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[PAGE  1]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                            GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

                                     BY

                                 MAX HEINDEL
                                 [1865-1919]



                            A SERIES OF ESSAYS ON
                             PRACTICAL MYSTICISM




                         THE ROSICRUCIAN FELLOWSHIP
                         INTERNATIONAL HEADQUARTERS
                                MT. ECCLESIA
                                P.O. BOX 713
                      OCEANSIDE, CALIFORNIA, 92054 U.S.A.





[PAGE  3]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

                                   FORWARD

   The contents of this book are among the last writings of Max Heindel, the
mystic.  They  contain  some  of his deepest thoughts, and are the result of
years  of  research and occult investigation.  He,  too,  could say  as  did
Parsifal: "Through error and through suffering I came, through many failures
and  through countless woes."   At last he was given the living  water  with
which he was able to quench the spiritual thirst of many souls.  He also de-
veloped  to their depths pity and love, and could feel the heart  throbs  of
suffering humanity.

   Strong  souls  are  usually endowed with great energy  and  impulse,  and
through these very forces,  they forge to the front ranks though they  often
suffer much.   As a result they are filled with compassion for others.   The
writer  of these lessons sacrificed his physical body on the altar  of  ser-
vice.

   In writing the books and monthly lessons of the Fellowship,  in his  lec-
tures and class work,  and in the arduous pioneer work of establishing Head-
quarters within the short span of ten years,  Max Heindel accomplished  more
than  many who are blessed with perfect health could have accomplished in  a
lifetime.   His  first  book,  his  masterpiece,  " The  Rosicrucian  Cosmo-


[PAGE  4]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Conception,"  was written under the direct guidance of the Elder Brothers of
the Rose Cross.  It carries a vital message to the world.   It satisfies not
alone the intellect, but also the heart.  His "Freemasonry and Catholicism,"
has found its way into many Masonic libraries.   The occultist has  received
much from the book entitled, "The Web of Destiny," which is a mine of mysti-
cal knowledge and helpful occult truths.  It is also a guide to the investi-
gator, establishing danger signals for the venturesome ones who wish to take
heaven  by storm.   To the science of astrology he has given more in  a  few
years than has previously been discovered for centuries.   His two  valuable
works,  "Simplified Scientific Astrology"  and "The Message of  the  Stars,"
deal largely with the spiritual and medical aspects of  astrology.  The lat-
ter gives methods of diagnosis and healing which form a valuable addition to
the  works of other authors,  both ancient and modern.   These books may  be
found in the libraries of many doctors of the old school.

   In "Gleanings of a Mystic"  are found twenty-four lessons which were for-
merly sent out to students.   It is the wish of the writer of this introduc-
tion  that  these  lessons  may carry a message of love  and  cheer  to  the
soul-hungry reader and hope to the disconsolate one.

                                                        Augusta Foss Heindel


[PAGE  5]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                              TABLE OF CONTENTS

Chapter I.
   Initiation: What It Is and Is Not--Part I.                        7
Chapter II
   Initiation: What It Is and Is Not--Part II.                      14
Chapter III.
   The Sacrament of Communion--Part I.                              21
Chapter IV.
   The Sacrament of Communion--Part II.                             28
Chapter V.
   The Sacrament of Baptism.                                        37
Chapter VI.
   The Sacrament of Marriage                                        46
Chapter VII.
   The Unpardonable Sin and Lost Souls.                             54
Chapter VIII.
   The Immaculate Conception.                                       61
Chapter IX.
   The Coming Christ.                                               69
Chapter X.
   The Coming Age.                                                  77
Chapter XI.
   Meat and Drink as Factors of Evolution.                          85


[PAGE  6]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Chapter XII.
   A Living Sacrifice.                                              94
Chapter XIII.
   Magic, White and Black.                                         101
Chapter XIV.
   Our Invisible Government.                                       108
Chapter XV.
   Practical Precepts for Practical People.                        114
Chapter XVI.
   Sound, Silence, and Soul Growth.                                121
Chapter XVII.
   The "Mysterium Magnum" of the Rose Cross                        130
Chapter XVIII.
   Stumbling Blocks                                                138
Chapter XIX.
   The Lock of Upliftment.                                         147
Chapter XX.
   The Cosmic Meaning of Easter--Part I.                           153
Chapter XXI.
   The Cosmic Meaning of Easter--Part II.                          160
Chapter XXII.
   The Newborn Christ.                                             167
Chapter XXIII.
   Why I am a Rosicrucian.                                         173
Chapter XXIV.
   The Object of the Rosicrucian Fellowship.                       180


[PAGE  7]                                  INITIATION: WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

                                  CHAPTER I

                      INITIATION: WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

                                   PART I

   IT IS NO rare occurrence to receive questions relating to Initiation, and
we are also frequently asked to state whether this order or that society  is
genuine,  and whether the initiations they offer to all comers who have  the
price are BONA FIDE.  For that reason it seems necessary to write a treatise
on  the subject so that students of the Rosicrucian Fellowship may  have  an
official statement for reference and guidance in the future.

  In the first place let it be clearly understood that we consider it repre-
hensible to express condemnation of any society or order,  no matter what it
practices.   It may be perfectly sincere and honest ACCORDING TO ITS  LIGHT.
We  do  not believe that we rise in the opinion of  discriminating  men  and
women  by speaking in disparaging terms of others;  neither are we  laboring
under  the delusion that WE have all the truth and the other  societies  are
plunged in Egyptian darkness.   We reiterate what we have often said before,


[PAGE  8]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

that  all religions have been given to mankind by the Recording Angels,  who
know the spiritual requirements of each class,  nation,  and race,  and have
the intelligence to give each a form of worship perfectly suited to its par-
ticular need;  that thus Hinduism is suited to the Hindu,  Mohammedanism  to
the  Arab,  and the Christian religion to those born in  the  Western  Hemi-
sphere.

   The Mystery Schools of each religion furnish to the more advanced members
of  the race or nation embracing its higher teaching,  which IF  LIVED,  ad-
vances  them into a higher sphere of spirituality than their brethren.   But
as the religion of the backward races is of a lower order than the  religion
of the pioneers,  the Christian nations, so also the MYSTERY TEACHING OF THE
EAST IS MORE ELEMENTARY THAN THAT OF THE WEST, and the Hindu or Chinese Ini-
tiate  is on a correspondingly lower rung of the ladder of  attainment  than
the Western Mystic.  Please ponder this well so that you may not fall a vic-
tim to misguided people who try to persuade others that the Christian  reli-
gion  is crude compared with oriental cults.   Ever westward in the wake  of
the shining sun, the light of the world, has gone the star of empire, and is
it  not  reasonable to suppose that the spiritual light has kept  pace  with
civilization,  or even preceded it as thought precedes action?  We hold that
such is the case,  that the Christian religion is the loftiest yet given  to
man, and that to repudiate the Christian religion, esoteric or exoteric, for
any of the older systems is analogous to preferring the  older  textbooks of


[PAGE  9]                                  INITIATION: WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

science to the newer ones which embrace discoveries to date.

   Neither  are the practices of Eastern aspirants to the higher life to  be
imitated  by Westerners;  we refer particularly to the breathing  exercises.
They  are both beneficial and necessary to the unfoldment of the Hindu,  but
it is otherwise with the Western aspirant.  To him it is dangerous to  prac-
tice breathing exercises for soul unfoldment;  they will even prove  subver-
sive of soul growth, and they are,  moreover,  absolutely unnecessary.   The
reason is this:

   During involution the threefold spirit has become gradually incrusted  in
a threefold body.   In the Atlantean Epoch man was at the nadir of material-
ity.   We are just now rounding the lowest point on the arc  of  involution,
and starting upward on the arc of evolution.  At this point, then,  all man-
kind is immured in this earthly prison house to such a degree that spiritual
vibrations are almost killed.  This is, of course,  particularly true of the
backward  races and the lower classes in the Western world.   The  atoms  in
such backward race bodies are vibrating at an exceedingly low rate, and when
in  the course of time one of these people develops to a point where  it  is
possible  to  further him upon the path of attainment,  it is  necessary  to
raise this vibratory pitch of the atom so that the vital body,  which is the
medium of occult growth, may to a certain extent be liberated from the dead-
ening forces of the physical atom.  This  result  is  attained  by  means of


[PAGE 10]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

breathing exercises, which in time accelerate the vibration of the atom, and
allow the spiritual growth necessary to the individual to take place.

   These exercises may also be used by a great number of people in the West-
ern  world,  particularly  those who are not at all  concerned  about  their
spiritual  advancement.   But even among those who desire soul growth  there
are  many who are not yet at the point where the atoms of their bodies  have
evolved to such a pitch of vibration that acceleration beyond the usual mea-
sure would injure them.  Here the breathing exercises would do no harm;  but
if given to a person who is really at the point where he can enter the  path
of advancement ordinarily mapped out for the Hindu's precocious brothers and
sisters in the West,  in other words, when he is nearly ready for Initiation
and when he would be benefited BY SPIRITUAL EXERCISES,  then the case is far
otherwise.

   During the aeons which we have spent in evolution since the time when  we
were in Hindu bodies, our atoms have accelerated their vibratory pitch enor-
mously,  and as said in the case of one who is really nearly ready for  Ini-
tiation,  the pitch of vibration is higher than that of the average  man  or
woman.   Therefore he does not need breathing exercises to  ACCELERATE  this
pitch, but certain spiritual exercises suited to him individually which will
advance  him  on  the proper path.  If such a person at this critical period


[PAGE 11]                                  INITIATION: WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

meets  some one who ignorantly or unscrupulously gives him  breathing  exer-
cises,  and if he follows the instructions accurately in the hope of GETTING
QUICK  RESULTS,  he will get them quickly but in a manner he has not  looked
for,  since the vibratory rate of the atoms in his body will in a very short
time  become accelerated to such a pitch that it will seem to him as  if  he
were  walking on air;  then also an improper cleavage of the vital body  may
take place, and either consumption or insanity follows.  Now please put this
down  where it will burn itself into your consciousness in letters of  fire:
INITIATION IS A SPIRITUAL PROCESS,  AND SPIRITUAL PROGRESS CANNOT BE  ACCOM-
PLISHED BY PHYSICAL MEANS, BUT ONLY BY SPIRITUAL EXERCISES.

   There  are many orders in the West which profess to INITIATE  ANYONE  WHO
HAS THE PRICE.   Some of these orders have names closely resembling our own,
and we are constantly asked by students whether they are affiliated with us.
In order to settle this once and for all,  please note that the  Rosicrucian
Fellowship  has constantly taught that NO SPIRITUAL GIFT MAY EVER BE  TRADED
FOR  MONEY.   If you bear this in mind,  you may know we have no  connection
with any order which demands money for the transference of spiritual  power.
He who has something to give of a truly spiritual nature will not barter  it
for money.  I received a particular injunction to this effect from the Elder
Brothers in the Rosicrucian Temple,  when they told me to go to the  English
speaking world as  their  messenger,  a claim I do not expect you to believe


[PAGE 12]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

SAVE AS YOU SEE IT JUSTIFIED BY FRUITS.

   Now,  however, about Initiation: What it is? Is it ceremony as claimed by
these other orders?   If so,  any order can certainly invent ceremonies of a
more or less elaborate kind.   They may by flowing robes and clashing swords
appeal  to the emotions;  they may appeal to the sense of wonder and awe  by
rattling chains and by deep sounding gongs,  and thus produce in their  mem-
bers an "OCCULT FEELING."   Many revel in the adventures and experiences  of
the hero in "The Brother of the Third Degree,"  thinking that this is surely
Initiation,  but I tell you that it is very far from being the case.  NO CE-
REMONY CAN EVER GIVE TO ANY ONE THAT INWARD EXPERIENCE which constitutes  I-
nitiation, no matter how much is charged or how fearful the oaths, how awful
or beautiful the ceremony, or how gorgeous the robes,  any more than passing
through a ceremony can convert a sinner and make him a saint, for conversion
is to the exoteric religionist exactly what Initiation is in the higher mys-
ticism.  Please consider this point thoroughly, and you will have the key to
the problem.

   Do you think that any one could go to a person of depraved character  and
agree to convert him for a certain sum and carry out his part of the  agree-
ment?  Surely you know that no amount of money could bring about that change
in a man's character.   Ask a true convert where he got his religion and how
he  got  it.  One  may  tell you that he received it upon the road as he was


[PAGE 13]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

walking along; another says that the light and the change came to him in the
solitude  of his room;  another that the LIGHT STRUCK him as it struck  Paul
upon the road to Damascus,  and forced him to change.   Every one has a dif-
ferent experience,  and the outward manifestation of that inward  experience
is  that  IT CHANGES THE MAN'S WHOLE LIFE from the very least  to  the  very
greatest aspect.

   So it is with Initiation;  it is an inward experience,  entirely SEPARATE
AND APART FROM ANY CEREMONIAL WHATEVER,  and therefore it is an absolute im-
possibility that any one could sell it to any one else.   Initiation changes
a man's whole life.   It gives him a confidence that he never possessed  be-
fore.   It  clothes him with a mantle of authority that never can  be  taken
from him.   No matter what the circumstances in life,  it sheds a light upon
his whole being that is simply wonderful.   Nor can any ceremony effect such
a change.   We therefore hold that anyone who offers initiation into an  oc-
cult order by ceremonials to everyone who has the price,  brands himself  as
an  imposter.   For the true teacher,  if he were approached by an  aspirant
with an offer of money for spiritual attainment, would answer indignantly in
the  words used by Peter to Simon the sorcerer,  who offered him  money  for
spiritual powers: "Thy silver perish with thee."


[PAGE 14]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

                                 CHAPTER II

                      INITIATION: WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

                                   PART II

   TO OBTAIN a better understanding of what constitutes Initiation and  what
the prerequisites are,  let the student fix firmly in his mind the fact that
humanity  as a whole is slowly progressing upon the path of evolution,  thus
very  slowly,  almost inperceptibly,  attaining higher and higher states  of
consciousness.  The path of evolution is a spiral when we regard it from the
physical  side only,  but a lemniscate when viewed in both its physical  and
spiritual phases.   (See the diagram of chemical caduceus in THE ROSICRUCIAN
COSMO-CONCEPTION,  page 410.)  In the lemniscate, or figure 8, there are two
circles  which converge to a central point,  which circles may be  taken  to
symbolize the immortal spirit,  the evolving ego.  One of the circles signi-
fies its life in the physical world from birth to death.   During this  span
of  time  it sows a seed by every act and should reap in  return  a  certain
amount of experience.   But as we may sow seed in the field and lose  return
on that which falls on stony ground, among thorns,  et cetera,  so also  may
the seed of opportunity  be  wasted  because of neglect to till the soil and


[PAGE 15]                                  INITIATION: WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

the life will then be barren of fruit.   Conversely,  as diligence and  care
in cultivation  increase the productive power of garden seed  enormously, so
earnest application to the business of life--improvement of opportunities to
learn  life's  lessons and extract from our environment  the  experience  it
holds--brings  added opportunities;  and at the end of the life-day the  ego
finds itself at the door of death laden with the richest fruits of life.

   The objective work of physical existence over, the race run,  and the day
of action spent, the ego enters upon the subjective work of assimilation ac-
complished  during its sojourn in the invisible worlds,  which it  traverses
during  the period from death to birth, symbolized by the other ring of  the
lemniscate.  As the method of accomplishment this assimilation has been most
minutely described in various parts of our literature, it is needless to re-
peat  it here.   Suffice it to say that at the time when an ego  arrives  at
thecentral point in the lemniscate, which divides the physical from the psy-
chic  worlds  and  which we call the gate of birth  or  death  according  to
whether the ego is entering or leaving the realm where we, ourselves, happen
to be at the time,  it has with it an aggregate of faculties or talents  ac-
quired  in all its previous lives,  which it may then put to usury  or  bury
during the coming life-day as it sees fit; but upon the use it makes of what
it has, depends the amount of soul growth it makes.


[PAGE 16]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   If  for many lives it caters mainly to the lower nature,  which lives  to
eat,  drink  and be merry,  or if it dreams its life  away  in  metaphysical
speculations upon nature and God, sedulously abstaining from all unnecessary
action,  it  is  gradually passed and left behind by  the  more  active  and
progressive.  Great companies of these idlers form what we know as "backward
races";  while the active,  alert,  and wide-awake who improve a larger per-
centage of their opportunities, are the pioneers.   Contrary to the commonly
accepted idea, this applies also to those engaged in industrial work.  Their
money-getting  is only an incident,  an incentive,  and entirely apart  from
this phase their work is as spiritual as or even more so than that of  those
who spend their time in prayer to the prejudice of useful work.

   From what has been said,  it will be clear that the method of soul growth
as accomplished by the process of evolution requires ACTION in the  physical
life,  followed  in the post-mortem state by a  RUMINATING  PROCESS,  during
which the lessons of life are extracted and thoroughly incorporated into the
consciousness   of   the  ego,   though  the  experiences   themselves   are
forgotten--as  we  forget our labor in learning  the  multiplication  table,
though the faculty of using it remains.

   This  exceedingly  slow and tedious process is perfectly  suited  to  the
needs of the masses;  but there are some who habitually exhaust the  experi-
ences  commonly  given, thus requiring and meriting a larger scope for their


[PAGE 17]                                  INITIATION: WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

energies.   Difference of temperament is responsible for their division into
two classes.

   One class, led by their devotion to Christ, simply follow the dictates of
the  heart  in their work of live for their  fellows--beautiful  characters,
beacon  lights of love in a suffering world,  never actuated by selfish  mo-
tives, always ready to forego personal comfort to aid others.  Such were the
saints;  they worked as they prayed; they never shirked in either direction.
Nor are they dead today.  The earth would be a barren wilderness in spite of
all  its civilization did not their beautiful feet circle it on  errands  of
mercy,  were not the lives of sufferers made brighter by the light  of  hope
which radiates from their beautiful faces.  Had they but the knowledge  pos-
sessed by the other class they would indeed outdistance all in the race  for
the Kingdom.

   Mind is the predominating feature of the other class.  In order to aid it
in  its  efforts toward attainment, mystery schools were  early  established
wherein  the world drama was played to give the aspiring soul while  he  was
entranced,  answers to the questions of the origin and destiny of  humanity.
When  awakened,  he  was instructed in the sacred science of  how  to  climb
higher by following the method of nature--which is meditating upon the expe-
rience,  and incorporating the essential moral to make thereby  commensurate
soul growth;  also with this important feature, that whereas in the ordinary


[PAGE 18]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

course  of things a whole life is devoted to sowing and a whole  post-mortem
existence to ruminating and incorporating the soul substance,  this cycle of
a thousand years, more or less, may be reduced to a day, as held by the mys-
tic maxim,  "A day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day."
To be explicit,  whatever work has been done during a single day,  if  rumi-
nated  over  at night before crossing the neutral point between  waking  and
sleeping,  may thus be incorporated into the consciousness of the spirit  as
usable soul power.  When that exercise is faithfully performed,  the sins of
each day thus reviewed are actually blotted out,  and the man commences each
day  as if it were a new life,  with the added soul power gained in all  the
preceding days of his probationary life.

   But!--yes,  there is a great big BUT; NATURE IS NOT TO BE CHEATED; God is
not to be mocked.  "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap."   Let
no  one  think that the mere perfunctory review of the happenings of  a  day
with perhaps the light-hearted admission of,  "I wish I had not done  that,"
when reviewing a scene where he did something palpably wrong,  will save him
from  the  wrath to come.   When we pass out of the body into  purgatory  at
death and the panorama of our past life unfolds in reverse order to show  us
first the effects and then the causes which produced them, we feel in inten-
sified measure the pain we gave others;  and unless we perform our exercises


[PAGE 19]                                  INITIATION: WHAT IT IS AND IS NOT

in  a similar manner SO THAT WE LIVE EACH EVENING OUR HELL as  merited  that
day,  acutely sensible of every pang we have inflicted,  it will avail noth-
ing.   We must also endeavor to feel in the same intense  manner,  gratitude
for kindness received from others, and approbation on account of the good we
ourselves have done.

   Only  thus are we really living the post-mortem existence  and  advancing
scientifically towards the goal of Initiation.   The greatest danger of  the
aspirant upon this path is that he may become enmeshed in the snare of  ego-
tism,  and his only safeguard is to cultivate the faculties of faith,  devo-
tion,  and an all-embracing sympathy.  It is difficult,  but it can be done,
and when it has been accomplished the man or woman becomes a wonderful power
for good in the world.

   Now,  if  the student has pondered the preceding argument  well,  he  has
probably  grasped  the analogy between the LONG CYCLE of evolution  and  the
short CYCLES or steps used upon the path of preparation.  It should be quite
clear  that no one can do this post-mortem work for him and transmit to  him
the resulting soul growth.   You think it preposterous when a priesthood of-
fers to shorten the sojourn of a soul in purgatory.  How, then,  can you be-
lieve  that anyone else can--no matter what the  consideration--obviate  the
necessity of a number of purgatorial existences for your benefit and  trans-
mit  to  you at once the usable soul power you would have acquired  had  you


[PAGE 20]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

pursued the ordinary course of life to the day you are ready for Initiation?
Yet  this is what the offer to initiate a person not yet upon the  threshold
means.   You must have the soul power requisite for Initiation or no one can
initiate you.   If you have it,  you are upon the threshold by your own  ef-
forts,  beholden to no one,  and may demand Initiation as a right which none
would  dare dispute or withhold.   If you have it not and could buy  it,  it
would be cheap at twenty-five million dollars, and the man who offers it for
twenty-five dollars is as ridiculous as his dupe.   Please remember that  if
anyone offers to initiate you into an occult order, no matter if he calls it
"Rosicrucian"  or by any other name, his demand of an initiation fee at once
stamps him as an imposter;  explanations ot the effect that the fee is  used
to purchase regalia,  et cetera,  are only added evidence of the  fraudulent
nature of the order for it is said,  "Initiation is most emphatically not an
outward  ceremony,  but an inward experience."  I may further add  that  the
Elder  Brothers of the Rose Cross in the Mystic Temple where I received  the
Light made it a condition that their SACRED SCIENCE MUST NEVER BE PUT IN THE
BALANCE AGAINST A COIN.  Freely had I received, and freely was I required to
give.   This injunction I have obeyed, both in spirit and to the letter,  as
all know who have had dealings with the Rosicrucian Fellowship.


[PAGE 21]                                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

                                 CHAPTER III

                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

                                   PART I


   TO  OBTAIN  a thorough understanding of the deep  and  far-reaching  sig-
nificance of the manner in which the Sacrament of Communion was  instituted,
it  is  necessary to consider the evolution of our planet and  of  composite
man,  also the chemistry of foods and their influence on humanity.   For the
sake  of lucidity we will briefly recapitulate the Rosicrucian teachings  on
the  various  points  involved.   They have been  given  at  length  in  the
ROSICRUCIAN COSMO-CONCEPTION and our other works.

   The  Virgin Spirits,  which are now mankind,  commenced their  pilgrimage
through matter in the dawn of time, that by the friction of concrete  exist-
ence  their  latent powers might be transmuted to kinetic energy  as  usable
soul  power.   Three successive veils of increasingly dense matter were  ac-
quired  by the involving spirits during the Saturn,  Sun and  Moon  Periods.
Thus each spirit was separated from all other spirits, and the consciousness
which  could  not penetrate the prison wall of matter and  communicate  with
others was forced to turn inwards,  and  in  so doing it discovered--ITSELF.


[PAGE 22]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Thus self-consciousness was attained.

   A further crystallization of the before mentioned veils took place in the
Earth Period during the Polarian, Hyperborean, and Lemurain Epochs.   In the
Atlantean Epoch,  the mind was added as a focusing point between the  spirit
and  body,  completing  the  constitution of composite  man,  who  was  then
equipped to conquer the world and generate soul power by endeavor and  expe-
rience,  each having free will and choice except as limited by the  laws  of
nature and his own previous acts.

   During the time man-in-the-making was thus evolving, great creative Hier-
archies guided his every step.  Absolutely nothing was left to chance.  Even
the  food he ate was chosen for him so that he might obtain the  appropriate
material wherewith to build the various vehicles of consciousness  necessary
to  accomplish the process of soul growth.   The Bible mentions the  various
stages,  though it misplaces Nimrod,  making him to symbolize the  Atlantean
kings who lived BEFORE the Flood.

   In  the Polarian Epoch pure mineral matter became a constituent  part  of
man;  thus ADAM was made of earth,  that is,  so far as his dense  body  was
concerned.

   In the Hyperborean Epoch the vital body was added, and thus his constitu-
tion became plantlike, and CAIN, the man of that time,  lived  on the fruits


[PAGE 23]                                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

of the soil.

   The  Lemurian Epoch saw the evolution of a desire body,  which  made  man
like  the present animals.   Then milk, the product of living  animals,  was
added to human diet.   ABEL was a shepherd, but it is nowhere stated that he
killed an animal.

   At  that time mankind lived innocently and peacefully in the misty  atmo-
sphere which enveloped the earth during the latter part of the Lemurian  Ep-
och,  as described in the chapter on "Baptism"   Men were then like children
under  the care of a common father,  until the mind was given to all in  the
beginning  of Atlantis.   Thought activity breaks down tissue which must  be
replaced; the lower and more material the thought, the greater the havoc and
the  more  pressing the need for albumen wherewith to  make  quick  repairs.
Hence necessity, the mother of invention, inaugurated the loathsome practice
of flesh eating,  and so long as we continue to think along purely  business
or  material lines we shall have to go on using our stomachs as  receptacles
for the decaying corpses of our murdered animal victims.   Yet we shall  see
later that flesh food has enabled us to make the wonderful material progress
achieved in the Western World,  while the vegetarian Hindus and Chinese have
remained in an almost savage state.   It seems sad to contemplate that  they
will be forced to follow in our steps and shed the blood of our fellow crea-
tures when we shall have outgrown the barbarous practice as  we  have ceased


[PAGE 24]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

cannibalism.

   The more spiritual we grow, the more our thoughts will harmonize with the
rhythm  of our body,  and the less albumen will be needed to  build  tissue.
Consequently,  a vegetable diet will suffice our needs.   Pythagoras advised
abstinence from legumes to ADVANCED scholars because they are rich in  albu-
men and apt to revive lower appetites.  Let not every student who reads this
rashly conclude to eliminate legumes from his diet.   Most of us are not yet
ready  for such extremes;  we would not even advise all students to  abstain
entirely from meat.   The change should come from within.   It may be safely
stated, however, that most people eat entirely too much meat for their good;
but this is in a certain sense a digression,  so we will revert to the  fur-
ther evolution of humanity in so far as it has a bearing upon the  Sacrament
of Communion.

   In  due time the dense mist which enveloped the earth cooled,  condensed,
and  flooded the various basins.  The atmosphere cleared,  and  concurrently
with  this atmospheric change a physiological adaptation in man took  place.
The  gill clefts which had enabled him to breathe in the  dense  water-laden
air  (and  which are seen in the human foetus to this day)  gradually  atro-
phied,  and their function was taken over by the lungs, the pure air passing
to  and  from  them  through  the larynx.  This allowed the spirit, hitherto


[PAGE 25]                                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

penned up within the veil of flesh, to express itself in word and act.

   There  in the middle of Atlantis the sun first shone upon MAN as we  know
him;  there he was FIRST BORN into the world.   Until then he had been under
the absolute control of great spiritual Hierarchies, mute,  without voice or
choice  in matters pertaining to his education, as a child is now under  the
control of its parents.

   But  one  day  when  he finally emerged  from  the  dense  atmosphere  of
Atlantis;  when  he first beheld the mountains silhouetted in  clear,  sharp
contours against the azure vault of heaven;  when he first saw the  beauties
of moor and meadow,  the moving creatures, birds in the air,  and his fellow
man;  when  his vision was undimmed by the partial obscuration of  the  mist
which had previously hampered perception; above all,  when he perceived HIM-
SELF  as SEPARATE and APART FROM ALL OTHERS,  there burst from his lips  the
glorious triumphant cry, "I AM."

   At  that point he had acquired faculties which equipped him to enter  the
school  of experience,  the phenomenal world,  as a free agent to learn  the
lessons of life, untrammeled save by the LAWS OF NATURE, which are his safe-
guards, and the reaction of his own previous acts, which become DESTINY.

   The  diet  containing an excess of albumen from the  flesh  wherewith  he
gorged himself,  taxed his liver beyond the capacity and clogged the system,
making  him  morose,  sullen, and brutish.  He was fast losing the spiritual


[PAGE 26]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

sight which revealed to him the guardian angels whom he trusted,  and he say
only  the FORMS of animals and men.   The spirits with whom he had lived  in
love  and  brotherhood during early Atlantis were obscured by  the  veil  of
flesh.  It was all so strange, and he FEARED them.

   Therefore  it became necessary to give him a NEW FOOD that could aid  his
spirit  to  overpower the highly individualized molecules of flesh  (as  ex-
plained  in the ROSICRUCIAN COSMO-CONCEPTION,  chapter on  Assimilation,  p.
457), brace it for battle with the world, and spur it on to self-assertion.

   As our visible bodies composed of chemical compounds can thrive only upon
chemical aliment,  so it requires spirit to act upon spirit to aid in break-
ing up the heavy proteid and in stimulating the drooping human spirit.

   The emergence from flooded Atlantis,  the liberation of humanity from the
absolute  rulership of visible superhuman guardians,  their placement  under
THE LAW OF CONSEQUENCE AND THE LAWS OF NATURE,  and THE GIFT OF WINE are de-
scribed  in the stories of Noah and Moses,  which are different accounts  of
the same event.

