Max Heindel

“ In the years of youth and health, when the bark of our life sails upon seas of prosperity, when all appears beautiful and bright, we may put the thought behind us, but there will surely come a time in the life of every thinking person when the problem of life and death forces itself upon his consciousness and refuses to be set aside. Neither will it help him to accept the ready made solution of anyone else without thought and in blind belief, for this is a basic problem which every one must solve for himself or herself in order to obtain satisfaction. ”

“ Because of the relative proximity or distance of these worlds, a statue, a form, withstands the ravages of time for millenniums, but the colors upon a painting fade in far shorter time, for they come from the Desire World, and music which is native to the World furthest removed from us, the World of Thought, is like a will-o-the-wisp which none may catch or hold, it is gone again as soon as it has made its appearance. But there is in color and music a compensation for this increasing evanescence. ”

“ These names only add to our confusion until we have thoroughly studied the science of electricity and then we shall find that the mystery deepens, for while the street car belongs to the world of inert form perceptible to our vision, the electric current which moves it is indigenous to the realm of force, the invisible Desire World, and the thought which created and guides it, comes from the still more subtile World of Thought which is the home world of the human spirit, the Ego. ”

“ The Materialistic Theory teaches that life is but a short journey from the cradle to the grave, that there is no higher intelligence in the universe than man; that his mind is produced by certain correlations of matter and that therefore death, and dissolution of the body terminate existence.
There was a day when the arguments of Materialistic philosophers seemed convincing, but as science advances it discovers more and more that there is a spiritual side to the universe. ”

“ He will not neglect to feel glad either when he comes to a scene where he has done well, and the more intensely he can feel, the more thoroughly he will eradicate the record upon the tablet of the heart and sharpen his conscience, so that as time goes on from year to year, he will find less cause for blame and enhance his soul power enormously. Thus he will grow in a measure impossible by any less systematic method, and there will be no necessity for his stay in purgatory after death. ”

“ We have been speaking of ether as an avenue of forces, a word which conveys no meaning to the average mind, because force is invisible. But to an occult investigator the forces are not merely names such as steam, electricity, etc. He finds them to be intelligent beings of varying grades, both sub and superhuman. What we call “laws of nature,” are great intelligences which guide more elemental beings in accordance with certain rules designed to further their evolution. ”

“ When one awakes in the Desire World after having passed through aforementioned experiences, the general feeling seems to be one of relief from a heavy burden, a feeling perhaps akin to that of a diver encased in a heavy rubber suit, a weighty brass helmet upon his head, leaden soles under his feet and heavy weights of lead upon his breast and back, confined in his operations on the bottom of the ocean by a short length of air tube, and able only to move clumsily with difficulty. ”

“ The busy day alternates with the quiet of night. The ebb of the ocean is succeeded by the flood-tide. Thus, as all other things move in cycles, the life that expresses itself here upon earth for a few years is not to be thought of as ended when death has been reached, but as surely as the sun rises in the morning after having set at night, will the life that was ended by the death of one body be taken up again in a new vehicle and in a different environment. ”

“ In other words, murder, or fatal accidents brought about by human [pg 147] carelessness, are in reality the only termination to life not planned by invisible leaders of humanity. No one is ever compelled to do murder or other evil, or there could not come to them a just retribution for their acts. The Christ said that evil must come but woe unto him by whom it cometh, and to harmonize that with the law of divine justice: “as a man soweth, so shall he also reap,” there must at least be absolute free will in respect to evil acts. ”

“ It is sad for the woman whose heart is bound up in home and the little ones she has reared, to leave them, perhaps without anyone to care for them; to know that they have to fight their way alone through the early years when her tender care is needed, and perhaps to see those little ones abused, and she unable to lift a hand, though her heart may bleed as freely as it would in earth life. ”

“ Man, who is a lesser spirit, also gathers about himself spirit-substance, which crystallizes into matter and becomes the visible body which the spiritual sight reveals as placed inside an aura of finer vehicles. ”

“ The difference between those who pass out at a ripe old age, and one who leaves this earth in the prime of life, may be illustrated by the manner in which the seed clings to a fruit in an unripe state. A great deal of force is necessary to tear the stone from a green peach; it has such a tenacious hold upon the fruit that shreds of pulp adhere to it when forcibly removed, so also the spirit clings to the flesh in middle life and a certain part of its material interest remain and bind it to earth after death. ”

“ As heat from a fire warms all objects within the sphere of its radiations, so also the Aquarian ray will raise the earth's vibrations to a pitch we are as yet unable to comprehend, though we have demonstrations of the material workings of this force in the inventions which have revolutionized life within the memory of the present generation. We have wondered at the X-ray, which sees through the human body, but each one has a sense latent which when evolved will enable him to see through any number of bodies or to any distance. ”

“ In the Desire World, on the contrary, force and matter are almost indistinguishable one from the other. We might almost describe desire-stuff as force-matter, for it is in incessant motion, responsive to the slightest feeling of a vast multitude of beings which populate this wonderful world in nature. ”

“ Not a sparrow falls to the ground without divine Will. There are along life's path partings of the way, as it were; on one side the main line of life continues onward, the other path leads into what we might call a blind alley. ”

