Filename: "RC1010.TXT
Source: "The Desire Body" by Max Heindel

[PAGE 314]

                      EARTHBOUND SPIRITS AND THEIR PREY:

   To  understand mediumship it is necessary to know that at death the  same
separation takes place as in sleep, but it is permanent.  The so-called dead
have Ego,  mind,  and desire body and are often conscious of the world  they
have left for some time after.  Some cling to the earth life, and cannot set
their  minds to learn the new lessons;  we call them  "earthbound  Spirits."
They cannot function in the visible world without a body,  however,  and  so
they take advantage of the fact that all Spirits are not confined with equal
rigor to the prison of the dense body.  Those who are most closely bound are
the rank materialists;  those who cords do not bind them so tightly are "im-
pressionists," capable of answering in some measure to spiritual vibrations.
Persons  of positive character thus constituted, if they develop,  do so  by
their own will,  and become trained occultists.  Those of weak will can only
develop by the aid of others,  and in a negative way.   They are the prey of
earthbound  Spirits  who constitute themselves "Spirit guides"  and  develop
their  victims  as  "trance mediums,"  or,  if the  connection  between  the
victim's dense and vital bodies be particularly lax, into "materializing me-
diums."

   Earthbound  Spirits  gravitate to the lower regions of the  Desire  World
which  interpenetrates  the  ether, and are in constant and close touch with

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those people on Earth most favorably situated for aiding them in their  evil
designs.   They usually stay in this earthbound condition for fifty,  sixty,
or  seventy-five  years,  but extreme cases have been found  in  which  such
people remain for centuries.  So far as the writer has been able to discover
up  to the present time,  there seems to be no limit to what they may do  or
how  soon  they will be let go.   But all the while they are piling  up  for
themselves an awful load of sin, nor can they escape suffering therefor; for
the  vital body reflects and etches deeply into the desire body a record  of
their  misdeeds,  and when at last they do let go and enter the  purgatorial
existence,  they meet the retribution which they well deserve.  This suffer-
ing is naturally lengthy in proportion to the time they have continued their
nefarious  practices  after the death of the dense body-another  proof  that
"Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small."

   When the Spirit has left the SIN BODY,  as we call this vehicle,  in con-
trast to the soul body, to ascend to the Second Heaven, it does not disinte-
grate as quickly as the ordinary shell left behind by normal people, for the
consciousness  in it is enhanced by its dual composition.   That is to  say,
being composed of both a vital and a desire body,  it has an individual or a
personal consciousness that is very remarkable.  It cannot reason, but there
is a low cunning present which makes it seem as though it were actually  en-
dowed  with  a spiritual presence,  an Ego, and this enables it  to  live  a
separate life for many centuries.   The departed Spirit meanwhile enters the
Second  Heaven,  but having done no work on Earth to desire or merit a  pro-
longed stay there or in the  Third  Heaven, it only stays there sufficiently

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long  enough  to create a new environment for itself and it is  then  reborn
much  earlier  than usual-to satisfy the craving for material  things  which
draw it so strongly.

   In such cases (people of an evil nature) where the animal nature has been
paramount,  where there has been no soul expression in the  preceding  earth
life,  the division in the vital body cannot take place at death,  for there
is  no dividing line.   In such a case,  if the vital body should  gravitate
back  to the dense body and there gradually disintegrate,  the effect  of  a
very evil life would not be so far-reaching,  but unfortunately there is  in
such  cases an interlocking grip of the vital and desire bodies  which  pre-
vents separation.   We have seen that where a man lives mostly in the higher
nature,  his spiritual vehicles are nourished to the detriment of the lower.
Conversely,  where  his consciousness is centered in the lower  vehicles  he
strengthens then immeasurably.

   It  should be understood that the life of the desire body is  not  termi-
nated by the departure of the Spirit; it has a residual life and  conscious-
ness.

   It is amazing when one searches the Memory of Nature of the past to  find
how prevalent this interlocking condition of the desire and vital bodies was
in former centuries and milleniums . . . .  That in our own historical times
savagery  should have been so common and so brutal,  and that might was  the
measure of right absolutely and beyond dispute, was, to say the least, quite
a shock to the writer.

   It  has been taught that selfishness and desire were  purposely  fostered
under the regime of Jehovah to give incentive to action.  This is the course
of time had so hardened the desire  body  that  when the vent of Christ took

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place, there was almost no heaven life among the people then living.

   Nor were these ancient people content do all the evil they could in  life
and  then get away,  but they must even have their war horses killed,  their
weapons  laid  down in their coffins, and everything else possible  done  to
keep  them here,  for the ether in those things which had belonged  to  them
during life had an attraction for them, and was a means further to keep them
within the Earth's atmosphere.   It enabled them to haunt-for they  actually
did  haunt-their castles for years and years, and of course it was not  only
the rich or the warrior classes,  but also others.   In cases of blood feuds
where people were slain,  the ghosts incited their relatives to avenge  them
by remaining about and helping them to carry out bloody deeds.

   Thus  they perpetuated evil and kept the world in a turmoil of blood  and
strife;  nor is this condition entirely broken in what we call modern  days.
Wherever  a  person dies who has fostered malice and hatred  in  his  heart,
these interlock the desire and vital bodies and make him a more serious men-
ace  to the community than anyone can imagine who has not investigated  this
subject.   Therefore,  if for no other reason,  capital punishment should be
abolished  so  that we may not let loose upon the community  such  dangerous
characters to incite the morally weak to follow in their footsteps.

   The Desire World is the abode of those who have died,  for some time sub-
sequent to that event, and we may mention that the so-called "dead" very of-
ten stay for a long while among their still living friends.  Unseen by their
relatives  they  go  about  the  familiar  rooms.  At  first  they are often

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unaware  of the condition mentioned:   "that two persons may be in the  same
place at the same time,"  and when they seat themselves in a chair or at the
table,  a living relative may take the supposedly vacant seat.   The man  we
mistakenly  call dead will at first hurry out his seat to escape  being  sat
upon,  but he soon learns that being sat upon does not hurt him in  his  al-
tered condition,  and that he may remain in his chair regardless of the fact
that his living relative is also sitting there.

   There are other classes who, so to speak,  become immortal in evil.   Not
quite  that,  but the interlocking of their vital and desire  bodies  forces
them  to  stay in the lower regions of the invisible world  nearest  to  the
Physical World in which we live.