   Both Noah and Moses led their followers through the water.   Moses  calls
heaven and earth to witness that he has placed before them the blessing  and
the curse, exhorts them to choose the good or take the consequences of their
actions; then he leaves them.


[PAGE 27]                                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

   The phenomenon of the rainbow requires that the sun be near the  horizon,
the nearer the better; also a clear atmosphere, and a dark rain cloud in the
opposite  quarter of the heavens.   When under such conditions  an  observer
stands with back to the sun,  drops as a rainbow.   In early Atlantean times
when  a  warm,  moist fog through which the sun appeared as one of  our  arc
lamps  on a foggy day,  the phenomenon of the rainbow was an  impossibility.
It could not have made its appearance until the mist had condensed to  rain,
flooded the basins of the earth,  and Noah,  which thus points TO THE LAW OF
ALTERNATING  CYCLES  that  brings  day and  night,  summer  and  winter,  in
unvarying sequence, and to which man is subject in the present age.

   Noah  cultivated the vine and provided a spirit to stimulate man.   Thus,
equipped  with  a  composite  constitution,  a  composite  diet  appropriate
thereto,  and divine laws to guide them, mankind were left to their own  de-
vices in the battle of life.
[PAGE 28]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

                                 CHAPTER IV

                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION
                           "IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME."

                                   PART II
  "THE LORD JESUS,  the same night in which he was betrayed took bread;  and
when he had given thanks, he brake it and said, Take, eat;  This is MY body,
which is broken for you.  This do in remembrance of me.  After the same man-
ner also he took the cup,  when he had supped,  saying,  This cup is the New
Testament in MY blood.  This do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of
me.   For as often as ye eat This bread, and drink This cup,  ye do shew the
Lord's death till he come.   Wherefore, whosoever shall eat This bread,  and
drink This cup of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood
of the Lord .  . . . For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily,  eateth and
drinketh damnation to himself .  .  .  .  For this cause many  are weak  and
sickly among you, and many sleep."--I Cor 11:23-30.

   In the foregoing passages there is a deeply hidden esoteric meaning which
is  particularly  obscured in the English translation,  but in  the  German,
Latin and Greek, the student still has a hint as to what was really intended


[PAGE 29]                                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

by that last parting injunction of the Savior to His disciples.   Before ex-
amining This phase of the subject, let us first consider the words,  "in re-
membrance  of me."   We shall then perhaps be in better condition to  under-
stand what is meant by the "cup" and the "bread."

   Suppose  a  man from a distant country comes into our midst  and  travels
about from place to place.  Everywhere he will see small communities gather-
ing around the Table of the Lord to celebrate This most sacred of all Chris-
tian rites, and should he ask why, he would be told that they do This in re-
membrance of One who lived a life nobler than any other has lived upon  This
earth; One who was kindness and love personified; One who was the servant of
all,  regardless of gain or loss to self.  Should This stranger then compare
the attitude of these religious communities on Sunday at the celebration  of
This  rite,  with their civic lives during the remainder of the  week,  what
would he see?

   Every one among us goes out into the world to fight the battle of  exist-
ence.   Under  the law of necessity we forget the love which should  be  the
ruling factor in Christian lives.   Every man's hand is against his brother.
Every one strives for position,  wealth,  and power that goes with these at-
tributes.  We forget on Monday what we reverently remembered on Sunday,  and
all  the  world  is poor in consequence.  We also make a distinction between


[PAGE  30]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the bread and wine which we drink at the so-called "Lord's Table,"  and  the
food  of  which  we  partake during  the  intervals  between  attendance  at
Communion.   But there is no warrant in the Scriptures for any such distinc-
tion,  as anyone may see,  even in the English version,  by leaving out  the
words printed in italics which have been inserted by the translators to give
what they thought was the sense of a passage.  On the contrary,  we are told
that whether we eat or drink,  or whatever we do,  all should be done to the
glory of God.  Our every act should be a prayer.  The perfunctory "grace" at
meals is in reality a blasphemy,  and the silent thought of gratitude to the
Giver of daily bread is far to be preferred.   When we remember at each meal
that it has been drawn from the substance of the earth, which is the body of
the  indwelling Christ Spirit,  we can properly understand how that body  is
being broken for us daily,  and we can appreciate the loving kindness  which
prompted  Him  thus to give Himself for us;  for let us also  remember  that
there is not a moment,  day or night, that He is not suffering because bound
to earth.   When we thus eat and thus realize the true situation, we are in-
deed declaring to ourselves the death of the Lord,  whose spirit is groaning
and  travailing,  waiting for the day of liberation when there shall  be  no
need of such a dense environment as we now require.

   But  there  is  another,  a  greater and more wonderful mystery hidden in


[PAGE 31]                                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

these words of the Christ.   Richard Wagner,  with the rare intuition of the
master  musician,  sensed This idea when he sat in meditation by the  Zurich
Sea  on a Good Friday,  and there flashed into his mind the  thought,  "What
connection  is  there between the death of the Savior and  the  millions  of
seeds  sprouting  forth  from the earth at this time of the  year?"   If  we
meditate upon that life which is annually poured out in the spring,  we  wee
it as something gigantic and awe-inspiring; a flood of life which transforms
the  glove from one of frozen death to rejuvenated life in a short space  of
time; and the life which thus diffuses itself in the budding of millions and
millions of plants is the life of the Earth Spirit.

   From that come both the wheat and the grape.  They are the body and blood
of the imprisoned Earth Spirit,  given to sustain mankind during the present
phase  of its evolution.   We repudiate the contention of people  who  claim
that the world owes them a living, regardless of their own efforts and with-
out MATERIAL responsibility on their part,  but we nevertheless insist  that
there is a SPIRITUAL responsibility connected with the bread and wine  given
at the Lord's Supper;  IT MUST BE EATEN WORTHILY,  OTHERWISE,  UNDER PAIN OF
ILL HEALTH AND EVEN DEATH.   This from the ordinary manner of reading  would
seem far-fetched, but when we bring the light of esotericism to bear,  exam-
ine other translations of the Bible,  and look at conditions in the world as


[PAGE 32]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

we find them today, we shall see that it is not so far-fetched after all.

   To  begin  with,  we must go back to the time when man  lived  under  the
guardianship  of the angels,  unconsciously building the body which  he  now
uses.  That was in ancient Lemuria.  A brain was needed for the evolution of
thought, and a larynx for verbal expression of the same.  Therefore, half of
the creative force was turned upwards and used by man to form these  organs.
Thus mankind became single-sexed and was forced to seek a complement when it
was  necessary  to create a new body to serve as an instrument in  a  higher
phase of evolution.

   While the act of love was consummated under the wise guardianship of  the
angels, man's existence was free from sorrow, pain and death.  But when, un-
der the tutelage of the Lucifer Spirits, he ate of the Tree of Knowledge and
perpetuated  the race without regard for interplanetary lines of  force,  he
transgressed  the law,  and the bodies thus formed crystallized unduly,  and
became subject to death in a much more perceptible manner than had  hitherto
been the case.   Thus he was forced to create new bodies more frequently  as
the span of life in them shortened.  Celestial warders of the creative force
drove him from the garden of LOVE into the wilderness of the world,  and  he
was made responsible for his actions under the cosmic LAW which governs  the
universe.  Thus for ages he struggled on, seeking to work out his own salva-
tion, and the earth in consequence crystallized more and more.


[PAGE 33]                                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

   Divine  hierarchies,  the Christ Spirit included,  worked upon the  earth
from without as the group spirit guides the animals under tis  protectorate;
but as Paul truly says, none could be justified under the law, for under the
law all sinned,  and all must die.  There is in the old covenant no hope be-
yond  the present,  save a foreshadowing of ONE WHO IS TO COME  and  restore
righteousness. Thus John tells us that the LAW was given by Moses, and GRACE
came by the Lord Jesus Christ.  But WHAT IS GRACE?   Can grace work contrary
to  the law and abrogate it entirely?  Certainly not.   The laws of God  are
steadfast and sure,  or the universe would become chaos.  The law of gravity
keeps our houses in position relative to other houses, so that when we leave
them we may know of a surety that we shall find them in the same place  upon
returning.   Likewise all other departments in the universe are  subject  to
immutable laws.

   As LAW, APART FROM LOVE, GAVE BIRTH TO SIN, SO THE CHILD OF LAW, TEMPERED
WITH LOVE,  IS GRACE.   Take an example from our concrete social conditions:
We  have  laws which decree a certain penalty for a specified  offense,  and
when the law is carried out, we call it JUSTICE.  But long experience is be-
ginning  to teach us that justice,  pure and simple,  is like  the  Colchian
dragon's teeth,  and breeds strife and struggle in increasing measure.   The
criminal,  so-called,  remains  criminal  and becomes more and more hardened


[PAGE 34]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

under  the ministrations of law;  but when the milder regime of the  present
day allows one who has transgressed to go under suspended sentence,  then HE
IS  UNDER GRACE and not under law.  Thus,  also the Christian,  who aims  to
follow in the Master's steps,  is emancipated from the law of sin by  grace,
provided he foresake the path of sin.

   It was the sin of our progenitors in ancient Lemuria that THEY  SCATTERED
THEIR SEED regardless of law and without love.   But it is the privilege  of
the  Christian  to redeem himself by purity of life in  remembrance  of  the
Lord.  John says, "His seed remaineth in him,"  and This is the hidden mean-
ing of the bread and wine.  In the English version we read simply:  "This is
the  CUP  of  the New Testament,"  but in the German the  word  for  cup  is
"Kelch,"  and in the Latin,  "Calix," both meaning the outer covering of the
seed pod of the flower.   In the Greek we have a still more subtle  meaning,
not  conveyed in other languages,  in the word "poterion,"  a meaning  which
will be evident when we consider the etymology of the word "pot."   This  at
once gives us the same idea as the chalice or calix--a receptacle;  and  the
Latin "POTARE"  (to drink) also shows that the "cup" is a receptacle capable
of holding a fluid.   Our English words "potent"  and "impotent"  meaning to
possess or to lack virile strength, further  show  the meaning of this Greek


[PAGE 35]                                         THE SACRAMENT OF COMMUNION

word, which foreshadows the evolution from man to superman.

   We have already lived through a mineral,  plant and an animal-like exist-
ence before becoming human as we are today,  and beyond us lie still further
evolutions  where we shall approach the Divine more and more.   It  will  be
readily  conceded that it is our animal passions which restrain us upon  the
path  if  attainment;  the lower nature is constantly  warring  against  the
higher self.   At least in those who have experienced a spiritual awakening,
a war is being fought silently within,  and is all the more bitter for being
suppressed.   Goethe with masterly art voiced that sentiment in the words of
Faust, the aspiring soul, speaking to his more materialistic friend, Wagner:

                 "Thou by one sole impulse art possessed,
                   Unconscious of the other still remain.
                 Two souls, alas, are housed within my breast,
                   And struggle there for undivided reign.
                 One, to the earth with passionate desire,
                   And closely clinging organs still adheres;
                 Above the mists the other doth aspire
                   With sacred ardor unto purer spheres."

   It  was the knowledge of this absolute necessity of chastity  (save  when
procreation  is the object) upon the part of those who have had a  spiritual
awakening which dictated the words  of  Christ,  and the Apostle Paul stated


[PAGE 36]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

an esoteric truth when he said that THOSE WHO PARTOOK OF THE COMMUNION WITH-
OUT LIVING THE LIFE WERE IN DANGER OF SICKNESS AND DEATH.  For just as under
a spiritual tutelage,  purity of life may elevate the disciple  wonderfully,
so also unchastity has a much stronger effect upon his more sensitized  bod-
ies than upon those who are yet under the law, and have not become partakers
of grace by the cup of the New Covenant.


[PAGE 37]                                           THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM

                                  CHAPTER V

                          THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM


   HAVING studied the esoteric significance of our Christian festivals, such
as  Christmas and Easter,  and having also studied the doctrine of  the  Im-
maculate  Conception,  it may be well now to devote attention to  the  inner
meaning of the sacraments of the church which are administered to the  indi-
vidual in all Christian lands from the cradle to the grave, and are with him
at all important points in his life journey.

   As soon as he has entered upon the journey of life, the church admits him
into  its fold by the rite of BAPTISM which is conferred upon him at a  time
when he himself is irresponsible;  later, when his mentality has been  some-
what  developed,  he ratifies that contract and is  admitted  to  COMMUNION,
where  BREAD  is broken and WINE is sipped in memory of the Founder  of  our
faith.   Still further upon life's journey comes the sacrament of  MARRIAGE;
and at last when the race has been run and the spirit again withdraws to God
who gave it, the earth body is consigned to the dust, whence it was derived,


[PAGE 38]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

accompanied by the blessings of the church.

   In our Protestant times the spirit of protest is rampant in the  extreme,
and  dissenters everywhere raise their voices in rebellion against the  fan-
cied  arrogance of the priesthood and deprecate the sacraments as mere  mum-
mery.   On account of that attitude of mind these functions have  become  of
little  or no effect in the life of the community;  dissensions have  arisen
even  among churchmen themselves,  and sect after sect has  divorced  itself
from the original apostolic congregation.

   Despite  all protests the various doctrines and sacraments of the  church
are, nevertheless, the very keystones in the arch of evolution, for they in-
culcate  morals of the loftiest nature;  and even  materialistic  scientist,
such as Huxley,  have admitted that while self-protection brings about  "the
survival of the fittest" in the animal kingdom and is therefore the basis of
animal  evolution,  self-sacrifice is the fostering principle of  human  ad-
vancement.   When that is the case among mere mortals,  we may well  believe
that it must be so to a still greater extent in the Divine Author of our be-
ing.

   Among animals might is right, but we recognize that the weak have a claim
to the protection of the strong.   The butterfly lays its eggs on the under-
side of a green leaf and goes off without another care for their well-being.
In  mammals  the  MOTHER  instinct  is  strongly  developed,  and we see the


[PAGE 39]                                           THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM

the lioness caring for her cubs and ready to defend them with her life;  but
not until the kingdom is reached does the FATHER commence to share fully  in
the responsibility as a parent.  Among savages the care of the young practi-
cally  ends with the higher we ascend in civilization the longer  the  young
receive  care from their parents,  and the more stress is laid  upon  mental
rather than from the physical point of vantage;  for the further we  proceed
along the path of development the more we shall experience the power of mind
over matter.  By the more and more prolonged self-sacrifice of parents,  the
race is becoming more delicate,  but what we lose in material ruggedness  we
gain in spiritual perceptibility.

   As  this faculty grows stronger and more developed,  the craving  of  the
spirit  immured in This earthly body voices itself more loudly in  a  demand
for understanding of the spiritual side of development.  Wallace and Darwin,
Haxley and Spencer, pointed out how evolution of FORM is accomplished in na-
ture;  Earnest Haeckel attempted to solve the riddle of the universe, but no
one  of them could satisfactorily explain away the DIVINE AUTHOR of what  we
see.   The great goddess,  NATURAL SELECTION, is being forsaken by one after
another of her devotees as the years go by.  Even Haeckel,  the arch materi-
alist, in his last years showed an almost hysterical anxiety to make a place


[PAGE 40]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

for  God in his system,  and the day will come in a not far  distant  future
when  science will have become as thoroughly religious as  religion  itself.
The church, on the other hand, though still extremely conservative is never-
theless slowly abandoning its autocratic dogmatism and becoming more  scien-
tific in its explanations.   Thus in time we shall see the union of  science
and  religion as it existed in the ancient mystery temples,  and  when  that
point has been reached,  THE DOCTRINES AND SACRAMENTS of the church will  be
found to REST UPON IMMUTABLE COSMIC LAWS OF NO LESS IMPORTANCE THAN THE  LAW
OF GRAVITY which maintains the marching orbs in their paths around the  sun.
As  the points of the equinoxes and solstices are turning points in the  cy-
clic  path of a planet,  marked by festivals such Christmas and  Easter,  so
birth into the physical world, admission to the church, to the state of mat-
rimony,  and finally the exit from physical life,  are points in the  cyclic
path of the human spirit around its central source--God, which are marked by
the sacraments of BAPTISM, COMMUNION, MARRIAGE, and THE LAST BLESSING.

   We will now consider the rite of baptism.  Much has been said by dissent-
ers,  against the practice of taking an INFANT INTO CHURCH AND PROMISING FOR
IT A RELIGIOUS LIFE.  Heated arguments concerning SPRINKLING VERSUS PLUNGING
have resulted in division of churches.   If we wish to obtain the true  idea
of  baptism,  we must revert to the early history of the human race  as  re-
corded in the  Memory  of  Nature.  All  that has ever happened is indelibly


[PAGE 41]                                           THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM

pictured  in  the ether as a moving picture is imprinted upon  a  sensitized
film,  which  picture can be reproduced upon a screen at  any  moment.   The
picutes  in  the Memory of Nature may be viewed by the  trained  seer,  even
though millions of years have elapsed since the scenes there portrayed  were
enacted in life.

   When  we  consult that unimpeachable record it appears that there  was  a
time when that which is now our earth came out of chaos,  dark and unformed,
as the Bible states.  The currents developed in This misty mass by spiritual
agencies,  generated HEAT, and the mass ignited at the time when we are told
that  God said,  "Let there be light."   The heat of the fiery mass and  the
cold  space  surrounding it generated MOISTURE;  the fire mist  became  sur-
rounded by water which boiled,  and steam was projected into the atmosphere;
thus "God divided the waters . . . . from the waters . .  .  .  "--the dense
water which was nearest the fire mist from the steam (which is water in sus-
pension), as stated in the Bible.

   When water contained sediment is boiled over and over it deposits  scale,
and similarly the water surrounding our planet finally formed a crust around
the fiery core.   The Bible further informs us that a MIST went up from  the
ground,  AND WE MAY WELL CONCEIVE how the moisture was gradually  evaporated
from our planet in those early days.


[PAGE 42]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   Ancient myths are usually regarded as superstitions nowadays,  but in re-
ality  each of them contains a great spiritual truth in  pictorial  symbols.
These  fantastic stories were given to infant humanity to teach  them  moral
lessons  which  their newborn intellects were note yet  fitted  to  receive.
They  were taught by myths--much as we teach our children by  picture  books
and fables--lessons beyond their intellectual comprehension.

   One of the greatest of these folk stories is "THE RING OF THE NIEBELUNG,"
which  tells of a wonderful treasure hidden under the waters of  the  Rhine.
It was a lump of gold in its natural state.  Placed upon a high rock, it il-
luminated the entire submarine scenery where water nymphs sported about  in-
nocently in gladsome frolic.  But one of the Neibelungs,  imbued with greed,
stole the treasure,  carried it out of the water,  and fled.   It was impos-
sible for him,  however,  to shape it until he had forsworn love.   Then  he
fashioned  it  into a ring which gave him power over all  the  treasures  of
earth,  but at the same time it inaugurated dissension and strife.   For its
sake, friend betrayed friend, brother slew brother, and everywhere it caused
oppression,  sorrow, sin and death, until it was at last restored to the wa-
tery element and the earth was consumed in flames.   But later there  arose,
like the new phoenix from the ashes of the old bird,  a new heaven and a new
earth where righteousness were re-established.


[PAGE 43]                                           THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM

   That  old folk story gives a wonderful picture of human  evolution.   The
name  NIEBELUNGEN  is  derived from the German words,  NIEBEL  (which  means
mist),  and UNGEN (which means children).   Thus the word NIEBELUNGEN  means
CHILDREN OF THE MIST,  and it refers back to the time when humanity lived in
the  foggy atmosphere surrounding our earth at the stage n  its  development
previously mentioned.   There infant humanity lived in one vast brotherhood,
innocent of all evil as the babe of today,  and illuminated by the Universal
Spirit  symbolized  as  the Rhinegold which shed its light  upon  the  water
nymphs of our story.   But in time the earth cooled more and more;  the  fog
condensed and flooded depressions upon the surface of the earth with  water;
the atmosphere cleared; the eyes of man were opened and he perceived himself
as a separate ego.  Then the Universal Spirit of LOVE and SOLIDARITY was su-
perseded by egotism and self-seeking.

   That was the rape of the Rhinegold, and sorrow, sin,  strife,  treachery,
and  murder have taken the place of the childlike love which  existed  among
humanity  in that primal state when they dwelt in the watery  atmosphere  of
long ago.  Gradually This tendency is becoming more and more marked, and the
curse  of selfishness grows more and more apparent.   "Man's  inhumanity  to
man"  hangs like a funeral pall over the earth,  and must  inevitably  bring
about destruction of existing conditions.  The  whole  creation  is groaning


[PAGE 44]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

and travailing,  waiting for the day of redemption, and the Western Religion
strikes the keynote of the way to attainment when it exhorts us to love  our
neighbor as we love ourselves;  for then egotism will be abrogated for  uni-
versal brotherhood and love.

   Therefore,  when a person is admitted to the church, which is a SPIRITUAL
institution where love and brotherhood are the mainsprings of action,  it is
appropriate to carry him UNDER THE WATERS of baptism in symbol of the  beau-
tiful condition of childlike innocence and love which prevailed when mankind
dwelt UNDER THE MIST in that bygone period.  At that time the eyes of infant
man  had not yet been opened to the MATERIAL advantages of This world.   The
little  child which is brought into the church has not yet become  aware  of
the allurements of life either,  and others obligate themselves to guide  it
to lead a holy life according to the best of their ability,  because experi-
ence gained since the Flood has taught us that the broad way of the world is
strewn with pain,  sorrow,  and disappointment;  that only by following  the
straight and narrow way can we escape death and enter into life everlasting.

   Thus we see that there is a wonderfully deep,  mystic significance behind
the sacrament of baptism; that it is to remind us of the blessings attendant
upon  those who are members of a BROTHERHOOD where self-seeking is put  into
the background and where SERVICE to others is the keynote and  mainspring of


[PAGE 45]                                           THE SACRAMENT OF BAPTISM

action.  While we are in the world, he is the greatest who can most success-
fully dominate others.   In the church we have Christ's definition,  "HE WHO
WOULD BE THE GREATEST AMONG YOU, LET HIM BE THE SERVANT OF ALL."


[PAGE  46]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                                 CHAPTER VI

                          THE SACRAMENT OF MARRIAGE


   WHEN STRIPPED of nonessentials the argument of the orthodox Christian re-
ligion may be said to be as follows:

   First,  that tempted by the devil,  our first parents sinned and were ex-
iled  form their previous state of celestial bliss,  placed under  the  law,
made  subject to death,  and became incapable of escaping by their  own  ef-
forts.

   Second,  that God so loved the world that He gave Christ, His only begot-
ten  Son,  for its redemption and to establish the kingdom of heaven.   Thus
death will finally be swallowed up in immortality.

   This simple creed has provoked the smiles of atheists,  and of the purely
intellectual  who have studied transcendental philosophies with their  nice-
ties of logic and argument; and even of some among those who study the West-
ern Mystery Teaching.

   Such an attitude of mind is entirely gratuitous.   We might know that the
divine leaders of mankind would not allow millions to continue in error  for
millennia.  When the Western Mystery Teaching is stripped of its exceedingly


[PAGE 47]                                          THE SACRAMENT OF MARRIAGE

illuminating explanations and detailed descriptions,  when its basic  teach-
ings are stated,  they are found to be in exact agreement with the  orthodox
Christian teachings.

   There  was  a time when mankind lived in a sinless  state;  when  sorrow,
pain, and death were unknown.  Neither is the PERSONAL TEMPTER of Christian-
ity a myth,  for the Lucifer Spirits may very well be said to be fallen  an-
gels,  and  their temptation of man resulted in focusing  his  consciousness
upon  the  material  phase of existence where he is under  the  law  of  de-
crepitude and death.   Also it is truly the mission of Christ to aid mankind
by elevating them to a more ethereal state where dissolution will no  longer
be necessary to free them from vehicles that have grown too hard and set for
further use.  For This is indeed a "body of death,"  where only the smallest
quantity of material is really alive, as part of its bulk is nutrient matter
that has not yet been assimilated,  another large part is already on its way
to elimination,  and only between these two poles may be found the  material
which is thoroughly quickened by the spirit.

   We  have in other chapters considered the sacraments of baptism and  com-
munion,  sacraments that have to do particularly with the spirit.   We  will
now  seek to understand the deeper side of the sacrament of marriage,  which
has to do particularly with the body.   Like the other sacraments the insti-
tution of marriage had its beginning and will also have its end.   The  com-
mencement was described by the Christ when He said, "Have ye not  read  that


[PAGE 48]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

He  which  made them at the beginning made them male and female,  and  said:
For  This  cause shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave  to  his
wife;  and they twain shall be one flesh?  Wherefore they are no more twain,
but one flesh."   Matt.  19:4-6.  He also indicated the end of marriage when
he said:  "In the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage,
but are as the angels of God in heaven." Matt. 22:30

   In This light the logic of the teaching is apparent,  for MARRIAGE became
necessary  in  order that BIRTH might provide new instruments  to  take  the
place  of those which had been ruptured by DEATH;  and when death  has  once
been  swallowed up in immortality and there is no need of providing new  in-
struments, marriage also will be unnecessary.

   Science with admirable audacity has sought to solve the mystery of fecun-
dation,  and  has told us how invagination takes place in the walls  of  the
ovary;  how the little ovum is formed in the seclusion of its  dark  cavity;
how  it emerges therefrom and enters the Fallopian tube;  is pierced by  the
spermatozoon of the male,  and the nucleus of a human body is complete.   We
are  thus supposed to be "at the fount and origin of life!"   But  life  has
neither beginning nor end,  and what science mistakenly considers the  foun-
tain of life is really the source of death, as all that comes from the  womb


[PAGE 49]                                          THE SACRAMENT OF MARRIAGE

is  destined sooner or later to reach the tomb.   The MARRIAGE  feast  which
prepares for BIRTH,  at the same time provides food for the insatiable  jaws
of DEATH, and so long as marriage is necessary to generation and birth, dis-
integration and death must inevitably result.  Therefore, it is of prime im-
portance  to know the history of marriage,  the laws and agencies  involved,
the duration of This institution, and how it may be transcended.

   When we obtained our vital bodies in Hyperborea, the sun,  moon and earth
were still united,  and the solar-lunar forces permeated each being in  even
measure so that all were able to perpetuate their kind by buds and spores as
do  certain plants of today.   The efforts of the vital body to  soften  the
dense vehicle and keep it alive were not then interfered with, and was these
primal,  plantlike bodies lived for ages.  But man was then unconscious  and
stationary like a plant;  he made no effort or exertion.   The addition of a
desire body furnished incentive and desire,  and consciousness resulted from
the war between the vital body, which builds, and the desire body, which de-
stroys the dense body.

   Thus dissolution became only a question of time, particularly as the con-
structive energy of the vital body was also necessarily divided, one part or
pole being used in the vital functions of the body,  the other to replace  a
vehicle lost by death.   But as the two poles of a magnet or dynamo are  re-


[PAGE 50]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

quisite to manifestation,  so also two single-sexed beings became  necessary
for generation; thus marriage and birth were necessarily inaugurated to off-
set the effect of death.  DEATH, THEN, IS THE PRICE WE PAY FOR CONSCIOUSNESS
IN THE PRESENT WORLD;  marriage and repeated births are our weapons  against
the  king  of terrors until our constitution shall change and we  become  as
angels.

   Please mark that it is not stated that we are to become angels,  but that
we are to become AS ANGELS.  For the angels are the humanity of the Moon Pe-
riod; they belong to an entirely different stream of evolution, as different
as are human spirits from those of our present animals.   Paul states in his
letter  to the Hebrews that man was made FOR A LITTLE WHILE inferior to  the
angels;  he descended lower into the scale of materiality during  the  Earth
Period,  while  the angels have never inhabited a globe denser  than  ether.
This  substance is the direct avenue of all life forces,  and when  man  has
once  become  as  the angels and has learned to build  his  body  of  ether,
naturally  there  will be no death and no need of marriage  to  bring  about
birth.

   But looking at marriage from another point of view,  looking upon it as a
union of souls rather than as a union of the sexes, we contact the wonderful
mystery of Love.  Union of the sexes might serve to perpetuate the race,  of
course,  but  the  true  marriage  is  a  companionship of souls also, which


[PAGE 51]                                          THE SACRAMENT OF MARRIAGE

altogether  transcends sex.   Yet those really able to meet upon that  lofty
plane  of spiritual intimacy gladly offer their bodies as living  sacrifices
upon  the altar of LOVE OF THE UNBORN, to woo a waiting spirit into  an  im-
maculately  conceived body.   Thus humanity may be saved from the  reign  of
death.

   This is readily apparent as soon as we consider the gentle action of  the
vital body and contrast it with that of the desire body in a fit of  temper,
where it is said that a man has "lost control" of himself.   Under such con-
ditions the muscles become tense,  and nervous energy is expended at a  sui-
cidal rate,  so that after such an outbreak the body may sometimes be  pros-
trated  for  weeks.   The hardest labor brings no such fatigue as a  fit  of
temper;  likewise a child conceived in passion under the crystallizing  ten-
dencies of the desire nature is naturally short-lived,  and it si a  regret-
table fact that LENGTH OF LIFE is nowadays almost a misnomer; in view of the
appalling infant mortality it ought to be called BREVITY OF EXISTENCE.

   The building tendencies of the vital body,  which is the vehicle of love,
are not so easily watched, but observation proves that contentment lengthens
life of any one who cultivates this quality, and we may safely reason that a
child conceived under conditions of harmony and love stands a better  chance
of life than one conceived under conditions of anger,  inebriety,  and  pas-
sion.