“ Thus, when you have given an astrologer the data of your birth, you have given him the key to your innermost soul, and there is no secret that he may not ferret out. This knowledge may be used for good or ill, to help or hurt, according to the nature of the man. Only a friend should be trusted with this key to your soul, and it should never be given to anyone base enough to prostitute a spiritual science for material gain. ”

“ Our homes may be saddened almost beyond endurance when the little flower is broken and the sunshine it brought has gone. But could we see the beautiful existence which these little ones lead, and did we understand the great benefits which accrue to a child from its limited stay there, our sorrow would be at least ameliorated in a great measure, and the wound upon our heart would heal more quickly. ”

“ When, in the dawn of Being, God the Father enunciated The Word, and The Holy Spirit moved upon the sea of homogeneous Virgin Matter, primeval Darkness was turned to Light. That is therefore the prime manifestation of Deity, and a study of the principles of Light will reveal to the mystic intuition a wonderful source of spiritual inspiration. As it would take us too far afield from our subject we shall not enter into an elucidation of that theme here, except so far as to give an elementary idea of how divine Life energizes the human frame and stimulates to action. ”

“ Considering thus the immense power and potency of the human word, we may perhaps dimly apprehend the potential magnitude of the Word of God, the Creative Fiat, when as a mighty dynamic force it first reverberated through space and commenced to form primordial matter into worlds, as sound from a violin bow moulds sand into geometrical figures. Moreover, the Word of God still sounds [pg 112] to sustain the marching orbs and impel them onwards in their circle paths, the Creative Word continues to produce forms of gradually increasing efficiency, as media expressing life and consciousness. ”

“ In the higher Regions of the Desire World the confusion of tongues gives place to a universal mode of expression which absolutely prevents misunderstandings 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. ”

“ Therefore the Great and Wise Beings, Who are behind the scene of evolution, terminate our life, that we may have a fresh start in a different sphere of influence. The law of conservation of energy is not confined to the Physical World, but operates in the spiritual realms also. There is nothing in life that has not its purpose. We do wrong to rail against circumstances, no matter how disagreeable, we should rather endeavor to learn the lessons which are contained therein, that we may live a long and useful life. ”

“ Thus we maintain that the Doctrine of Rebirth offers the only solution to the problem of life which is in harmony with the laws of nature, which answers the ethical requirements of the case and permits us to love God without blinding our reason to the inequalities of life and the varying circumstances which give to a few the ease and comfort, the health and wealth, which are denied to the many. ”

“ In one region the extract of sufferings become conscience to deter us from doing wrong, in the other region the quintessence of good is transmuted to benevolence and altruism which are the basis of all true progress. Moreover, purgatory is far from being a place of punishment, it is perhaps the most beneficent realm in nature, for because of purgation we are born innocent life after life. The tendencies to commit the same evil for which we suffered remain with us and temptations to commit the same wrongs will be placed in our path until we have consciously overcome the evil here ”

“ Being dense, it is also to a great extent impervious to disturbing influences from which the more subtle spiritual bodies do not shield us. It enables us to bring our ideas to a logical conclusion with far less effort at concentration than is necessary in that realm where all is in such incessant and turbulent motion. Thus we are gradually developing the faculty of holding our thoughts to a center by existence in this world, and we should value our opportunities here, rather than deplore the limitations which help in one direction more than they fetter in another. ”

“ At this point in life self-assertion, the feeling “I am myself”, is stronger than at any other time and therefore authority should give place to Advice; the parent should practice the utmost tolerance, for at no time in life is a human being as much in need of sympathy as during the seven years from fourteen to twenty-one when the desire nature is rampant and unchecked.
It is a crime to inflict corporal punishment upon a child at any age. Might is never right, and as the stronger, parents should always have compassion for the weaker. ”

“ The reason for taking a child to watch in preference to an adult, is, that the child is reborn very quickly, for its short life on earth has borne but few fruits and these are soon assimilated, while the adult who has lived a long life, and had much experience remains in the invisible worlds for centuries, so that the pupil could not watch him from death to rebirth. ”

“ The Theory of Theology claims that just prior to each birth a soul is created by God and enters into the world where it lives for a time varying from a few minutes to a few score of years; that at the end of this short span of life it returns through the portal of death to the invisible beyond, where it remains forever in a condition of happiness or misery according to the deeds done in the body during the few years it lived here. ”

“ If anyone should attempt to forcibly extract a babe from the protecting womb of its mother, the outrage would result in death, because the babe has not yet arrived at a maturity sufficient to endure impacts of the Physical World. In the three septenary periods which follow birth, the invisible vehicles [pg 195] are still in the womb of mother nature. If we teach a child of tender years to memorize, or to think, or if we arouse its feelings and emotions, we are in fact opening the protecting womb of nature and the results are equally as disastrous in other respects as a forced premature birth. ”

“ A man does not become an Angel by the mere fact of dying and entering a new world any more than an animal advances to be a man by the same process. But in time all that lives, mounts the ladder of Being from the clod to the God. There is no limitation possible to the spirit, and so at various stages in its unfoldment the Human Spirit works with the other nature forces, according to the stage of intelligence which it has attained. ”