   This  class  may consequently be met with for a  considerable  number  of
years  after they have passed away from the body.   It is indeed  a  curious
fact that sometimes these vile persons are sought by former friends who have
passed  out  of the body and need help to contact the Physical  World.   The
writer  remembers such an instance occurring a few years ago,  when an  aged
relative was about to pass over to the other side.   She looked forward very
anxiously to seeing her mate who had gone on before her.   But as he had al-
ready reached the First Heaven, his arms and body had passed away,  and only
the head remained.   Therefore he would scarcely be able to show himself  to
her when she had passed over,  much less influence conditions at the time of
the passing,  and these were far from being to his liking.   Certain  things
were  being  done to retard the severance of the Spirit from the  flesh  and
considerable distress was occasioned to the person thereby.

   In  his  anxiety  over  this  condition  the  husband of the lady secured

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assistance from a friend whose interlocking vital and desire bodies made  it
easy  for  him to manifest.   This Spirit took a have cane standing  in  the
room,  and  knocked a book out of the hand of the passing  lady's  daughter,
which so frightened those present that they stopped their demonstration, al-
lowing the mother to pass out.   The poor man who had performed this phenom-
enon had already been more than twenty years in the invisible world,  and so
far as the writer can perceive there seemed to be no sign of dissolution  of
the sin body wherein he had clothed himself; he may remain there for perhaps
twice or three times as long.

   The  writer  was at one time quite apprehensive of the effect  which  war
might  have in respect to locking the desire and vital bodies  together  and
bring to birth legions of monsters to afflict future generations.  But it is
with great thankfulness that he records his conviction that we need have  no
fear on that score.  Only when people are premeditatively malicious and vin-
dictive,  and  persistently harbor a desire and a purpose to get  even  with
someone, only when such feelings are hugged, nursed, and entertained do they
harden the vital body and cause the interlocking grip of these vehicles.  We
know  from the records of the Great War that the rank and file have no  such
sentiments  against one another,  but that enemies meet as friends  whenever
chance  brings them into such relationship that they may converse  one  with
another.  So, though war is responsible for the awful mortality now and will
cause deplorable infant mortality in a future age, it will be blameless with
regard to the dreadful diseases engendered by obsession and the crimes  sug-
gested by these demoniacal sin bodies.

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   Following the above investigations,  the writer attempted a number of ex-
periments  with Spirits who were in the higher realms of the  ether,  having
just  passed  out,  and with people who had been in the Desire World  for  a
longer  or  shorter  time,  some of them being almost ready  for  the  First
Heaven.  A number of Spirits who had departed this life kindly cooperated as
subjects.   The aim of the experiments was to determine how far it would  be
possible for them to clothe themselves in the materials of the lower etheric
and even the gaseous regions.  It was noticed that those who had just passed
out could quite readily endure the lower ether vibrations, although being of
good character they were not well satisfied to remain there longer than nec-
essary,  for they were uncomfortable.   But as we tried people from  succes-
sively higher regions of the Desire World up to the First Heaven,  it became
more and more difficult to wrap themselves in ether or descent into it.  The
consensus of opinion was that it was like going down into a deep well, there
to smother.   It was also found that it was absolutely impossible for anyone
in  the  physical to see them.   We tried by every method of  suggestion  to
arouse the people in rooms which we visited, to a sense of our presence, but
we  found no response,  though in a number of cases the forms which we  con-
densed were so opaque that it seemed to the writer as if they were nearly as
dark as those physical people whom we desired to attract.  We placed our ex-
perimental subjects between the physical people and the light; nevertheless,
we had no success, either with those who were from the higher realms or with
those  who had passed out recently and were able to stay in the given  posi-
tion and density for a considerable time.

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                               THE BORDERLAND:

   It  is a mistake to think that heaven is a place of  unalloyed  happiness
for  all.   No one can reap any more happiness than he sowed on Earth.   The
measure  of our joy there will be the good deeds we did in earth life.   The
panorama  of life etched into our desire bodies just after death  forms  the
basis of our enjoyment in heaven,  as it was the decreer of our suffering in
Purgatory.

   There  are  two classes for whom post-mortem  existence  is  particularly
blank and monotonous; the materialist and the man who was so absorbed in his
material business that he never gave a thought to the spiritual worlds.  The
reason not far to seek.   They led good, moral lives as a rule,  indulged in
one of the vices which find their expurgation in the purgatorial regions  of
the  lower Desire World,  but neither have they done any good such as  would
find  its fruition in feelings of joy in the First Heaven.   To  have  given
even large sums of money for the building of churches,  libraries,  or parks
will  help nothing there,  unless the giver took particular interest in  his
gift, and thus gave himself with the money.  Merely to give money will bring
affluence in a future life,  but to give oneself is more than money - it  is
soul-growth.   The materialistic business man therefore goes to  the  fourth
region,  which  is  a  sort  of  Borderland  between Purgatory and the First

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Heaven.  He is too good to suffer in Purgatory and not good enough to have a
First Heaven Life.   He has still a keen longing for business.   With no in-
terests,  save  desires  that  cannot be gratified there,  his  life  is  an
unenviable monotony, though he suffers in no other way.

   The out-and-out materialist,  who denies God and has the idea that  death
in annihilation, is in the worst of straits.  He sees his mistake,  yet hav-
ing so disassociated himself from spiritual ideas,  he often cannot  believe
but  that this is a prelude to annihilation.   The dreadful  suspense  wears
terribly on such people,  and it is not an uncommon sight to see them  going
about murmuring to themselves:  Is it not soon the end?  And,  worst of all,
if  anyone who is instructed tries to inform them they will deny the  exist-
ence of spirit there as much as they did in earth life,  calling him vision-
ary for thinking that there is anything beyond.

   There  are  many people (of the belief that when a man  pays  his  debts,
cares  for his family,  and lives a moral life here,  he will be  all  right
thereafter)  who  have a rather unenviable time in the  Desire  World  after
death.   They are, of course, to be looked up to from the standpoint of this
life  only,  but at the present time we are required to cultivate  at  least
some  altruistic tendencies in order to progress beyond our  present  evolu-
tionary status.

   We find the people who have neglected the higher duties in the fourth re-
gion of the Desire World after death.   There is the business man who paid a
hundred cents on the dollar, who dealt honestly by everyone,  who worked for
the material improvement of his city and country as a good citizen, paid his
employees fair wages,  treated his wife and family with consideration,  gave
them all possible advantages, etc.   He may  even  through them have built a

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church, or at least given liberally to it; or he may have built libraries or
founded institutes,  etc.  But HE DID NOT GIVE HIMSELF.  He took interest in
the  church only for the sake of his family or for the sake of  respectabil-
ity;  he had no heart in it.   All his heart was in his business,  in making
money, or in attaining a worldly position.