[PAGE 52]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   According to Genesis it was said to the woman, "In sorrow shalt thou bear
children,"  and it has always been a sore puzzle to Bible commentators  what
logical  connection  there may be between eating of fruit and the  pains  of
parturition.   But when we understand the chaste references of the Bible  to
the act of generation,  the connection is readily perceived.   While the in-
sensitive  Negro or Indian mother may bear her child and  shortly  afterward
resume  her labors in the field, the western woman,  more acutely  sensitive
and of high-strung nervous temperament, is year by year finding it more dif-
ficult to go through the ordeal of motherhood,  though aided by the best and
most skilled scientific help.

   The contributory reasons are various:   In the first place,  while we are
exceedingly  careful in selecting our horses and cattle for breeding,  while
we  insist upon pedigree for the animals in order that we may bring out  the
very best strain of stock upon our farms,  we exercise no such care with re-
spect  to  the selection of a father and mother for our children.   We  mate
upon impulse and regret it at our leisure,  aided by laws which make it  all
to  easy to enter or leave the sacred bonds of matrimony.   The  words  pro-
nounced by minister or judge are taken to be a license for unlimited  indul-
gence,  as if any man-made law could license the contravention of the law of


[PAGE 53]                                          THE SACRAMENT OF MARRIAGE

God.   While animals mate only at a certain time of the year and the  mother
is undisturbed during the period of pregnancy, this is not true of the human
race.

   In view of these facts is it to be wondered at that we find such a  dread
of maternity, and is it not time that we seek to remedy the matter by a more
sane  relation between marriage partners?  Astrology will reveal the  temper
and tendencies of each human being; it will enable two people to blend their
characters in such a manner that a love live may be lived, and it will indi-
cate  the periods when interplanetary lines of force are most nearly  condu-
cive to painless parturition.  Thus it will enable us to draw from the bosom
of nature,  children of love,  capable of living long lives in good  health.
Finally  the day will come when these bodies will have been made so  perfect
in  their ethereal purity that they may last throughout the coming Age,  and
thus make marriage superfluous.

   But if we can love now when we see one another "through a glass  darkly,"
through the mask of personality and the veil of misunderstanding , we may be
sure  that the love of soul for soul,  purged of passion in the  furnace  of
sorrow, will be our brightest gem in heaven as its shadow is on earth.


                             --- END OF FILE ---

[PAGE  54]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                                 CHAPTER VII

                     THE UNPARDONABLE SIN AND LOST SOULS

   SOME OF OUR students have been exercised about the unpardonable sin,  and
as  this subject has a certain connection with the subject of marriage,  one
being a sacrilege and the other a sacrament,  it might be well to  elucidate
the  matter from a different point of view than has been formerly  taken  in
our literature.

   First let us see what is meant by a sacrament,  and why the rites of bap-
tism, communion, marriage, and extreme unction are properly so called;  then
we  shall  be in a position to understand what sacrilege is and  why  it  is
unpardonable.

   The  Rosicrucians teach,  only with more detail,  the same doctrine  that
Paul  preached  in  the 15th Chapter of 1st  Corinthians,  starting  at  the
thirty-fifth verse,  that in addition to the body of flesh and blood we have
a soul body,  SOMA PSUCHICON (mistranslated "natural"  body) and a spiritual
body; that each of these bodies is grown from a different SEED atom and that
there  are  THREE stages of unfoldment for Adam, or man.  The first Adam was


[PAGE 55]                                               THE UNPARDONABLE SIN

taken from the ground and was without sentient life.   Soul was added to the
SECOND ADAM;  thus he had life within, a leaven laboring to elevate the clod
to God.  When the potential of the soul extracted from the physical body has
been  raised  to  the spiritual,  the LAST ADAM will become  a  life  GIVING
spirit, capable of transmitting the life impulse to others directly as flame
from  one candle can be communicated to many without diminishing the  magni-
tude of the original light.

   In the meantime the germ for our early body had to be properly placed  in
fruitful  soil to grow a suitable vehicle,  and generative organs were  pro-
vided from the beginning to accomplish this purpose.   It is stated in  Gen-
esis  1:27 that Elohim created them MALE and FEMALE.   The Hebrew words  are
"SACRE VA N'CABAH."   THESE ARE NAMES OF THE SEX ORGANS.   Literally  trans-
lated,  SACR means "bearer of the germ."  Thus marriage is a sacr-ament, for
it opens the way for transmission of a physical seed atom from the father to
the  mother,  and tends to preserve the race against the ravages  of  death.
Baptism  as  a  SACRament signifies the germinal urge of the  soul  for  the
higher life.   Holy Communion,  in which we partake of bread (made from  the
SEED  of chaste plants),  and of wine (the cup symbolizing  the  passionless
SEE-pod),  points to the age to come, and age wherein it will be unnecessary
to TRANSMIT the seed through a father and mother , but where we may feed di-
rectly upon cosmic life and thus conquer death.  Finally, extreme unction is

[PAGE  56]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the SACRament which marks the loosening of the silver cord,  and the extrac-
tion  of  the sacred germ,  freeing it until it shall again  be  planted  in
another N'CABAH, or mother.

   As the seed and ovum are the root and basis of racial development,  it is
easy to see that no sin can be more serious than that which abuses the  cre-
ative  function,  for  by that SACR-ilege we stunt  future  generations  and
transgress against the Holy Spirit,  Jehovah, who is warder of the  creative
lunar forces.  His angels herald births, as in the cases of Isaac,  John the
Baptist, and Jesus.  When he wanted to reward his most faithful follower, he
promised to make his seed as numerous as the sands on the seashore.  He also
meted  out  a  most  terrible punishment  to  the  Sodomites  who  committed
SACR-ilege by misdirecting the seed.  He even visits the sins of the fathers
upon the children to the third and fourth generations,  for under his regime
LAW reigns supreme.   Man has not yet evolved to the point where he can  re-
spond to LOVE.  He requires from his enemies an eye for an eye, and with the
same measure that he metes, it is meted unto him.

   Though  this  seems very cruel to us who are each day evolving  more  and
more the faculties of love and mercy, we must remember that this retributive
justice relates purely to the physical body, which is under the laws of  Na-
ture just as much as any other chemical composition in  the  universe.  When


[PAGE 57]                                               THE UNPARDONABLE SIN

abuses have weakened it, it is incapable of fulfilling its mission and meet-
ing our demands in any respect, just as is the case with any other machinery
which we have made from materials around us.   There are no miracles such as
would be required to generate a sound and healthy body from parents who have
transgressed the laws of nature by their abuses; therefore but when time and
care  have restored the necessary strength and vigor,  the body  will  again
perform its functions in a normal and healthy manner.

   Thus  we understand that under the law there is no mercy,  for  mercy  is
dictated by love.  Therefore, it was perfectly in consonance with cosmic or-
der when CHRIST, THE LORD OF LOVE, said that all things would be forgiven to
men which they did against Him, as LOVE is the reigning feature in His king-
dom;  but whatsoever was done contrary to the LAW of Jehovah must  meet  its
full retribution.   We cannot be sufficiently thankful for the wonderful re-
ligion  which  He gave us,  particularly if we compare it with  those  under
which less evolved peoples are now struggling.  Take the Buddhists,  for in-
stance;  grand and beautiful though their leader was, he saw only SORROW,  a
constant struggle against the law of nature.   He aimed to teach his follow-
ers to transcend that condition by perfect obedience such as that whereby we
have  conquered  the  laws  of  electricity and other forces in nature.  The

[PAGE 58]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Buddhist sees nothing but the cold and merciless law; on the other hand,  we
of  the  Western World have before our eyes from the cradle to the  grave  a
beautiful picture of One who said,  "Come unto me all ye that labor and  are
heavy laden, and I will give you rest."

   But it may be asked,  "What about LOST SOULS;  are they a figment of  the
imagination also?"   To this question may be answered,  "yes",  although  it
needs some qualification.   We shall best understand the case if we go  back
into the history of mankind and view the experiences of some who have trans-
gressed , for they will furnish us an example of what may happen.   In order
to establish the point properly we shall reiterate a few of the  Rosicrucian
teachings  regarding  the genesis of the earth and of man  upon  it.   Three
great stages of unfoldment have preceded the present Earth Period.   THE FA-
THER is the highest Initiate of the Saturn Period,  inhabiting  particularly
the Spiritual Sun.   THE SON, the cosmic Christ,  is the highest initiate of
the Sun period,  inhabiting the Central Sun and guiding the planets in their
orbits  by a ray from Himself,  which becomes the indwelling spirit of  each
planet when it has been sufficiently ripened to contain such a great  Intel-
ligence.   Jehovah, the HOLY SPIRIT, is the highest Initiate of the Moon Pe-
riod and dwelling in the physical, visible sun.  He is regent of the various
moons  thrown off by the different planets for the purpose of giving  beings
who have fallen behind in the march of evolution more rigid discipline under


[PAGE 59]                                               THE UNPARDONABLE SIN

a  firmer law,  to awaken them and spur them on in the proper  direction  if
possible.

   When we look into space,  we perceive that some planets have a number  of
moons and others have none;  but as there are laggards in any large company,
and as moons are required to aid these stragglers to retrieve their lost es-
tate if possible,  we may be sure that these planets which have no moons now
have  had  them in the past.   Those Great Beings of  whom  the  ROSICRUCIAN
COSMO-CONCEPTION speaks as "Lords of Venus" and "Lords of Mercury" were,  in
fact,  stragglers from those two planets.   In the dim distant past they in-
habited moons which encircled their respective planets,  and were successful
in retrieving their loss in a large measure under the discipline given  them
there.    Later they received the opportunity to serve to secure a return to
the home planet whence they had been exiled.   They were LOST under the LAW,
but REDEEMED BY LOVE;  and thus we may infer that opportunities for  service
will also bring to other beings,  who may become "lost"  the opportunity  to
retrieve the past.

   Since  it  may puzzle the student as to what becomes of  the  moons  upon
which such beings dwell for a time,  we may say that the solar system is  to
regarded as the body of the Great Spirit whom we call God, and as any growth
caused by an abnormal process pains us when it occurs in our body,  so  also


[PAGE 60]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

such  crystallizations as moons are sources of discomfort to that Great  Be-
ing.   Furthermore,  as our own systems endeavor to  eliminate  such  abnor-
malities  as growths,  so also the universe endeavors to expel  moons  which
have served their purpose.   While the beings who have been exiled to a moon
are there,  the Planetary Spirit of the primary planet by his care for these
beings, hold the moon in its orbit, and we speak of his love for them as the
Law  of Attraction;  but when they have returned to the parent  planet,  the
Planetary  Spirit has no further interest in their  cinder-like  habitation.
Then slowly the orbit of the vacated moon widens,  it commences to  disinte-
grate,  and it is finally expelled into interstellar space.   The  asteroids
are  remnants  of moons which once encircled Venus and Mercury.   There  are
also  other seeming moons and lunar fragments in our solar system,  but  the
ROSICRUCIAN  COSMO-CONCEPTION does not concern itself with them as they  are
outside the pale of evolution.


[PAGE 61]                                          THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

                                CHAPTER VIII

                          THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION


   THE  PERIODICAL ebb and flow of the material and spiritual  forces  which
invest the earth are the invisible causes of the physical, moral, and mental
activities upon our globe.

   According to the hermatic axiom, "As above so below,"  a similar activity
must take place in man, who is but a minor edition of Mother Nature.

   The animals have twenty-eight pairs of spinal nerves and are now in their
Moon  stage,  perfectly attuned to the twenty-eight days in which  the  moon
passes  around the zodiac.   In their wild state the group spirit  regulates
their mating.   Therefore there is no overflow with them.  Man, on the other
hand,  is in a transition stage;  he is too far progressed for the lunar vi-
brations  for he has thirty-one pairs of spinal nerves.   But he is not  yet
attuned to the solar month of thirty-one days,  and he mates at all times of
the year;  hence the periodical flow in woman, which under proper conditions
is  utilized to form part of the body of a child more perfect than its  par-
ents.  Similarly,  the  periodical  flow  in  mankind  becomes the sinew and


[PAGE 62]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

backbone  of  racial advancement;  and the periodical flow  of  the  earth's
spiritual forces, which occurs at Christmas, results in birth of Saviors who
from  time to time give renewed impetus to the spiritual advancement of  the
human race.

   There are two parts to our Bible, the Old and the New Testaments.   After
briefly reciting how the world came into being,  the former tells the  story
of the "Fall"   In view of what has been written in our literature we under-
stand  the Fall to have been occasioned by man's impulsive and ignorant  use
of  the  sex forces at times when the interplanetary rays were  inimical  to
conception of the purest and best vehicles.   Thus man became gradually  im-
prisoned in a dense body crystallized by sinful passion and consequently  an
imperfect vehicle, subject to pain and death.

   Then commenced the pilgrimage through matter,  and for millennia we  have
been living in this hard and flinty shell of body,  which obscures the light
of heaven from the spirit within.  The spirit is like a diamond in its rough
coat, and the celestial lapidaries, the Recording Angels, are constantly en-
deavoring to remove the coating so that the spirit may shine through the ve-
hicle which it ensouls.

   When the lapidary holds a diamond to the grindstone,  the diamond emits a
screech like a cry of pain and the opaque covering is removed; but gradually
by  many  successive  applications  to  the grindstone the rough diamond may


[PAGE 63]                                          THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

become a gem of transcendent beauty and purity.   Similarly,  the  celestial
beings in charge of our evolution hold us closely to the grindstone of expe-
rience.  Pain and suffering result, which awaken the spirit sleeping within.
The man hitherto content with material pursuits,  indulgent discontent which
impels him to seek the higher life.

   The  gratification  of that aspiration, however,  is not  usually  accom-
plished without a severe struggle upon the part of the lower nature.  It was
while  wrestling thus that Paul exclaimed with all the anguish of  a  devout
aspiring heart: "Oh wretched man that I am * * * * The good that I would,  I
do not;  but the evil which I would not,  that I do * * * * I delight in the
law of God after the inward man; but I see another law in my members warring
against the law of my mind and bringing it into captivity to the law of  sin
which is in my members."  (Rom. 7:19-24)

   When  the flower is crushed,  its scent is liberated and fills  the  sur-
roundings with grateful fragrance,  delighting all who are fortunate  enough
to  be near.   Crushing blows of fate may overwhelm a man or woman  who  has
reached  the  stage of efflorescene;  they will but serve to bring  out  the
sweetness  of the nature and enhance the beauty of the soul till  it  shines
with  an effulgence that marks the wearer as with a halo.   Then he is  upon
the path of Initiation.  He is taught how unbridled use of sex regardless of


[PAGE 64]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the stellar rays has imprisoned him in the body, how it fetters him, and how
by  the  proper  use of that same force in harmony with  the  stars  he  may
gradually  improve  and etherealize his body and finally  attain  liberation
from concrete existence.

   A shipwright cannot build a staunch oak ship from spruce lumber; " men do
not gather grapes of thorns;"  like always begets like,  and an incoming ego
of a passionate nature is drawn to parents of like nature, where its body is
conceived upon the impulse of the moment in a gust of passion.

   The  soul who has tasted the cup of sorrow incident to the abuse  of  the
creative  force  and  has drunk to the dregs the  bitterness  thereof,  will
gradually seek parents of less and less passionate natures,  until at length
it attains to Initiation.

   Having  been  taught in the process of Initiation the  influence  of  the
stellar rays upon parturition,  the next body provided will be generated  by
Initiate parents without passion,  under the constellation most favorable to
the work which the ego contemplates.  Therefore the Gospels (which are  for-
mulae of Initiation) commence with the account of the immaculate  conception
and  end with the crucifixion,  both wonderful ideas to which we  must  some
time  attain,  for each of us is a Christ-in-the-making,  and will  sometime
pass  through both the mystic birth and the mystic death adumbrated  in  the
Gospels.  By knowledge we may hasten  the  day,  intelligently  co-operating


[PAGE 65]                                          THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

instead  of as now often stupidly frustrating through ignorance the ends  of
spiritual development.

   In connection with the immaculate conception misunderstandings prevail at
every point;  the perpetual virginity of the mother even after the birth  to
other  children;  the lowly station of Joseph,  the supposed  foster-father,
etc.   We  will briefly view them in the light of facts as revealed  in  the
Memory of Nature:

   In  some  parts of Europe people of the higher classes are  addressed  as
"wellborn,"  or even as "highwellborn,"  meaning that they are the offspring
of  cultured  parents in high station.  Such people usually look  down  with
scorn  upon those in modest positions.  We have nothing against the  expres-
sion "wellborn;"  we would that every child were well born,  born to parents
of  high moral standing no matter what their station in life.   There  is  a
virginity of soul that is independent of the state of the body,  a purity of
mind  which will carry its possessor through the act of  generation  without
the  taint of passion and enable the mother to carry the unborn child  under
her heart in sexless love.

   Previous to the time of Christ that would have been impossible.   In  the
earlier stages of man's career upon earth quantity was desirable and quality
a minor consideration,  hence the command was given to "go forth,  be fruit-
ful,  and multiply."   Besides, it was necessary that man should temporarily
forget  his  spiritual  nature  and  concrete  his  energies  upon  material


[PAGE 66]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

conditions.  Indulgence of the sex passion furthers that object, and the de-
sire  nature was given full sway.  Polygamy flourished,  and the larger  the
number  of their children,  the more a man and a woman were  honored,  while
barrenness was looked upon as the greatest possible affliction.

   In other directions the desire nature was being curbed by God-given laws,
and  obedience  to divine commands was enforced by swift punishment  of  the
transgressor, such as war, pestilence or famine.  Rewards for dutiful obser-
vance  of the mandates of the law were not wanting either;  the  "righteous"
man's children,  his cattle and crops were numerous;  he was victorious over
his enemies and the cup of his happiness was full.

   Later  when the earth had been sufficiently peopled after  the  Atlantean
Flood,  polygamy became gradually more and more obsolete,  with  the  result
that the quality of the bodies improved,  and at the time of Christ the  de-
sire  nature had become so far amenable to control in the case of  the  more
advanced among humanity that the act of generation could be performed  with-
out passion,  out of pure love, so that the child could be immaculately con-
ceived.

   Such were the parents of Jesus.  Joseph is said to have been a carpenter,
but he was not a worker in wood.  He was a "builder" in a higher sense.  God
is  the  Grand  Architect  of  the universe.  Under Him are many builders of


[PAGE 67]                                          THE IMMACULATE CONCEPTION

varying  degrees of spiritual splendor,  down even to those whom we know  as
Freemasons.   All are engaged in building a temple without sound of  hammer,
and Joseph was no exception.

   It is sometimes asked why Initiates are always men.  They are not; in the
lower degrees there are many women,  but when an Initiate is able to  choose
his  sex  he usually takes the positive masculine body,  as the  life  which
brought  him  to  Initiation has spiritualized his vital body  and  made  it
positive  under  all conditions,  so that he has then an instrument  of  the
highest efficiency.

   There are times,  however, when the exigencies of a case require a female
body, such as, for instance, providing a body of the highest type to receive
an ego of superlatively high degree.  Then a high Initiate may take a female
body and go through the experience of maternity again,  after perhaps having
eschewed it for several lives,  as was the case with the beautiful character
we know as Mary of Bethlehem.

   In conclusion,  then, let us remember the points brought out, that we are
all  Christs-in-the-making;  that sometime we must cultivate  characters  so
spotless that we may be worthy to inhabit bodies that are immaculately  con-
ceived;  and  the  sooner  we commence to purify  our  minds  of  passionate
thoughts, the sooner we shall attain.  In the final analysis it only depends
upon the earnestness of our purpose, the strength of our wills.   Conditions
are  such  now  that  we  can live pure lives whether married or single, and


[PAGE  68]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

cold, sister-and-brother relationships are not necessary either.

   Is  the life of absolute purity beyond some of us yet?   Be not  discour-
aged;  Rome was not built in a day.   Keep on aspiring though you fail again
and again, for the only real failure consists in ceasing to try.

   So may God strengthen your aspirations to purity.


[PAGE 69]                                                  THE COMING CHRIST


                                 CHAPTER IX

                              THE COMING CHRIST


   WE  HAVE previously seen how infant humanity in Atlantis lived  in  unity
under  direct  guidance  of divine leaders,  and how  they  were  eventually
brought  out of the water into a clear atmosphere where the separateness  of
each individual from all others became obvious at once.

   "God  is  Light"--the Light which became life in man.   It  was  dim  and
achromatically diffused in the misty atmosphere of early Atlantis, as color-
less as the air on a densely foggy day in the present age,  hence the  unity
of all beings who lived in that light.   But when man rose above the waters,
when he emerged into the aire where the godly manifestation, Light,  was re-
fracted in multitudinous hues,  this variously colored light was differently
absorbed by each.  Thus diversity was inaugurated, when mankind went through
the  mighty  arch of the rainbow with its variegated and  beautiful  colors.
That  bow  may  therefore be considered an entrance gate  to  "the  promised
land,"  the world as now constituted.  Here the light of God is no longer an


[PAGE  70]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

insipid  single  tint as in early Atlantis.   The present dazzling  play  of
color  tells  us that THE WATCHWORD OF THE PRESENT AGE IS  SEGREGATION,  and
therefore so long as we remain in the present condition under the law of al-
ternating cycles,  where summer and winter, ebb and flow, succeed each other
in unbroken sequence,  so long as God's bow stands in the sky,  an emblem of
diversity,  it is yet the day of the kingdoms of men, and the kingdom of God
is held in abeyance.

   Nevertheless,  as surely as the Edenic conditions upon the fire girt  is-
lands of ancient Lemuria ended in separation into sexes, each expressing one
element of the creative fire,  and making the union of man and woman as nec-
essary to the generation of a body as is the union of hydrogen and oxygen to
the  production of water;  and as surely as emergence from the watery  atmo-
sphere of Atlantis into the airy environment of ARYANA,  the world of today,
promoted further segregation into separate nations and individuals,  who war
and  prey upon one another (because the sharply differentiated  forms  which
they  behold blind them to the inalienable unity of each soul with all  oth-
ers);  just  as  certainly will this world condition give place  to  a  "new
heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness."

   In  early Atlantis we lived in the deepest basins of the earth where  the
mist was densest;  we breathed by means of gills and would have been  unable
to live in an atmosphere such as we have now.  In  the course of time desire


[PAGE 71]                                                  THE COMING CHRIST

to explore beyond caused the invention of airships,  which were propelled by
the  expansive  force of sprouting grain.  The "ark"  story is  a  perverted
remembrance  of that fact.   Those ships actually did founder upon  mountain
tops  where the atmosphere was too rare to sustain them.   Today  our  ships
float  upon  the element in which the Atlantean ships were at one  time  im-
mersed.   We have now contrived various means of propulsion able to carry us
over the highlands of the earth which we occupy at present, and are commenc-
ing to reach out into the atmosphere to conquer that element as we have sub-
jected the waters;  and as surely as our Atlantean ancestors made a  highway
of the watery element which they breathed AND THEN ROSE ABOVE IT TO LIVE  IN
A  NEW  ELEMENT,  just as certainly shall we conquer the air and  then  rise
above it into the newly discovered element which we call ether.

   Thus  each age has its own peculiar conditions and laws;  the beings  who
evolve  have a physiological constitution suited to the environment of  that
age, but are dominated by the nature forces then prevailing until they learn
to conform to them.  Then these forces become most valuable servants, as for
instance, steam and electricity, which we have partially harnessed.  The law
of gravity still holds us in its powerful grip, although by mechanical means
we are trying to escape into the new element.  We  shall  at  a  not distant


[PAGE 72]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

time attain to mastery of the air,  but as the ships of the Atlanteans foun-
dered  upon the mountains of the earth because their buoyancy  was  insuffi-
cient  to enable them to rise higher in the light mist of  those  altitudes,
and because respiration was difficult, so also will the increasing rarity of
our present atmosphere prevent us from entering the "new heaven and the  new
earth," which are to be the scene of the New Dispensation.

   Before  we  can  reach that state, physiological as  well  as  moral  and
spiritual changes must take place.   The Greek text of the new New Testament
does not leave us in doubt as to this,  though lack of knowledge of the mys-
tery teachings prevented the translators from bringing it out in the English
version.   Did  we but believe the Bible even as we have it,  we  should  be
spared  many  delusions  and much uneasiness concerning the  time  of  this.
Whole sects have disposed of their belongings in anticipation of the  advent
of Christ or even as God, have married, raised families,  and died,  leaving
their sons,  who were supposed to be Christs,  to fight for the kingdom.   A
temporal government was forced to banish one of these militant "Christs"  to
an island of the Mediterranean,  and another to an Asiatic city where he  is
now under military supervision.  Nor is there any sign that the future  will


[PAGE 73]                                                  THE COMING CHRIST

lack similar claimants; rather, the sacrilegious imposture is spreading.

   WE MAY REST ASSURED THAT THE DIVINE LEADERS OF EVOLUTION MADE NO  MISTAKE
WHEN  THEY GAVE THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION TO THE WESTERN WORLD-- THE  MOST  AD-
VANCED TEACHING TO THE MOST PRECOCIOUS AMONG MANKIND.   It may therefore  be
regarded as a detriment when an organization undertakes to graft a Hindu re-
ligion  (which  is excellent for the people to whom it was  divinely  given)
upon our people.  The imported Hindu breathing exercises have certainly sent
may people to insane asylums.

   If  we  believe  Christ's words:   "My kingdom is  not  of  this  world,"
(KOSMOS,  the Greek word used for "world" meaning " order of things"  rather
than our planet, the earth, which is called GAEA), we shall know better than
to look for Christ today.

   "Flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God."   any more than  the
gill-breathing  creature of early Atlantean times was fit to live under  the
natural  conditions prevailing in the present age where  "the  resurrection,
does  not say as in the English translation,  "There is a natural  body  and
there is a spiritual body."  I Cor. 15:44.  He affirms that there is a "SOMA
PSUCHICON,"  a soul body, and tells in the preceding verses how this is gen-
erated from a "SEED"  in the same way as explained in the Rosicrucian teach-
ings.  The Bible affirms that our bodies are corruptible.  (It also  teaches


[PAGE 74]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

that one organ,  the heart, is an exception.  This has reference to the seed
atom in the heart.  Ps.  22:26)  Therefore our bodies must be changed before
Christ can come.

   If these things were believed,  few  would run after impostors,  and  the
latter would have their labors for their pains.  But Western papers unfortu-
nately give notoriety to such schemers,  though regarding them as a joke  as
well  they may,  for it would be preposterous to believe that the great  and
wise Being who guides evolution could be so shortsighted as not to know that
the  Western  World  would never accept the scion of what it  regards  as  a
semi-barbaric race for its Savior.

   When  preparations were made 2000 years ago,  for the embodiment  of  the
Savior  of  the world,  Galilee was the Mecca for roving  spirits.   Thither
flocked people from Asia,  Africa, Greece, Italy, and all other parts of the
world  of that day.   Conditions there were exceptionally congenial and  at-
tractive so that,  as declared by various scholars who have investigated the
matter,  Galilee was as cosmopolitan as Rome itself.  It was,  in fact,  the
"melting pot'  of that day.   Among others, Joseph and Mary,  the parents of
Jesus,  had emigrated from Judea to Nazareth in Galilee before the advent of
their  firstborn,  and the body generated in that environment was  different
from the ordinary Jewish race body.

   It is an incontrovertible fact that  environment  plays  a  great part in


[PAGE 75]                                                  THE COMING CHRIST

evolution.  We have today upon earth THREE GREAT RACES.  One, the Negro, has
hair which is FLAT in section, and the head is long, narrow and FLATTENED on
the sides.   The orbit of the eye is also long and narrow.   The Negroes are
descendants of the Lemurain Race.

   The Mongols and kindred peoples have ROUND heads.  Their hair is round in
section,  and orbits of their eyes are also round.  They are the remnants of
the Atlantean Race.

   The ARYAN RACE have oval hair, oval skulls,  and oval orbits of the eyes,
these features being especially pronounced in the Anglo-Saxons,  who are the
flower of the race at present.

   In America, the Mecca of nations today, these various races are of course
represented.  Here is the "melting pot" in which they are being amalgamated.
It has been ascertained that there is a difference in children belonging  to
the  same family.   The SKULLS OF YOUNGER CHILDREN BORN IN AMERICA ARE  MORE
NEARLY OVAL THAN THE HEADS OF THEIR OLDER BROTHERS AND SISTERS BORN ABROAD.

   From  this fact and from others which need not be mentioned here,  it  is
evident that a new race is being born on the American continent; and reason-
ing from the known fact that the Christ came from the most cosmopolitan part
of the civilized world of 2000 years ago,  it would be but logical to expect
that if a new embodiment were sought for that exalted Being, His body  would


[PAGE 76]                                                  THE COMING CHRIST

more likely be taken from the new race than from an ancient one.  Otherwise,
if there is virtue in obtaining a Savior from the older races, why not get a
Bushman or a Hottentot?

   But  we  may be sure that though impostors deceive for a time,  they  are
found out sooner or later, and their plans come to naught.  Meanwhile,  pro-
gression  continues to bring us nearer the Aquarian Age,  and A  TEACHER  IS
COMING to give the Christian Religion impetus in a new direction.


[PAGE 77]                                                     THE COMING AGE


                                  CHAPTER X

                               THE COMING AGE


   WHEN WE speak of the "Coming Age,"  of the "New Heaven and the New Earth"
mentioned in the Bible, and also of the "Aquarian Age,"  the differences may
not be quite clear in the minds of our students.   Confusion of terms is one
of the most fertile seed grounds of fallacy,  and the Rosicrucian  teachings
aim to avoid it by a particularly definite nomenclature.  Sometimes an extra
effort  seems  necessary to disperse the haze engendered by  current  cloudy
conceptions of others as sincere as the present writer, but not so fortunate
in having access to the incomparable Western Wisdom Teachings.

