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

amidst the shadows on the Earth. And this we would say with all solemnity: let those who to-day amongst you are searching into the meaning of His Divinity, and the relation of that to His Humanity, do so fearlessly and reverently. For such are guided more than they know from these realms. And be it always in the mind of those who are sincere that they can do no irreverence to Him Who Himself is Truth in inquiring what the Truth is as He revealed it.

 

Nevertheless, friend, we tell you, with this same fearlessness, and with great reverence also, that what goes by the name of Orthodoxy among Christians in the Church on Earth is not a fair and true presentation, in many ways, of the Truth as we have come to know it here. Also we see among you too much unreadiness to go forward, and lack of courage and faith in the providence of God Who will, if men will follow, lead them more and more into the light,

 

the radiant, glowing light, as it envelops those who are brave, to show them the right and holy way towards His Throne. Let such remember that that Throne shall be shared only by the brave who are strong to overcome come, and these are they who are valiant to do and dare, and pay the price at the hands of those their fellows who are less courageous and less enlightened.

 

Now we continue our instruction, and you will accept it so far as you can. What you do not feel able to receive leave, and perhaps, as you proceed on your way, you will find it fall into place little by little until you understand it all.

 

We were telling you formerly about the heavenly bodies and their correlation to each other. Now we will tell you somewhat of their creation and of the aspect they wear to us as viewed on their spiritual side. For you will understand that every star and planet, and every thing material, has its spiritual counterpart. You do understand this, we know, and are going to build what we now have to say on that knowledge.

 

The heavenly bodies are the expression in matter, of ideas originating among those high in the Heavenly Spheres of Creative Power. They are all and each the effect of thoughts and impulses proceeding from those spheres. When a world is in process of creation those

 

High Beings are constantly energizing, and projecting into the forming matter their spiritual influence and, so to speak, character. Thus, although the planets of your system are all conformable to one great scheme of unity, they are diverse in their individual characteristics. These characteristics answer to the characters of the Great Lords in Whose charge they severally are. Astronomers are correct when they say that certain of the elements which go to form the Earth are found in, say Mars and Jupiter, and in the Sun itself. But they would err if they should say that they are found in the same proportion, or in similar combination. Every planet differs in these things from its fellow, but all conform to the one broader scheme which governs them as a system. What is here said of the units which go to make up the Solar system may be applied to the wider range of things. Considering the Solar realm as a unit, it is not identical, either in composition of elements or in planetary constitution, with other systems. Each differs from its fellow also.

 

Now, we have explained the reason of this. It issues in the individual mind of the Chief Lord of the particular system. Under him are other great Lords who work in unison with his one governing idea. But these also have freedom in those things which are under their charge, and so on downward to the minute things of creation—the flowers and trees and animals and the formation of the face of the planet. It is on account of this latitude in

creation and control that you have such diversity in detail; and because of the limit of restriction to the exercise of that free individuality that you have the unity which you find interpenetrating every department and subdepartment of creation.

 

Under these supervisors there are also myriads of lesser ministers of different grades downward until some of the lowest orders may scarcely be termed persons, for they merge into the lower species of life which you might term sensory, as distinguishing them from those who, like ourselves, are possessed not only of intelligence, but also of that independence in judgment which we know as freewill.

 

Are you speaking of fairies, pixies, and elementals generally, of which some writers tell us?

 

Yes, these are real things, and mostly benevolent; but they are far below the human sphere, and therefore are less known than the higher grades of ministry, such as the spirits of men, and those who have attained to angelic degree.

 

Now, a little more about the Earth itself. Geologists tell how some of the rocks are alluvial and others igneous in formation, and so on. But if you will carefully examine some of these you will find that they give off a certain

 

vapour, or one might almost say magnetic influence. That is the effect of the original inspiration into them by those who formed them originally. And these characteristics are worthy of deeper study than they have hitherto received. The chemical composition has been, more or less, ascertained. But the more subtle influences proceeding from the ever-vibrating particles have been neglected. Yet when it is remembered that no piece of rock or stone is still, but that all its particles are in movement orderly and constant, it is only one step onward then to realize that, in order that this movement be maintained, there must be present some great force and, at the back of that force, a personality of which it is the expression.

