was dead. The Teacher sought me out and invited me to go with him. He
said that something would occur there which I ought to see.
His prophecy was verified. I saw a soul, a great soul, go out as a
suicide. It was sad and terrible.
But as I write this the Teacher comes and stands beside me; he advises
me to say no more on that subject.
One sees horrible things out here, as well as beautiful things. I can
only say with regard to suicide, that if men knew what awaits those
who go out by their own hand, they would remain with the evil that
they know. I am sorry I cannot tell you more about this, for it would
interest you. The testimony of an eye-witness is always more convincing
than the mere repetition of theories.
The appearance of the Teacher with his advice has put out of my mind
for the moment the desire to write. But I will come again.
_Later._
I have been able to do what you so much desired--to find the boy who
came out accidentally by drowning.
As you looked at his photograph, I saw it through your eyes, and
carried away the memory of the face. I found him wandering about, quite
bewildered. When I spoke to him of you and said that you had asked me
to help him, he seemed surprised.
I was able to give him a little aid, though he has a friend here--an
old man who is nearer to him than I could ever be. He will gradually
adjust himself to the new conditions.
You had better not try to speak with him. He is on a different path,
and is being looked after, for he has friends. The little help I was
able to give was in the nature of information. He needed diversion
from a too-pressing thought, and I suggested one or two ways of passing
time which are both agreeable and instructive.
You wonder at the expression “passing time”? But time exists out here.
Wherever there is sequence, there is time. There may come a “time”
when all things will exist simultaneously, past, present and--shall we
say future? But so long as past, present and future are more or less
distinct, so long time is. It is nothing but the principle of sequence.
Did you fancy it was anything else?
Interiorly, that is, deep within the self, one may find a silent place
where all things _seem_ to exist in unison; but as soon as the
soul even there attempts to examine things separately, then sequence
begins.
The union with the All is another matter. That is, or seems to be,
timeless; but as soon as one attempts to unite with or to be conscious
of things, time is manifest.
LETTER XXV
A SHADOWLESS WORLD
I HAD been here some time before I noticed one of the most marked
peculiarities of this world.
One night as I was passing slowly along, I saw a group of persons
approaching me. It was very light where they were, because there were
so many of them. Suddenly, as I saw this light, a thought came to my
mind, a saying from one of the Hermetic books: “Where the light is
strongest, there are the shadows deepest.” But on looking at these men
and women, I saw that _they cast no shadows_.
I hailed the nearest man--you must remember that this was soon after
I came out, and when I was still more ignorant than I am now--and I
called his attention to this peculiar phenomenon of a shadowless yet
brilliantly lighted world. He smiled at my surprise, and said:
“You have not been here long, have you?”
“No.”
“Then you are not aware that we light our own place? The substance of
which our bodies are composed is radiant. How could our forms cast
shadows, when light radiates from them in all directions?”
“And in the sunlight?” I asked.
“Oh,” he answered, “you know that in the sunlight we cannot be seen
at all! The light of the sun is coarse and crude, and it puts out the
light of the spirits.”
Does it seem strange to you that at this moment I can feel the warmth
of that wood fire by which you sit? There is a magic in burning wood.
The combustion of coal has quite a different effect upon the psychic
atmosphere. If one who had always been blind to visions and insensible
to the finer feelings and premonitions of the invisible world would try
meditating before a blazing wood fire for an hour or two every day or
night, his eyes and other subtler senses might be opened to things of
which he had theretofore never even dreamed.
Those Orientals who worship their God with fire are wise and full of
visions. The light of burning wax has also a magical effect, though
different from that of a wood fire. Sit sometimes in the evening with
no light but that of a solitary candle, and see what visions will come
from the “Void.”
I have not told you anything for a long time about the boy Lionel. He
is now much interested in the idea of choosing a family of engineers
in which to be born again. The thought is one to which he is always
returning.
“Why are you in such a hurry to leave me?” I asked him, the first time
he mentioned the subject.
“But I do not feel as if I should be leaving you altogether,” he
replied. “I could come out to you in dreams.”
“Not at first,” I told him. “You would be prisoned and blind and deaf
for a long time, and you might not be able to come out to me here until
after I had also gone back again to the earth.”
“Then why not come along with me?” he asked. “Say, Father, why
shouldn’t we be born as twins?”
The idea was so absurd that I laughed heartily; but Lionel could not
see where the joke came in.
“There are such things as twins,” he said, seriously. “I knew a pair of
twin brothers when I lived in Boston.”
But, when I return to earth, it is no part of my plan to be anybody’s
twin; so I tell Lionel that if he wants to enjoy my society for a time
he will have to stay quietly where he is.
“But why can’t we go back together?” he still asks, “and be cousins or
neighbours, at least?”
“Perhaps we can,” I tell him, “if you do not spoil everything by an
unseemly haste.”
