoubtedly his capacity for bliss would be far greater if he had the whole mental plane at his disposal and had developed the faculties which would enable him to function fully on it. As it is, he is in the midst of it all, but because of his limitations he can touch only a small amount of what might otherwise be attained.

Few people have developed the mental body to a point at which it can be used as a vehicle.    Pupils of the

264

Masters are in due course taught to travel in their mental bodies, and to form what is called the mayavi rupa when they wish to work on the astral plane. One who has learnt to do this leaves his astral and physical bodies lying on the bed, and when he wishes to work on the astral plane he materializes a temporary astral body for that purpose and lets it dissolve again as soon as the necessity for it has passed. The Master first teaches the pupil how it is done, and after that he can do it for himself, as I have explained in The Masters and the Path.1

The assurance that the disciple will find his Master in the hall of learning seems to be a direct contradiction to the direction given in The Voice of the Silence—" Look not for the Guru in those mayavic regions " 2 The two passages are perfectly reconcilable if one understands what each means. The meaning here is that in the astral world the man will always find someone representing the Master. The Master himself will deal with him probably only on special occasions, and he will work on the astral plane generally under the direction of one of the older pupils of the Master.

The statement in The Voice of the Silence is merely a warning to us not to accept any casual astral entity as a guide, without knowing exactly who he is, for there are numbers of astral beings of various kinds who are ready in the most praiseworthy way to appoint themselves as teachers, and they are not in the least deterred by the

1 Op. cit., Ch. IX.

2  Ante, Vol. II, p. 102,

265

fact  that they often know very much less than the people whom they propose to teach.

Those that ask shall have. But though the ordinary man asks perpetually, his voice is not heard. For he asks with his mind only; and the voice of the mind is only heard on that plane OP which the mind acts. Therefore, not until the first twenty-one rules are passed do I say that those that ask shall have.

The first sentence in the above passage recalls a very similar one in the Gospels, in which the Christ says: " Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you." 1 People generally take this to mean that their prayers will be answered and that if they knock at the door of heaven it will be opened to them. They vaguely think that if they try to obtain salvation it will be vouchsafed to them. This passage takes a higher standpoint, and refers quite clearly to truth and occult development. It does not apply to the ordinary man, but to the pupil who, when the first twenty-one rules are passed, has reached the first Initiation.

The man who asks with his mind only is endeavouring to gain occult knowledge, trying to peer into the mysteries of life and nature, merely by his mental powers, and the Master says quite clearly that that is not enough. That man will get his reply, but only at the level on which the mind acts. That is, he will acquire only an 1 S. Matthew, 7. 7.

266

intellectual conception of certain matters. Still, that is a very fine thing to have, and is not at all to be despised. The man who in studying Theosophy obtains a firm intellectual grasp of its teaching has done exceedingly well. He then accepts it as true, because it satisfies the demands of his intellect. That is already a valuable result, but it is not actual knowledge; it is not at all the same thing as the absolute certainty which comes from knowledge gained on the intuitional plane, and the occultist thinks only of that knowledge as marking a really important advance.

One cannot have too keen an intellect; we may take that quite definitely for granted. It is well that we should endeavour to add to our knowledge, to develop our intellects by doing something definite, because, as I have explained before, no great progress can be made before there is mental as well as astral development. In some cases the man who gains an intellectual grasp of the Theosophical system may run a considerable risk of exalting his intellect unduly. He may be tempted to criticize, to feel that he could have planned the universe much better than it is at present arranged. The man who does that is making an entirely wrong use of his intellect and will do himself harm. It would be much better for him if he were able to acquire some development along the line of feeling more deeply and keenly. But if along with his intellectual development the man can retain humility, if, while he grasps as much as he can of the system, he can yet, within himself and without, refrain from sitting in

267

judgment upon it, then only good will result from his development.

We are always told that we must follow our own conscience. The dictates of conscience come from above and represent usually the knowledge of the ego on the subject. But the ego himself is only partially developed as yet. His knowledge on any given subject may be quite small, or even inaccurate, and he can reason only from the information before him. Because of this a man's conscience often misleads him. It sometimes happens that an ego who is young and knows but little may nevertheless be able to impress his will upon the personality. As a general rule, the undeveloped ego is also undeveloped in his power of impressing himself upon his lower vehicles, and perhaps that is just as well. Sometimes, however, an ego who lacks development in tolerance and wide knowledge may yet have a will sufficiently strong to impress upon his physical brain orders which would show that he was a very young ego and did not understand.1

We cannot but obey our conscience, yet surely we might try to check and verify it by certain broad facts which no one can dispute. It may be that the Inquisitors were acting under the dictates of their conscience sometimes, but if they had compared the great broad rules that they should love one another which their supposed leader, Christ, had given them, with the conscience which dictated murders and tortures and burnings, they would have waited and said: " Manifestly something is 1 Ante., Vol. I, Part IV, Ch. 6: Confidence.

268

wrong. Let us at least take counsel before we follow our instincts in this particular matter." They would have been quite right to take such counsel, to test that conscience, by the general rules coming from One whom they themselves acknowledged as infinitely greater than themselves. They did not think of it; so came much evil into the world. Very few people will pause and consider in a case of that sort, yet one can easily see that it is the only safe thing to do.

So we must use our intellect in such a way that it will be an instrument of the ego, and will not be an obstacle in the path of his development. Therefore, when conscience seems to dictate to us something which is clearly against the great laws of mercy and truth and justice, we shall do well to think carefully whether the universal rule is not a greater thing than this particular application which seems to conflict with it.

Even before we have any definite consciousness on the intuitional plane we often receive reflections from it. Intuitions occasionally come through into our daily life, and although most of those impressions from the higher self which are genuine come rather from the causal world than from the buddhic, still now and then we receive a flash of the real knowledge of the spirit which cannot express itself on any level lower than the buddhic plane. These priceless flashes bring us a knowledge which we feel to be absolutely certain, though in many cases we cannot give any intellectual reason for it.

We are right in feeling confident about it, if the thing is a real intuition. The difficulty for most of us at the

269

earlier stages is that we cannot always distinguish between intuition and impulse. Dr. Besant has given one or two rules for that distinction. She says: " If you have time to wait and see, let the matter remain for a while—sleep on it, as people sometimes say. If it be merely an impulse, the probability is that it will die away; if it is a real intuition it will remain as strong as ever. Then, again, the intuition is always connected with something unselfish. If there is any touch of selfishness shown in some impulse coming from a higher plane you may be sure that it is only an astral impulse and not a true bu