On this
matter, William Atkinson in his book "Life
beyond death" related the following:
« It is one of
the saddest features of earth-life that
we find ourselves unable to express to the fullest the creative impulse, the
artistic urge, the striving of the genius within us to unfold itself. After
passing a certain place in the scale of life, the evolving soul finds within
itself the ever present urge of the something within which is striving to
express and unfold itself into objective manifestation.
It may be the craving
to express in art, music, literature, invention; or it may be the insistent
desire to be at work remodeling the affairs of the world nearer to the soul’s
desire. In all of such cases, it is really the creative impulse at work,
striving to “make things” in objective form, in accordance with the pattern or
model within the soul. And toward such expression, head, heart and hand is
eager to work.
But, alas, very few
are able to realize in earth-life one
tithe of what the soul dreams.
The artistic instinct
is ever hungering for perfect expression, and yet it is given but the crumbs
that fall from the table. The soul is ever thirsting for progress and
achievement, and yet it is given but the few drops that trickle from the
fountain. If this one life were all — if these longings, cravings, desires, and
hunger and thirst of the soul, depended only upon the possibilities of the one
earth-life — then indeed would the moaning
cry of the pessimists be justified, and the wail of the discouraged be
justified. For, in fact, these impulses and cravings are but as the urge of the
seed striving to break through its sheaths, that it may put forth stem, branch,
blossom and fruit. And the seed can scarce expect to reach the blossom and
fruit while it is in the earth.
But, as the advanced
occultist knows full well, these seed-desires
are but the promise of the future blossom and fruit. The very fact of their
existence is a proof of the possibility —nay, the certainty— of their
fulfillment. So far from being a cause of discouragement, they should be
regarded as a prophecy of future achievement and realization. It has been well
said that “in every aspiration there dwells the certainty of its own
fulfillment.” These words seem like mockery to many, and, indeed, they would be
mockery were the possibility of realization confined to the one particular
earth-life in which they are manifested.
But, to the soul which has advanced on the Path of Attainment sufficiently high
that it may look back and down upon the planes of life beneath it, it is seen
that these strivings of genius to express itself are but the “labor-pains
of the soul,” which must precede the future birth of the fruit of genius.
On the Astral Plane
these seeds of genius put forth stem and branch, and are prepared for the
blossom and fruit of the incarnations ahead of it. In the highly concentrated
state of the mind, in certain phases of the Astral life, the talents and genius
of the individual grow and develop very rapidly, and the next incarnation finds
the individual ready and prepared to manifest the power which he has generated
during his sojourn on the Astral. The soul may be said to receive and store up
energy while on the Astral, which will enable it to manifest heretofore
undreamed of powers in the next earth-life.
A familiar example is
that of the boy who is learning to skate, and who finds that he makes little
progress during the afternoon. He goes to sleep that night, and forgets all
about the art of skating, but when he returns to the task the next day, lo! he
finds that he has made wonderful progress. The majority of us have had similar
experiences regarding our little tasks in life. We find that something happens
to us when we are asleep.
The secret of the
above-mentioned phenomena is that, during
the sleep of the boy, his sub-conscious
or instinctive mind rehearses the task until it has accomplished much in the
direction of mastering it, and the next day it puts into practice that which it
has learned during the night — but the conscious mind is not aware of the
process of learning. There are depths of the mind which take up these tasks of
ours, and which while we are asleep and our objective conscious faculties are
resting, straighten out the troublesome kinks of performance, and practice the
tasks to be performed the coming day.
In the same way, the super-conscious
(not the sub-conscious)
faculties of the mind of the soul practice and become proficient in the tasks
of the next earth-life, as
indicated by the urge of desire and the pangs of achievement seeking birth.
But, with this difference, the soul is fully conscious of the workings of the
super-conscious faculties, and, in fact,
experiences the greatest joy in the work of development and achievement. The
heaven-world of those souls which are
possessed of the desire to “do things” —to create, to perform, to make— is
indeed a realm of bliss. For there the soul finds itself able to manifest the
things which were beyond it during the earth-life,
and to express itself in a measure almost beyond the fondest dreams and hopes
of the soul on earth.
And this expression
and manifestation is performed from the very love of the performance—from the
joy of work, the ecstasy of creative achievement — rather than from the hope of
reward. On the Astral Plane, alone, can the soul find the conditions which are
pictured in Kipling’s lines:
“And only the Master
shall praise us,
And only the Master
shall blame;
And no one shall work
for money,
And no one shall work
for fame;
But each for the joy
of the working,
And each in his
separate star,
Shall draw the Thing
as he sees it
For the God of Things
as They are.”