It is strange about this boy. Out in this world there is boundless
opportunity to work in subtle matter, opportunity to invent and
experiment; yet he wants to get his hands on iron and steel. Strange!
Some night I will try to bring the boy to pay you a visit, so that you
can see him--I mean just before you fall asleep. Those are the true
visions. The ones which come in sleep are apt to be confused by the
jarring of the matter through which you pass in waking. Do not forget
the boy. I have already told him how I come and write with your hand,
and he is much interested.
“Why couldn’t I operate a telegraph in that way?” he asked me; but I
advised him not to try it. He might interrupt some terrestrial message
which had been sent and paid for.
Occasionally I take him with me up to the pattern world. He has a
little model of his own there with which he amuses himself while I
am examining other things. It is the model of a wheel, and he sets
it going by the electricity of his fingers. No, it is not made of
steel--not as you know steel. Why, what you call steel is too heavy! It
would fall through this world so fast that it would not even leave a
rent behind it.
You must understand that the two worlds are composed of matter not only
moving at a different rate of vibration, but charged with a different
magnetism. It is said that two solid objects cannot occupy the same
space at the same time; but that law does not apply to two objects--one
of them belonging to your world and the other to ours. As water can be
hot and wet at the same time, so a square foot of space can contain a
square foot of earthly matter and a square foot of etheric matter.
No, do not quibble about terms. You have no terms for the kind of
matter that we use here, because you do not know anything about it.
Lionel and his electric wheel would both be invisible to you if they
were set down on the hearthrug before you at this moment. Even the
magic of that wood fire would not make them visible--at least, not in
the daylight.
Some evening--but we will speak of that at another time. I must go now.
LETTER XXVI
CIRCLES IN THE SAND
I AM just beginning to enjoy the romance of life out here. I must
always have had the romantic temperament; but only since changing my
place have I had time and opportunity to give rein to it. On earth
there was always too much to be done, too many duties, too many demands
on me. Here I am free.
You have no idea of the meaning of freedom unless you can remember when
you were out here last, and I doubt if you can remember that yet.
When I say “romance” I mean the charm of existence, the magic touch
which turns the grey face of life to rose colour. You know what I mean.
It is wonderful to have leisure to dream and to realise one’s dream,
for here the realisation goes with the dream. Everything is so real,
imagination is so potent, and the power to link things is so great--so
almost unlimited!
The dreamers here are really not idle, for our dreaming is a kind of
building; and even if it were not, we have a right to do about as we
please. We have earned our vacation. The labour will come again. We
shall reclothe ourselves in gross matter and take on its burdens.
Why, it takes more energy on earth to put one heavy foot before another
heavy foot, and to propel the hundred or two-hundred pound body a mile,
than it takes here to go around the world! That will give you an idea
of the quantity of surplus energy that we have for enjoying ourselves
and for dream-building.
Perhaps on earth you work too much--more than is really necessary. The
mass of needless things that you accumulate round you, the artificial
wants that you create, the break-neck pace of your lives to provide
all these things, seem to us absurd and rather pitiful. Your political
economy is mere child’s play, your governments are cumbrous machines
for doing the unnecessary, most of your work is useless, and your lives
would be nearly futile if you did not suffer so much that your souls
learn, though unwillingly, that most of their strivings are vain.
How I used to sweat and groan in the early days to make my little
circle in the sand! And now I see that if I had taken more time to
think, I might have recovered something of my past knowledge, gained
in other lives; and though I still had felt obliged to draw my circle
in the sand, I might have done it with less difficulty and in half the
time.
Here, if I choose, I can spend hours in watching the changing colours
of a cloud. Or, better still, I can lie on my back and remember. It
is wonderful to remember, to let the mind go back year after year,
life after life, century after century, back and back till one finds
oneself--a turtle! But one can also look ahead, forward and forward,
life after life, century after century, æon after æon, till one finds
oneself an archangel. The looking back is memory; the looking forward
is creation. Of course we create our own future. Who else could do
it? We are influenced and moved and shifted and helped or retarded by
others; but it is we ourselves who forge the chains every time. We tie
knots that we shall have to untie, often with labour and perplexity.
In going back over my past lives I realise the why and the wherefore
of my last one. It was, in a way, the least satisfactory of many
lives--save one; but now I see its purpose, and that I laid the plans
for it when I was last out here. I even arranged to go back to earth
at a definite time, in order to be with certain friends who met me
there.
But I have turned the corner now, and have begun the upward march
again. Already I am laying the lines for my next coming, though there
is no hurry. Bless you! I am not going back until I have had my fill of
the freedom and enjoyment of this existence here.
Also I have much studying to do. I want to review what I learned in
those hitherto forgotten but now remembered lives.