 

This is true, and the baleful influence which some gems do exercise on those whose sentiments towards them are not governed aright, is an evidence of this. On the other hand, you have heard of lucky-stones, which is a phrase which shows some rather vague notion of the underlying truth. Eliminate all idea of chance from these matters, and substitute an orderly system of cause and effect, and remember the consequence of ignorance in traversing all natural law, and you will see that there may be something in what we have been trying to explain.

 

For the sake of emphasis we have limited our consideration to the mineral creation, but the same truth may be adapted to the vegetable and animal kingdoms

also. Of this we will not speak tonight. What we, have said has been said with the object of showing that there is a field for those who have a scientific turn of mind, and who are not afraid to go farther afield than scientists have hitherto allowed themselves to go.

 

The whole may be summed up in a few words, if which be accepted then the conclusion we have intimated must, of necessity, be accepted too. The whole material creation is nothing in itself and by itself. It is but the expression, on a lower plane, of personalities on higher planes, the effect of which their wills are the causes. As a man leaves the imprint of his character on his work day by day, so these great Creative Lords and their ministers have left the impress of their personality on these material phenomena.

 

Nothing is still, all moves continuously. This movement is controlled and orderly, and that is a warrant of the constant energizing of personality. As the lower grades of service are dependent on those higher Lords for their existence and continuance, so are these latter to those of grade more sublime, as these are to the One Supreme Energy, the Self-Existent One, Whose Will is our life, and Whose Wisdom is more wonderful than we can express in words or in thoughts. To Whom be reverence done from all who are in Him, and from us who, in the Christ our Lord and Saviour, dwell in Him, and He in us. Amen.†

Friday, October 24, 1913

 

We have come tonight with our friends, your mother and her companions, at their invitation once again, in order to speak to you some message of friendly help and counsel. And in thinking over what would most interest you, we concluded that if we were to say something to you of those powers which watch over the world, we might, perchance, be able to lead you, and those who are willing to follow with you, a little onward towards the great body of knowledge which awaits your searching when you have laid aside those trammels of the Earth life, and stand free to progress into the greater glories of the realm of spirit.

 

Who writes this, please?

 

We are they who came before, friend; Astriel, as you know me, and my fellow-workers of the Tenth Sphere of progress. Shall we proceed, then?

 

If you please; and I thank you for your courtesy in coming down here into this dim realm, as it must seem to you.

 

You say “coming down here,” and that fairly well expresses the condition of things from your point of view. Yet not altogether, nor perfectly. For if the planet on which you live your present life is dependent in space, then “up”

 

and “down” are terms which must be very restricted in their meaning. You already have noted this in your writing or, rather, you were impressed to note it.

 

When we said “the powers which watch over the world,” we did not, of course, mean to localize these powers on one side of this planet, but to imply the all-enveloping watch which the heavenly powers keep about the sphere which is called Earth. These powers are resident in zones of which the Earth itself is the centre, and they lie in concentric circles around it. The inferior zones are those near the planet’s surface, and progress in power and glory as the distance is increased. But yet, space must be enlarged in meaning when applied to these spheres; for distance has not the same obstructive sense to us as it has to you.

 

For instance, when I am in the Tenth of these zones,4 my cognizance is limited, more or less, by that Tenth zone as to its outer or superior boundary. I may, on occasion and by permission, visit the Eleventh zone, or even go higher; but residence in those higher zones is not permitted me. On the other hand, the zones inferior to the Tenth are not impossible to me; for the zone in which I dwell, being a sphere, includes within itself, even geometrically considered, all the nine inferior spheres. So that we may, for the sake of clarity of understanding, put it thus: The Earth is the centre about which many spheres are; and is

 

enclosed in all those spheres. And the residents in the Earth life are potentially in touch with all those spheres, and actually so in ratio to their altitude spiritually considered—spiritually, because these spheres are spiritual and not material.

 

Even the material Sphere of Earth is only so phenomenally, for it is a manifestation in matter of all these zones of spiritual power which envelop it; and of others, too, of other degree which interpenetrate it. Leave these latter aside, for the present at least, and consider the matter as we have described it.

 

You will now have some idea of what aspiration and prayer and worship mean. They are the means of communion with the Creator and His High and Holy Ones Who (to put it in a way which you will understand) dwell in the highest, or outermost, of these spheres, and include within Himself and these all the zones within that highest Zone or Sphere.

 

And so the Earth is enveloped by, and included in and affected by the spiritual powers, of varying degree and kind, entrusted by the Creator—God—to