   When he enters the Desire World after death he is too good to go to  Pur-
gatory and not good enough to go to heaven.  He has dealt justly with every-
one and wronged nobody.  Therefore, he has nothing to expiate.   But neither
has  he done any good that could give him a life in the First  Heaven  where
the  good of his past life is assimilated.   Therefore he is in  the  fourth
region-between Heaven and Hell, as it were.  The fourth region is the center
of  the Desire World and the feeling there is most intense.   The man  still
feels  a  keen desire for business,  but since he can neither buy  nor  sell
there, his life is a most dreadful monotony.

   All that he gave to the churches, institutes, etc., counts as nothing be-
cause of his lack of heart.   ONLY WHEN WE GIVE FOR LOVE WILL THE GIFT AVAIL
TO BRING HAPPINESS HEREAFTER.   It is not the amount that we give,  but  the
spirit that accompanies the gift,  which matters.   Therefore,  it is within
the  power of everyone to give and thus benefit himself and others.   Indis-
criminate money giving,  however,  often causes people to become  thriftless
and indigent,  but by giving heartfelt sympathy,  by helping  people to  be-
lieve in themselves and start life with fresh ardor when they have fallen by
the  wayside,  by giving ourselves in service rendered humanity,  we lay  up
treasures in heaven and give more than gold.  Christ  said:  "The  poor  are

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with  us always."   We may not be able to bring them from poverty to  riches
and  that may not be best for them, but we can encourage them to  learn  the
lesson that is to be learned in poverty.  We can help them to a better  view
of life, and unless the man does that also, he will not be "all right"  when
he passes out.  He will suffer that dreadful monotony in order to learn that
he must fill his life with something of real value, and thus is a succeeding
life  his conscience will spur him on to do something better than  to  grind
out dollars.   However, he will not neglect his material duties, for that is
as bad as to spurn spiritual endeavor.

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                             THE FIRST HEAVEN:

   During the earlier part of its evolution mankind committed the most atro-
cious  crimes  because actuated entirely by selfishness  and  disregard  for
other people's feelings.  In those early lives we were cunning,  cruel,  and
seldom did a good deed.  In fact, it is recorded that at that time man spent
the whole of the interval between lives in the purgatorial regions expiating
the  crimes  he had committed during his physical life,  and  there  was  no
heaven  life to speak of.   That was the condition spoke of in the Bible  as
"lost in trespasses and sin,"  which made it necessary for the Christ to en-
ter  the  Earth  and attempt the task of raising  the  vibrations,  so  that
altruism might gradually conquer egoism and give us a heaven life upon which
promotion and progression in our evolutionary career could be based.

   We saw in the last lecture how the evil acts of life and our  undesirable
habits  are dealt with by the impersonal Law of Consequence,  and  make  for
good in future lives, and to illustrate we noted its operation in such cases
as those of the murderer, suicide, drunkard,  and miser.   These are extreme
cases,  however,  and there are many people who have lived good moral lives,
tainted  more by petty selfishness,  which is the besetting sin of our  age,
than  by actual pronounced evil.   For them the stay in the purgatorial  re-
gions  of  the  Desire  World is of course correspondingly shortened and the

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incidental suffering is lightened.   Thus in time all pass to the upper  re-
gions of the Desire World where the First Heaven is located.

   This is the "Summerland" of the Spiritualists.  Of the matter of this re-
gion  and thoughts and fancies of people during life build the actual  forms
they see in their imagination.   It is a characteristic of the inner  worlds
that the matter in them is readily molded by thought and will, and all these
fantastic forms created by people to got about,  ensouled by elementals  and
enduring as long as the thought or desire which formed them endures.  Around
Christmas time, for instance, Santa Claus actually lives and rides around in
his sleigh.  There are all sorts of variety of him, and he remains in vigor-
ous health for a month or more until the desires of the children who created
him cease to flow in that direction,  then he fades away till he is  re-cre-
ated  next  year.   The New Jerusalem,  with its pearly streets and  sea  of
glass,  and all the other pious and moral fancies of the church  people  are
there  also.   Purgatory has its thought form devil,  with horns and  cloven
hoof,  created by the thoughts of people,  but in this upper part of the De-
sire  World we find only that which is good and desirable in  human  aspira-
tions.  Here the student revels in libraries and is able to pursue his stud-
ies in a much more effective way than while confined to the dense body.   If
he  desires a book,  presto,  it is there.   The artist by  his  imagination
shapes his models perfectly,  he paints with living fiery colors instead  of
with  the dead and dull pigments of earth,  which are the physical  artist's
despair,  for here in earth it is impossible for him to reproduce the  tints
he  sees with his inner vision,  but the Desire World is the world of  color
par excellence,  and  therefore  he  obtains his heart's desire in the First

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Heaven,  and receives inspiration and power to continue his work  in  future
lives.

   The sculptor likewise finds this part of the post-mortem state a joy  and
an upliftment;  he shapes with facility the plastic materials of this  world
into  the statues he dreamed of in earth life.   The musician is  also  ben-
efited, but he is not yet in the true world of tone.  That ocean of harmony,
where the heavenly "music of spheres" is heard, is in the part the Region of
Concrete Thought which,  in the esoteric Christian religion,  we call Second
Heaven;  and so the musician hears only the echoes of the celestial strains;
yet they are sweeter than any he ever heard on Earth, and his soul revels in
their exquisite harmony, the earnest of better things to come.

   Here we also find all the little children,  who go directly to this place
after passing out,  and if their friends could see them,  there would be  no
mourning,  for theirs is rather enviable life.   They are always met by some
relative or friend who has previously passed out,  and are taken care of  in
every  respect.   There are people who lay up a great deal of  treasure  for
themselves  by giving much of their time to the invention of plays and  toys
for the little ones, and thus life in this First heaven is spent in the most
beautiful  way by the children,  nor is their instruction neglected.   There
are brought together in classes,  not only according to age and  capability,
but according to temperament,  and particularly instructed in the effects of
desires and emotions, which can so objectively demonstrated.   Thus they are
taught by object-lessons the benefit of cultivating good and altruistic  de-
sires, and many a soul who lives a moral  life now,  owes it to such a cause

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as the death in infancy and fifteen or twenty years in the First Heaven  be-
fore a new incarnation was entered upon.

   In the lower regions of the Desire World the whole body of each being may
be seen, but in the highest regions only the head seems to remain.  Raphael,
who,  like many other people in the middle ages, was gifted with a so-called
second sight, pictures that condition for us in his Sistine Madonna,  now in
the Dresden Art Gallery,  where Madonna and the Christ child are represented
as floating in a golden atmosphere and surrounded by a host of  genie-heads:
conditions which the occult-investigator knows to be in harmony with  actual
facts.