Do you recall how, when you went to school, you had occasionally to
review the lessons of the preceding weeks or months? That custom is
based on a sound principle. I am now having my review lessons. By and
by, before I return to the world, I shall review these reviews, fixing
by will the memories which I specially wish to carry over with me. It
would be practically impossible to carry over intact the great panorama
of experience which now unrolls itself before the eyes of my memory;
but there are several fundamental things, philosophical principles and
illustrations, which I must not forget. Also I want to take with me the
knowledge of certain formulæ and the habit of certain practices which
you would probably call occult; by means of which, when I am mature
again in my new body, I can call into memory this very pageant of
experience which now rolls before me whenever I will it.
No, I am not going to tell you about your own past. You must, and can,
recover it for yourself. So can anyone who knows the difference between
memory and imagination. Yes, the difference is subtle, but as real as
the difference between yesterday and to-morrow.
I do not want you to be in any hurry about coming out here to stay.
Remain where you are just as long as possible. Much that we do on this
side you can do almost as well while still in the body. Of course you
have to use more energy, but that is what energy is for--to use. Even
when we store it, we store it for future use. Do not forget that.
One reason why I rest much now and dream and amuse myself is because I
want to store as much energy as possible, to come back with power.
It is well that you have taken my advice to idle a little and to get
acquainted with your own soul. There are surprises in store for the
person who will deliberately set out on the quest of his soul. The soul
is not a will-o’-the-wisp; it is a beacon light to steer by and avoid
the rocks of materialism and forgetfulness.
I have had much joy in going back over my Greek incarnations. What
concentration they had--those Greeks! They knew much. The waters of
Lethe, for instance,--what a conception!--brought from this side by
masterly memory.
If man would even try to remember, if he would only take time to
consider all that he has been, there would be more hope of what he may
become! Why, do you know that man may become a god--or that which,
compared with ordinary humanity, has all the magnitude and grandeur of
a god? “Ye are gods,” was not said in a merely figurative sense.
I have met the Master from Galilee, and have held communion with Him.
There was a man--and a god! The world has need of Him now.
LETTER XXVII
THE MAGIC RING
IT would be hard for you to understand, merely by my telling you, the
difference between your life and ours. Begin with the difference in
substance, not only the substance of our bodies, but the substance of
natural objects which surround us.
Do you start at the term “natural objects” as applied to the things of
this world? You did not fancy, did you, that we had escaped Nature? No
one escapes Nature--not even God. Nature _is_.
Imagine that you had spent sixty or seventy years in a heavy earthly
body, a body which insisted on growing fat, and would get stiff-jointed
and rheumatic, even going on strike occasionally to the extent of
laying you up in bed for repairs of a more or less clumsy sort. Then
fancy yourself suddenly exchanging this heavy body for a light and
elastic form. Can you imagine it? I confess that it would have been
difficult for me, even a year or two ago.
Clothed in this form, which is sufficiently radiant to light its own
place when its light is not put out by the cruder light of the sun,
fancy yourself moving from place to place, from person to person, from
idea to idea. As time goes on even the habit of demanding nourishment
gradually wears off. We are no longer bothered by hunger and thirst;
though I, for instance, still stay myself occasionally with a little
nourishment, an infinitesimal amount compared with the beefsteak
dinners which I used to eat.
And we are no longer harassed by the thousand-and-one petty duties of
the earth. Out here we have more confidence in moods. Engagements are
seldom made--that is, binding engagements. As a rule, though there
are exceptions, desire is mutual. I want to see and commune with a
friend at the same time when he feels a desire for my society, and we
naturally drift together. The companionships here are very beautiful;
but the solitudes are also full of charm.
Since the first two or three months I have not been lonesome. At first
I felt like a fish out of water, of course. Nearly everyone does;
though there are exceptions in the case of very spiritual people who
have no earthly ties or ambitions. I had so fought the idea of “dying,”
that my new state seemed at first to be the proof of my failure, and
I used to wander about under the impression that I was going to waste
much valuable time which could have been used to better advantage in
the storm and stress of earthly living.
Of course the Teacher came to me; but he was too wise to carry me on
his back even from the first. He reminded me of a few principles, which
he left me to apply; and gradually, as I got hold of the applications,
I got hold of myself. Then also gradually the beauty and wonder of the
new condition began to dawn on me, and I saw that instead of wasting
time I was really gaining tremendous experience which could be utilised
later.
I have talked with many people here, people of all stages of
intellectual and moral growth, and I am sorry to say that the person
who has a clear idea of the significance of life and its possibilities
for development is about as rare here as on the earth. As I have said
before, a man does not suddenly become all-wise by changing the texture
of his body.
The vain man of earth is likely to be vain here, though in his next
life the very law of reaction--if he has overdone vanity--may send him
back as a modest or even bashful person, for a while at least, until
the reaction has spent itself. In coming out a man brings his character
and characteristics with him.
