The Life Beyond the Veil Volume I: The Lowlands of Heaven - George Owen, Kenroy Hunter, Geoff Cutler (best novels for beginners .TXT) 📗

the ascension of the globe and the Christ and the child led our aspirations into those realms which are at present beyond our attainment.

 

But of course, there is much more than this mere outline in it, and we are, as I said, left to work it out for ourselves. This, according to our custom, we shall do,

and, at future gatherings, give our conclusions from time to time, and discuss them.

 

Thank you. May I now ask you a question which I have been requested to put to you?

 

No need to put it into words. We can see it in your mind, and knew it before you wrote.2 The dove which Miss E. saw above the altar of your church was a manifestation, in presence form, such as that I have just related. It was for your invisible congregation, and symbolized, in a way they would readily understand, the gentleness of the presences about the altar, that they were there indeed in love, and ready to help those who were willing to receive their help, and, in token of their gentleness, a dove was seen hovering near them and unafraid; a state of mind which those who are not progressed are not always able to maintain in the presence of those from the higher realms whose bright holiness sometimes, in the minds of those who are not able to judge proportionately, by reason of their still lingering imperfections, eclipse their other virtues and make the poor doubting ones afraid.

 

 

Wednesday, October 8, 1913.

 

Because of certain matters which are of importance to

 

those who would understand our meaning in its inner sense, we have decided to endeavour tonight to give you some instruction which will be of help and guidance when dealing with those things which lie beneath the surface of things, and which are usually not taken into account by the ordinary mind.

 

One of these is the aspect which thoughts wear when projected from your sphere into ours.

 

Thoughts which are good appear with a luminance which is absent from those of a less holy kind. This luminance appears to issue from the form of the thinker, and, by means of its manifold rays of divided colours, we are able to come at some knowledge as to his spiritual state, not alone as to whether his state is of the light or of the darkness, and of what degree in light, but also of the points in which he excels or comes short in any direction. It is by this that we are able to allot to him the guardians who will best be able to help him in the fostering of that which is good in him, and in the cleansing away of that which is not good or desirable. By means of a kind of prismatic system we divide up his character, and so reach our conclusions, which are based on the result.

 

In this life such a method is unnecessary, for it is a matter concerning the spiritual body, and here, of course, that body is patent to all, and, being a perfect index of the

spirit, shows forth his characteristics. Only I may say that the colours of which I have spoken are here communicated, in a degree, to our clothing, and those which are dominant over the others serve to classify us into our various spheres and grades. But thoughts which are the effect of spirit action, are seen in the effect they, in their turn, produce on the environment of the thinker, and not only are seen, but felt, or sensed, by us in a more accurate and intense way than with you.

 

Following on this line of reasoning, you will naturally see that when we think anything very intensely our wills are able to produce an outward manifestation which is really objective to those who behold it. Thus are many beautiful effects produced.

 

Can you give me a particular instance, by way of illustration?

 

Yes; it will help you to see what we mean.

 

A company of my friends and myself, who were being instructed in this knowledge, met together in order to see how far we had progressed, and resolved on an experiment to that end. We selected a glade in the midst of a beautiful wood, and, as a test, we resolved all to will one particular thing, and see if we were successful. What we selected was the producing of a phenomenon in the

 

open space which should be so solid and permanent as to allow of us examining it after-wards. And that was to be a statue of an animal something like an elephant, but rather different; an animal which we have here, but which has ceased to inhabit your Earth.

 

We all sat round the open space and concentrated our wills on the object to be produced. Very quickly it appeared and stood there before us. We were much surprised at the quickness of the result. But, from our point of view, there were two defects. It was much too large; for we had failed to regulate the combination of our wills in due proportion. And it was much more like a live animal than a statue, for many had thought in their minds of the live animal itself, and also of its colouring, and so the result was a mixture between stone and flesh. Also many points were disproportionate—the head too large and the body too small, and so on, showing that more power had been concentrated on some parts than on others. It is thus we learn our imperfections, and how to remedy them, in all our studies. We experiment, and then examine the result, and try again. We did so now.

 

Taking our minds off the statue so produced, and talking together, it gradually faded away. And then we were fresh and ready for our next trial. We decided not to select the same model as before, or our minds would probably run into more or less the same grooves. So we, this time,

chose a tree with fruit on it—something like an orange tree, but not quite the same.