   In the higher regions of the Desire World the confusion of tongues  gives
place to a universal mode of expression which absolutely prevents  misunder-
standings of our meaning.   There each of our thoughts takes a definite form
and color perceptible to all,  and this thought symbol emits a certain tone,
which  is not a word,  but it conveys our meaning to the one we  address  no
matter what language he spoke on Earth.

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                            THE SECOND HEAVEN:

   In  the  course of time every man makes ready to ascend into  the  Second
Heaven,  which is located in the Region of Concrete Thought.  All good aspi-
rations  and desires of the past life are etched into and branded  upon  the
mind, which then contains all that is of permanent value.  The Ego withdraws
from the desire body, which is then but an empty shell, and, clothed only in
the mind, it ascends into the Second Heaven.

   We remember, that after the termination of the panorama,  just subsequent
to death,  when the Ego withdrew from the vital body,  it went through a pe-
riod of unconsciousness before it awoke in the Desire World.   There is also
an interval between the withdrawal from the desire body in the First  Heaven
to  the  awakening in the Second Heaven.  But this time there is  no  uncon-
sciousness;  every  faculty  is keenly on the alert,  there is  a  state  of
hyperconsciousness,  as  the Spirit passes through this interval,  which  is
called "The Great Silence."   No matter how materialistic a man may have be-
come on Earth,  that state of mind has now vanished,  and the man knows that
he is inherently divine when he reaches this Great Silence which is the por-
tal of his heavenly home.   It is as when on awakens after a dreadful dream,
and draws a deep sigh of relief at finding that the occurrences of the dream
were not realities.  So the ego, when it enters this  Great  Silence, awakes

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from the delusions and illusions of earth life with a sense of infinite  re-
lief, is filled with a feeling of impregnable security, feels anew the rest-
ful repose of being in the everlasting arms of the Great Universal Spirit.

   In time a point is reached were the result of the pain and suffering  in-
cident to purgation,  together with the joy extracted from the good  actions
of  the past life,  have been built into the seed atom of the  desire  body.
Together  these  constitute what we call conscience,  that  impelling  force
which  warns  us against evil as productive of pain and inclines  us  toward
good as productive of happiness and joy.  Then man leaves his desire body to
disintegrate,  as he left his dense body and vital body.   He takes with him
the  forces only of the seed atom,  which are to form the nucleus of  future
desire  bodies,  as it was the persistent particle of his past  vehicles  of
feeling.

   The usual time of duration of one's stay in the Desire World, after leav-
ing  the  body at death,  is one-third the length of the life lived  in  the
body,  but this measure is only a general guide.   There are many  cases  in
which the stay is shortened or lengthened.   For instance,  if a person fol-
lows The Rosicrucian Fellowship exercises, particularly the retrospection in
the evening,  he may in this scientific manner,  provided he is very earnest
and sincere in the performance thereof, entirely obviate the necessity of  a
purgatorial  experience.   The pictures of scenes where he  wronged  someone
would have been wiped away from the seed atom in his heart by contrition and
thus  there would be for him no purgatorial expiation.   Where he  had  done
something commendable,  that would be absorbed as pabulum for the soul,  and
this would materially shorten,  if not entirely do away with,  experience in
the First Heaven.  Thus such a person would be comparatively if not entirely

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free to devote himself to the service of humanity in the beyond, and as such
he might remain in these lower regions.  However,  they would not,  for him,
constitute Purgatory or the First Heaven.  Many of the most devout disciples
do  this humanitarian work for a number of years after passing over.   There
are some, however, who go to the Second Heaven at once.  The soul growth at-
tained during the life of helpfulness which freed them from the  purgatorial
and First Heaven existence also enables them to carry on certain  investiga-
tions  there  and go through a certain schooling which will fit them  for  a
higher  and better position as helpers of humanity in a future  life.   This
class,  therefore,  could not be seen by any friend or relative going out of
the body during sleep.

   The  "Aerial  Region"  is the third division of the  Region  of  Concrete
Thought.  Here we find the archetype of desires, passions, wishes, feelings,
and  emotions such as we experience in the Desire World.   Here all the  ac-
tivities  of  the Desire World appear as atmospheric conditions.   Like  the
kiss  of  the  summer breeze come the feelings of pleasure and  joy  to  the
clairvoyant  sense;  as the sighing of the wind in the tree  tops  seem  the
longing  of the soul and like flashes of lightening the passions of  warring
nations.   In this Region of Concrete Thought are also pictures of the  emo-
tions of man and beast.

   Both  color  and form are there (in the Second Heaven),  just as  in  the
Physical  World,  but  tone is the predominating feature  of  the  World  of
Thought.   Color  is most accentuated in the Desire World and  form  in  the
Physical World,  although it is true that the colors and forms of the Second
Heaven are much more beautiful than in the other worlds.

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                         ON THE WAY TO REBIRTH:

   After  a time (in the Third Heaven) comes the desire for  new  experience
and the contemplation of a new birth.

   Previous  to taking the dip into matter,  the threefold Spirit is  naked,
having  only the forces of the four seed atoms (which are the nuclei of  the
threefold body and the sheath of mind).

   It (the seed atom) can take, in each region,  nothing except the material
for which it has an affinity and nothing beyond a certain definite  quantity
even of that.   Thus the vehicle build around this nucleus becomes an  exact
counterpart  of  the corresponding vehicle of the last life minus  the  evil
which  has been expurgated and plus the quintessence of good which has  been
incorporated in the seed atom.

   The  material selected by the threefold Spirit forms itself into a  great
bell-shaped  figure,  open at the bottom and with the seed atom at the  top.
If  we  conceive  of this illustration spiritually we may compare  it  to  a
diving-bell descending into a sea composed of fluids of increasing  density.
These  correspond to the different subdivisions of each world.   The  matter
taken into the texture of the bell-shaped body makes it heavier,  so that it
sinks  into  the  next  lower  subdivision  and  it  takes  from  that   its

[PAGE 333]

proper quota of matter.   Thus it becomes still heavier and sinks yet deeper
until it has passed through the four subdivisions of the Region of  Concrete
Thought  and  the sheath of the new mind of the man is complete.   Next  the
forces in the seed atom of the desire body are awakened.   It places  itself
at the top of the bell,  INSIDE,  and the materials of the seventh region of
the Desire World draw around it until it sinks to the sixth region,  getting
more  material there,  and this process continues until the first region  of
the Desire World is reached.  The bell has now two layers-the sheath of mind
outside and the new desire body inside.

   Except in the case of a very highly developed being, this work of the Ego
(building  its  vehicles) is most negligible at the present stage  of  man's
evolution.   The greatest scope is given in the building of the desire body,
very  little in that of the vital body,  and almost none in the dense  body;
yet  this little suffices to make each individual an expression of  his  own
Spirit and different from the parents.