   It has been taught in our literature that four great epochs of unfoldment
preceded the present order of things; that the destiny of the earth, its at-
mospheric conditions, and the laws of nature prevailing in one epoch were as
different  from  those  of  the  other  epochs  as  was  the   corresponding
physiological  constitution of mankind in one epoch different from those  in
he others.


[PAGE 78]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   The  bodies  of ADM (the name means RED EARTH),  the  humanity  of  fiery
Lemuria,  were formed of the "dust of the ground,"  the red,  hot,  volcanic
mud,  and were just suited to their environment.  Flesh and blood would have
shriveled up in the terrible heat of that day,  and though suited to present
conditions,  Paul tells us that they cannot inherit the Kingdom of God.   It
is therefore manifest that before a new order of things can be  inaugurated,
the  physiological constitution of mankind must be radically changed to  say
nothing of the spiritual attitude.   Aeons will be required to generate  the
whole human race and fit them to live in ethereal bodies.

   On the other hand,  neither does a new environment come into existence in
a  moment,  but land and people are evolved together from the  smallest  and
most primitive beginnings.   When the mists of Atlantis commenced to settle,
some of our forbears had grown embryonic lungs and were forced to  highlands
ages before their compeers.  They wandered in "the wilderness"  while "  the
promised  land"  was emerging from the lighter fogs,  and at the  same  time
their growing lungs were fitting them to live under present atmospheric con-
ditions.

   Two  more races were born in the basins of the earth before a  succession
of floods drove them to the highlands; the last flood took place at the time
when the sun entered the watery sign Cancer, about ten thousand years ago as
told Plato by the Egyptian priests.  Thus  we  see there is NO SUDDEN change


[PAGE 79]                                                     THE COMING AGE

of constitution or environment for the whole human race when a new epoch  is
ushered  in,  but an overlapping of conditions which makes it  possible  for
most  of the race by gradual adjustment to enter the new  condition,  though
the change may seem sudden to the individual when the preparatory change has
been  accomplished  unconsciously.   The metamorphosis of a tadpole  from  a
denizen  of  the watery element to one of the airy gives an analogy  of  the
past,  and the transformation of the caterpillar to a butterfly  soaring  in
the air is an apt simile of the coming age.   When the heavenly time  marker
came into Aries by precession, a new cycle commenced, and the "glad tidings"
were  preached by Christ.   He said by implication that the new  heaven  and
earth were not ready then when He told His disciples:  Whither I go you can-
not NOW follow,  but you shall follow afterwards.   I go to prepare a  place
for you and will come again and receive you.

   Later John saw in a vision the new Jerusalem descending from heaven,  and
Paul taught the Thessalonians "BY THE WORD OF THE LORD"  that those who  are
Christ's at His coming shall be caught up IN THE AIR to meet Him and be with
Him FOR THE AGE.

   But  during this change there are pioneers who enter the kingdom  of  God
before their brethren.   Christ, in Matt. 11:12, said that "  the kingdom of
heaven suffereth violence, and the violent take it by force."  This is not a
correct translation.  It ought to be:  The  kingdom  of the heavens HAS BEEN


[PAGE 80]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

INVADED (BIAXETAI),  and invaders seize on her.   Men and women have already
learned  through  holy,  helpful lives to lay aside the body  of  flesh  and
blood,  either  intermittently or permanently,  and to walk the  skies  with
winged feet,  intent upon the business of their Lord,  clad in the  ethereal
"wedding garment"  of the new dispensation.  This change may be accomplished
through  a  life of simple helpfulness and prayer as  practiced  by  devoted
Christians,  no matter with what church they affiliate,  as well as  by  the
specific  exercises given in the Rosicrucian Fellowship.   The  latter  will
prove  barren of results,  unless accompanied by constant ACTS of  love  for
LOVE  will be the keynote of the coming age as LAW is of the present  order.
The  intense expression of the former quality increases  the  phosphorescent
luminosity and density of the ethers in our vital bodies,  the fiery streams
sever the tie to the mortal coil,  and the man,  once BORN OF WATER upon his
emergence from Atlantis,  is now born OF THE SPIRIT into the kingdom of God.
The dynamic force of his love has opened a way to the land of love,  and in-
describable is the rejoicing among those already there when new invaders ar-
rive,  for each new arrival hastens the coming of the Lord and the  definite
establishment of the Kingdom.

   Among  the religiously inclined there is a definite unceasing  cry:   How
long,  O Lord;  how long?  And despite the emphatic statement of Christ that
the day and hour are unknown, even to Himself,  prophets  continue  to  gain


[PAGE 81]                                                     THE COMING AGE

credence when they predict His coming on a certain day,  though each is dis-
comfited  when the day passes without development.   The question  has  also
been  mooted among our students,  and the present chapter is an  attempt  to
show the fallacy of looking for the Second Advent in a year or fifty or five
hundred.   The Elder Brothers decline to commit themselves further  than  to
point out what must first be accomplished.

   At the time of Christ the sun was in about seven degrees of Aries.   Five
hundred years were required to bring the precession to the thirtieth  degree
of Pisces.   During that time the new church lived through a stage of offen-
sive  and defensive violence well justifying the words of Christ:   "I  came
not to bring peace but a sword."   Fourteen hundred years more have  elapsed
under the negative influence of PISCES,  which has fostered the power of the
church and bound the people by creed and dogma.

   In the middle of the last century the sun came within orb of influence of
the scientific sign AQUARIUS,  and although it will take about seven hundred
years  before the Aquarian Age commences, it is highly instructive  to  note
what  changes the mere touch has wrought in the world.   Our  limited  space
precludes enumeration of the wonderful advances made since then;  but it  is
not  too much to say that science,  invention,  and resultant industry  have
completely changed the world, its social life, and economic conditions.  The


[PAGE 82]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

great  strides made in means of communication have done much to  break  down
barriers of race prejudice and prepare us for conditions of Universal Broth-
erhood.   Engines of destruction have been made so fearfully efficient  that
the  militant  nations will be forced ere long to "beat  their  swords  into
plowshares  and  their spears into pruning hooks."   THE SWORD HAS  HAD  ITS
REIGN during the Piscean Age, but SCIENCE WILL RULE in the Aquarian Age.

   In the land of the setting sun we may expect to first see the ideal  con-
ditions of the Aquarian Age:  A blending of religion and science,  forming a
religious science and a scientific religion,  which will promote the health,
happiness and the enjoyment of life in abundant measure.

                              SUGAR FOR ALCOHOL

   In  the  chapter elucidating the Law of Assimilation in  the  ROSICRUCIAN
COSMO-CONCEPTION, we stated that minerals cannot be assimilated because they
lack a vital body, which lack makes it impossible for man to raise their vi-
bratory  rate  to  his  own  pitch.    Plants  have  a  vital  body  and  no
self-consciousness,  hence are most easily assimilated and remain  with  man
longer than cells of animal flesh, which is permeated by a desire body.  The
vibratory  rate  of the latter is high, and much energy is required  in  as-
similation;  its  cells also quickly escape and make it  necessary  for  the
flesh eater to forage often.


[PAGE 83]                                                     THE COMING AGE

   We are aware that alcohol is a "foreign spirit"  and a "spirit of  decay"
because IT IS GENERATED BY FERMENTATION OUTSIDE the consumer's system.   Be-
ing "spirit,"  it vibrates with such intense rapidity that the human  spirit
is incapable of tuning it down and controlling it as food must be, hence me-
tabolism is out of the question.  Nay, more,  as we cannot reduce its vibra-
tory  rate to that of our bodies,  this foreign spirit may accelerate  their
vibratory  pitch  and control us as happens in the  state  of  intoxication.
Thus  alcohol  is a great danger to mankind and one from which  we  must  be
emancipated ere we can realize our divine nature.

   A  stimulant  spirit  is necessary while we live on a DIET  OF  FLESH  or
progress  would stop,  and A FOOD has been provided for the pioneers of  the
West that answers all requirements; its name is "sugar."  FROM SUGAR THE EGO
ITSELF  GENERATES  ALCOHOL INSIDE the system by the very  processes  of  me-
tabolism.   This  product is therefore both food  and  stimulant,  perfectly
keyed to the vibratory pitch of the body.   It has all the good qualities of
alcohol in enhanced measure and none of its drawbacks.  To perceive properly
the effect of this food, consider the peoples of eastern Europe where little
sugar is consumed.   They are slavish;  they speak of themselves in terms of
depreciation; the pronoun "I" is always spelled with small letters but "you"
with a capital.  England consumes five times as  much  sugar  per  capita as


[PAGE  84]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Russia.   In  the former we meet a different spirit,  the big  "I"  and  the
little "you."   In America the candy store becomes a most dangerous rival of
the  saloon,  for THE MAN WHO EATS SWEETS WILL NOT DRINK,  and there  is  no
surer  cure  for  alcoholism than to induce the sufferer to  eat  freely  of
sweets.   The drunkard abhors sugar,  however, while his system is under the
sway of the "foreign spirit."

   The  temperance movement was begun in the land where MOST SUGAR  IS  CON-
SUMED, and has GENERATED "THE SPIRIT OF SELF-RESPECT."


[PAGE 85]                                                    MEAT AND DRINK


                                 CHAPTER XI

                   MEAT AND DRINK AS FACTORS IN EVOLUTION


   IN PREVIOUS chapters we saw how infant humanity was cared for by superhu-
man guardians, provided with appropriate food, led out of danger's way,  and
sheltered in all respects until grown to human stature and fit to enter  the
school  of experience to learn the lessons of life in the phenomenal  world.
We  saw also how the rainbow points to natural laws peculiar to the  present
age,  how man was given free will under these laws,  and how the  spirit  of
wine was given to cheer and to stimulate his own timid,  fearful spirit,  to
nerve it for the war of the world.

   In  an  analogous  manner the irresponsible little  child  who  has  been
brought  under the waters of baptism by its natural guardians is  cared  for
through  the years of childhood while its various vehicles are  being  orga-
nized.   When  the parental blood stored in the thymus gland  has  been  ex-
hausted and the child thus emancipated from the parents, it awakens to indi-
viduality,  to  the  feeling  of  "I AM."  It  has then been prepared with a


[PAGE 86]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

knowledge  of good and evil with which to fight the battle of life;  and  at
that  time the youth is taken to the church and given the bread and wine  to
nerve and nourish him spiritually,  also as a symbol that henceforth he is a
free  agent,  only responsible to the laws of God.   A blessing or a  curse,
this freedom, according to the way it is used.

   In early Atlantis mankind was a universal brotherhood of submissive chil-
dren  with no incentive to war or strife.   Later they were segregated  into
nations, and wars inculcated loyalty to kin and country.  Each sovereign was
an absolute autocrat with power over life and limb of his subjects, who were
numbered  in hundreds of millions,  and who yielded ungrudging  and  slavish
submission, an attitude maintained to the present day among millions of Asi-
atics, who are vegetarians and consequently need no alcohol.

   As flesh eating came into vogue,  wine became a more and more common bev-
erage.   In consequence of flesh eating much material progress was made  im-
mediately  preceding  the advent of Christ, and because of the  practice  of
drinking  wine an increasing number of men asserted themselves  as  leaders,
with  the  result that instead of a few large nations such as  people  Asia,
many  small  nations were formed in the southwestern portion of  Europe  and
Asia Minor.

   But though the great mass of people who formed these various nations were
ahead of their Asiatic brethren as craftsmen,  they  continued submissive to


[PAGE 87]                                                    MEAT AND DRINK

their  rulers  and  lived as much in their traditions  as  did  the  latter.
Christ upbraided them because they gloried in being Abraham's seed.  He told
them that "before Abraham was, I AM," that is, the ego has always existed.

   It is His mission to emancipate humanity from Law and lead it to LOVE, to
destroy "the kingdoms of men" with all their antagonism to one another,  and
to build upon their ruins " the kingdom of God."   An illustration will make
the method clear:

   If we have a number of brick buildings and desire to amalgamate them into
one large structure,  it is necessary to break them down first and free each
brick  from the mortar which binds it.   Likewise each human being  must  be
freed from the fetters of family, hence Christ taught, " Unless a man leaves
his father and mother he cannot be my disciple."   He must outgrow religious
partisanship and patriotism and learn to say with the much misunderstood and
maligned Thomas Paine:  "THE WORLD IS MY COUNTRY, AND TO DO GOOD IS MY RELI-
GION."

   Christ  did not mean that we are to foresake those who have a claim  upon
our help and support,  but that we are not to permit the suppression of  our
individuality out of deference to family traditions and beliefs.

   Consequently He came "not to bring peace,  but a sword;"  and whereas the
eastern religions discourage the use of wine,  CHRIST'S FIRST MIRACLE WAS TO
CHANGE  WATER  TO  WINE.  The  sword  and  the wine cup are signature of the


[PAGE 88]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Christian religion,  for by them nations have been broken to pieces and  the
individual emancipated.  Government by the people, for the people, is a fact
in northwestern Europe, the rulers being that principally in name only.

   But the fostering of the martial spirit as prevails in Europe was only  a
means to an end.   The segregation which it has caused must give place to  a
regime of brotherhood such as professed by Paine.   A new step was necessary
to  bring  this about;  A NEW FOOD must be found which would  act  upon  the
spirit  in such a way as to foster individuality through ASSERTION  OF  SELF
WITHOUT  OPPRESSION  OF OTHERS AND WITHOUT LOSS OF  SELF-RESPECT.   We  have
enunciated it as a law that only spirit can act upon spirit,  and  therefore
that food must be a spirit but differing in other respects from intoxicants.

   Before  describing this let us see what flesh has done for the  evolution
of the world.

   We  have noted previously that during the Polarian Epoch man had  only  a
dense body;  he was like the present minerals in this respect, and by nature
he was inert and passive.

   By absorbing the crystalloids prepared by plants he evolved a vital  body
during the Hyperborean Epoch and became plant-like both in constitution  and
by nature, for he lived without exertion and as unconsciously as the plants.

   Later  he  extracted  milk  from the then stationary animals.  Desire for


[PAGE 89]                                                    MEAT AND DRINK

this more readily digestible food spurred him on to exertion,  and gradually
his  desire nature was evolved during the Lemurian Epoch.   Thus  he  became
constituted like the present day HERBIVORA.  Though possessed of a passional
nature,  he was docile and could not be induced to fight save to defend him-
self,  his mate, and family.  Hunger alone had the power to make him aggres-
sive.

   Therefore,  when animals began to move and sought to elude this  ruthless
parasite,  increasing difficulty of obtaining the coveted food  aroused  his
craving  to such an extent that when he had hunted and caught an animal,  he
was no longer content to suck its udders dry but commenced to feed upon  its
blood and flesh.  Thus he became as ferocious as our present day CARNIVORA.

   Digestion  of flesh food requires much more powerful chemical action  and
speedy  elimination of the waste than that of a vegetable diet as proved  by
chemical analysis of the gastric juices from animals,  and by the fact  that
the  intestines  of  Herbivora are many times longer than those  of  a  car-
nivorous animal of even size.   Carnivora easily become drowsy and averse to
exertion.

   When prodded by the pangs of hunger the ferocious wolf does indeed pursue
its prey with unwavering perseverance,  and the spring of the crouching king
of beasts overmatches the speed of the wing-footed deer.   By ambush the fe-
line family foil the fleetest in their attempts to escape.  The  cunning  of


[PAGE 90]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the  fox is proverbial,  and the slinking nocturnal habits of the hyena  and
kindred  scavengers illustrate the depth of depravity resulting from a  diet
of decayed flesh.

   The  vices generated by flesh eating may be said to be lassitude,  feroc-
ity,  low cunning,  and depravity.   We may tame the herbivorous ox and  el-
ephant.   Their diet makes them docile and stores enormous power which  they
obediently  use in our service to perform prolonged and arduous labor.   The
flesh  food required by the constitutional peculiarities of Carnivora  makes
them dangerous and incapable of thorough domestication.   A cat may  scratch
at any moment,  and the muzzling ordinances of large cities are ample  proof
of the danger of dogs.   Besides,  energy contained in the diet of Carnivora
is  so largely expended in digestion that they are drowsy and  unfitted  for
sustained labor like the horse or elephant.

   The  drowsiness following a heavy meal of meat is too well known  to  re-
quire  arguement,  and the custom of taking stimulants with food is an  out-
growth of the desire to counteract the deadening effect of dead flesh.   The
intensified  effect of feasting upon FLESH IN AN ADVANCED STATE OF DECAY  is
well illustrated in "society," where banquets of game that is "high" are ac-
companied by orgies of the wildest nature and followed by indulgence of  the
vilest instincts.

   The Westerner who can live upon a clean,  sweet,  wholesome diet of  veg-
etables, cereals and fruit, does not become drowsy from his food;  he  needs


[PAGE 91]                                                    MEAT AND DRINK

no stimulant.   THERE ARE NO VEGETARIAN DRUNKARDS.   The soothing effects of
vegetable food manifest as finer feelings,  which replace the ferocity  fos-
tered  by flesh food.   Many need the mixed diet yet,  for the  practice  of
flesh eating has furthered the progress of the world as nothing else  except
perhaps its companion vice--drunkenness;  and though we cannot say that they
have  been a blessing in disguise,  they have at least not been  unmitigated
curses,  for in the Father's kingdom all seeming evil nevertheless works for
good  in some respect,  though it may not be apparent upon the surface.   We
shall see how presently.

   A private corporation, the East India Company,  commenced and practically
achieved the subjugation of India with her three hundred million people, for
the  English are voracious flesh eaters, while the Hindu's diet fosters  do-
cility.   But when England fought the flesh eating Boers,  Greek met  Greek,
and  the  valor  displayed by both sides is a matter  of  brilliant  record.
Courage, physical as well as moral, is a virtue and cowardice a vice.  Flesh
has fostered self-assertion and helped us to develop backbone, though unfor-
tunately  often at the expense of others who still retain the wishbone.   It
has done more as will be illustrated:

   As  said previously,  the crouching cat is forced to employ  strategy  to
save strength when procuring its prey,  so that it may retain sufficient en-
ergy  to  digest  the  victim.  Thus  brain  becomes  the ally of brawn.  In


[PAGE  92]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

ancient  Atlantis DESIRE FOR FLESH DEVELOPED THE INGENUITY OF PRIMITIVE  MAN
AND LED HIM to trap the elusive denizens of field and forest.   The hunter's
snare was among the first LABOR-SAVING DEVICES--which mark the beginning  of
the evolution of mind, and of the uncompromising, unflagging struggle of the
meat fed mind for supremacy over matter.

   We say "THE MEAT FED MIND,"  and we reiterate it,  because we wish to em-
phasize  that  it is by the nations which have adopted flesh food  that  the
most noteworthy progress has been made.  The vegetarian Asiatics remain upon
the lower rungs of civilization.   The further west we travel,  THE MORE THE
CONSUMPTION  OF MEAT INCREASES AS DOES THE DISINCLINATION FOR  BODILY  EXER-
CISE, AND CONSEQUENTLY THE ACTIVITY OF THE MIND IS INCREASED TO A HIGHER AND
HIGHER  PITCH  IN  THE  INVENTION OF  LABOR-SAVING  DEVICES.   The  American
agriculturists' acres are counted by thousands, and they harvest large crops
with  less labor than the peasant of the East who has only a small patch  of
ground.   The reason is that the poor, plodding grain fed Easterner has only
his hands and his hoe,  which he keeps in motion all day and day after  day,
while the meat fed, progressive Westerner turns power-driven implements into
his  fertile fields and sits down in a comfortable seat to watch them  work.
One uses muscle, the other mind.


[PAGE 93]                                                    MEAT AND DRINK

   Thus  the indomitable courage and energy which have transformed the  face
of  the  Western World are virtues directly traceable to flesh  food,  which
also fosters love of ease and invention of labor-saving devices; while alco-
hol  stimulates enterprise in execution of schemes thus hatched  to  procure
the maximum of comfort with a minimum of labor.

   But  the spirit of alcohol is obtained by a process of fermentation.   It
is a SPIRIT OF DECAY,  altogether different from the SPIRIT OF LIFE in  man.
This counterfeit spirit lures man on and on,  always holding before his  vi-
sion the dreams of FUTURE grandeur,  and goading him to strenuous efforts of
body and mind in order to attain and obtain.   Then when he has achieved and
attained,  he awakens to the utter worthlessness of his  prize.   Possession
soon  shatters  illusion as to the worth of whatever he may  have  acquired;
NOTHING  THE WORLD HAS TO GIVE CAN FINALLY SATISFY.   Then again the  lethal
draught  drowns  disappointment,  and the mind conjures up a  new  illusion.
This he pursues with fresh zeal and high hopes, to meet disappointment again
and  again,  for lives and lives,  until at last he learns that "wine  is  a
mocker," and that "all is vanity but to serve God and to do His will."
[PAGE 94]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                                 CHAPTER XII


                             A LIVING SACRIFICE

    VOLUMES, OR RATHER libraries, have been written to explain the nature of
God,  but  it is probably a universal experience that the more  we  read  of
other people's explanations,  the less we understand.  There is one descrip-
tion, given by the inspired apostle John when he wrote "GOD IS LIGHT," which
is  as  illuminating as the others are befogging to the  mind.   Anyone  who
takes this passage for meditation occasionally will find a rich reward wait-
ing,  for no matter how many times we take up this subject, our own develop-
ment  in the passing years assures us each time a fuller and  better  under-
standing.   Each  time we sink ourselves in these three words we lave  in  a
spiritual fountain of inexhaustible depth, and each succeeding time we sound
more  thoroughly  the divine depths and draw more closely to our  Father  in
heaven.

   To get in touch with our subject, let us go back in time to get our bear-
ing and the direction of our future line of progress.


[PAGE 95]                                                 A LIVING SACRIFICE

   The  first  time  our consciousness was directed towards  the  Light  was
shortly  after  we had become endowed with mind and had  entered  definitely
upon our evolution as human beings in Atlantis,  the land of the mist,  deep
down in the basins of the earth,  where the warm mist emitted from the cool-
ing earth hung like a dense fog over the land.   Then the starry heights  of
the universe were never seen,  nor could the silvery light of the moon  pen-
etrate the dense, foggy atmosphere which hung over that ancient land.   Even
the fiery splendor of the sun was almost totally extinguished,  for when  we
look in the Memory of Nature pertaining to that time,  it appears very  much
as an arc lamp on a high pole looks to us when it is foggy.   It was exceed-
ingly dim, and had an aura of various colors, very similar to those which we
observe around an arc light.

   But this light had a fascination.  The ancient Atlanteans were taught  by
the divine Hierarchs who walked among them, to aspire to the light,  and  as
the  spiritual sight was then already on the wane (even the  messengers,  or
Elohim,  being perceived with difficulty by the majority),  they aspired all
the  more ardently to the new light, for they feared the darkness  of  which
they had become conscious through the gift of mind.

   Then  came the inevitable flood when the mist cooled and condensed.   The
atmosphere  cleared,  and  the  "CHOSEN  PEOPLE"  were saved.  Those who had


[PAGE 96]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

worked within themselves and learned to build the necessary organs  required
to breathe in an atmosphere such as we have today,  survived and came to the
light.   It was not an arbitrary choice; THE WORK OF THE PAST  CONSISTED  OF
BODY  BUILDING.   Those who had only gill clefts,  such as the foetus  still
uses  in its prenatal development,  were unfit physiologically to enter  the
new era as the foetus would be to be born were it to neglect to build lungs.
It would die as those ancient people died when the rare atmosphere made gill
clefts useless.

   Since  the day when we came out of ancient Atlantis our bodies have  been
practically complete,  that is to say, no new vehicles are to be added;  but
from  that  time  and from now on THOSE WHO WISH TO FOLLOW  THE  LIGHT  MUST
STRIVE FOR SOUL GROWTH.  The bodies which we have crystallized about us must
be dissolved,  and the quintessence of experience extracted, which as "soul"
may  be  amalgamated  with the spirit to nourish if from  impotence  to  om-
nipotence.  Therefore, the Tabernacle in the Wilderness was given to the an-
cients, and THE LIGHT OF GOD DESCENDED UPON THE ALTAR OF SACRIFICE.  This is
of great significance:  The ego had just descended into its tabernacle,  the
body.   We all know the tendency of the primitive instinct towards  selfish-
ness,  and if we have studied the higher ethics we also know how  subversive
of good the indulgence of the egotistic tendency is; therefore,  God immedi-
ately placed before mankind the Divine Light upon the Altar of Sacrifice.


[PAGE 97]                                                    MEAT AND DRINK

   Upon  this altar they were forced by dire necessity to offer their  cher-
ished possessions for every transgression,  God appearing to them as a  hard
taskmaster whose displeasure it was dangerous to incur.  But still the Light
drew them.   They knew then that it was futile to attempt to escape from the
hand of God.   They had never heard the words of John, "God is Light,"   but
they  had already learned from the heavens in a measure the meaning  of  in-
finitude,  as  measured by the realm of light,  for we hear  David  exclaim:
"Whither shall I go from thy Spirit?  or whither shall I flee from thy pres-
ence?  If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell,
thou art there.   If I take the wings of the morning,  and dwell in the  ut-
termost  part of the sea,  even there shall thy hand lead me and  thy  might
hand shall hold me.  If I say, surely the darkness shall cover me,  even the
night shall be light about me.  Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee,  but
the night shineth as the day,  for the darkness and the light are both alike
to thee."

   With  every  year that passes,  with the aid of the  greatest  telescopes
which the ingenuity and mechanical skill of man have been able to  construct
to pierce the depths of space,  it becomes more evident that the  infinitude
of  light teaches us the infinitude of God.   When we hear that  "men  loved
darkness  rather  than  Light because their deed were evil," that also rings


[PAGE 98]                                              GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

true to what we unfortunately know as present day facts,  and illumines  the
nature of God for us;  for is it not true that we always feel endangered  in
the dark, but that the light gives us a sense of safety which is akin to the
feeling of a child who feels the protecting hand of its father?

   To  render  permanent this condition of being in the Light was  the  next
step in God's work with us, which culminated in the birth of Christ,  who as
the bodily presence of the Father, bore about in Himself that Light, for the
Light came into the world that whosoever should believe in Christ should not
perish,  but have everlasting life.  He said, "I am the Light of the World."
The  altar in the Tabernacle had illustrated the principle of  sacrifice  as
the medium of regeneration,  so Christ said to His disciples:  Greater  love
hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends.  Ye are my
friends.  And forthwith He commenced a sacrifice, which, contrary to the ac-
cepted orthodox opinion was not consummated in a few hours of physical  suf-
fering  upon a material cross,  but is as perpetual as were  the  sacrifices
made upon the altar of the Tabernacle in the Wilderness,  for it entails  an
annual  descent  into the earth and an endurance of all  that  the  cramping
earth conditions must mean to such a great spirit.

   This must continue till a sufficient number have evolved who can bear the
burden of this dense lump  of  DARKNESS  which  we call the earth, and which


[PAGE 99]                                                 A LIVING SACRIFICE

hangs  as a millstone about the neck of humanity,  an impediment to  further
spiritual growth.   Until we learn to follow "in His steps,"  we can rise no
higher towards the Light.

   It is related that when Leonardo da Vinci had completed his famous paint-
ing "The Last Supper,"  he asked a friend to look at it and tell him what he
thought of it.

   The friend looked at it critically for a few minutes and then said:

   "I  think you have made a mistake in painting the goblets from which  the
apostles  drink so ornamental and to resemble gold.   People in their  posi-
tions would not drink from such expensive vessels."

   Da Vinci then drew his brush through the entire set of vessels which  had
drawn  the  criticism  of his friend,  but he was heartbroken,  for  he  had
painted  that picture with his soul rather than with his hands,  and he  had
prayed over it that it might speak a message to the world.   He had put  all
the  greatness  of his art and the whole-hearted devotion of his  soul  into
that effort to paint a Christ who should speak the word that would lead  men
to emulate His deeds.

   Can you see Him as He sits there at that festive board, THE EMBODIMENT OF
LIGHT,  and speaks those wonderful, mystic words:  THIS IS MY BODY,  THIS IS
MY BLOOD, GIVEN FOR YOU-- a living sacrifice.


[PAGE 100]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   In  the  past period of our spiritual career we have been looking  for  a
Light EXTERIOR to ourselves,  but now we have arrived at the point where  we
must look for the Christ light within and emulate Him by making of ourselves
"living sacrifices" as He is doing.  Let us remember that when the sacrifice
which  lies before our door seems pleasant and to our liking,  when we  seem
able to pick and choose our work in His vineyard and do what pleases us,  we
are  not making a real sacrifice as He did,  nor are we when we are seen  of
men and applauded for our benevolence.   But when we are ready to follow Him
from that festive board where He was the honored one among friends, into the
garden of Gethsemane WHERE HE WAS ALONE and wrestled with the great  problem
before Him while His friends slept, then are we making a living sacrifice.

   When  we  are  content  to  follow  "in  His  steps"  to  that  point  of
self-sacrifice  where we can say from the bottom of our hearts,  "THY  WILL,
NOT MINE," then we have surely THE LIGHT WITHIN, and there will never hence-
forth be for us that which we feel as darkness.  WE SHALL WALK IN THE LIGHT.

