We know so little of the mysteries of occult, divine law, and yet
taking thought of the entire history of the human race, such as we
have, and our own personal experience and observation, we must
recognize that there are certain fixed principles, certain laws,
indicating the undying value of right living. To understand and apply
these laws to the all around conduct of life, to the practical affairs
of human effort, is in its highest, its spiritual sense the real
business of earthly existence. Those religious teachers who have had a
degree of spiritual enlightenment have wrapped up their perceptions of
moral law, and disguised them with creeds and dogmas, and have used
them to further their personal ambitions, and to hold their power over
such people as they have been able to hypnotize into believing in them
as the vice-gerents of the Most High. All this has been going on for
long, and has been handed down through unnumbered generations until it
has crystallized into forms and ceremonies, and unmoral
conventionalities which stultify the race. "Dead loads" of good people
believe they are doing God's service in trying to live up to these,
never knowing how much they are the result of fanaticism and ignorance,
and the concentrated intention of every sort of priests to keep their
power over unthinking minds. Here and there, scattered along
throughout the realms of intelligent being, there have always been
noble and true men and women who have brought a sufficient
comprehension of the out-working of the eternal principles of
unswerving moral law to make their conduct of life here wise and
dependable, and to give to them the assurance of a successful
continuance of individual life in other spheres of being, beyond
earthly limitations. Those untrammelled souls who thus unfold grow up
into an at-one-ment with the divine, all-pervading principle we call
God. They have been, and are light bringers, and saviors of humanity.
The perfection of individual character can only be achieved by
determined effort, by unshrinking, concentrated labor. This simply
means an acceptance of all the inevitable experiences incident to this
life, coupled with a brave determination to wring from each and every
one of them, good, or seemingly bad and unfortunate, all the lessons it
can teach, and all the truth it can possibly reveal. This evolution of
the soul is from the innermost sacred precincts of the personality, and
it is often unrecognized by those who have the most inclusive
development of the attributes and innate resources of their own souls.
Those people who are thus intent upon their souls' growth do not flaunt
themselves in forms and ceremonies. Life is too short. The chief, the
most important moral law is the law of justice, absolute unerring
justice. This law is the very least comprehended of men, because its
majesty, its even-handedness has been so misinterpreted, so travestied
by various kinds of religious teachers, rulers, and self-appointed
judges. Man-made laws which everywhere prevail tend always to
segregate people into classes, producing results devoid of equity,
favoring the materially superior. It is quite common for people who
know nothing whatever of the operations of occult and spiritual law to
ignore all responsibility for their unhappy earthly experiences, and
"blame it all" on God. A child dies, the mother accuses God of making
her the special subject of his unkindness in taking away from her the
object of her love. Everywhere, among all classes of people this is
not at all an unusual experience. The fact is, the prevailing
ignorance of natural law--moral, spiritual law--is alone the cause of
nearly all the misery of humanity. God has nothing whatever to do with
it. There is this about it: there are the "eternal verities," the laws
which speak ever to the consciousness of man, and whether they are
broken in ignorance or willfully set aside, the results are nearly the
same; the penalties exacted by beneficent justice are unalterable; only
in one case, there must finally be regrets for ignorance; in the other,
great remorse for wickedness and ill-doing. But these results are not
eternal, though the dreadfully cruel teachings of religion have made
people believe so. The faintest stirrings of desire to be better, the
least aspiration toward the higher life is sure of a response from
loving, compassionate beings in angelic ministrations.
The priests of different religions who have been most valiant and
positive in preaching hell fire and eternal damnation have entirely
lost sight of this fact. Not the most strenuous of the whole lot has
ever been able to follow one miserable wretch into the spirit world to
find out whether his prognostications anent his hypnotized victims,
have "come true." "_Au contraire_," great numbers of reputed sinners
have come back in their real personality to report to their friends
that there is no such fate for anyone, that it is one great lie. But
it must not be supposed that there are no sure enough hells. There
have to be places for the hellish to stay till they come of a better
mind. Nature provides for them other opportunities for their gradual
redemption through re-embodiments in the flesh on this earth. There is
besides a constant outpouring from the dark abodes of estrayed and
benighted souls, for the all-embracing love of our Father-Mother
reaches even the horribly suffering lunatics, made so by their selfish,
vicious lives here on earth. There is, indeed, the greatest possible
difference between an intended eternal punishment of sin, such as has
been preached for ages for the purpose of scaring people out of their
wits, and a recognized, just retribution for broken law. Punishments
such as have been believed in suggest a punisher, and our Father in
heaven has been blasphemously represented as "angry with the wicked
every day" and glad to have a chance to pour out his "bottles of wrath"
on their elected heads.
The torturing remorse of the slowly awakening consciousness of those
who have lived selfishly and viciously is far beyond the pains of the
burning, material fires. Every human being that has in it a living
germ of spirit shall be liberated and helped toward the light, not by
any so-called personal redeemer--that is not possible--but by the power
of its own aspiring soul, and even moderately decent folk shall come to
enjoy all that they have imagined and longed for, and all great souls
shall find the peace they have dreamed of. All souls everywhere in the
spirit world will have all they have truly earned in their earthly
lives.
While we stay here we are hardly protected from the envious thoughts
and deeds of evilly disposed and vengeful people. Once safely landed
in that superior and satisfactory realm no such invasions can reach us
ever.