   When the impregnation of the ovum has taken place, the desire body of the
mother works upon it for a period of from about eighteen to twenty-one days,
the Ego remaining outside in its desire body and mind sheath,  yet always in
close touch with the mother.

   We know that the silver chord is grown anew in each life,  that one  part
sprouts  from  the seed atom of the desire body in the great vortex  of  the
liver,  that the other part grows out of the seed atom of the dense body  in
the  heart,  that both parts meet in the seed atom of the vital body in  the
solar  plexus,  and that this union of the higher and lower vehicles  causes
the quickening.

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                     SPIRITUALIZATION OF MAN'S DESIRE BODY:

                           HIGHER BEINGS AS FACTORS:

   The  Archangels  became experts at building a body of desire  stuff,  the
densest  matter of the Sun Period.   Therefore,  they are able to teach  and
guide  such less evolved beings as man and animal how to mold and use a  de-
sire body.

   Again we have a seeming anomaly,  for the Archangels were the humanity of
the  Sun Period when the vital body was started,  at a time when man had  as
yet no desire body,  but the difficulty vanishes when we remember that  each
of  our bodies is the shadow of one of the aspects of the Spirit,  and  that
the vehicles are not given by these Hierarchies.  They are merely helpers of
man  in training a particular vehicle, because of a special  fitness.   Thus
the  Archangels are trainers of our desire bodies,  because they became  ex-
perts  at building and using such a vehicle when they were human in the  Sun
Period,  for them they build their densest bodies of "desire stuff,"  as  we
are now building ours from chemical mineral matter.

   In  the Moon Revolution of the Earth Period the Archangels  (humanity  of
the  Sun Period) and the Lords of Form took charge of the reconstruction  of
the desire body, but they were not alone in that work.   When the separation
of  the Globe into two parts occurred, there was a similar division  in  the
desire bodies of some of the evolving beings.  We  have  already  noted that

[PAGE 335]

where this division took place,  the form was ready to become the vehicle of
an indwelling Spirit, and in order to further this purpose the Lords of Mind
(humanity  of the Saturn Period) took possession of the higher part  of  the
desire  body and implanted in it the separate selfhood,  without  which  the
present man with all his glorious possibilities, could never have existed.

   Thus in the latter part of the Moon Revolution the first germ of separate
personality was implanted in the higher part of the desire body by the Lords
of Mind.

   The  Archangels were active in the lower part of the desire body,  giving
it the purely animal desires.   They also worked in the desire bodies  where
there  was no division.   Some of these were to become the vehicles  of  the
animal  Group Spirits,  which work on them from without,  but do  not  enter
wholly into the animal forms,  as the individual Spirit does into the  human
body.

   The desire body was reconstructed to render it capable of being interpen-
etrated  by the germinal mind which,  during the Earth Period,  will be  im-
planted  in  all those desire bodies in which it was possible  to  make  the
before-mentioned division.

   The  Lords of Mind took charge of the higher part of the desire body  and
of  the  germinal  mind,  impregnating them with  the  quality  of  separate
selfhood,  without which no separate,  self-contained beings such as we  are
today would be possible.

   As when reflected in a pond, the images of trees appear inverted, the fo-
liage seeming to be the deepest down in the water,  so the highest aspect of
the  Spirit (the Divine Spirit) finds its counterpart in the lowest  of  the
three bodies (the dense body).  The  next  highest  Spirit (the Life Spirit)

[PAGE 336]

is  reflected in the next lowest body (the vital body).   The  third  Spirit
(the Human Spirit) and its reflection, the third body (the desire body), ap-
pear closest of all the the reflecting mirror, which is the mind, the latter
corresponding to the surface of the pond-the reflecting medium in our  anal-
ogy.

   The lowest vehicle of the Archangels is the desire body.  Our desire body
was  added in the Moon Period,  at which time Jehovah was the  highest  Ini-
tiate.  Therefore Jehovah is able to deal with man's desire body.  Jehovah's
lowest  vehicle is the Human Spirit and its counterpart is the desire  body.
The Archangels are His helpers because they are able to manage the Spiritual
Sun forces and the desire body is their lowest vehicle.   Thus they are able
to  work  with  and prepare humanity for the time when it  can  receive  the
spiritual impulses directly from the Solar Orb,  without the intervention of
the Moon.

   Jehovah helped man to get control over the mind and desire body by giving
Law  and decreeing punishment for its transgression.   The fear of  God  was
pitted  against the desires of the flesh.   Thus sin became manifest in  the
world.

   The Angels cause man's corn and grapes to grow or wither,  his cattle  to
increase  or not,  his family to multiply or die out,  as required to  bless
him for obedience to the law of the chief Race Spirit Jehovah,  or to punish
him  for transgression against the law.   Under his sway all the Race  Reli-
gions:   Confucianism,  Taoism, Buddhism, Judaism, etc., have flourished and
worked  in the desire body as Religions of the Holy Spirit.   Jehovah  helps
man to curb the desire body because that was started in the Moon Period.

[PAGE 337]

   The  Angels worked alone with man in the Hyperborean Epoch,  when he  had
only a dense and a vital body,  but in the Lemurian Epoch,  when the  desire
body was added,  the Archangels also took a hand,  to help the infant  human
Spirit to control its future vehicles.  They neutralized the desire body  so
that it was sexually active only at certain times of the year.

   At  stated times of the year (during the Lemurian Epoch)  the  Archangels
withdrew their restraining influence on the desire body and the Angels  mar-
shaled  humanity to great temples where the generative act was performed  at
times  when the constellations were propitious.   Our present-day  honeymoon
trips are atavistic reminders of those migrations for propagative  purposes,
and show a connection with the heavenly bodies in the name HONEYMOON.

   When  propagation had been accomplished,  the desire body was again  neu-
tralized,  and in consequence there was no more pain connected with parturi-
tion than is the case with the animals at present,  where similar conditions
obtain now.

   The human Ego was very weak (in the middle third of Atlantis) and had  to
get help from someone else.  Therefore Jehovah,  the highest Initiate of the
Moon  Period,  the ruler over the Angels and Archangels that work with  men,
breathes into man's nostrils, gives him lungs, and gives him the Race Spirit
in  the air that is to curb the hardening tendencies of the desire body  and
help him to get it under control.  The desire body has control of the volun-
tary muscles.   Every movement we make is caused by desire,  and every exer-
tion  breaks down tissue,  and hardens more and more every particle  of  our
tissue.