   This is our glorious privilege,  and the meditation upon the words of the
apostle,  "God is Light," will help us to realize this ideal provided we add
to  our faith,  WORKS,  and say by our deeds as did the Christ of da  Vinci,
"THIS IS MY BODY AND THIS IS MY BLOOD," a living sacrifice upon the altar of
humanity.


[PAGE 101]                                            MAGIC, WHITE AND BLACK


                                CHAPTER XIII

                           MAGIC, WHITE AND BLACK


   FROM  TIME  to  time  as  occasion  requires  we  warn  students  of  the
Rosicrucian  Fellowship  in  our private individual letters  not  to  attend
spirit seances,  hypnotic demonstrations,  or places where incense is burned
by dabblers in occultism.   Black Magic is practiced by both consciously and
unconsciously to an extent that is almost unbelievable.   "Malicious  animal
magnetism,"  which is only another name for the Black Force,  is responsible
for more failures in business, loss of health, and unhappiness in homes than
most  people are aware of.   Even the perpetrators of such outrages are,  as
said, often unconscious of what harm they have done.  Therefore it seems ex-
pedient to devote a chapter to an explanation of some of the laws of  magic,
which are the same for the white as for the black.  There is only one force,
but it may be used for good or evil;  and according to the motive behind  it
and the use that is made of it, it becomes either black or white.

   It is a scientific axiom that "EX NIHIL, NIHIL FIT" (out of nothing noth-
ing comes).  There must be a seed before there  can  be  a flower, but where


[PAGE 102]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the  first seed came from is something which science has failed to  explain.
The occultist knows that all things have come from ARCHE,  the infinite  es-
sence of chaos,  used by God,  the Grand Architect,  for the building of our
universe; and , given the nucleus of anything, the accomplished magician can
draw upon the same essence for a further supply.  Christ, for instance,  had
some loaves and some fishes;  by means of that nucleus He drew upon the pri-
mordial  essence of chaos for the rest needed in performing the  miracle  of
feeding a multitude.   A human magician whose power is not so high can  more
easily  draw upon things which have already materialized out of  chaos.   He
may take flowers or fruit belonging to some one else,  miles or hundreds  of
miles away, disintegrate them into their atomic constituents, transport them
through  the air,  and cause them to assume their regular physical shape  in
the the room where he is entertaining friends in order to amaze them.   Such
magic  is GREY at best,  even if he sends sufficient of his coin to pay  for
what he has taken away;  if he does not,  it is Black Magic to thus rob  an-
other of his goods.  Magic to be white must always be used unselfishly,  and
in  addition,  for a noble purpose--to save a fellow being  suffering.   The
Christ,  when He fed the multitude from chaos,  gave as His reason that they
had been with Him for several days and if they had to journey  back to their


[PAGE 103]                                            MAGIC, WHITE AND BLACK

homes without physical food they would faint by the wayside and suffer  pri-
vation.

   God is the Grand Architect of the Universe and the Initiates of the White
Schools  are  also arche-tektons,  builders from the primordial  essence  in
their  beneficent  work  for humanity.  These Invisible  Helpers  require  a
nucleus  from  the  patient's  vital body, which  is,  as  students  of  the
Rosicrucian  Fellowship know,  given to them in the effluvia from the  hand,
which impregnates the paper when the patient makes application for help  and
healing. With this nucleus of the patient's vital body they are able to draw
upon  virgin matter for whatever they need to restore health by building  up
and strengthening the organism.

   The Black Magicians are despoilers, actuated by hatred and malice.   They
also  need a nucleus for their nefarious operations,  and this  they  obtain
most easily from the vital body as spiritualistic or hypnotic seances, where
the sitters relax, put themselves into a negative frame of mind,  drop their
jaws,  and sink their individualities by other distinctly mediumistic  prac-
tices.   Even  people who do not frequent such places are  not  immune,  for
there are certain products of the vital body which are ignorantly  scattered
by all and which may be used effectively by the Black Magicians.   Chief  in
this  category are the hair and fingernails.   The Negroes in  their  voodoo
magic  use the placenta for similar evil purposes.   One  particularly  evil
man, whose practices were exposed a decade ago, obtained from boys the vital


[PAGE 104]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

fluid  which he used for his demoniac acts.   Even so innocent a thing as  a
glass of water placed in close proximity to certain parts of the body of the
prospective victim,  while the Black Magician converses with him can be made
to absorb a part of the victim's vital body.  This will give the Black Magi-
cian  the  requisite  nucleus,  or it may be obtained from a  piece  of  the
person's clothing.   The same invisible emanation contained in the  garment,
which  guides the bloodhound upon the track of a certain person,  will  also
guide the Magician,  white or black, to the abode of that person and furnish
the Magician with a key to the person's system whereby the former by help or
hurt according to his inclination.

   But  there  are methods of protecting oneself from  inimical  influences,
which we shall mention in the latter part of this chapter.   We have debated
much  whether it were wise or not to call to call the attention of  students
to these facts, and have come to the conclusion that it does not help anyone
to imitate the ostrich which sticks its head into a hole in the sand at  the
approach of danger.   It is better to be enlightened concerning things  that
threaten so that we may take whatever precautions are necessary to meet  the
emergency.   The battle between the good and the evil forces is being  waged
with  an intensity that no one not engaged in the actual combat can  compre-
hend.  The Elder Brothers of the Rosicrucians and kindred  orders  which, we


[PAGE 105]                                            MAGIC, WHITE AND BLACK

may say,  in their totality represent the Holy Grail,  live on the love  and
essence  of the unselfish service which they gather and garner as  the  bees
gather honey,  from all who are striving to live the life.  This they add to
the lustre of the Holy Grail, which in turn grows more lustrous and radiates
a  stronger  influence upon all who are spiritually inclined,  imbuing  them
with greater ardor,  zeal and zest in the good work and in fighting the good
fight.  Similarly the evil forces of the Black Grail thrive on hate, treach-
ery,  cruelty,  and every demoniac deed on the calendar of crime.   Both the
Black  and  White Grail forces require a pabulum,  the one of good  and  the
other of evil,  for the continuance of their existence and for the power  to
fight.   Unless they get it, they starve and grow weaker.  Hence the relent-
less struggle that is going on between them.

   Every midnight the Elder Brothers at their service open their breasts  to
attract  the  darts of hate,  envy,  malice,  and every evil that  has  been
launched during the past twenty-four hours.  First,  in order that they  may
deprive the Black Grail forces of their food;  and secondly,  that they  may
transmute the evil to good.  Then, as the plants gather the inert carbon di-
oxide exhaled by mankind and build their bodies therefrom,  so the  Brothers
of  the Holy Grail transmute the evil within the temple;  and as the  plants
send  out  the  renovated oxygen so necessary to human life,  so  the  Elder
Brothers  return  to  mankind  the  transmuted  essence of evil as qualms of


[PAGE 106]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

conscience  along with the good in order that the world may grow better  day
by day.

   The Black Brothers, instead of transmuting the evil, infuse a greater dy-
namic  energy into it and speed it on its mission in vain endeavors to  con-
quer the powers of good.   They use for their purposes elementals and  other
discarnate entities which,  being themselves of a low order,  are  available
for such vile practices as required.  In the ages when men burned animal oil
or  candles made from tallow of animals,  elementals swarmed around them  as
devils or demons,  seeking to obsess whoever would offer an occasion.   Even
wax tapers offer food for these entities,  but the modern paraffin  candles,
are  uncongenial to them.   They still flock around our  saloons,  slaughter
houses,  and  similar  places  where  there  are  passionate  animals,   and
animal-like men.   They also delight in places where incense is burned,  for
that offers them an avenue of access, and when the sitters at seances inhale
the odor of the incense they inhale elemental spirits with it,  which affect
them according to their characters.

   This is where the protection we spoke about before may be used.   When we
live  lives of purity,  when our days are filled with service to God and  to
our fellow men, and with thoughts and actions of the highest nobility,  then
we create for ourselves the GOLDEN WEDDING GARMENT, which is a radiant force
for good.  No evil is able to penetrate this armor for the evil then acts as


[PAGE 107]                                            MAGIC, WHITE AND BLACK

a boomerang and recoils on the one who sent it,  bringing to him the evil he
wished us.

   But alas,  none of us are altogether good.  We know only too well the war
between  the flesh and the spirit.   We cannot hide from ourselves the  fact
that like Paul,  "the good that we would do, we do not, and the evil that we
would shun,  that we do."  Far too often our good resolutions come to naught
and we do wrong because it is easier.   Therefore we all have the nucleus of
evil within ourselves,  which affords the open sesame for the evil forces to
work  upon.   For that reason it is best for us not unnecessarily to  expose
ourselves  at places where seanes are held with spirits invisible to us,  no
matter  how fine their teachings may sound to the unsophisticated.   Neither
should we take part even as spectators at hypnotic demonstrations, for there
also  a  negative attitude lays one liable to the danger of  obsession.   We
should at all times follow the advice of Paul and put on the whole armor  of
God.   We should be positive in our fight for the good against the evil  and
never let an occasion slip to aid the Elder Brothers by word or deed in  the
Great War for spiritual supremacy.


[PAGE 108]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                                 CHAPTER XIV


                          OUR INVISIBLE GOVERNMENT


   IT IS WELL known to students of the Rosicrucian Philosophy that each spe-
cies of animals is dominated by a group spirit,  which is their guardian and
looks after these, its wards, with a view to bringing them along the path of
evolution that is best suited to their development;  it does not matter what
the  geographical position of these animals is;  the lion in the jungles  of
Africa is dominated by the same group spirit as is the lion in the cage of a
menagerie in our northern countries.   Therefore these animals are alike  in
all their principal characteristics;  they have the same likes and  dislikes
with  respect  to diet,  and they act in an almost  identical  manner  under
similar  circumstances.   If one wants to study the tribes of lions  or  the
tribe of tigers,  all that is necessary is to study one individual,  for  it
has neither choice nor prerogative,  but acts entirely according to the dic-
tates of the group spirit.   The mineral cannot choose whether it will crys-
tallize or not;  the rose is bound to bloom;  the lion is compelled to prey;
and in each case the activity is dictated entirely by the group spirit.


[PAGE 109]                                          OUR INVISIBLE GOVERNMENT

   But man is different;  when we want to study him we find that each  indi-
vidual  is as a species by himself.  What one does under any  given  circum-
stances is no indication of what another may do;  "one man's meat is another
man's poison";  each has different likes and dislikes.   This is because man
as  we  see  him in the physical world is the expression  of  an  individual
indwelling spirit, seemingly having choice and prerogative.

   But  as a matter of fact man is not quite as free as he seems;  all  stu-
dents of human nature have observed that on certain occasions a large number
of  people will act as though dominated by one spirit.   It is also easy  to
see  without recourse to occultism that the different nations  have  certain
physical characteristics.  We all know the German, French, English, Italian,
and Spanish types.   Each of these nations has characteristics which  differ
from those of the other nations,  thus indicating that there must be a  RACE
SPIRIT at the root of these peculiarities.  The occultist who is gifted with
spiritual sight knows that such is the case, and that each nation has a dif-
ferent  race spirit which broods as a cloud over the whole country.   In  it
the people live and move and having their being; it is their guardian and is
constantly working for their development, building up their civilization and
fostering  ideals of the highest nature compatible with their  capacity  for
progress.


[PAGE 110]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   In the Bible we read the JEHOVAH, ELOHIM,  who was the race spirit of the
Jews, went before them in a pillar and a cloud, and in the Book of Daniel we
gain considerable insight into the workings of these race spirits.   The im-
age  seen  by Nebuchadnezzar with its head of gold and feet of  clay  showed
plainly how a civilization built up in the beginning with golden ideals  de-
generated  more and more until in the latter part of its existence the  feet
were of unstable, crumbling clay, and the image was doomed to topple.   Thus
all civilizations when started by the different race spirits have great  and
golden  ideals,  but humanity by reason of having some free will and  choice
does  not follow implicitly the dictates of the race spirits as the  animals
follow the commands of the group spirits.  Hence in the course of time a na-
tion ceases to rise, and as there can be no standing still in the cosmos, it
begins to degenerate until finally the feet are of clay and it is  necessary
to strike a blow to shatter it, THAT ANOTHER CIVILIZATION MAY BE BUILT UP ON
ITS RUINS.

   But empires do not fall without a strong physical blow,  and therefore an
instrument  of the race spirit of a nation is always raised up at  the  time
when  that nation is doomed to fall.  In the tenth and eleventh chapters  of
Daniel we are given an insight into the workings of the invisible government
of the race spirits, the powers behind the throne.  Daniel is much disturbed
in spirit;  he fasts,  for fully THREE WEEKS, praying for light,  and at the
end  of  that  time  an  arch-angel,  a  race spirit, appears before him and


[PAGE 111]                                          OUR INVISIBLE GOVERNMENT

addresses him: "Fear not, Daniel, for from the first day that thou didst set
thine heart to understand, and to chasten thyself before thy God,  thy words
were heard,  and I am come for thy words.   But the prince of the kingdom of
Persia withstood me ONE AND TWENTY DAYS, but lo,  Michael,  one of the chief
princes,  came to help me;  and I remained there with the king  of  Persia."
After he explains to Daniel what is to happen, he says: "Knowest thou where-
fore  I came unto thee?   AND NOW WILL I RETURN TO FIGHT WITH THE PRINCE  OF
PERSIA:  AND WHEN I AM GONE FORTH, LO, THE PRINCE OF GRECIA SHALL COME,  and
there  is  none  that holdeth with me in these  things,  but  Michael,  your
prince."   The archangel also says:  "In the first year of Darius the  Mede,
even I stood to confirm and to strengthen him."

   So when the handwriting is on the wall, some one is raised up to adminis-
ter the blow;  it may be a Cyrus, a Darius, an Alexander, a Caesar,  a Napo-
leon, or a kaiser.  Such a one may think himself a prime mover, a free indi-
vidual acting by his own choice and prerogative,  but as a matter of fact he
is only the instrument of the invisible government of the world,  the  power
behind  thrones,  the race spirits,  who see the necessity  of  breaking  up
civilizations that have outlived their usefulness,  so that humanity may get
a  new  start  and evolve under a new and a higher  ideal  than  that  which
ensouled it before.


[PAGE 112]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   Christ himself when upon earth,  said: "I came not to bring peace,  but a
sword,"  for it was evident to Him that as long as humanity was divided into
races  and  nations there could be no "peace on earth and  good  will  among
men."   Only when the nations have become united in a universal  brotherhood
is peace possible.  The barriers of nationalism must be done away with,  and
to  this end the United States of America has been made a melting pot  where
all  that is best in the old nations is being brought together and  amalgam-
ated, so that A NEW RACE WITH HIGHER IDEALS AND FEELINGS OF UNIVERSAL BROTH-
ERHOOD  MAY BE BORN FOR THE AQUARIAN AGE.   In the meantime the barriers  of
nationalism  have been partially broken down in Europe by the terrible  con-
flict just past.   This brings nearer the day of universal amity and the re-
alization of the Brotherhood of Man.

   There is also another object to be gained.   Of all the terrors to  which
mankind is subjected,  there is none so great as DEATH,  which separates  us
from  those  we  love,  because we are unable to see them  after  they  have
stepped  out  of their bodies.   But just as surely as the day  follows  the
night,  so will every teardrop wear away some of the scale that  now  blinds
the eyes of man to the unseen land of the living dead.  We have said repeat-
edly and we now reaffirm that one of the greatest blessings which will  come
from the war will be the spiritual sight which a great number of people will
evolve.  The intense sorrow of millions of  people, the longing to see again


[PAGE 113]                                          OUR INVISIBLE GOVERNMENT

the dear ones who have so suddenly and ruthlessly been torn from us,  are  a
force  of  incalculable strength and power.   Likewise those who  have  been
snatched  by  death in the prime of life and who are now  in  the  invisible
world  are equally intense in their desires to reunite with those  near  and
dear to them,  so that they may speak the word of comfort and assure them of
their well being.  Thus it may be said that two great armies comprising mil-
lions upon millions are tunneling with frantic energy and intensity of  pur-
pose through the wall that separates the invisible from the visible.  Day by
day this wall or veil is growing thinner, and sooner or later the living and
the  living dead will meet in the middle of the tunnel.   Before we  realize
it,  communication will have been established, and we shall find it a common
experience that when our loved ones step out of their worn and sick  bodies,
we  shall feel neither sorrow nor loss because we shall be able to see  them
in their ethereal bodies, moving among us as they used to do.  So out of the
great  conflict we shall come as victors over death and be able to  say:  "O
death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?"


[PAGE 114]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                                 CHAPTER XV

                   PRACTICAL PRECEPTS FOR PRACTICAL PEOPLE


   "IF  I WERE to do business on the principles laid down in the  Sermon  on
the  Mount I would be down and out in less than a year,"  said a critic  re-
cently.  "Why, the Bible is utterly impracticable under our present economic
conditions; it is impossible to live according to it."

   If that is true there is a good reason for the unbelief of the world, but
in  a court the accused is always allowed a fair trial,  and let us  examine
the Bible thoroughly before we judge.  What are the specific charges?  "Why,
they are countless," answered the critic, "but to mention only a few, let us
take such passages as,  'Blessed are the poor in spirit,  for theirs is  the
Kingdom of Heaven;' 'Blessed are the meek for they shall inherit the earth;'
'Take no thought for the morrow,  what ye shall eat or what ye shall drink.'
Such ideas point the way to the poorhouse."

   "Very  well,"  says the apologist,  "let us take the last  charge  first.
King James' version says: 'No man can serve  two  masters.  Ye  cannot serve


[PAGE 115]                           PRACTICAL PRECEPTS FOR PRACTICAL PEOPLE

God  and mammon,  therefore I say unto you,  take no thought for your  life,
what  ye  shall eat or what ye shall drink,  nor yet for your body  what  ye
shall  put on.   Is not the life more than food and the body  than  raiment?
Behold the fowls of the air:  they sow not,  neither do they reap nor gather
into barns;  yet your heavenly Father feedeth them.   Are ye not much better
than they?   Which of you by taking thought can add one cubit unto his stat-
ure?   And  why take ye thought for raiment?   Consider the  lilies  of  the
field,  how they grow:  they toil not, neither do they spin.   And yet I say
unto  you that Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one  of  these.
Wherefore, if God so clothe the grasses of the field, which today is and to-
morrow  is cast into the oven,  shall He not much more clothe you,  O ye  of
little faith?  Therefore take no thought saying, What shall we eat? or, What
shall we drink?  or,  Wherewithal shall we be clothed?  for after all  these
things do the Gentiles seek;  your heavenly Father knoweth that ye have need
of  all these things.   But seek ye first the Kingdom of God and  His  righ-
teousness and all these things shall be added unto you.'"

   If  this  is intended to mean that we should wastefully squander  all  we
have in prodigal or riotous living,  then it is of course not only impracti-
cal but demoralizing.   Such an interpretation is,  however,  out of keeping
with the tenor and teaching of the whole Book, and it does not say so.   The
Greek word MERIMNON means being overly careful or anxious,  and  if  we read


[PAGE 116]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the  passage with this alteration we shall find that it teaches a  different
lesson which is entirely practical.   Mammon is the Syriac word for  riches,
desired by foolish people.   In the preceding paragraph Christ exhorted them
not  to become servants or slaves to riches,  which they must  leave  behind
when  the  silver  cord is broken and the spirit returns to  God,  but  seek
rather to live lives of love and service and lay up treasures of good deeds,
which  they might take with them into the Kingdom of Heaven.   In the  mean-
time,  He exhorted,  be not overly anxious regarding what you shall eat  and
drink and clothe yourself with.  Why worry?  You cannot add a hairbreadth to
your height or a hair to your head by worrying.   Worry is the most wasteful
and depleting of all our emotions, and it does no good whatever.  Your heav-
enly Father knows you need material things, therefore seek first His kingdom
and righteousness and all else needed will be added.   On at least two occa-
sions when multitudes came to Christ in places far from their homes and dis-
tant from towns where refreshment was obtainable,  He demonstrated this;  He
gave them first the spiritual food they sought and then ministered to  their
bodily needs direct from a spiritual source of supply.

   Does  it work out in these modern days?   Surely there have been so  many
demonstrations  of this that it is not at all necessary to recount any  spe-
cial one.  When we work and pray, pray and work, and make our lives a living


[PAGE 117]                           PRACTICAL PRECEPTS FOR PRACTICAL PEOPLE

prayer for opportunities to serve others, then all earthly things will  come
of  their own accord as we need them,  and they will keep coming  in  larger
measure  according  to the degree to which they are used in the  service  of
God.   If  we regard ourselves only as stewards and custodians  of  whatever
earthly goods we possess, then we are really "POOR IN SPIRIT"  so far as the
evanescent  earthly treasures are concerned,  but rich in the  more  lasting
treasures of the Kingdom of Heaven;  and if we are not out and out material-
ists, surely this is a practical attitude.

   It is not so long ago that "CAVEAT EMPTOR,"  "Let the buyer beware,"  was
the slogan of the merchants who sought after earthly treasures and  regarded
the buyer as their legitimate prey.   When they had sold their wares and re-
ceived the money,  it did not matter to them whether the buyer was satisfied
or  not.   They even prided themselves on selling an inferior article  which
would soon wear out, as evident in the short-sighted motto, "The weakness of
the  goods  is the strength of the trade."   But gradually even  people  who
would  scorn the idea of introducing religion into their business  are  dis-
carding  this CAVEAT EMPTOR as a motto,  and are unconsciously adopting  the
precept of Christ,  "HE THAT WOULD BE THE GREATEST AMONG YOU, LET HIM BE THE
SERVANT  OF ALL."   Everywhere the best business men are insistent in  their
claim  to  patronage  on  the  ground of the service they give to the buyer,


[PAGE 118]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

because it is a policy that pays, and may therefore be classed as another of
the practical precepts of the Bible.

   But  it  sometimes happens that in spite of their desire to  serve  their
customers,  something goes wrong and an angry,  dissatisfied customer  comes
blustering in,  decrying their goods.   Under the old shortsighted regime of
CAVEAT EMPTOR the merchant would have merely laughed or thrown the buyer out
of the door.  Not so the modern merchant, who takes his Bible into business.
He remembers the wisdom of Solomon that "a soft answer turneth away  wrath,"
and the assertion of Christ that "THE MEEK SHALL INHERIT THE EARTH,"  so  he
apologizes  for the fault in the goods,  offers restitution,  and sends  the
erstwhile  dissatisfied customer away smiling and eager to sing the  praises
of  the concern that treats him no nicely.   Thus by obeying  the  practical
precepts  of the Bible,  keeping his temper in meekness,  the  business  man
gains additional customers who come to him in full faith of fair  treatment,
and  the  added profit in sales made to them soon overbalances the  loss  on
goods which may have caused the dissatisfaction of other customers.

   It pays dividends in dollars and cents to keep one's temper and be  meek;
it  pays greater dividends from the moral and spiritual  standpoints.   What
better business motto can be found than in Ecclesiastes:  "Wisdom is  better
than weapons of war.  Be  not  rash in thy mouth, be not hasty in thy speech


[PAGE 119]                           PRACTICAL PRECEPTS FOR PRACTICAL PEOPLE

to be angry,  for anger reseth in the bosom of fools."   Tact and  diplomacy
are always better than force;  as the Good Book says:  "If the iron be blunt
we must use more strength, but wisdom is profitable to direct."  The line of
least  resistance,  so long as it is clean and honorable,  is  always  best.
Therefore,  "LOVE YOUR ENEMIES,  DO GOOD TO THEM THAT DESPITEFULLY USE YOU."
It  is  good practical business policy to try to reconcile those who  do  us
harm lest they do more;  and it is better for us to get over our ill feeling
than to nurse it,  for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap,  and
if  we sow spite and meanness,  we breed and beget in others the same  feel-
ings.   Furthermore,  all these things will apply in private life and in so-
cial intercourse just as in ordinary business.   How many quarrels could  be
avoided if we cultivated the virtue of meekness in our homes; how much plea-
sure would be gained; how much happiness would come into our lives if in so-
cial  and business relations we learned to DO UNTO OTHERS AS WE  WOULD  THAT
THEY SHOULD DO UNTO US!

   There is no need for the great mental strain that so many of us are work-
ing under concerning what we shall eat and what we shall drink.   Our Father
in Heaven does own the earth and the fullness thereof; the cattle on a thou-
sand hills are His.  If we learn truly to cast our cares upon Him,  there is
no doubt that the way out of our difficulties will be provided.


[PAGE 120]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   It is a fact,  acknowledged by all authorities who have investigated  the
subject, that comparatively few people die from lack of necessities of life,
but a great many die because of overindulgence of the appetites.   It is the
practical  experience  of the writer and numerous others that if we  do  our
work day by day as it appears before us,  faithfully and to the best of  our
ability,  the wherewithal for the morrow will always be provided.   If we go
according to the instruction of the Bible, doing all "as unto the Lord,"  it
does not matter what line of honest work we follow;  we are then at the same
time seeking the Kingdom of God.   But if we are only time servers,  working
for  fear  or favor,  we cannot expect to succeed in the long  run;  health,
wealth,  and  happiness may attend us for a little while,  but  outside  the
solid  foundation  of the Bible there can be no lasting joy in life  and  no
real prosperity in business.


[PAGE 121]                                   SOUND, SILENCE, AND SOUL GROWTH


                                 CHAPTER XVI


                       SOUND, SILENCE, AND SOUL GROWTH

   SINCERE STUDENTS of the Science of the Soul are naturally anxious to grow
in  grace  that  they may serve so much better in the Great  Work  of  Human
Upliftment.   Being humble and modest they are only too painfully  aware  of
their  shortcomings,  and frequently while casting about for  means  to  fa-
cilitate progress they ask themselves, "WHAT HINDERS?"   Some,  particularly
in  bygone ages when life was lived less intensely than now,  realized  that
the everyday life among ordinary humanity had many drawbacks.   To  overcome
these  and further their soul growth they withdrew from the community  to  a
monastery  or to the mountains where they could give themselves over to  the
spiritual life undisturbed.

   We know,  however,  that that is not the way.  It is too well established
in the minds of most of our students that if we run away from an  experience
today,  it will confront us again tomorrow,  and that the victor's  palm  is
earned by overcoming the world,  not by running away from it.   The environ-
ment in which we have been placed by the Recording Angels was our own choice


[PAGE 122]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

when we were at the turning point of our life cycle in the Third Heaven,  we
then  being pure spirit unblinded by the matter which now veils our  vision.
Hence  it  is undoubtedly the one that holds lessons needed by  us,  and  we
should make a serious mistake if we tried to escape from it altogether.

   But  we  have  received a mind for a definite  purpose--to  reason  about
things  and conditions so that we may learn to discriminate  between  essen-
tials and non-essentials,  between that which is designed to hinder for  the
purpose of teaching us a virtue by overcoming it,  and that which is an  out
and out hindrance,  which jars our sensibilities and wrecks our nerves with-
out any compensating spiritual gain.   It will be of the greatest benefit if
we can learn to differentiate for the conservation of our strength,  accept-
ing only that which we must endure for the sake of our spiritual well-being.
We  shall then save much energy and having much more zest in profitable  di-
rections than now.  The details of that problem are different in every life;
however,  there are certain general principles which it will benefit us  all
to  understand and apply to our lives,  and among them is the effect of  si-
lence and sound on soul growth.

   At  first blush it may surprise us when the statement is made that  sound
and silence are very important factors in soul growth,  but when we  examine
the matter we shall soon see  that it is not a far-fetched notion.  Consider


[PAGE 123]                                   SOUND, SILENCE, AND SOUL GROWTH

first the graphic expression, "War is hell," and then call up in imagination
a war scene.   The sight is appalling, even more so to those who see it with
the  undimmed  spiritual vision than to those who are  limited  to  physical
sight,  for the latter can at least shut their eyes to it if they  want  to,
but the whole horror lies heavily upon the heart of the Invisible Helper who
not  only hears and sees but FEELS in his own being the anguish and pain  of
all  the  surrounding suffering as Parsifal felt in his heart the  wound  of
Amfortas,  the stricken Grail king; in fact, without that intensely intimate
feeling  of  oneness with the suffering there could be no  healing  or  help
given.   But there is one thing which no one can escape,  the terrible noise
of the shells, the deafening roar of the cannon, the vicious spitting of the
machine  guns,  the groans of the wounded, and the oaths of a certain  class
among the participants.  We shall need no further arguement to agree that it
is  really a "hellish noise"  and as subversive of soul growth as  possible.
The battle field is the last place anyone with a sane mind would choose  for
the  purpose of soul growth,  though it is not to be forgotten that much  of
this has been made by noble deeds of self-sacrifice there;  but such results
have been achieved IN SPITE of the condition and not because of it.

   On  the other hand,  consider a church filled with the noble strain of  a
Gregorian chant or a Handel oratorio  upon which the prayers of the aspiring


[PAGE 124]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

soul  wing their way to the Author of our Being.   That music may surely  be
termed "HEAVENLY"  and the church designated as offering an ideal  condition
for  soul growth,  but if we stayed there permanently to the neglect of  our
duties we should be failures in spite of the ideal condition.

   There remains, therefore, only one safe method for us, namely, to stay in
the din of the battle field of the world, endeavoring to wrest from even the
most  unpromising conditions the material of soul growth by  unselfish  ser-
vice,  and at the same time TO BUILD WITHIN OUR OWN INNER SELVES A SANCTUARY
filled  with  that silent music which sounds ever in the serving soul  as  a
source of upliftment above all the vicissitudes of earthly existence.   Hav-
ing that "living church"  WITHIN, being in fact under that condition "LIVING
TEMPLES,"  we may turn at any moment when our attention is not  legitimately
required by temporal affairs to that spiritual house not made with hands and
lave in its harmony.   We may do that many times a day and thus restore con-
tinually the harmony that has been disturbed by the discords of  terrestrial
intercourse.