 

We were more successful this time. The chief points of failure were that some of the fruit was ripe and some unripe. And the leaves were not correct in colour, nor the branches rightly proportioned. And so we tried one thing after another, and found ourselves a little more successful each time. You can imagine somewhat of the joy of such schooling as this, and the laughter and happy humour which result from our mistakes. Those among you who think that in this life we never make jokes, and never even laugh, will have to revise their ideas some day or they will find us strange company—or perhaps we shall find them so. But they soon learn what the love of this land is, where we can be perfectly natural and unrestrained, and indeed are compelled to be so if we wish to be accepted into respectable company, as you would phrase it. I fear the obverse is rather true on Earth, is it not? Ah well, live and learn, and those who live in this life—and not merely exist, or worse—learn very quickly. And the more we learn, the more we marvel at the forces at our command.

 

Astriel,3 who came yesterday—is he here now!

 

Not tonight. But he will, no doubt, come again, as you wish it.

 

Thank you. But I hope you will come and write too.

 

Oh yes, we will do so, for it is practice both for you and for us also, for, in thus impressing you, we are learning to use our wills and powers in a similar way to that I have been describing. Do you not see the image of the things we are telling you in your mind?

 

Yes, very vividly sometimes; but I had not thought of it in that way.

 

Ah well, my boy, you see now, do you not, that we had an object in writing what we have above? All the time you were thinking it was rather thin (and perhaps it was—we do not say to the contrary), and you were wondering whither it all was tending, and, in your mind, you were just a very wee bit disgusted. Now, were you not, dear? Well, we were smiling all the time; and now you understand that you were interpreting our thoughts, more or less, as we sent them forth, and the object we had was to explain to you how those scenes appeared before you so vivid and so real, as you described them.

 

Good-bye, dear lad, and God bless you and your dear ones now and always.

 

 

1 If one reads this very carefully, it is saying that just as we can get thought inputs from spirits of the light, so too can the evil spirits have input, and that the spiritual condition of the mortal is

largely to blame for which of these is the more powerful or frequent. This is the Law of Attraction in action.

 

2 A member of the congregation of All Hallows, Orford, had told me a few days previously that she had seen clairvoyantly a dove hovering over the altar during the celebration of the Holy Communion—G.V.O.

 

3 Astriel’s messages were given on various dates which, however, were not consecutive. Why they were given in this way is not apparent. The effect, however, was to cut into the communications given by Mr. Vale Owen’s mother in such a way as rather to break the continuity of her messages as well as to destroy the sequence of those of Astriel himself. I have deemed it advisable, therefore, to collect them into a separate chapter. See chapter six.—H.W.E.

Chapter 3

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Darkness into Light

 

 

 

 

At the Home of Arnol—A lesson in wisdom— Evolution, inverted and progressive—The science of creation—The entity the “Name”— Chasm and the Bridge —“Send out Thy light” to “lead me”— From darkness into light—Angels can suffer—Angelic ministry.

 

 

Friday, October 10, 1913

 

WERE we to impress you to write on matters which to us are of everyday concern, you would perhaps be able to compare them with your own daily life, and you would see then that we and you are both at school, and that the school is a very large one, with many classes, and many

instructors,—but with one scheme running throughout the course of instruction, and that scheme a unity of progress from the simple to the complex, and that complexity does not mean perplexity, for, as we learn more of the wisdom of the Divine Author of all, we see how beautifully composite is the realm in which He exerts His Loving Will to the end we may, by our very joy of knowledge, give homage to the Glory of Him Who holds all things in the hollow of His Hand.

 

And so, dear lad, we will once again take up our theme, and tell you of our doings here in these bright realms, and of how the Father’s love encompasses us all around as a radiant cloud in which all things appear to us more plainly —as we progress in humility and in love.

 

One of those things which matter here is that due proportion be meted out between wisdom and love. These are not contrary the one from the other, but are two great phases of one great principle. For love is to wisdom as the tree is to the leaves, and if love actuate and wisdom breathe, then the fruit is healthy and sound. By way of illustrating this we will give you a concrete instance of how we are taught to consider duly both love and wisdom in our dealings with ourselves and others to whom we are permitted to minister.

 

We were given a task to perform a short time ago in

 

which a party of us, to the number of five, were to go to a colony in a rather distant part of this land, and inquire of them by what means could best be given help to