[PAGE 338]

   There  are  three steps by which this work (UNION WITH THE  HIGHER  SELF)
conquers the lower nature,  but they are not completely taken one after  the
other.   In a certain sense they go together,  so that at the present  stage
the first receives the most attention, the second less,  and the third least
of all.  In time, when the first step has been wholly taken,  naturally more
attention can be paid to the other two.

   There are three helps given in attaining these three stages.  They can be
seen in the outside world,  where the great Leaders of humanity have  placed
them.

   The  first help is Race Religions, which by aiding humanity  to  OVERCOME
THE DESIRE BODY, prepare for it for union with the Holy Spirit.

   The full operation of this help was seen on the Day of Pentecost.  As the
Holy Spirit is the Race God,  all languages are expression of it.   That  is
why the apostles,  when fully united and filled with the Holy spirit,  spoke
with different tongues and were able to convince their hearers.   Their  de-
sire bodies had been sufficiently purified to being about the wish-for union
and this is an earnest of what the disciple will one day attain to-the power
to speak all tongues.  It may also be cited as a modern, historical example,
that  the Compte de St.  Germain (who was one of the later  incarnations  of
Christian Rosenkreuz, the founder of our sacred Order), spoke all languages,
so that all to whom he spoke thought he belonged to the same nation as they.
He also had achieved union with the Holy Spirit.

   The effect of this (Ancient Initiation) was to produce a race having  the
proper degree of laxity between the dense and vital bodies; also to wake the

[PAGE 339]

desire  body from its state of lethargy during sleep.   Thus a  special  few
were made fit for Initiation and were given special opportunities that could
not be given to all.  We see instances of this method among the Jews,  where
the  tribe of Levi were the chosen Templars;  also in the case of the  Brah-
mins, who were the only priestly class among the Hindus.

   When the blood flowed from these centers, the great Sun-Spirit Christ was
liberated from the physical vehicle of Jesus and found Himself in the Earth,
with individual vehicles.  The already existing planetary vehicles He perme-
ated with His own vehicles and, in the twinkling of an eye, diffused His own
desire body over the planet,  which has enabled Him thenceforth to work upon
the Earth and its humanity from within.

   At that moment a tremendous wave of spiritual sunlight flooded the Earth.
It  rent the veil which the Race Spirit had hung before the Temple  to  keep
out all but the chose few,  and it made the Path of Initiation free  thence-
forth  to whomsoever will.   So far as concerned the spiritual worlds,  this
wave transformed the conditions of Earth like a flash of lightning,  but the
dense, concrete conditions are, of course, much more slowly affected.

   Like all rapid and high vibrations of light,  this great wave blinded the
people by its dazzling brilliance,  therefore it was said that "the Sun  was
darkened."   The very opposite was what actually occurred.   The Sun was not
darkened,  but shone out in glorious splendor.   It was the excess of  light
that  blinded the people,  and only as the entire Earth absorbed the  desire
body  of  the bright Sun-Spirit did the vibration return to  a  more  normal
rate.

[PAGE 340]

   In the Sun Period, the lowest of the Globes was in the Desire World,  and
therefore  the Archangels have the desire body as their lowest vehicle  yet;
but  Christ has gone beyond.   He has raised Himself higher,  so He has  the
Life Spirit as his lowest vehicle today,  and ordinarily uses no denser  ve-
hicle.   Only by the power of the Life Spirit can the national  tendency  be
overcome  and  a universal brotherhood of man become a fact.   The  vehicles
pertaining  to  the  World of Thought,  the Ego,  and  the  mind,  make  for
separateness.  They have that for their characteristic.  But the Life Spirit
is the unifying principle in the universe,  and therefore Christ is the only
one fitted to bring about brotherhood.

   Christ,  as an Archangel,  had learned to build down to the desire  body,
but  the vital body and the dense body He had never learned to  build.   The
Archangels had worked on humanity FROM WITHOUT before,  as Group Spirits do;
but that was not enough.   The help had to come FROM WITHIN.   That was made
possible by the combination of Christ and Jesus and therefore it is true, in
the very highest sense, in the most literal sense, when Paul says:

   "There  is but one mediator between God and man-Christ Jesus,  the  righ-
teous."

   On  the other hand,  the Initiates have progressed and evolved for  them-
selves higher vehicles, discontinuing the ordinary use of the lowest vehicle
when the ability to use a new and higher one has been attained.  Ordinarily,
the lowest vehicle of an Archangel is the desire body,  but Christ,  who  is
the highest Initiate of the Sun Period,  ordinarily uses the Life Spirit  as
lowest vehicle, functioning as consciously in the World of Life Spirit as we
do  in  the  Physical  World.    The  student  is  requested  to  note  this

[PAGE 341]

point  particularly,  as  the  World  of  Life  Spirit  is  the  first  uni-
versal  world,  as explained in the chapter on worlds.   It is the world  in
which differentiation ceases and unity begins to be realized,  so far as our
solar system is concerned.

   Christ  could not be born in a dense body,  because He had  never  passed
through an evolution such as the Earth Period, therefore He would first have
had to acquire the ability to build a dense body such as ours.  But even had
He  possessed that ability,  it would have been inexpedient for such an  ex-
alted   Being  to  expend  for  that  purpose  the  energy   necessary   for
body-building through an ante-natal life,  childhood and youth,  to bring it
to sufficient maturity for use.  He had ceased to use, ordinarily,  vehicles
such  as would correspond to our Human Spirit,  mind,  and desire body,  al-
though  He  had learned to build them in the Sun Period,  and  retained  the
ability to build and function in them wherever desired or required.  He used
all  His own vehicles,  taking only the vital and dense bodies  from  Jesus.
When the latter was thirty years of age Christ entered these bodies and used
them until the climax of his Mission of Golgotha.   After the destruction of
the  dense body,  Christ appeared among His disciples in the vital body,  in
which He functioned for some time.   The vital body is the vehicle which  He
will use when He appears again, for He will never take another dense body.

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                        UNRELIABILITY OF DESIRE BODY:

   How  then  are we to unfold our spiritual power?   What is the  way,  the
truth,  and the life?  We have had the threefold path shown us in the glori-
ous teaching of the Christ.   Ordinary humanity all over the world are being
worked  up by law,  which works upon the desire body and holds it in  check.
The thinker is pitted against the flesh.  But under law no one can be saved.

   The Christian religion has not yet had time to accomplish this great  ob-
ject  (Universal Brotherhood).   Man is still in the toils of  the  dominant
Race  Spirit and the ideals of Christianity are yet too high for  him.   the
intellect  can see some of its beauties,  and readily admits that we  should
love our enemies,  but the passions of the desire body are still too strong.
The  law  of the Race Spirit being an "An eye for an eye,"  the  feeling  is
"I'll get even!"   The heart prays for love;  the desire body hopes for  re-
venge.   The intellect sees, IN THE ABSTRACT, the beauty of loving one's en-
emies,  but in concrete cases it allies itself with the vengeful feeling  of
the desire body, pleading, as an excuse for "getting even," that "the social
organism must be protected."