   How  then shall we build that temple and fill it with the heavenly  music
we so much desire?  What will help and what will hinder? are questions which
call for a practical solution,  and we shall try to make the answer as plain
and  practical  as possible,  for this is a very vital matter.   The  LITTLE
THINGS are particularly important, for  the  neophyte needs to take even the


[PAGE 125]                                   SOUND, SILENCE, AND SOUL GROWTH

slightest things into account.   If we light a match in a strong wind it  is
extinguished ere it has gained a fair start, but if the little flame is laid
on  a  brush heap and given a chance to grow in comparative calm,  a  rising
wind will fan the flame instead of extinguishing it.   Adepts of Great Souls
may remain serene under conditions which would upset the ordinary  aspirant,
hence  he should use discrimination and not expose himself unnecessarily  to
conditions  subversive of soul growth;  what he needs more than anything  is
POISE, and nothing is more inimical to that condition than NOISE.

   It is undeniable that our communities are "Bedlams,"  and that we have  a
legitimate right to escape some noises if possible,  such as the  screeching
made by street cars rounding a curve.  We do not need to live on such a cor-
ner to the detriment of our nerves or endeavors at concentration,  but if we
have a sick, crying child that requires our attention day and night, it does
not matter how if affects our nerves,  we have no right in the sight of  God
or man to run away or neglect it in order to concentrate.   These things are
perfectly  obvious and produce instant assent, but the things that  help  or
hinder most are,  as said, the things that are so small that they escape our
attention entirely.  When we now start to enumerate them, they may provoke a
smile of incredulity,  but if they are pondered upon and practiced they will
soon win assent, for judged by the formula that  "by  their  fruits ye shall


[PAGE 126]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

know them," they will show results and vindicate our assertion that "Silence
is one of the greatest helps in soul growth," and should therefore be culti-
vated by the aspirant in his home, his personal demeanor, his walk, his hab-
its, and paradoxical as it seems, even his speech.

   It is a proof of the benefit of religion that it makes people happy,  but
the greatest happiness is usually too deep for outward expression.  It fills
our whole being so full that it is almost awesome,  and a boisterous  manner
never goes together with that true happiness for it is the sign of  superfi-
ciality.  The loud voice, the coarse laugh, the noisy manner, the hard heels
that sound like sledge hammers,  the slamming of doors,  and the rattling of
dishes are the signatures of the unregenerate, for they love noise, the more
the merrier,  as it stirs their desire bodies.  For their purpose church mu-
sic is anathema; a blaring brass band is preferable to any other form of en-
tertainment, and the wilder the dance, the better.  But it is otherwise,  or
should be, with the aspirant to the higher life.

   When  the infant Jesus was sought by Herod,  with murderous  intent,  his
only safety lay in flight, and by that expedient were preserved his life and
power to grow and fulfill his mission.   Similarly,  when the Christ is born
within the aspirant he can best preserve this spiritual life by fleeing from
the  environment  of  the  unregenerate  where  these  hindering  things are


[PAGE 127]                                   SOUND, SILENCE, AND SOUL GROWTH

practiced, and seek a place among others of kindred ambitions provided he is
free to do so; but if placed in a position of responsibility to a family; it
is  his  duty  to strive to alter conditions by precept  and  example,  par-
ticularly by example, so that in time that refined, subdued atmosphere which
breathes harmony and strength may reign over the whole house.  It is not es-
sential  to the happiness of children that they be allowed to shout  at  the
top to their voices or to race pell-mell through the house,  slamming  doors
and wrecking furniture in their mad race;  it is indeed decidedly  detrimen-
tal,   for  it  teaches  them  to  disregard  the  feelings  of  others   in
self-gratification.   They will benefit more than mother by being shod  with
rubber heels and taught to reserve their romps for outdoors and to play qui-
etly in the house,  closing doors easily, and speaking in a moderate tone of
voice such as mother uses.

   In childhood we begin to wreck the nerves that bother us in later  years,
so  if we teach our children the lessons above indicated,  we may save  them
much  trouble  in life as well as further our own soul growth now.   It  may
take  years to reform a household of these seemingly unimportant faults  and
secure  an atmosphere conducive to soul growth,  especially if the  children
have  grown to adult age and resent reforms of that nature,  but it is  well
worth while.  We  can  and  MUST at least cultivate the virtue of silence in


[PAGE 128]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

ourselves, or our own soul growth will be very small.  Perhaps if we look at
the  matter from its occult point of view in connection with that  important
vehicle, THE VITAL BODY, the point of this necessity will be more clear.

   We know that the vital body is ever storing up power in the physical body
which is to be used in this "School of Experience,"  and that during the day
the desire body is constantly dissipating this energy in actions which  con-
stitute experience that is eventually transmuted to soul growth.   So far so
good,  but the desire body has the tendency to run amuck if not held in with
a  tight  reign.   It revels in UNRESTRAINED motion,  whistle,  sing,  jump,
dance,  and do all the other unnecessary and undignified things which are so
etrimental to soul growth.   While under such a spell of in harmony and dis-
cord  the  person  is dead to the spiritual opportunities  in  the  physical
world,  and at night when he leaves his body the process of  restoration  of
that vehicle consumes so much time that very little,  if any,  time is  left
for work, even if the person has the inclination to think seriously of doing
such work.

   Therefore,  we  ought by all means to flee from noises which we  are  not
obliged to hear, and cultivate personally the quiet yet kindly demeanor, the
modulated  voice,  the silent walk,  the unobtrusive presence,  and all  the
other  virtues which make for harmony, for then the restorative  process  is
quickly accomplished and we  are free the major part of the night to work in


[PAGE 129]                                   SOUND, SILENCE, AND SOUL GROWTH

the  invisible worlds to gain more soul growth.   Let us in this attempt  at
improvement  remember  to be undaunted by occasional  failures,  remembering
Paul's admonition to continue in well-doing with patient persistence.


                             --- END OF FILE ---

[PAGE 130]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                                CHAPTER XVII


                  THE "MYSTERIUM MAGNUM" OF THE ROSE CROSS


   Occasionally we get letters from students voicing their regret that  they
are alone in the study of the Rosicrucian Philosophy,  that their  husbands,
wives, children or other relatives are unsympathetic or even antagonistic to
the teachings, despite all efforts of the said student to interest favorably
these  friends and thus obtain companionship in their studies,  or at  least
freedom from their bent.   This friction causes them a certain amount of un-
happiness according to their various temperments, and we are asked by  these
students  to  advise them how to overcome the antagonism and  convert  their
relatives.   This we have done by personal letters and have been  privileged
to help conditions in not a few homes when our advice has been followed; but
we  know  that frequently those who suffer most acutely are silent,  and  we
have  therefore decided to devote a little time to a discussion of the  sub-
ject.

   It is truly said,  very truly,  that  "a little knowledge is a  dangerous
thing," and this applies with the same force to the Rosicrucian teachings as


[PAGE 131]                                            THE "MYSTERIUM MAGNUM"

to any other subject.   Therefore, the very first step is to find out IF YOU
HAVE ENOUGH KNOWLEDGE to be on the safe side.   So let me ask the  question:
What  is  the Rosicrucian teaching which you are so anxious to  have  others
share and to which they object?  Is it the twin laws of "CAUSATION" and "RE-
BIRTH?"   They are excellent for explaining a great many problems  of  life,
and they are a great comfort when the grim reaper appears and robs our  home
of some one near and dear.   But then you must remember that there are  many
who  do not feel the need of any explanation whatever.   They are  constitu-
tionally as unfit to apply it as a deaf mute is to use the telephone.  It is
true that we work to better advantage when conscious of the law and its pur-
pose, but let us take comfort from the fact that these laws work for good to
all whether they know it or not, and therefore THIS KNOWLEDGE IS NOT  ESSEN-
TIAL.   They will suffer no great loss because they do not embrace this doc-
trine,  and  they  may escape the danger incident to the  possession  of  "a
little knowledge."

   In  India where these truths are known and believed by  millions,  people
make  little  effort at material progress because they know that  they  have
endless time, and what they do not accomplish in this life may wait till the
next or a later life.  Many Westerners who have embraced the doctrine of re-
birth have ceased to be useful members of their community by adopting a life


[PAGE 132]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

of indolence, thereby bringing reproach on these so-called higher teachings.
If your friends will have none of this teaching,  leave them alone.   Making
converts  is  by no means the essential point of the  Rosicrucian  teaching.
The Guardian of the Gate will not examine them as to knowledge,  and he  may
admit some who are entirely ignorant of this matter and shut the door in the
face of others who have devoted their lives to studying,  lecturing on,  and
teaching these laws.

   Then if the doctrines of "Causation" and "Rebirth" are unessential,  what
about the COMPLEX CONSTITUTION OF MAN?   Surely it is essential to know that
we are not merely this visible body, but have a vital body to charge it with
energy,  a desire body to spend this force, a mind to guide our exertions in
channels of reason,  and that we are virgin spirits enmeshed in a  threefold
veil as egos.  Is it not essential to know that the physical body is the ma-
terial counterpart of the Divine Spirit, that the vital body is a replica of
the Life Spirit, and that the desire body is the shadow of the Human Spirit,
the  mind  forming the link between the threefold spirit and  the  threefold
body?

   No, IT IS NOT ESSENTIAL TO KNOW THESE THINGS.  Properly used, this knowl-
edge is an advantage,  but it may also be a very decided disadvantage in the
case of those who have only "a little knowledge"  in that direction.   There
are many such who are always meditating on "the higher self"  while entirely
forgetful of the many "lower selves" groaning in misery at their very doors.


[PAGE 133]                                            THE "MYSTERIUM MAGNUM"

There are many who dream day and night of the time when they will take their
daily  SOUL  FLIGHTS as "invisible helpers" and ease the sufferings  of  the
sick and sorrowful,  yet would not spend a five cent car fare and an  hour's
time to bring a poor, friendless soul in a city hospital a flower and a word
of cheer.  Again I say that the Guardian of the Gate is more likely to admit
him who did what he could than him who dreamed much and did nothing to  help
his suffering fellow man.

   If  you could get people to study the Rosicrucian teachings  about  death
and the life after,  you would feel it important that they should also  know
about  the silver cord remaining unbroken for a period  approximately  three
and  one-half days after the spirit has left the body,  and that it must  be
left  undisturbed while the panorama of its past life is being  etched  into
the desire body to serve as arbiter of its life in the invisible world.  You
would  like them to know all about the spirit's life in  purgatory--how  the
evil acts of its life react upon it as pain to create conscience and keep it
from repeating in a later life the acts that cause the suffering.  You would
have them know how the good acts of life are transmuted into virtues  usable
in later lives as set forth in our philosophy.

   You have no doubt been surprised at the assertion that a knowledge of the
great  twin  laws  in  unessential.  Probably  the next assertion that it is


[PAGE 134]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

immaterial whether others learn about the constitution of man as we know  it
may have scandalized you;  and you will undoubtedly feel shocked to have  it
stated  that the Rosicrucian teachings concerning death and the  passing  of
the spirit into the unseen worlds are also comparatively unnecessary to  the
purpose  we  aim  to accomplish.   It really does not  matter  whether  your
relatives  understand  or believe in these teachings.   So far as  your  own
passing is concerned, an earnest request that they leave your body quiet and
undisturbed  for the proper period will probably be carried out to the  let-
ter,  for  people  have  an  almost  superstitious  regard  for  such  "last
requests";  and if any of your friends pass over,  YOU are there  with  your
knowledge and can do the right thing for them.  So never mind if they refuse
to take up that part of the Rosicrucian teaching.

   But the student may say, "If a knowledge of the before mentioned subjects
which  seems of such practical value is immaterial to advancement,  then  it
follows that study of the Periods, Revolutions, World Globes,  etc.,  is en-
tirely so.   That disposes of everything taught in the 'COSMO,' and there is
nothing left of the Rosicrucian teaching which we have embraced and to which
we have pinned our faith!

   IS NOTHING LEFT?   Yes,  indeed, ALL IS LEFT,  for those things mentioned
are only the husks which you must remove to get at THE MEAT IN THE NUT,  the
kernel of it all.  You have read the "COSMO" many  times perhaps.  Maybe you


[PAGE 135]                                            THE "MYSTERIUM MAGNUM"

have  studied it and feel proud of your knowledge of the world mystery,  but
HAVE YOU EVER READ THE MYSTERY HIDDEN IN EVERY LINE?   That is the great and
essential teaching, the one teaching to which your friends will respond,  if
you can find it and give it to them.  The "COSMO" preaches on every page THE
GOSPEL OF SERVICE.

   For our sakes Deity manifested the universe.   The great creative Hierar-
chies have all been and some of them still are OUR SERVANTS.   The  luminous
star angels,  whose fiery bodies we see whirling through space,  have worked
with us for ages,  and in due time Christ came to bring us the spiritual im-
petus  needed at that time.   It is also significant in the extreme that  in
the parable of the last judgment Christ does not say, "Well done, thou great
and erudite PHILOSOPHER, who knoweth the Bible, the Kabala, the "COSMO"  and
all the other mysterious literature which reveals the intricate workings  of
nature" but He says, "Well done, thou good and faithful servant: * * * enter
thou into the joy of thy lord.  * * * * For I was an hungered,  and you gave
me meat:  I was thirsty, and ye gave me drink; * * * ."  Not one single word
about knowledge; THE WHOLE EMPHASIS WAS LAID UPON FAITHFULNESS AND SERVICE.

   There  is a deep occult reason for this:   SERVICE BUILDS THE SOUL  BODY,
the glorious wedding garment without which no man can enter into the kingdom
of the heavens, occultly termed "THE NEW GALILEE,"  and  it  does not matter


[PAGE 136]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

whether we are aware of what is going on, so long as we accomplish the work.
Moreover, as the luminous soul body grows in and around a person, this light
will teach him or her about the Mysteries without the need of books, and one
who  is thus God taught knows more than all the books in the world  contain.
In due time the inner vision will be opened and the way to the Temple shown.
If you want to teach your friends, no matter how skeptical they may be, they
will believe you if you preach the gospel of service.

   But you must PREACH BY PRACTICE.   You must become a servant of men your-
self if you would have them believe in you.  If you want them to follow, you
must lead,  or they will have the right to question your sincerity.   Remem-
ber,  "ye are a city upon a hill," and when you make professions they have a
right to judge you by your fruits; therefore SAY LITTLE, SERVE MUCH.

   There are many who love to discuss the harmless, peaceful life at dinner,
oblivious  of the fact that the red roast on the table and the cigar in  the
mouth dull the effect.   There are others who make a god of the stomach  and
would rather study dietetics than the Bible;   they are always ready to but-
tonhole  their friends and discourse upon the latest food fad.   I knew  one
man who was at the head of an esoteric group.   His wife was antagonistic to
occultism and the meatless diet.  He forced her  to  cook  his vegetables at


[PAGE 137]                                            THE "MYSTERIUM MAGNUM"

home,  and told her that if she ever dared to bring meat into HIS kitchen or
contaminate HIS dishes with it,  he would pitch her and the dishes into  the
street,  adding that if she must make a pig of herself she could go and  get
flesh food in a restaurant.

   IS IT TO BE WONDERED AT THAT SHE JUDGED THE RELIGION BY THE MAN AND WOULD
HAVE NONE OF IT?  Surely he was to blame, being "his brother's keeper,"  and
though this is an extreme case, it makes the lesson more obvious.   It is to
the  everlasting praise of Mahomet that his wife became his first  disciple,
and  it speaks volumes for his kindness and consideration in the home.   His
is an example we should all do well to follow if we would win our friends to
the higher life,  for though all religious systems differ outwardly THE KER-
NEL OF ALL IS LOVE.


[PAGE 138]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                                CHAPTER XVIII


                              STUMBLING BLOCKS


   Not  infrequently the remark is made by people who have no sympathy  with
our  aspirations  to live the higher life,  that it unfits  people  for  the
world's work.   Unfortunately it cannot be denied that there is seeming jus-
tification for the assertion, though in reality the very first requisite for
living the higher life involves an obligation to comport oneself irreproach-
ably  in dealing with material matters,  for unless we are faithful  in  the
little  things,  how  can we expect to be  trusted  with  greater  responsi-
bilities?   It has therefore been deemed expedient to devote a lesson to the
discussion  of some of the things which act as stumbling blocks in the  life
of aspirants.

   In the Bible story where the king sent out his servants with  invitations
to the feast he had prepared,  we are told that his invitations were refused
on various grounds.  Each one had material cares, buying, selling, marrying,
therefore they could not attend to the spiritual things,  and such people we
may  say  represent  the  greater  number  of  humanity  today,  who are too


[PAGE 139]                                                  STUMBLING BLOCKS

engrossed  in the cares of the world to devote even a thought to  aspiration
in  the higher direction.   But there are others who become so  enthusiastic
upon the first taste of the higher teachings that they are ready to give  up
all work in the world, repudiate every obligation,  and devote their time to
what they are pleased to call "helping humanity."   They will readily  admit
that it takes time to learn how to be a watchmaker,  a shoemaker,  an  engi-
neer,  or  a musician,  and they would not for a moment dream of  giving  up
their present material business to establish themselves as shoemaker, watch-
maker,  or  music teacher just because they felt enthusiastic about  or  in-
clined  to  take  up such work.   They would know that  lacking  the  proper
preparation and training they would be doomed to failure, and yet they think
that just because they have become enthusiastic over the higher world's work
and devote their time to service similar, even though in a lesser degree, to
that rendered by the Christ in His ministry.

   One writes to Headquarters: "I have given up flesh eating,  and I long to
live the ascetic life, far from the world's noise that jars upon me.  I want
to give my life for humanity."  Another says:  "I want to live the spiritual
life,  but I have a wife who needs my care and support. Do you think I would
be justified in leaving her to help my fellow men?"  Still another says: " I
am in a business which is unspiritual; every day I must do things  which are


[PAGE 140]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

against  my higher nature,  but I have a daughter dependent upon me  for  an
education.  What shall I do: continue or give up?"  There are of course many
other problems presented to us,  but these serve as fair samples,  for  they
represent a class which is ready to give up the world at the slightest  word
of encouragement,  and rush off to the hills in the expectation of sprouting
wings immediately.  If the people who are in that class have any ties,  they
break them without a scruple or a moment's consideration.

   Another class still feels some obligation,  but could be easily persuaded
to repudiate it in order that they might live what they call " the spiritual
life."   It cannot be denied that when people get into this state  of  mind,
when they lose their ambition to work in the world,  when they become shift-
less and neglectful of their duties,  they merit the reproach of the  commu-
nity.

   But as already said such conduct is based upon a misunderstanding of  the
higher  teachings  and is not at all sanctioned by the Bible  or  the  Elder
Brothers.

   It is a step in the right direction when a person ceases to feed on flesh
because  he  feels compassion for the suffering of the animals.   There  are
many people who abstain from flesh foods for health's sake, but theirs being
selfish motive,  the sacrifice carries with it no merit.  Where the aspirant
to  the  higher  life  is  prompted  to  abstain  from flesh food because he


[PAGE 141]                                                  STUMBLING BLOCKS

realizes  that the refining influence of a meatless diet upon the body  will
aid  him in his quest by making the body more sensitive to spiritual  influ-
ences,  there is no real merit either.  Truly,  the person who abstains from
flesh  foods for the sake of health will be much benefited,  and the  person
who  abstains  to make his body more sensitive will also get his  reward  in
that respect, but from the spiritual point of view neither will be very much
better.   On the other hand, whoever abstains from flesh food because he re-
alizes that God's life is immanent in every animal just as in himself,  that
in the final analysis God feels all suffering felt by the animal, that it is
a divine law, "Thou shalt not kill," and that he must abstain out of compas-
sion,  this  person is not only benefited in health and by making  his  body
more sensitive to spiritual impacts, but because of the motive which prompts
him  he  reaps a reward in soul growth immeasurably more precious  than  any
other consideration.  Therefore we would say by all means abstain from flesh
food, but be sure to do so prompted by the right spiritual motive or it will
not affect your spiritual interests one iota.

   When the enthusiast says that he wants to get away from the world and the
noise  that jars upon him to live the ascetic life,  it is truly  a  strange
idea  of service.   The reason why we are here in this world is that we  may
gather experience,  which is then transmuted into soul growth.  If a diamond
in the rough were laid away in a drawer for years  and years, it would be no


[PAGE 142]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

different  than before,  but when it is placed against the gridstone by  the
lapidary the harsh grinding process removes the last atom of the rough coat-
ing  and  brings out the beautiful,  luminous gem.   Every one of  us  is  a
diamond  in the rough,  and God,  the Great Lapidary,  uses the world  as  a
grindstone which rubs off the rough and ugly coating, allowing our spiritual
selves to shine forth and become luminous.   The Christ was a living example
of  this.   He did not go away from the centers of civilization,  but  moved
constantly among the suffering and the poor, teaching, healing,  and helping
until  by the glorious service rendered,  His body was made luminous on  the
Mount of Transfiguration,  and He who had trodden the Way exhorted His  fol-
lowers  to be "in the world but not of it."   That is the great lesson  that
every aspirant has to learn.

   It is one thing to go out in the mountains where there is no one to  con-
tradict or to jar upon our sensibilities and keep our poise there; it is an-
other thing entirely to maintain our spiritual aspirations and keep our bal-
ance  in the world where everything jars upon us;  but when we stay on  this
path, we gain a self-control which is unattainable in any other manner.

   However,  though we are careful to prepare our food well and  to  abstain
from  flesh eating or any other contaminating OUTWARD influence,  though  we
want to get away to the mountains to escape the sordid  things of city life,


[PAGE 143]                                                  STUMBLING BLOCKS

and  we  want  to  rid ourselves of every outward thing  that  may  prove  a
stumbling block to our progress,  still what about the things that come from
WITHIN,  the  thoughts we have in our minds and our mental  food?   It  will
avail  us not one iota of good if we could feed our bodies upon  nectar  and
ambrosia, the ethereal food of the gods, when the mind is a charnel house, a
habitat of low thoughts, for then we are only as whited sepulchres,  beauti-
ful  to  behold from without but inwardly full of a nauseating  stench;  and
this  mental delinquency can be maintained just as easily and perhaps it  is
even  more  apt to be maintained in the solitude of the mountains  or  in  a
so-called  spiritual retreat than in a city where we are busy with the  work
of  our  vocation.   It is indeed a true saying that "an idle brain  is  the
devil's  workshop,"  and  the safest way to attain to  interior  purity  and
cleanliness  is  to keep the mind busy all the time,  guiding  our  desires,
feelings,  and emotions toward the practical problems of life,  and working,
each  one in his own immediate environment, to find the poor and  the  needy
that  he  may give them whatever help their cases require and  merit.   That
class  which  has not ties of its own may profitably make ties of  love  and
friendship with those who are loveless and friendless.

   Or if it is the care of a relative--wife,  daughter,  husband,  or anyone
else that claims us, let us remember the words of Christ  when He said, "Who


[PAGE 144]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

are my mother and my brother?"  and answered the question by saying,  "Those
who do the will of my Father."  This saying has been misconstrued by some to
mean  that Christ repudiated His physical relationships for  the  spiritual,
but it is only necessary to remember that in the last moments of His life on
earth He called to His mother,  giving him to her as a son and charging  the
disciple  to care for His parent.   Love is the unifying force in life,  and
according to the higher teachings we are required to love our kin,  but also
to extend our love natures so that they may also include everyone else.   It
is good that we love our own mother and father,  but we should also learn to
love other people's mothers and fathers, sisters and brothers, for universal
brotherhood can never become a fact so long as our love is confined only  to
the family.  It must be made all inclusive.

   There was one among the disciples of Christ whom He loved especially, and
following His example we also may bestow a particular affection upon certain
ones,  though  we ought to love everyone and do good even to them  that  de-
spitefully use us.  These are high ideals and difficult of accomplishment at
our  present stage of development,  but as the mariner steers his ship by  a
guiding star and reaches his desired haven though never the star itself,  so
also by setting our ideals high we shall live nobler and better  lives  than


[PAGE 145]                                                  STUMBLING BLOCKS

if we do not aspire, and in time and through many births we shall eventually
attain, because the inherent divinity in ourselves makes it imperative.

   Finally then, to sum up, it does not really matter where we are placed in
life,  whether in a high station or a low.  Present environment with its op-
portunities and limitations is such as suits our individual requirements  as
determined by our self-made destinies in previous existences.   Therefore it
holds for us the lesson we must learn in order to progress properly.   If we
have a wife,  a daughter, or other family relations to hold us to that envi-
ronment, they must be considered as part of what we have to reckon with, and
by  doing our duty to them we learn the required lesson.   If they  are  an-
tagonistic to our belief, if they have no sympathy with our aspirations,  if
we  have on their account to stay in a business and do things which  we  are
not pleased with,  it is because we must learn something from these  things,
and  the proper way for the earnest aspirant is to look conditions  squarely
in the face with a view to finding out just what it is that is needed.  This
may not be an easy matter.  It may take weeks, months, or years to solve the
problem,  but  so long as the aspirant applies himself  prayerfully  to  the
task,  he may be sure that the light will shine some day,  and then he  will
see  what is required and why these conditions were imposed upon him.   Then
having  learned the lesson or found out it purpose,  he will if he  has  the
right spirit prayerfully bear the burden, for he will know that he  is  upon


[PAGE 146]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the right road and that it is an absolute certainty that as soon as the les-
son of that environment has been learned a new way will be opened up showing
him  the next step upon the path of progress.   Thus the "stumbling  blocks"
will have been turned into "stepping stones,"   which would never have  hap-
pened if he had run away from them.   In this connection we would quote  the
beautiful poem.

             "Let us not waste our time in longing
               For bright but impossible things.
             Let us not sit supinely waiting
               For the sprouting of angel wings.
             Let us not scorn to be rush-lights,
               Everyone can't be a star,
             But let us fulfill our mission
               By shining just where we are.

             "There is need of the tiniest candle
               As well as the garish sun;
             And the humblest deed is ennobled
               When it is worthily done.

             We may never be called on to brighten
               Those darkened regions afar,
             So let us fulfill our mission
               By shining just where we are."


[PAGE 147]                                            THE LOCK OF UPLIFTMENT


                                 CHAPTER XIX


                           THE LOCK OF UPLIFTMENT


   HAVE  YOU ever seen how ships going up a canal or river are  lifted  from
one  level to another?   It is a very interesting and  instructive  process.
First  the ship is floated into a small enclosure where the water  level  is
the  same as that of the lower part of the river where the ship  has  previ-
ously been sailing.   Then the gates of the enclosure are shut and the  ship
is cut off from the outside world by the high wall of the lock.   It  cannot
go back to the river without; even the light is dimmed around it,  but ABOVE
the  moving clouds or the brightest sunshine are seen beckoning.   The  ship
cannot  rise without assistance,  and the law of gravity make it  impossible
for  the water in that part of the river where the ship has been sailing  to
float  it  to  a higher level,  hence no help may be looked  for  from  that
source.

   There are also gates in the upper part of the lock which prevent the  wa-
ters on the higher levels from rushing into the lock from  above,  otherwise


[PAGE 148]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the inrushing water would flood the lock in a moment and crush the ship  ly-
ing  at the bottom level because acting in conformity with that same law  of
gravitation.   It is from ABOVE,  nevertheless, that the power must come  if
the ship is ever to be lifted to the higher level of the river, and so to do
this  safely  a SMALL STREAM is conducted to the bottom of the  lock,  which
lifts  the  ship VERY SLOWLY AND GRADUALLY BUT SAFELY to the  level  of  the
river  above.   When that level has been reached,  the upper  gates  may  be
opened without danger to the ship,  and it may sail forth upon the expansive
bosom of the higher waterway.  Then the lock is SLOWLY emptied and the water
it contained added to the water at the lower level,  which is thereby raised
even if but slightly.  The lock is then ready to raise another vessel.

   This  is,  as said in the beginning,  a very interesting and  instructive
physical operation, showing how human skill and ingenuity overcome great ob-
stacles by the use of nature's forces.   But it is a source of still greater
enlightenment  in a spiritual matter of vital importance to all  who  aspire
and  endeavor  to live the higher life,  for it illustrates  the  only  safe
method whereby man can rise from the temporal to the spiritual world, and it
confutes those false teachers who for personal gain play upon the too ardent
desires  of the unripe,  and who profess ability to unlock the gates of  the
unseen worlds for the consideration of an initiation fee.   Our illustration
shows that this is impossible, because the immutable laws of nature forbid.


