Charles Webster Leadbeater

“ Just as before, the third aspect descends two planes, and shrines itself in matter of the highest level of the mental plane, and we call that manas, and this trinity of atma-buddhi-manas, manifesting in the causal body, is what we call the ego.
Never forget that the ego is not the manas only, but the spiritual triad; at our present stage of evolution he rests in his causal body on the higher levels of the mental plane, but as he passes onwards his consciousness will be centred on the buddhic plane, and afterwards, when he attains adeptship ”

“ Therefore the spirit is truly seven-fold, for he is triple on his own plane, dual on the buddhic, and single on the mental, and the unity which is his synthesis makes seven. Though he draws back into the higher he retains the definiteness of the lower. ”

“ For us now in this lower consciousness it is the voice of the ego; when we identify ourselves with the ego it is the voice of the spirit; when we reach the spirit it is the voice of the monad, and when in the far-away future we identify ourselves wholly with the monad it ill be the voice of the LOGOS ”

“ Now an exact repetition of this process takes place in the case of man, who is in very truth made in the image of God. The spirit is triple upon the third plane, and the first of its three manifestations does not descend below that level. ”