   While  the clean thoughts take us a long step on the path of  attainment,
the  emotions and desires of the desire body are not so easily subdued,  for
that vehicle is already  considerably  more  set  than  the mind.  While the

[PAGE 343]

regenerate mind readily agrees to the idea that we should love our  enemies,
the desire body (the emotional and passionate nature) aims with every  fiber
of  its being to get even-to get an eye for an eye and a tooth for a  tooth.
Sometimes,  even years and years after we think that the sleeping serpent is
subdued, that we have at last gained mastery over it, and that it cannot mar
our peace,  it may suddenly rise and overthrow all our hopes,  take the  bit
between its teeth,  go on a rampage, and vow vengeance for some real or fan-
cied  wrong.   Then it takes the whole power of the higher nature to  subdue
this rebellious part of our being.  This, the writer thinks, is the thorn in
the  flesh concerning which Paul besought the Lord thrice and was given  the
answer:   "My grace is sufficient for thee."  It certainly does need all the
grace  one can command to overcome,  and eternal vigilance is the  price  of
safety, so let us "watch and pray."

   It  is  the desire body which is responsible for all our  actions,  good,
bad,  or indifferent, and the oriental philosophers have therefore given di-
rections  to their disciples to KILL OUT DESIRE and to abstain from  action,
good  or bad,  as much as possible,  in order that they may thus save  them-
selves from the wheel of birth and death.  But that temper,  which is such a
great menace when it takes control, may be made as effective for service un-
der  our proper guidance.   We would not for one moment think of taking  the
temper out of a knife;  we should then be unable to cut anything  therewith.
The  temper  of  the desire body must be controlled but  not  by  any  means
killed.   For the dynamic power of motion and action in the invisible  world
is  stored  in  this  desire  body,  and  unless  it  is  intact,  we cannot

[PAGE 344]

expect to control ourselves there any more than an ocean liner whose engines
were  disabled could buffet the ocean waves.   There are  certain  societies
which teach negative methods of development, and one of their first instruc-
tions  to the pupil is to drop the jaw and make himself perfectly  negative.
Anyone  floated from the Physical World toward the Spiritual World  by  such
methods  would  certainly  find himself as driftwood upon  the  ocean,  cast
hither  and tither by the waves,  the prey and the sport of  every  current.
There are in the inner worlds, as well as here,  beings who are anything but
benevolent,  who  are ready to take advantage of anyone that  ventures  into
their world not fully prepared to protect himself against them.  Thus we see
the  supreme importance of subjecting our desires to the will of the  Spirit
HERE IN THIS WORLD,  of forcing this desire body of ours into subjection  so
that it may be trained before we attempt to enter the inner world.   Here it
is,  in a very large measure,  held in check by the fact that it is interpo-
lated within the dense body,  and therefore cannot sway us hither and yon in
the  same  degree  as it can when it has been  released  from  the  physical
prison-house.

   Even the subjection of the desire body, difficult as it is to accomplish,
will not serve to make a man conscious in the invisible worlds,  for the de-
sire body has not evolved to such a point that it can act as a real  instru-
ment of consciousness.   It is unformed and cloudlike in the great  majority
of  people,  and only a number of vortices are present as sense  centers  or
centers  of consciousness;  these are not yet sufficiently unfolded so  that
they can serve the purpose without some other help.  Therefore, it is neces-
sary  to  work  upon  and  educate  the  vital  body  in  such a manner that

[PAGE 345]

it  may be used in soul-flights.   The part of the vital body formed of  the
two higher ethers, the light ethers and the reflecting ether, is what we may
term the SOUL BODY;  that is to say, it is more closely linked with the  de-
sire body and the mind and also more amenable to the Spirit's touch than are
the two lower ethers.

   There  are  a great many people who associate spirituality with  a  great
show  of emotionalism,  but this idea has absolutely no foundation if  fact.
On the contrary,  the kind of spirituality which is developed by and associ-
ated  with the emotional nature of the desire body is unreliable in the  ex-
treme; this the the variety that is generated in revival meetings where emo-
tionalism  is brought up to a high pitch,  causing a person to make a  great
splurge of religious fervor which soon spends itself and leaves him  exactly
as  he was before,  much to the chagrin of the revivalists and other  people
who are engaged in evangelical work.   But what else can they expect?   They
set  out to save souls with drums and fifes,  with rhythmic  revival  songs,
with appeals made in a voice which is raised and lowered in harmonic  waves,
all of which are as powerfully effective on the desire body as storms  which
stir the sea to fury and then subside.

   When  newspapers  start out to inculcate certain ideas  into  the  public
mind, they do not expect to accomplish this by a single editorial, no matter
how powerfully written,  but by articles of daily recurrence they  gradually
create the desired sentiment in the public mind.  The Bible has been preach-
ing the principle of love for two thousand years,  Sunday after Sunday,  day
after  day,  from hundreds of thousands of pulpits.   War has not  yet  been
abolished, but the sentiment in favor of universal peace is growing stronger

[PAGE 346]

as time passes.  These sermons have had but a slight effect in so far as the
world at large in concerned,  no matter how powerfully a particular audience
might be moved for the time being;  for the desire body is that part of  the
composite man which was impressed at the time and was stirred thereby.

   The desire body is a later acquisition than the vital body,  hence not so
crystallized,  and therefore more impressionable.   Because it is of a finer
texture than the vital body, it is less retentive,  and the emotions so eas-
ily generated are also dissipated.

   It is sometimes contended that hypnotism may be used benevolently for the
cure  of  drunkenness  and other vices, and it  is  readily  admitted  that,
viewed,  soley from the material standpoint, that appears to be  true.   But
from  the viewpoint of occult science it is far otherwise.   Like all  other
desires, the craving for liquor is in the desire body, and it is the duty of
the Ego to master it by will power.   That is why he is in the school of ex-
perience called life, and no man can do him moral growing for him,  any more
than he can digest another's dinner for him.   Nature is not to be  cheated;
each  must solve his own problems overcome his faults by his own will.   If,
therefore,  a hypnotist overpowers the desire body of a drunkard, the Ego in
the drunkard will have to learn its lesson in a future life,  if he dies be-
fore the hypnotists.   But if the hypnotist dies first the man will inevita-
bly  turn to drink again,  for then the part of the hypnotist's  vital  body
which held the evil desire in check gravitates back to its source,  and  the
cure is nil.   The only way to permanently to master a vice is by one's  own
will

   The desire body is the perverted expression of the Ego.  It  converts the

[PAGE 347]

"Selfhood"  of the Spirit into "selfishness."  Selfhood seeks not its own at
the  expense of others.   Selfishness seeks gain regardless of others.   The
seat of the Human Spirit is primarily in the pineal gland and secondarily in
the  brain  and cerebro-spinal nervous system which  control  the  voluntary
muscles.