[PAGE 149]                                            THE LOCK OF UPLIFTMENT

   For  the purpose of elucidation we may call our river the river of  life,
and we as individuals are the ships sailing upon t;  the lower river is  the
temporal  world,  and when we have sailed its length and  breadth  for  many
lives,  we inevitably come to the lock of upliftment which is placed at  the
end.  We may for a long time cruise about the entrance and look in, impelled
by  an  inner urge to enter but drawn by another impulse towards  the  broad
river  of life without.   For a long time this lock of upliftment  with  its
high,  bare walls looks forbidding and solitary,  while the river of life is
gay  with bunting and full of kindred craft gaily cruising about;  but  when
the inner urge has become sufficiently intense, it imbues us with a determi-
nation not to go back to the river of worldly life.   But even at that stage
there are some who falter and fear to shut the gate behind them; they aspire
to ardently at times to the life on the higher level, but it makes them feel
less alone to look back upon the river of worldly life,  and sometimes  they
stay  in this condition for lives,  wondering why they do not progress,  why
they  experience no spiritual downpouring,  why there is no uplift in  their
lives.  Our illustration makes the reason very plain; no matter how hard the
captain might beg, the lock keeper would never think of releasing the stream


[PAGE 150]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

of water from above until the gate had been closed behind the ship,  for  it
could  never lift the ship,  for it could never lift the ship an inch  under
such conditions but would flow through the open gates to waste in the  lower
river.   Neither will the guardians of the gates of the higher  worlds  open
the stream of upliftment for us,  no matter how hard we pray,  until we have
shut the door to the world behind us, and shut it very tight with respect to
the lust of the eyes and the pride of life, the sins that so easily beset us
and are fostered by us in the careless worldly days.   We must shut the door
on  them  all before we are really in a condition to receive the  stream  of
upliftment,  but  once we have thus shut the door and  irrevocably  set  our
faces forward,  the downpouring begins,  slowly but surely as the stream  of
the lock keeper which lifts the vessel.

   But  having left the temporal world with all its deed behind  and  having
set his face towards the spiritual worlds,  the yearning of the aspirant be-
comes more intense.   As time passes he feels in increasing measure the void
on  both sides of himself.   The temporal world and its deeds  have  dropped
from him as a garment;  he may be bodily in that world,  performing his  du-
ties,  but he has lost interest;  he is in the world but not of it,  and the
spiritual  world where he aspires to citizenship seems equally distant.   He
is  all  alone and his whole being cries and writhes in  pain,  longing  for
light.


[PAGE 151]                                            THE LOCK OF UPLIFTMENT

   Then comes the turn of the tempter:  "I have a school of initiation,  and
am  able to advance my pupils quickly for a fee,"  or words to that  effect,
but usually more subtle; and who shall blame the poor aspirants who fall be-
fore the wiles of these pretenders?  Lucky are they if,  as is generally the
case,  they are merely put through a ceremonial and given an  empty  degree,
but  occasionally they meet one who has really dabbled in magic and is  able
to open the flood gates from the higher level.  Then the inrush of spiritual
power shatters the system of the unfortunate dupe as the waters of the river
above would wreck a vessel at the bottom of the lock is an ignorant or mali-
cious  person were to open the gates.  The vessel must be lifted slowly  for
safety's  sake,  and so must the aspirant to spiritual upliftment;  patience
and  unwavering persistence in well-doing are absolutely indispensable,  and
the door to the pleasures of the world must be kept closed.  If that is done
we  shall surely and certainly accomplish the ascent to the heights  of  the
unseen world with all the opportunities for further soul growth there found,
for it is a natural process governed by natural laws,  just as is the eleva-
tion of a ship to the higher levels of a river by a system of locks.

   But how can I stay in the lock of upliftment and serve my fellow man?  If
soul growth comes only by service,  how can I gain by isolation?   These are
questions  that  may  not  unnaturally  present  themselves to students.  To


[PAGE 152]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

answer them we must again emphasize that no one can lift another who is  not
himself upon a higher level, not so far above as to be unreachable, but suf-
ficiently close to be within grasp of the reaching hand.   There are,  alas,
too  many who profess the higher teachings but live lives on the level  with
ordinary men and women of the world or even below that level.  Their profes-
sions  make the higher teachings a byword and call down the scorn of  scoff-
ers.   But those who live the higher teachings have no need to profess  them
orally;  they  are isolated and marked in spite of  themselves,  and  though
handicapped  by the misdeeds of the "professors,"   they do in time win  the
respect  and  confidence of those about them;  eventually they call  out  in
their  associates  the desire of emulation, they convert them  in  spite  of
themselves, reaping in return for this service a commensurate soul growth.

   Now is the time of the year (Christmas) when the crest wave of  spiritual
power envelops the world.   It culminates at the winter solstice,  when  the
Christ is reborn into our planet,  and though hampered by the present  (from
the limited viewpoint) deplorable war conditions, His life given for us  may
be  most  easily  drawn  upon by the aspirant  at  this  season  to  further
spiritual  growth;  therefore all who are desirous of attaining  the  higher
levels  would do well to put forth special efforts in that direction  during
the winter season.



[PAGE 153]                                      THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER



                                 CHAPTER XX


                        THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER


   ON THE MORNING of Good Friday, 1857, Richard Wagner, the master artist of
the nineteenth century,  sat on the verandah of a Swiss villa by the  Zurich
Sea.   The  landscape about him was bathed in the  most  glorious  sunshine;
peace  and  good will seemed to vibrate through nature.   All  creation  was
throbbing with life;  the air was laden with the fragrant perfume of budding
pine forests--a grateful balm to a troubled heart or a restless mind.

   Then  suddenly,  as a bolt from an azure sky,  there came  into  Wagner's
deeply  mystic  soul  a  remembrance of the  ominous  significance  of  that
day--the darkest and most sorrowful in the Christian year.   It almost over-
whelmed him with sadness, as he contemplated the contrast.  There was such a
marked incongruity between the smiling scene before him, the plainly observ-
able  activity  of nature,  struggling to renewed life after  winter's  long
sleep, and the death struggle of a tortured Savior upon a cross; between the
full  throated  chant  of life and love issuing from the thousands of little


[PAGE 154]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

feathered choristers in forest,  moor and meadow,  and the ominous shouts of
hate  issuing from an infuriated mob as they jeered and mocked  the  noblest
ideal  the world has ever known; between the wonderful creative  energy  ex-
erted by nature in spring,  and the destructive element in man,  which  slew
the noblest character that ever graced our earth.

   While  Wagner  meditated thus upon the incongruities  of  existence,  the
question presented itself:  Is there any connection between the death of the
Savior upon the cross at Easter, and the vital energy which expresses itself
so prodigally in spring when nature begins the life of a new year?

   Though  Wagner  did not consciously perceive and realize  the  full  sig-
nificance of the connection between the death of the Savior and the  rejuve-
nation of nature, he had, nevertheless, unwittingly stumbled upon the key to
one  of  the most sublime mysteries encountered by the human spirit  in  its
pilgrimage from clod to God.

   In  the  darkest night of the year,  when earth sleeps  most  soundly  in
Boreas' cold embrace, when material activities are at the very lowest ebb, a
wave  of spiritual energy carries upon its crest the divine  creative  "Word
from  Heaven"  to a MYSTIC BIRTH at Christmas;  and as a luminous cloud  the
spiritual impulse broods over the world that "knew it not,"  for it  "shines
in the darkness" of winter when nature is paralyzed and speechless.


[PAGE 155]                                      THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER

   This divine creative "Word" has a message and a mission.   It was born to
"save the world,"  and "to give its life for the world."   It must of neces-
sity  sacrifice its life in order to accomplish the rejuvenation of  nature.
Gradually it BURIES ITSELF IN THE EARTH and commences to infuse its own  vi-
tal  energy into the millions of seeds which lie dormant in the ground.   It
whispers "the word of life" into the ears of beast and bird,  until the gos-
pel  or  good news has been preached to every creature.   The  sacrifice  is
fully  consummated  by the time the sun crosses its Easter (n) node  at  the
spring equinox.   Then the divine creative Word expires.   IT DIES UPON  THE
CROSS AT EASTER in a mystical sense,  while uttering a last triumphant  cry,
"It has been accomplished" (consummatum est).

   But as an echo returns to us many times repeated,  so also the  celestial
song of life is re-echoed from the earth.   The whole creation takes up  the
anthem.  A legion-tongued chorus repeats it over and over.  The little seeds
in the bosom of Mother Earth commence to germinate; they burst and sprout in
all directions,  and soon a wonderful mosaic of life, a velvety green carpet
embroidered  with multicolored flowers,  replaces the shroud  of  immaculate
wintry  white.   From  the furred and feathered tribes "the  word  of  life"
re-echoes as a song of love, impelling them to mate.   Generation and multi-
plication are the watchwords everywhere--THE SPIRIT HAS RISEN to more  abun-
dant life.


[PAGE 156]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   Thus,  mystically, we may note the annual birth, death,  and resurrection
of the Savior as the ebb and flow of a spiritual impulse which culminates at
the winter solstice,  Christmas, and has egress from the earth shortly after
Easter when the "word"  ASCENDS TO HEAVEN"  on Whitsunday.   But it will not
remain there forever.  We are taught that "thence it shall return,"  "at the
judgement."   Thus when the sun descends below the equator through the  sign
of  the  scales  in October,  when the fruits of  the  year  are  harvested,
weighed,  and assorted according to their kind, the descent of the spirit of
the new year has its inception.  This descent culminates in birth at Christ-
mas.

   Man is a miniature of nature.   What happens on a large scale in the life
of a planet like our earth,  takes place on a smaller scale in the course of
human events.   A planet is the body of a wonderfully great and exalted  Be-
ing,  one of the Seven Spirits before the Throne (of the parent  Sun).   Man
isalso a spirit and "made in their likeness."   As a planet revolves in  its
cyclic  path  around the sun whence it emanated,  so also the  human  spirit
roves in an orbit around its central source--God.   Planetary orbits,  being
ellipses,  have  points of closest approach to and  extreme  deviation  from
their solar centers.   Likewise the orbit of the human spirit is elliptical.
We are closest to God when our cyclic journey  carries us into the celestial


[PAGE 157]                                      THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER

sphere  of  activity--heaven,  and we are farthest removed from  Him  during
earth life.   These changes are necessary to our soul growth.  As the festi-
vals  of the year mark the recurring events of importance in the life  of  a
Great Spirit,  so our births and deaths are events of periodical recurrence.
It is as impossible for the human spirit to remain perpetually in heaven  or
upon earth as it is for a planet to stand still in its orbit.   The same im-
mutable  law  of periodicity which determines the unbroken sequence  of  the
seasons,  the alternation of day and night, the tidal ebb and flow,  governs
also the progression of the human spirit, both in heaven and upon earth.

   From realms of celestial light where we live in freedom,  untrammeled  by
limitations of time and space,  where we vibrate in tune with infinite  har-
mony  of the spheres,  we descend to birth in the physical world  where  our
spiritual  sight is obscured by the mortal coil which binds us to this  lim-
ited  phase of our existence.   We live here awhile;  we die and  ascend  to
heaven,  to be reborn and to die again.  Each earth life is a chapter  in  a
serial life story, extremely humble in its beginnings, but increasing in in-
terest  and importance as we ascend to higher and higher stations  of  human
responsibility.   No limit is conceivable,  for in essence we are divine and
must therefore have the infinite possibilities of God dormant within.   When
we have learned all that this world has to teach us, a wider orbit, a larger


[PAGE 158]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

sphere  of  super-human usefulness,  will give scope to  our  greater  capa-
bilities.

             "Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul,
             As the swift seasons roll!
             Leave thy low vaulted past!
             Let each new temple, nobler than the last,
             Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast,
             Till thou at length art free,
             Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea."

   Thus says Oliver Wendell Holmes,  comparing the spiral progression in the
widening  coil  of a chambered nautilus to the  expansion  of  consciousness
which is the result of soul growth in an evolving human being.

   "But what of Christ?"  someone will ask.  "Don't you believe in Him?  You
are  discoursing upon Easter,  the feast which commemorates the cruel  death
and the glorious,  triumphant resurrection of the Savior, but you seem to be
alluding  to  Him more from an allegorical point of view than as  an  actual
fact."

   Certainly we believe in the Christ;  we love Him with our whole heart and
soul,  but we wish to emphasize the teaching that Christ is the first fruits
of  the race.   He said that we shall do the things He did,  "and  greater."
Thus we are Christs-in-the-making.

             "Though Christ a thousand times in Bethlehem be born,
             And not within thyself, thy soul will be forlorn.
             The cross on Golgotha thou lookest to in vain,
             Unless within thyself it be set up again."



[PAGE 159]                                      THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER

   Thus  proclaims Angelus Silesius,  with true mystic understanding of  the
essentials of attainment.

   We  are too much in the habit of looking to an outside Savior while  har-
boring  a devil within;  but till Christ be formed IN US,  as Paul says,  we
shall  seek in vain,  for as it is impossible for us to perceive  light  and
color,  though they be all about us,  unless our optic nerve registers their
vibrations,  and as we remain unconscious of sound when the tympanum of  our
ear is insensitive,  so also must we remain blind in the presence of  Christ
and deaf to His voice until we arouse our dormant spiritual natures  within.
But  once these natures have become awakened,  they will reveal the Lord  of
Love  as a prime reality;  this on the principle that when a tuning fork  is
struck,  another of identical pitch will also commence to sing, while tuning
forks of different pitches will remain mute.  Therefore the Christ said that
His  sheep knew the SOUND of His voice and responded,  but the voice of  the
stranger they heard not (John 10:5).   No matter what our creed,  we are all
brethren of Christ,  so let us rejoice, the Lord has risen!  Let us seek Him
and forget our creeds and other lesser differences.


[PAGE 160]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


                                 CHAPTER XXI


                        THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER


   ONCE MORE we have reached the final act in the cosmic drama involving the
descent of the solar Christ Ray into the matter of our earth,  which is com-
pleted at the Mystic Birth celebrated at Christmas, and the Mystic Death and
Liberation,  which are celebrated shortly after the vernal equinox when  the
sun  of  the new year commences its ascent into the higher  spheres  of  the
northern heavens,  having poured out its life to save humanity and give  new
life to everything upon earth.  At this time of the year a new life, an aug-
mented energy,  sweeps with an irresistible force through the veins and  ar-
teries of all living beings, inspiring them, instilling new hope,  new ambi-
tion,  and new life, impelling them to new activities whereby they learn new
lessons  in the school of experience.   Consciously or unconsciously to  the
beneficiaries, this outdwelling energy invigorates everything that has life.
Even the plant responds by an increased circulation of sap, which results in
additional growth of the leaves, flowers, and  fruits  whereby this class of


[PAGE 161]                                      THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER

life is at present expressing itself and evolving to a higher state of  con-
sciousness.

   But wonderful though these outward physical manifestations are,  and glo-
rious though the transformation may be called which changes the earth from a
waste of snow and ice into a beautiful, blooming garden,  it sinks into sig-
nificance before the spiritual activities which run side by side  therewith.
The salient features of the cosmic drama are identical in point of time with
the material effects of the sun in the four cardinal signs,  Aries,  Cancer,
Libra  and  Capricorn,   for  the  most  significant  events  occur  at  the
equinoctial and solstitial points.

   It is really and actually true that "IN God we live and move and have our
being."   Outside Him we could have no existence; we live by and through His
life;  we move and act by and through His strength;  it is His  power  which
sustains  our dwelling place,  the forts the universe itself would  disinte-
grate.   Now we are taught that man was made in the likeness of God,  and we
are  given  to understand that according to the law of analogy we  are  pos-
sessed of certain powers latent within us which are similar to those we  see
so potently expressed in the labor of Deity in the universe.   This gives us
a  particular  interest in the annual cosmic drama involving the  death  and
resurrection of the sun.  The life of the GOD MAN,  CHRIST JESUS was moulded


[PAGE 162]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

in conformity with the solar story,  and it foreshadows in a similar  manner
all that may happen to the MAN GOD of whom this Christ Jesus prophesied when
He said:  The works that I do shall ye do also;  and greater works shall  ye
do;  whither I go thou canst not follow me now, but thou shalt follow me af-
terwards.

   Nature  is the symbolic expression of God.   She does nothing in vain  or
gratuitously,  but  there  is a purpose behind every thing  and  every  act.
Therefore  we should be alert and regard carefully the signs in the  heavens
for  they have a deep and important meaning concerning our own  lives.   The
intelligent  understanding of their purpose enables us to work so much  more
efficiently  with God in His wonderful efforts for the emancipation  of  our
pace from bondage to the laws of nature,  and for its liberation into a full
measure  of the stature of the sons of God--crowned with glory,  honor,  and
immortality,  and free from the power of sin, sickness,  and suffering which
now  curtail our lives by reason of our ignorance and nonconformity  to  the
laws of God.   The divine purpose demands this emancipation,  but whether it
is to be accomplished by the long tedious process of evolution or by the im-
mensely  quicker  pathway of Initiation depends upon whether or not  we  are
willing  to lend our cooperation.   The majority of mankind go through  life
with  unseeing eyes and with ears that do not hear.   They are engrossed  in
their material affairs, buying and selling, working  and playing, without an


[PAGE 163]                                      THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER

adequate understanding or appreciation of the purpose of existence, and were
it  unfolded to them it is scarcely to be expected that they  would  conform
and co-operate because of the sacrifice it involves.

   It is no wonder that the Christ appeals particularly to the poor and that
He emphasizes the difficulty of the rich entering the kingdom of heaven, for
even  to this day when humanity has advanced in the school of evolution  for
two  millenia  since His day,  we find that the great majority  still  value
their houses and lands, their pretty hats and gowns,  the pleasures of soci-
ety,  dances,  and dinners more than the treasurers of heaven which are gar-
nered by service and self-sacrifice.  Although they may intellectually  per-
ceive  the  beauty  of  the spiritual  life,  its  desirability  fades  into
insignificance  in their eyes when compared with the sacrifice  involved  in
attaining.   Like the rich young man they would willingly follow Christ were
there no such sacrifice involved.   They prefer rather to go away when  they
realize  that sacrifice is the one condition upon which they may enter  dis-
cipleship.   So for them Easter is simply a season of joy because it is  the
end  of winter and the beginning of the summer season with its call of  out-
door sports and pleasures.

   But for those who have definitely chosen the path of self-sacrifice  that
leads to Liberation, Easter is the annual sign given them as evidence of the
cosmic basis of their hopes and aspirations.  As  Paul  properly  states  in


[PAGE 164]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

that glorious fifteenth chapter of 1st Corinthians, "If Christ be not risen,
then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain.

   "Yea,  and we are found false witnesses of God, because we have testified
of  God that He raised up Christ,  whom He raised not up if so be  that  the
dead rise not.

   "For if the dead rise not, then is not Christ raised.

   "And if Christ be not raised your faith is vain; ye are yet in your sins.

   "If  after the manner of men I have fought with beasts at  Ephesus,  what
advantageth it me if the dead rise not?

   "But  now is Christ risen from the dead,  and become the first fruits  of
them that slept."

   But in the Easter sun which at the vernal equinox commences to soar  into
the northern heavens after having laid down its life for the earth,  we have
the  cosmic symbol of the verity of resurrection.   When taken as  a  cosmic
fact in connection with the law of analogy that connects the macrocosm  with
the microcosm, it is an earnest that some day we shall all attain the cosmic
consciousness  and know positively for ourselves by our own experience  that
there is no death,  but that what seems so is only a transition into a finer
sphere.


[PAGE 165]                                      THE COSMIC MEANING OF EASTER

   It is an annual symbol to strengthen our souls in the work of  well-doing
that we may grow the golden wedding garment required to make us sons of  God
in the highest and holiest sense.   It is literally true that unless we walk
in the light as God is in the light, we are not in fellowship; but by making
the sacrifices and rendering the services required of us to aid in the eman-
cipation  of our race we are building the soul body of radiant golden  light
which  is the special substance emanated from and by the Spirit of the  Sun,
the  Cosmic Christ.   When this golden substance has clothed us with  suffi-
cient density, then we shall be able to imitate the Easter sun and soar into
the higher spheres.

   With these ideals firmly fixed in our minds, Easter time becomes a season
when  it is in order to review our life during the preceding year  and  make
new  resolutions  for  the coming season to serve  in  furthering  our  soul
growth.   It is a season when the symbol of the ascending sun should lead us
up to a keen realization of the fact that we are but pilgrims and  strangers
upon earth, that our real home as spirits is in heaven, and that we ought to
endeavor  to learn the lessons in this life school as quickly as is  consis-
tent with proper service,  so that as Easter Day marks the resurrection  and
liberation of the Christ Spirit from the lower realms,  so we also may  con-
tinually look for the dawn of that day which shall permanently free us  from
the meshes of matter, from the body of  sin  and  death,  together  with our


[PAGE 166]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

brethren  in bondage,  for no true aspirant would conceive of  a  liberation
that did not include all who were similarly placed.

   This is a gigantic task; the contemplation of it may well daunt the brav-
est heart,  and were we alone it could not be accomplished;  but the  divine
hierarchies who have guided humanity upon the path of evolution from the be-
ginning of our career are still active and working with us from their  side-
real worlds,  and with their help we shall eventually be able to  accomplish
this  elevation of humanity as a whole and attain to an individual  realiza-
tion of glory,  honor,  and immortality.  Having this great hope within our-
selves, this great mission in the world, let us work as never before to make
ourselves better men and women,  so that by our example we may waken in oth-
ers a desire to lead a life that brings liberation.


[PAGE 167]                                                THE NEWBORN CHRIST


                                CHAPTER XXII


                             THE NEWBORN CHRIST


   IT  HAS  OFTEN been said in our literature that the sacrifice  of  Christ
wass not an event which, taking place on Golgotha, was accomplished in a few
hours  once and for all time,  but that the mystic births and deaths of  the
Redeemer  are continual cosmic occurrences.  We may therefore conclude  that
this sacrifice is necessary for our physical and spiritual evolution  during
the  present phase of our development.   As the annual birth of  the  Christ
Child approaches,  it presents a never old,  ever new theme for  meditation,
from which we may profit by pondering it with a prayer that it may create in
our hearts a new light to guide us upon the path of regeneration.

   The inspired apostle gave us a wonderful definition of Deity when he said
that "God is Light,"  and therefore "light"  has been used to illustrate the
nature of the Divine in the Rosicrucian teachings, especially the mystery of
the  Trinity in Unity.   It is clearly taught in the Holy Scriptures of  all
times that God is one and indivisible.  At the same time we find that as the


[PAGE 168]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

one  white light is refracted into three primary colors,  red,  yellow,  and
blue,  so God appears in threefold role during manifestation by the exercise
of the three divine functions of CREATION, PRESERVATION, AND DISSOLUTION.

   When He exercises the attribute of CREATION, God appears as Jehovah,  the
HOLY  SPIRIT;  He is the Lord of law and generation and projects  the  solar
fertilizing principle INDIRECTLY through the lunar satellites of all planets
where it is necessary to furnish bodies for their evolving beings.

   When  He exercises the attribute of PRESERVATION for the purpose of  sus-
taining  the bodies generated by Jehovah under the laws of nature,  God  ap-
pears as the Redeemer,  CHRIST,  and radiates the principles of love and re-
generation  DIRECTLY into any planet where the creatures of Jehovah  require
this  help to extricate themselves from the meshes of mortality and  egotism
in order to attain to altruism and endless life.

   When God exercises the divine attribute of DISSOLUTION, He appears as THE
FATHER  who calls us back to our heavenly home to assimilate the  fruits  of
experience  and soul growth garnered by us during the day of  manifestation.
This Universal Solvent,  the ray of the Father,  emanates from the Invisible
Spiritual Sun.

   These divine processes of creation and birth, preservation and life,  and
dissolution, death and return to the Author of our being  we  see everywhere


[PAGE 169]                                                THE NEWBORN CHRIST

about us,  and we recognize the fact that they are activities of the  Triune
God in manifestation.  But have we ever realized that in the spiritual world
there are no definite events,  no static conditions;  that the beginning and
the end of all adventures of all ages are present in the eternal "here"  and
"now"?   From the bosom of the Father there is an everlasting outdwelling of
the  essence  of things and events,  which enters the realms of  "time"  and
"space."   There it gradually crystallizes and becomes inert,  necessitating
dissolution that there may be room for other things and other events.

   There is no escape from this cosmic law;  it applies to everything in the
realm of time and space, the Christ ray included.  As the lake which empties
itself  into the ocean is replenished when the water that left it  has  been
evaporated and returns to it as rain,  to flow again ceaselessly toward  the
sea, so the Spirit of Love is eternally born of the Father, day by day, hour
by hour, endlessly flowing into the solar universe to redeem us in its death
grip.  Wave upon wave is thus impelled outward from the sun to all the plan-
ets, giving a rhythmic urge to the evolving creatures there.

   And  so it is in the very truest and most literal sense A NEWBORN  CHRIST
that we hail at each approaching Yule-feast, and Christmas is the most vital
annual  event  for  all humanity whether we realize it or not.   It  is  not
merely a commemoration of the birth of our beloved Elder Brother, Jesus, but


[PAGE 170]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

the advent of the rejuvenating love of life of our Heavenly Father,  sent by
Him to redeem the world from the wintry death grip.   Without this new infu-
sion  of  divine life and energy we should soon perish physically,  and  our
orderly progress would be frustrated so far as our present lines of develop-
ment  are concerned.   This is a point we should endeavor to  realize  thor-
oughly  in order that we may learn to appreciate Christmas as keenly  as  we
should.

   We may learn a lesson in this respect as in many others from our children
or from reminiscences of our own childhood.  How keen were our anticipations
of the approaching feast!  How eagerly we waited for the hour when we should
receive  the gifts which we knew would be forthcoming from Santa Claus,  the
mysterious  universal benefactor who brought the toys for the  coming  year!
How  would we have felt had our parents given us the dismembered  dolls  and
broken drums of yesteryear?  It would surely have been felt as an overwhelm-
ing  misfortune and would have left a deep sense of broken trust which  even
time would have found it difficult to heal;  yet it would have been as noth-
ing compared with the cosmic calamity that would befall mankind if our Heav-
enly Father should fail to provide the newborn Christ for our cosmic Christ-
mas gift.

   The Christ of last year cannot save us from physical famine any more than
last year's rain can drench the soil again and swell the millions  of  seeds


[PAGE 171]                                                THE NEWBORN CHRIST

that  slumber in the earth awaiting the germinal activities of the  Father's
life  to begin their growth;  the Christ of last year cannot kindle anew  in
our  hearts the spiritual aspirations which urge us onward in the Quest  any
more than last summer's heat can warm us now.   The Christ of last year gave
us  His love and His life to the last breath without stint or measure;  when
He was born into the earth last Christmas,  He endued with life the sleeping
seeds which have grown and gratefully filled our granaries with the bread of
physical  life;  He lavished the love given Him by the Father upon  us,  and
when  He had wholly spent His life,  He died at Eastertide to rise again  to
the Father, as the river by evaporation rises to the sky.

   But endlessly wells the divine love; as a father pities his children,  so
does  our Heavenly Father pity us,  for He knows our physical and  spiritual
frailty and dependence.   Therefore we are now confidently awaiting the mys-
tic birth of the Christ of another year,  laden with new life and love  sent
by  the Father to preserve us from the physical and spiritual  famine  which
would ensue were it not for this annual love offering.

   Younger  souls usually find it difficult to disabuse their minds  of  the
personality of God,  of Christ,  and of the Holy Spirit,  and some can  only
love Jesus, the man.  They forget Christ, the Great Spirit, who ushered in a
new era in which the nations established under the regime of Jehovah will be
broken to pieces that the sublime structure of Universal Brotherhood  may be


[PAGE 172]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

built  upon their ruins.   In time all the world will realize that  "God  is
spirit,  to be worshiped in spirit and truth."  It is well to love Jesus and
to imitate him;  we know of no nobler ideal and none more worthy.   Could  a
cobler one have been found, Jesus would not have been chosen as a vehicle of
that Great One,  the Christ, in whom dwelt the Godhead.   We shall therefore
do well to follow "in His steps."

   At  the same time we shall exalt God in our own consciousness  by  taking
the word of the Bible that He is spirit,  and that we cannot make any  like-
nesses which will portray Him for He is like nothing in heaven or on  earth.
We  can see the physical vehicles of Jehovah circling as  satellites  around
the various planets;  we can also see the sun,  which is the visible vehicle
of the Father and the source of all,  appears to the greatest of human seers
only as a higher octave of the photosphere of the sun, a ring of violet-blue
luminosity behind the sun.  But we do not need to see; we can feel His love,
and that feeling is never so great as at Christmas time when He is giving us
the greatest of all gifts, the Christ of the new year.


[PAGE 173]                                            WHY I AM A ROSICRUCIAN

                                CHAPTER XXIII

                           Why I Am A Rosicrucian

   Not infrequently we find that some one takes the platform to explain  why
he is a Baptist, Methodist, or Christian Scientist,  and what his particular
faith may be.   We have often been asked by our students for something which
would  help make plain to their associates why they had embraced the  teach-
ings  of  the Elder Brothers given through the  Rosicrucian  Fellowship,  in
preference to the faith which they had left.  We will,  therefore,  endeavor
to  give a succinct resume of reasons which appeal to us as sufficient,  but
students  will  doubtless find many other reasons equally  good  or  better,
which they may add verbally to what is here said.

   It  should  be  made clear in the very beginning  that  students  in  the
Rosicrucian Fellowship do not call themselves Rosicrucians.   That title ap-
plies  alone to the Elder Brothers,  who are the hierophants of the  Western
Wisdom  Teaching.   They are as far beyond the greatest living saint in  the
spiritual development as that saint is above the lowest fetish worshiper.


[PAGE 174]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   When  the bark of our life sails lightly upon smooth summer seas,  wafted
along by the fair winds of health and prosperity,  when friends are  present
on every hand,  eager to help us plan pleasures which will increase our  en-
joyment of this world's goods,  when social favors or political powers  come
to us to gratify our every wish in whatever sphere our inclinations seek ex-
pression,  then,  indeed,  we may say and seem justified in saying with  our
whole heart and soul:  "This world is good enough for me."  But when we come
to  the end of the smiling sea of success;  when the whirlwind of  adversity
has  blown  us upon the rocky shores of disaster,  and a wave  of  suffering
threatens to engulf us;  when friends have failed and every human help is as
far off as it is unavailing,  then we must look for guidance to the skies as
does the mariner when he steers his ship over the waste of waters.