I have often been sorry for men who in life had been slaves of the
business routine. Many of them cannot get away from it for a long time;
and instead of enjoying themselves here, they go back and forth to
and from the scenes of their old labours, working over and over some
problem in tactics or finance until they are almost as weary as when
they “died.”
As you know, there are teachers here. Few of them are of the stature of
my own Teacher; but there are many who make it their pleasure to help
the souls of the newly arrived. They never leave a newcomer entirely
to his own resources. Help is always offered, though it is not always
accepted. In that case it will be offered again and again, for those
who give themselves to others do so without hope of reward or even
acknowledgment.
If I had set out to write a scientific treatise of the life on this
side, I should have begun in quite a different way from this. In the
first place, I should have postponed the labour about ten years, until
all my facts were pigeon-holed and docketed; then I should have begun
at the beginning and dictated a book so dull that you would have fallen
asleep over it, and I should have had to nudge you from time to time to
pick up the pencil fallen from your somnolent hand.
Instead, I began to write soon after coming out, and these letters are
really the letters of a traveller in a strange country. They record
his impressions, often his mistakes, sometimes perhaps his provincial
prejudices; but at least they are not a rehash of what somebody else
has said.
I like your keeping my photograph on your mantel as you do; it helps me
to come. There is a great power in a photograph.
I have been drawing pictures for you lately on the canvas of dreams, to
show you the futility and vanity of certain things. Did you not know
that we could do that? The power of the so-called dead to influence the
living is immense, provided that the tie of sympathy has been made. I
have taught you how to protect yourself against influences which you do
not want, so do not be afraid. I will always stand guard to the extent
of warning you if there is any danger of attack from this side. Already
I have drawn a magic ring around you which only the most advanced
and powerful spirits could pass, even if they desired--that is, the
Teachers and I drew it together. You are doing our work just now, and
have a right to our protection. That the labourer is worthy of his hire
is an axiom of both worlds.
Only you yourself could now let down the bars for the inrush of
evil and irresponsible spiritual intelligences, and if you should
inadvertently let down the bars we should rush to put them up again. We
have some authority out here. Yes, even so soon I can say that. Are you
surprised?
LETTER XXVIII
EXCEPT YE BE AS LITTLE CHILDREN
I ONCE heard a man refer to this world as the play world, “for,” said
he, “we are all children here, and we create the environment that we
desire.” As a child at play can turn a chair into a tower or a prancing
steed, so we in this world can make real for the moment whatever we
imagine.
Has it never filled you with amazement, that absolute vividness of the
imagination of children? A child says unblushingly and with conviction,
“That rug is a garden, that plank in the floor is a river, that chair
is a castle, and I am a king.”
Why does he say these things? How _can_ he say these things?
Because--and here is the point--he still subconsciously remembers the
life out here which he so lately left. He has carried over with him
into the life of earth something of his lost freedom and power of
imagination.
That does not mean that all things in this world are imaginary--far
from it. Objects here, objects existing in tenuous matter, are as real
and comparatively substantial as with you; but there is the possibility
of creation here, creation in a form of matter even more subtle
still--thought-substance.
If you create something on earth in solid matter, you create it first
in thought-substance; but there is this difference between your
creation and ours: until you have moulded solid matter around your
thought-pattern you do not believe that the thought-pattern really
exists save in your own fancy.
We out here can see the thought-creations of others if we and they will
it so.
We can also--and I tell you this for your comfort--we can also see your
thought-creations, and by adding the strength of our will to yours we
can help you to realise them in substantial form.
Sometimes we build here bit by bit, in the four-dimensional world,
especially when we wish to leave a thing for others to see and enjoy,
when we wish a thing to survive for a long time. But a thought-form is
visible to all highly developed spirits.
Of course you understand that not all spirits are highly developed.
In fact very few are far progressed; but the dullest man out here
has something which most of you have lost--the faith in his own
thought-creations.
Now, the power which makes creation possible is not lost to a soul when
it takes on solid matter again. But the power is gradually overcome and
the imagination is discouraged by the incredulity of mature men and
women, who say constantly to the child: “That is only play; that is not
really so; that is only imagination.”
If you print these letters, I wish you would insert here fragments from
that wonderful poem of Wordsworth, “Intimations of Immortality from
Recollections of Early Childhood.”
“Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;
The Soul that rises with us, our life’s Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,
And cometh from afar:
Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy,
But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,
He sees it in his joy;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still is Nature’s Priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;
At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.”
There is almost no limit to the possibilities of the imagination; but
to get the full power of it, one must trust one’s imagination. If you
say to yourself constantly, as the mother says to the child, “But this
is only play; this is not real,” you never can make real the things you
have created in thought.
The imagination itself is like a child and must be encouraged and
believed in, or it cannot develop and do its perfect work.
It is really fortunate for some of you that I am out here. I can do
more for you here than there, because I have even greater faith in my
imagination than I had before.