   The  desire  body,  which we sense as our  emotional  nature,  is  always
seeking  something  new.   This desire for change of  condition,  change  of
scene,  change  of mood,  love of emotion and sensation is due  to  the  ac-
tivities  of  the desire body,  which is like the sea in a  storm,  full  of
waves,  tossing hither and thither,  at random and without design,  each one
powerful  and destructive when unbridled and without allegiance to the  cen-
tral directing power.

   The mind, indeed, is the focus through which the Spirit endeavors to sub-
due  the  lower personality and guide it according to the  ability  acquired
during  its evolutionary period.   But at the present time it is so vague  a
quantity that among the great majority of people it cannot be reckoned with,
and they are therefore led principally by their feelings and emotions, with-
out much amenability to reason and thought.

   Recognizing  the great and wonderful power of the emotional body and  its
amenability  to "rhythm,"  which may be said to be its keynote,  progressive
theology  has  addressed itself to and focused its efforts upon  appeals  to
this vehicle.  It is this part of our nature which enjoys the entertainments
of  the sensational vaudeville pastor.   This vehicle it is that  sways  and
groans under the rhythmic rant of the revivalist,  itself vibrant with  emo-
tion,  rising  and falling in the well calculated measure of  the  speaker's
voice.  Unity of pitch is soon established, a state of actual hypnosis where

[PAGE 348]

the victim can no more help going to "mourners bench" than water can refrain
from  running  down hill.   They realize powerfully for the time  being  the
enormity of their sins and they are equally anxious to start a better  life.
Alas,  however, the next wave of attraction to their emotional nature washes
away all the preacher has said, as well as their resolutions, and they stand
exactly where they were before,  much to the chagrin and sorrow of the evan-
gelist concerned.

   Thus  all  efforts to elevate humanity by work upon the  unstable  desire
body are and must always prove futile.  This the occult schools of all  ages
have recognized and they have therefore addressed themselves to the changing
of the vital body by working with its keynote, which is repetition.

[PAGE 349]

                       PREPARATION FOR THE HIGHER LIFE:

   The  expression,  "prepared the Earth,"  means that all  evolution  on  a
planet is accompanied by? the evolution of THAT PLANET ITSELF.  Had some ob-
server  gifted with spiritual sight watched the evolution of our Earth  from
some  distant star,  he would have noticed a gradual change taking place  in
the Earth's desire body.

   Under  the old dispensation the desire bodies of people in  general  were
improved by means of the law.   This work is still going on in the  majority
of people, who are thus preparing themselves for the higher life.

   The Group Spirit works upon animals through their desire bodies,  calling
up  pictures which give to the animal a feeling and a suggestion of what  it
must do.   Likewise, the allegorical pictures, which are contained in myths,
laid the foundation in man for his present and future development.   Subcon-
sciously  these myths worked upon him and brought him to the stage where  he
is today.   Without that preparation he would have been unable to accomplish
that work which he is now doing.

   The  Ego  has several instruments-a dense body,  a vital body,  a  desire
body,  and a mind.  these are its tools and upon their quality and condition
depends how much or how little it can accomplish  in  its  work of gathering

[PAGE 350]

experience in each life.  If the instruments are poor and dull there will be
little  spiritual growth and the life will be a barren one,  so far  as  the
Spirit is concerned.

   If  strict attention is paid to hygiene and diet,  the dense body is  the
one  principally affected,  but at the same time there is also an effect  on
the  vital body and the desire body because,  as purer and better  materials
are  built into the dense body,  the particles are enveloped in purer  plan-
etary  ether and desire stuff also.  Therefore,  the planetary parts of  the
vital and desire bodies become purer.   If attention is paid to food and hy-
giene only, the personal vital and desire bodies may remain almost as impure
as before, but it has become just a little easier to get into touch with the
good than if gross food were used.

   No matter what people say to us or about us,  their words have no intrin-
sic  power  to hurt-it is our own mental attitude towards  their  utterances
which  determines the effect of their words upon us for good or ill.   Paul,
when  facing persecution and slander,  testified that "None of these  things
move me."  All who hope to advance spiritually must cultivate equipoise, for
without it the desire body will either run riot or congeal, according to the
nature of the emotions generated by intercourse with others,  whether worry,
anger, or fear.  We know that the dense body is our vehicle of action,  that
the vital body gives it the power to act, that the desire body furnishes the
incentive to action, and that the mind was given as a brake on impulse.

   We learn from the COSMO-CONCEPTION,  pp.  89-91,  that thought forms from
within and without the body are being continually projected upon the  desire
body in an endeavor the arouse feeling which will lead to action,  and  that
reason ought to rule the lower nature and leave the higher  self  scope  for

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expression of its divine proclivities.   We also know that habitual  thought
has power to mold even physical matter, for the nature of the sensualist  is
plainly  discernible  in his features which are as coarse and gross  as  the
features  of  the spiritually minded are delicate and fine.   The  power  of
thought is still greater in its potency to mold the finer vestures.

   We  have already seen how thoughts of fear and worry congeal  the  desire
body of anyone who indulges in that habit, and it is equally certain that by
cultivating  an optimistic frame of mind under all circumstances we can  at-
tune our desire bodies to any key we wish.  AFTER A TIME, THAT WILL BECOME A
HABIT.   It must be confessed that it is difficult to hold the  desire  body
down to any definite lines, but it can be done, and the attempt must be made
by all who aspire to spiritual advancement.

   We have created a subtle aura about us under the guardianship of the  Di-
vine Hierarchies reigning over the seven planets:  Saturn, Sun, Moon,  Mars,
Mercury,  Jupiter,  and Venus.  The Universe, or great world,  is mystically
called the seven-stringed lyre of Apollo.  Our individual organism or micro-
cosm is a replica or image of God, and it behooves us to awaken in ourselves
an  echo of this music of the spheres.   Most of us have learned to  respond
too much to saturnine vibrations of sorrow, gloom,  fear,  and worry,  which
congeal our desire bodies,  and it would be to the lasting benefit of all to
try to cultivate the spiritual vibrations of the Sun, filling our lives with
optimism and sunshine which will dispel the saturnine gloom and  despondency
and prevent such thoughts entering our aura in the future.

Continued with file "RC1011.TXT"

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