   But  when the skipper scans the sky in search of a star whereby to  steer
the ship safely,  he finds that the whole heavens are in motion.   Therefore
to follow almost any one of the myriad of wandering stars visible to the eye
would be disastrous.  To meet the requirements the guiding star must be per-
fectly  steadfast  and immovable,  and there is only one such,  namely,  the
North Star.   By its guiding light the mariner may steer in full  confidence
and bring his ship to a haven of rest and safety.  Likewise one who is look-
ing  for  a  guide  which  he may trust in days of sorrow and trouble should


[PAGE 175]                                            WHY I AM A ROSICRUCIAN

embrace a religion founded on eternal laws and immutable principles, able to
explain the mystery of life in a logical manner so that his intellect may be
satisfied,  and  at the same time containing a system of devotion  that  may
satisfy the heart, so that these twin factors in life may receive equal sat-
isfaction.   Only when man has a clear intellectual conception of the scheme
of human development is he in a position to range himself in line therewith.
When it is made clear to him that this scheme is beneficient and  benevolent
in  the very highest degree,  that all is truly ruled by divine  love,  then
this understanding will sooner or later call out in him a true devotion  and
heartfelt  acquiescence  which  will  awaken in him a  desire  to  become  a
co-worker with God is the world's work.  When seeking souls come to the door
of  the church to seek surcease from sorrow,  they cannot be satisfied  with
the  platitudes  that it is the will of God that sorrow and  suffering  have
come to them, that in His divine providence He has seen fit to scourge them,
and that they must take it as an indication that He regards them as His  be-
loved  children and be satisfied no matter what happens.   They  cannot  see
that Deity does justice when He makes some rich and many poor, a few healthy
and many sickly; and it is only too often in evidence that iniquity is pros-
perous while rectitude is in rags.


[PAGE 176]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

   The  Rosicrucian Teaching gives clear and logical information  concerning
the  world and man;  it invites questions instead of discouraging  them,  so
that  the seeker after spiritual truth may receive full satisfaction  intel-
lectually;  and its explanations are as strictly scientific as they are rev-
erently religions.   It refers us for information regarding life's  problems
to laws that are unchangeable and immutable in their realm of action as  the
North Star is in the heavens.

   Though  the world whirls upon its axis at the rate of one thousand  miles
an hour,  we stand safely anywhere upon its surface because the principle of
gravity prevents us from being hurled into space by the terrific speed.   We
know that the law of gravity is eternal;  it will not act today and  suspend
action tomorrow.   When we enter a hydraulic elevator we rest safely upon  a
column of water because that fluid is more incompressible that most  solids,
and this property is the same yesterday, today,  and forever.   Were its ac-
tion  suspended for even a few moments,  thousands of people would  fall  to
their death; but it is steadfast and sure, therefore we trust in implicitly.

   The law of cause and effect is also immutable;  if we throw a stone  into
the  air,  the act is not complete until by gravitation it has  returned  to
earth.   "Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap," is the way this
law  is expressed in the realm of morals.   "The mills of God grind  slowly,
but they grind exceedingly small," and once an act has been done,  the reac-
tion will come some time, some where, as surely as the stone that was thrown


[PAGE 177]                                            WHY I AM A ROSICRUCIAN

into the air will return to the earth.

   But  it is manifest that all of the causes that we set going in  life  do
not ripen in the present existence,  and it therefore follows that they must
find their fruition somewhere else at some other time,  or the law would  be
invalidated,  a proposition that would be as absolutely impossible  as  that
the law of gravitation could be suspended,  for either would make chaos  out
of cosmos.   The Rosicrucian Teachings explain this by a statement that  man
is a spirit attending the School of Life for the purpose of unfolding latent
spiritual  power,  and that for this purpose he lives many lives in  earthly
bodies  of increasingly finer texture,  which enable him to express  himself
better and better.   In the lower grades of this school of evolution man has
few  faculties.   Each life-day he comes to school in the morning of  child-
hood,  and  is given lessons to learn,  and at night when old and  gray  the
nurse maid of nature,  "Death,"  puts him to sleep that he may rest from his
labors until the dawn of another life-day, when he is given a new child body
and new lessons.  Each day "Experience," the teacher of the school helps him
to learn some of the lessons of life, and gradually he becomes more and more
proficient.   Some  day he will have learned the entire  curriculum  of  the
school, which includes building of bodies as well as using them.

   Thus when we see one who  has  few  faculties, we know that he is a young


[PAGE 178]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

soul who has gone to life's school only a few days; and when we find a beau-
tiful character, we recognize an old soul who has spent much time in master-
ing its lessons.   Therefore we do not despair of God's love when we see the
inequalities  of life,  for we know that in time all will be perfect as  our
Father in Heaven is perfect.

   The Rosicrucian teachings also take the sting of sorrow out of the great-
est of all trials,  the loss of loved ones,  even if they have been what  is
called wayward or black sheep; for we know that it is an actual fact that IN
GOD  WE LIFE AND MOVE AND HAVE OUR BEING;  hence,  if one single  soul  were
lost,  a part of God would be lost, and such a proposition is absolutely im-
possible.   Under the immutable law of cause and effect we are bound to meet
these  loved  ones some time in the future under  other  circumstances,  and
there  the love that binds us together must continue until it has found  its
fullest expression.   The laws of nature would be violated if a stone thrown
from  the earth were to remain suspended in the atmosphere,  and  under  the
same  immutable  laws those who pass into the higher  spheres  must  return.
Christ said,  "Ye must be born again," and "If I go to my Father, I will re-
turn."

   But  although our reason may reach into the mysteries of life,  there  is
still a higher stage,  actual firsthand knowledge.   As a matter of fact the
foregoing propositions are capable of verification by each one,  for we  all
have  a sixth sense latent in our being,  which will sometime enable  us  to
view the spiritual  world  with  the same distinctness as that with which we


[PAGE 179]                                            WHY I AM A ROSICRUCIAN

see the temporal.   This sixth sense will be developed by all in the  course
of evolution, and there are certain means whereby it may be developed now by
all  who  care to take the necessary time and trouble to do so.   Some  have
done this,  and they have told us of their travels in the land of the  soul.
We  believe  their testimony concerning that place just as we  believe  what
people who have traveled in Africa or Australia tell us of those  countries.
And just as we say that we know the earth rotates upon its axis and revolves
in its orbit around the sun because we have been thus informed by scientists
who  have  made  the investigations and calculations  that  establish  these
facts,  so also we say that we know the dead live,  and that whether dead or
alive,  in the body or out of it, we are all enfolded in the love of our Fa-
ther  in Heaven,  without whose Will not the smallest sparrow falls  to  the
ground,  and that He cares for all and orders our steps in harmony with  His
plans to develop our spiritual powers to the highest possible degree.

   So  because of the logical,  soul-satisfying philosophy of life given  by
the Rosicrucians,  we follow their teachings in preference to other systems,
and invite others who wish to share the blessings thereof to investigate.


[PAGE 180]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

                                CHAPTER XXIV

                  THE OBJECT OF THE ROSICRUCIAN FELLOWSHIP

   The  object of the Rosicrucian Fellowship has been clearly stated in  our
literature, as have the means whereby it is hoped to attain the end in view,
but in response to requests for a succinct summary we devote this chapter to
that subject.

   The world is God's training school.   During the past we have learned  to
build different vehicles,  among other the physical body.   By this work  we
are  promoted from class to class,  each with its particular scope  of  con-
sciousness.  We evolved eyes that we might see, ears that we might hear, and
other organs that we might taste,  smell, and feel.   But not all egos  were
promoted  at every step.   When the mist in the air at the time of  Atlantis
condensed  and filled the basins of the earth with oceans of water,  driving
men  to the highlands,  many perished by asphyxiation because they  had  not
evolved lungs.  They could not pass through the portal of the rainbow, which
was,  so to speak, the entrance gate to the new age with its dry atmospheric
conditions.


[PAGE 181]                          THE OBJECT OF THE ROSICRUCIAN FELLOWSHIP

   Another great world transformation is coming, we know not when;  even the
Christ  confessed His ignorance of the day and the hour;  but He  warned  us
that the day would come as a thief in the night,  and He prophesied that the
conditions  in  the world would then be similar to those prevailing  in  the
days of Noah;  they were living then in carefree enjoyment of life when sud-
denly the floodgates of heaven were opened, and death and destruction spread
before them.

   Christ  told us that it is possible to take the kingdom of God  by  storm
and attain to the consciousness and conditions there prevailing.   But  Paul
informs us that flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God; he states
that we have a soul body (SOME PSUCHICON-1 Cor. 15:  44),  and that we shall
meet the Lord in the air when He comes.  This soul body is therefore as nec-
essary  to  entrance  into  the new age of the kingdom of  God,  as  a  body
equipped with lungs was to the Atlanteans who desired to enter into the  age
in  which  we are now living.   Therefore it is necessary that we  make  our
calling and election sure by preparing the GOLDEN WEDDING GARMENT,  the soul
body, which alone can secure our admission to the mystic marriage.

   The multitude is slowly moving in the right direction as led by the  dif-
ferent churches, but there is an ever growing class that, so to speak, feels
the wings of the soul body sproating,  people who feel an inner urge to take
the  kingdom of God by storm.   Though unaware of any definite  ideal,  they
sense  a  greater  truth  and more certain light than those which the Church


[PAGE 182]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

radiates;  they are tired of parables and long to learn the underlying facts
at the very feet of Christ.

   The  Rosicrucian Fellowship was started for the purpose of reaching  this
class,  to show them the way to illumination,  to help them build their soul
body and evolve the soul powers which will enable them to enter  consciously
into the kingdom of God and obtain first-hand knowledge.

   This is a large undertaking,  none greater and even under the most favor-
able  existing conditions progress must be slow,  but if the  aspirant  will
continue with patient perseverance in well doing, it can be done.

   The  methods  are definite,  scientific, and religious;  they  have  been
originated by the Western School of the Rosicrucian Order, and are therefore
specially suited to western people.  Sometimes, but very rarely,  they bring
results in a short time;  generally it requires years and even lives  before
the aspirant attains,  but the following system will in the end bring all to
their heart's desire.

   The Tabernacle in the Wilderness was a symbolic representation of the way
to God,  and, as Paul says, held a shadow of better things to come.   Every-
thing  in it had its spiritual meaning.  The table of shewbread gives us  an
important lesson germane to our present consideration.  Students will remem-
ber that the ancient Israelites were commanded to bring the shewbread to the


[PAGE 183]                          THE OBJECT OF THE ROSICRUCIAN FELLOWSHIP

tabernacle  at  stated intervals.   The grain from which this was  made  was
given  them by God but they must prepare the soil in which it was  to  grow,
they must plant and cultivate, they must weed and water, so as to secure the
greatest possible increase;  they must harvest and thresh,  grind and  bake,
ere  they  had the loaves which they brought to the tabernacle as  bread  to
shew for their toil.   Similarly,  God gives to all the grain of opportunity
to serve,  but it is our duty to cultivate these opportunities and nurse and
nourish  them in the soil of loving kindness so that they may bring a  great
increase.   We must always bear in mind the words of Christ that He came  to
minister and to serve.  Therefore anyone aspiring to follow in His steps and
to be great in the kingdom of god must ever be on the lookout for opportuni-
ties to serve his fellows.  Each day must be filled as full as possible with
kind  and  considerate deeds,  for they are the warp and woof of  which  the
golden wedding garment is woven.  Without these "works" no amount of prayer,
fasting, or other religious exercise will avail.  It is useless to repair to
the  temple  without this bread to shew that we have really  worked  in  the
Master's service.

   The foregoing is also the teaching of the exoteric churches; but the fol-
lowing is the exclusively Rosicrucian scientific teaching and method,  based
upon  the deepest knowledge of spiritual facts whereby the aspirant  is  en-
abled to gain the maximum  soul  growth  in each life, so that his spiritual


[PAGE 184]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

advancement is accelerated beyond his very wildest dreams.   Therefore  this
is the most important spiritual teaching that has been given to man in  mod-
ern  times,  and no one who tries honestly to follow this simple method  can
fail to be enormously benefited:

   Ether is the medium of transmission light, that which etches a picture on
the photographic film.   It permeates the air, and with every breath we draw
from birth to death ether enters our system and etches a picture of our sur-
roundings and actions on a little atom in the heart.  Thus each carries with
him  a complete record of his life,  which is assimilated after death.   Ex-
piation of the evil deeds causes paid and anguish in purgatory.   These  are
thus transmuted to conscience to prevent repetition of the same mistakes  in
succeeding  lives:   the good deeds are transmuted to love and  benevolence.
Instead  of waiting for this post-mortem transmutation of the shrewbread  of
life,  the aspirant who desires to take heaven by storm may  assimilate  the
fruits of each day after retiring and before going to sleep by running  over
the  deeds done.   The events of the day are considered in reverse order  so
that that which happened in the evening is taken first,  then the happenings
of the afternoon,  forenoon, and morning.  This is important for it conforms
to the way the life panorama acts after death,  taking first the events just
prior  to  death,  last  the  events  of infancy.  The object is to show the


[PAGE 185]                          THE OBJECT OF THE ROSICRUCIAN FELLOWSHIP

effects and then refer them to their antecedent causes.

   In  this  retrospection it will do the aspirant no good to run  over  the
events of the day and mildly blame himself where he did wrong-he is  usually
sure enough to praise himself sufficiently for his good deeds.   But he must
remember the altar of burnt offerings where the sacrifices for sin were  of-
fered.   They were first rubbed with salt and then placed on the altar to be
consumed by a divinely enkindled fire.  Anyone knows what an intense pain is
caused when salt is rubbed into a wound,  and this rubbing with salt is sym-
bolic of the pain the aspirant must feel for his wrongdoing.   Now mark that
it was not permissible to place the sacrifice on the altar until it had thus
rubbed  with salt.   God would not accept it before,  but WHEN IT  HAD  BEEN
SALTED IT WAS CONSUMED BY A FIRE KINDLED BY GOD HIMSELF.

   This tells us that unless we have washed our evil deeds of the day in the
salt of our tears and heartfelt contrition,  God will not accept our  sacri-
fice  of  repentance;  but when we have really repented,  our sins  will  be
washed  away and our recording atom will be clean as the driven snow.   With
respect  to our good deeds we may remember that there were two little  piles
of frankincense of the top of the shew bread.   These were offered upon  the
altar of incense, where the smoke ascended as a sweet savor to the Lord,  so
different from the nauseating stench  that  went up from the altar where the


[PAGE 186]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

sin offerings were burned.  Is it any wonder that God took no delight in the
sacrifice of bulls and calves,  but delighted in a contrite heart and repen-
tant spirit?

   It  is this spiritual aromatic extract of our good deeds that builds  our
soul body.  By the ordinary natural process it takes about one-third as many
years in our post-mortem existence as we lived in the body,  to reap what we
have  sowed.   But when an aspirant has assimilated the fruits  of  life  by
faithful  retrospection  at the end of each day,  he is free as soon  as  he
leaves  the body and may use the years spent by others in purgatory and  the
first heaven as he pleases.  Furthermore, as he needs neither food, shelter,
nor  sleep,  he may spend twenty-four hours a day doing good.   Thus he  has
practically as many years of service and soul growth after death as the num-
ber of his earth life;  and being trained and schooled in this work his  at-
tainments  are probably greater than could be made in a number of  lives  in
the ordinary way.

   To aid deserving aspirants,  still deeper and more definite teachings are
given  by the Elder Brothers through the Rosicrucian  Fellowship.   Students
who feel the inner urge may ask for information concerning these teachings.


[PAGE 187]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

                                    INDEX

Abel, man of Lemuria, 23.
Action, desirability of, 16.
Action, good, required for soul body, 183.
A. D. M., red earth, 78.
Adam, a Polarian, 22.
Airships of Atlantis, 71.
Albumen not needed by spiritual, 24.
Alcohol, action, 83.
Altar of sacrifice, 96.
America, the melting pot, 112.
Angels, humanity of Moon Period 50.
   lived in etheric world 50.
   trusted guardians, 26
   wisely guided man 32.
Anglo-Saxons, pioneers of race, 75.
Animals ruled by group spirits 108.
Aquarian Age, science to rule in 82.
   seven hundred years until 81
   teacher of 76.
Arche-Tektons, Initiates are 103.
Ark, airship of Atlantis, 71.
Aryan Age, invaders of 80.
Aryana, national segregation of 70.
Assimilation of life experiences 184.
Asteroids, remnants of Moons 60.
Astrology, value of in marriage 53.
Atlantis, destruction of 180.
Atlantean epoch, the nadir of materiality 9.
Atlanteans aspired to light 95
   divinely guided 69.
Atlantis, airships of 71.
   atmosphere of 69.
   man becomes man in 25.
   peaceful conditions of 86.
Atmosphere, changes of 180.
Attainment, method of 171.

Baptism, soul's urge for higher life 55.
Bible, only solid foundation 120; two parts of 126.


[PAGE 188]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Black Brothers, increase evil 106.
Black magic, frequent practice of 101.
   golden wedding garment protects against 106.
   practices of 103.
Blood hound, follows invisible emanation 104.
Born of water and spirit 80.
Brain gained at sacrifice of creative force 32.
Breathing exercises, danger of 9.
   use of 10.
Brotherhood, all members of 44.
"Brother of the Third Degree"--NOT Initiation 12.

Cain, a Hyperborean 23.
Candles, tallow, attract elementals 106.
Causation 177.
Children, training of 127.
Chosen people 95.
Christ, annual coming of 171.
   bodily presence of the Father 98.
   forgiveness of 57.
   Inhabits central sun 58.
   man a Christ-in-the-making 158.
   mission of 47, 87.
   power of 158, 159.
   preservation, principle of 168.
   sacrifice of 98.
Christ, SEE ALSO Earth Spirit.
Church, doctrines of, keystones of evolution 38.
Civilization, evolution of 111.
Communication with dead 113.
Communion, points to age to come 55.
   worthy celebration of 31.
Conscience gained in purgatory 184.
Consciousness result of ware between vital and desire bodies 49.
Conservation of strength 122.
Contentment lengthens life 41.
Contrition, importance of 185.
Conversion and Initiation 12.
   inner experience 13.
Converts, making of 132.
Courage 91.
Creations, principle of Jehovah 168.
Creative hierarchies guide man 22.
Crystalloids aid in evolving vital body 88.


[PAGE 189]                                                             INDEX

Dead, communication with 113.
Death, care of body after 134.
   conquest of 56.
   price of consciousness 50.
Dense body, care of after death 134.
   crystallized state of 47
   raising vibrations of 10.
   restoration of in sleep 128.
   spiritualization of 74.
   under laws of nature 57.
Desire body, control of 128.
   destroys dense body 49.
   evolution of, in Lemuria 23
   reaction of man's acts 25.
Dietetics, albumen not needed by spiritual 24.
   legumes not to be rashly eliminated 24.
Diplomacy and force 119.
Dissolution the Father's power 168.
Divine hierarchies work upon man 22.
Divine leaders abolish religious errors 46.
Divine spirit and physical body 132.

Earth conditions cramp humanity 99.
   crystallization of due to man 32.
Earth Spirit body and blood 31.
Earth Spirit, SEE ALSO Christ.
Earthly goods, use of 177.
Easter, Christ's liberation 160.
   vital, force of 161.
Effort brings opportunities 15.
Ego chooses work of life 64.
Egotism, protection from 19.
Elder Brothers hierophants of western wisdom teaching 173;
   high status of 173.
   injunction to Max Heindel 11, 20.
   not mercenary 20.
   transmute evil 105.
Elementals inhaled with incense 106.
Emancipation, God's purpose 162.
Environment chosen by ego 64, 122.
   power of 74.
Epochs, changes of 77. 


[PAGE 190]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC


Ether etches pictures on seed atom 184.
   medium of transmission of light 184.
   new element 71.
Evolution 177; Evolution of man 35.
   spiral path of 14;  slow, tedious process 16.
Exercises:  Breathing practices 9, 10.
Experience, a grindstone 63.
Extreme unction 56.

Faculties, evolution of 177.
Fall, unchastity 62.
Family, duty to 127.
Father, The, dissolution principle of 168.
   highest Initiate of Saturn period 58.
   inhabits spiritual sun 58.
Finger nails used in Black Magic 103.
Flesh, difficult to digest, 90.
   material progress result of 23, 86, 92.
   necessitated by materialism 23.
   sins of 90.
Flood, sun in Cancer 78.
Food, significance of 22.
Forgiveness of Christ 57.
Free Will 22.
   of Initiate in choice of environment 64.
   in Atlantis 25.

Galilee, melting pot 74.
Gill clefts replaced by lungs 24.
Gills of early Atlantis 70.
Blass of water in Black Magic 104.
God, immanence of 161.
Golden wedding garment 165, 185.  SEE ALSO Soul Body.
Good Friday 153.
Gospels formulae of Initiation 64.
Grace and forgiveness of sin 34.
Grail, SEE holy Grail.
Group Spirit 108.

Hair used in Black Magic 103.
Healing, Rosicrucian method of 103.
Heaven, Third, turning point of life cycle 122.
Help, practical 133.
Hierarchies, service of 145.
   still active 166.


[PAGE 191]                                                             INDEX

Hindu breathing exercises 73,
Holy Grail, many orders constitute 105.
   two forces of 105.
Holy Spirit SEE Jehovah.
Human spirit and desire body 132.
Humanity, salvation of 160.
   slowly progressing 14.
Hyperborea, generation in 49.
Hyperborean epoch, man plantlike in 22.
   vital body gained in 22.
Hypnotism, danger of 107.

I am 25, 85, 87.
I as pronoun 83.
Inactivity causes straggling 16.
Incense, Black Forces use 106.
Inequalities, harmonizing of 178.
Initiates, arche-tektons 103.
   bodies of, immaculately conceived 64.
   choose own life work 64.
   purity of 64.
   may be women 67.
Initiation, changes life, 13.
   confers authority 13.
   free 13.
   inner experience 12.
   money cannot buy 11.
   requirements for 20.
   spiritual process 11.
   spiritualizes vital body 67.
   through spiritual exercises 11.
   tribulation leads to 63.
Initiation fee, impossibility of 20.
Inner vision opened 136.
Intellectual conception of life 175.
Intensity of feeling 19.
Invisible Helpers require nucleus 103.

Jehovah, creation principle of God, 168.
   dwells in physical sun 58.
   highest Initiate of Moon Period 58.
   race spirit of the Jews 110.
   regent of various moons 58.
   warder of creative forces 56.
Jesus, race body of 74; noblest ideal 172.


[PAGE 192]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Judgment, Sun in Libra 156.
Justice of life 175; with mercy 33.  

Knowledge, necessity for 131.
Larynx gained at sacrifice of creative force 32.
Law, knowledge of 131.
Law of Consequence given to Atlanteans 26.
Laws of nature and destiny 25.
Legumes not needed by ADVANCED scholars 24.
Lemniscate, meaning of 14.
Lemurian epoch, evolution of desire body in 23.
Life Spirit and vital body 132.
Light Atlanteans aspired to 95
   symbol of God 167.
Living church within 124.
Lords of Mercury, stragglers of past 59.
Lords of Venus, stragglers of past 59.
Lord's Supper, SEE communion.
Lost souls 58.
Love endlessly born 169.
   keynote of coming age 80.
   of soul for soul 53; transcends sex 51.
Lucifer spirits cause body's crystallization 32
Lungs related to spirit's freedom 24.

Man becomes man in Atlantis 25.
   mineral-like in Polarian Epoch 88.
Marriage necessitated by disintegration and death 49
   sacrament of 55.
   transcends sex 51.
Materialism, predominance of 163.
Matter, limitation of causes self-consciousness 22.
Materialization, varieties of 102.
Meat non-permanent as food 82.
Meat eating, SEE Flesh eating.
Michael, race spirit 111.
Milk aid in evolving desire boyd 89.
   given in Lemuria 23.
Mind, effect of meat upon 93.
   given during Atlantean epoch 22.
   given for discrimination 122.
   link between spirit and matter 132.
Minerals, assimilation impossible 82.
Moderation in food 136.
Mongols, descendents of Atlanteans 75.


[PAGE 193]                                                             INDEX

Moons, discipline stragglers 59.
   physical vehicles of Jehovah 172.
   tumors of universe 60.
Moses led followers through water 26.
Motive, importance of 101.
Mysteries, soul body teaches 136.
Mystery schools furnish higher teaching 8.

Nationalism must pass 112.
Nations, rise and fall of 110.
Negroes, descendants of Lemurians 75.
New Galilee 135.
New Heaven and new earth, SEE Aquarian Age.
New race 75.
Niebulungen ring 42.
Nimrod, misplaced in Bible 22.
Noah 27.
Noise, evil effects of 125.
   stirs desire bodies 126.
Nucleus in magic practices 108.

Orthodoxy, arguments of 46.
Panorama etched into desire body 133.
Passion, crystallizing power of 32.
Periodic flow of earth 62.
Philosophy, hidden meaning in 135.
Physical body, SEE Dense body. 
Pioneers the active workers 16.
   two classes of 17.
Pisces, creed and dogma of 81.
Planet, body of Great Spirit 156.
   evolution of 41.
   orbit of 156.
Poise, necessity for 125.
Polarian had only dense body 88.
Polarian epoch, dense body in 22.
   mineral-like state of man in 22.
Polygamy 66.
Possession cures desire 93.
Post mortem experience 15.
Post mortem state 16.
Preservation, Christ principle 168.
Progress, impossible to unworthy 150.
13


[PAGE 194]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Proselyting unnecessary 132.
Providence of God 120.
Purity, redemption of 35.
Race spirits cause racial characteristics 109.
   high ideals of 110.
Racial characteristics 109.
Rainbow, advent of 27.
   emblem of diversity 70.
   entrance to new age 180.
   gates to promised land 69.
Rebirth and Causation 132.
Reconciliation, desirability of 119.
Recording angels give religions 7.
Religion, happiness from 126.
Religion given by Recording Angels 7.
   suited to nations 8.
Religious errors, not long permitted 46.
Responsibility not to be shirked 127.
Resurrection, Easter Sun symbolizes 163.
Retrospection, good gained by; most important spiritual teaching 184.
   importance of 18.
Rhine Gold 42.
Rosicrucian messengers 11.
   methods, definite, scientific, religious 182.
Sacrament, Hebrew derivation of 55.
   importance of 38.
Sacrifice, evolution result of 97.
   soul growth from 165.
Sanctuary, inner 124.
Saints, 17.
Salt, 185.
Science becomes religious 40.
   to rule Aquarian Age 82.
Seances, danger of 107.
Seasons symbolize diversity 70.
Self-Sacrifie, advancement from 38.
   of Christ 100.
Selfishness bane of race 43.
Separation of sexes 32.
Service builds soul body 135.
   essential in life 135.
   redemption of stragglers 59.
   the policy that pays 118.

[PAGE 195]                                                             INDEX

Sexes, separation of 32.
Silence, great help in soul growth 126.
Sin must be expiated 57.
Sixth sense 178.
Sleep, work during, gains soul growth 129.
Solar system body of God 59.
Son, SEE Christ. 
Sorrow, keynote of Buddhism 57.
Soul amalgamates with spirit 96.
Soul body 54.
   from seed 73.
   light of, teaches man 136.
   of new age 181.
   methods of building 80.
   protects against Black Magic 106.
   wedding garment of new age 80.
Soul growth dissolves crystallized bodies 96.
   helps in 126.
   method of 17.
Sound, effect of 124.
Spinal nerves, animal twenty-eight pairs of 61.
   man thirty-one pairs of 61.
Spirit orbit of 156.
Spiritual forces, ebb and flow of 61.
Spiritual sight result of war 112.
Spiritual world, time non-existent 169.
Spring and Earth Spirit 31.
Stellar ray 64.
Strength, conservation of 122.
Sugar, beneficial effects of 83
   cure of alcoholism by 84.
Sun ascends at Easter 165.
   in Cancer, the flood 78.
   invisible vehicle of God 172.
   visible vehicle of Christ 172.

Tact, value of 119.
Talents of ego 15.

Teacher of New Age 76.
Temple, way to shown 136.
Though breaks down tissue 23.
Time, non-existent in spiritual world 169.
Tolerance for our families 137.
Tree of knowledge 32.


[PAGE 196]                                             GLEANINGS OF A MYSTIC

Tribulation prepares for Initiation 63.
Trinity, mystery of 167.

Unfoldment, three states of 55.
Universal solvent 168.

Vegetarianism, advantages of 91.
Vegetarian needs no alcohol 91.
Virgin spirits enmeshed in matter as egos 132.
   self-consciousness attained by 22.
Vital body charges body with energy 132.
   constructive energy of 49.
   evolved by Hyperborean 22, 88.
   medium of occult growth 9.
   spiritualized by Initiation 67.
   stores up power 128.
   vehicle of love 51.

War, spiritual aspects of 123.
   spiritual intensity of 104.
   spiritual sight result of 112.
Water, Noah and Moses led followers through 26.
   used in Black Magic 104.
Wedding garment, SEE Soul Body.
Western Initiates more advanced 8.
Western Mystery Teaching Christian 47.
White Magic, unselfish 102.
Wine, given in Atlantis 26.
   self-assertion from drinking 86.
   stimulates spirit of man 27.
Word, cosmic meaning of 155.
Workers, the pioneers 16.
World, God's training school 180.
World change to come 181.
Worry, evil of 116.

You as pronoun 83.


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