The same thing is
true of the seeker after knowledge — the man to whom the exercise of the
intellect is the greatest joy. Such a one finds the Books of Knowledge opened
for many pages beyond those at which he was compelled to pause in earth-life.
The philosopher, the scientist, the metaphysician, the naturalist — these find
full exercise for their faculties on the Astral Plane. The library of the
Cosmos —the laboratories of the universe— are at their disposal, and they are
made welcome there. They find their heart’s desire fulfilled in the
opportunities afforded them on the Astral Plane. And, they go back to earth-life,
when their time comes for reincarnation, with stimulated intellect and
increased reasoning power. What they have thus learned appears in the next life
as “intuition.”
It is a fact well
known to the advanced occultist that great inventors, like Edison — great
philosophers like Hegel, or Herbert Spencer —great scientists like Darwin or
Huxley— who seemingly manifest intuitive knowledge of their subjects, are but
manifesting on the material plane that which they have already acquired on the
Astral as the fruition of desires and attempts made in previous incarnations.
It is the common experience of such geniuses, as related in their memoirs, that
the majority of their greatest discoveries have come to them suddenly as if
from a clear sky. But it is a rule of Nature that there is no blossom or fruit
without the preceding seed — and this is true on the mental as well as on the
physical plane. There is always a “cause” for the “effect,” in these cases.
The struggling genius
—nay, more, the one who feels that he or she
could be a genius if that which is within could only be expressed— these
souls will have their chance in the Astral, and if the seed be well planted in
the rich soil, of the soul, then in the next incarnation will the blossom and
fruit appear. We may carry this idea with us, a little more clearly, perhaps,
if we will make the following comparison:
1.
The earth-life
is like the phase of the crawling-caterpillar,
which feels within itself a something which it cannot express, and which it
scarcely understands.
2.
The astral-life
is like the phase of the chrysalis, in which the future gorgeous butterfly is
being formed, and in which the colored wings already exist in Astral form.
3.
The reincarnated earth-life
is like the phase of the butterfly, in which the ideal felt in the first stage
and mentally experienced in the second stage becomes fully manifest and active.
The Law of Karma
performs much of its work on the Astral Plane, for there the sole material is
plastic and non-resistant,
the coarse sheaths of the body being absent. And this law is exact and
unfailing in its operations — it always brings the seed to fruition, and each
seed brings forth only its own appropriate fruit:
“Karma—all that total of a soul
Which is the thing it did, the thoughts it
had,
The ‘self’ it wove with woof of viewless time
Crossed on the warp invisible of acts.
Before beginning, and without an end,
As space eternal and as surety sure,
Is fixed a Power divine which moves to good,
Only its laws endure.
That which ye sow, ye reap. See yonder fields
The sesamum was sesamum, the corn
The Life Beyond Death Was corn.
The silence and the darkness knew;
So is a man’s fate born.
He cometh, reaper of the things he sowed,
Sesamum, corn, so much cast in past birth;
And so much weed and poison stuff, which mar
Him and the aching earth.
If he labor rightly, rooting these,
And planting wholesome seedlings where
they grew,
Fruitful and fair and clean the ground
shall be,
And rich the harvest due.”
»
(Chapter 12)
OBSERVATION
In this chapter, William
Atkinson continues to tell lies, because he continues to ensure that humans are
awake and active in the astral plane, carrying out everything that they most
wanted to do during their earthly life, but that they could not do while they
were living on the physical plane.
But this is false
because the masters specified that the vast majority of humans lose
consciousness after death and are asleep on the astral plane.
And although it is
true that the masters added that during the post-mortem sleep, souls can
experience and develop what they most desired, but could not achieve during
their earthly life, they also specified that this is done in Devachan and not
in Astral (which is just a transition zone between the physical world and the
divine world).
And also William
Atkinson makes the mistake of declaring that the Law of Karma performs much of
its work on the astral plane, because master Kuthumi specified that when a
human dies, negative karma stops temporarily and waits for that human to return
to physical life to haunt him again, since the physical world is the place for
action, while the Devachan is the place for rest.
And surely William
Atkinson copied these lies from Charles Leadbeater who was spreading them as
you can read in the following extract that appears in chapter three of his book
"The life after death and how theosophy unveils it":
« On the astral plane
the man is free to do precisely what he likes, and can devote his whole time to
whatever may be his chosen occupation so long. For example, a man who greatest
delight is music, upon the astral plane he has the opportunity of listening to
all the grandest music that earth can produce, and is even able under these new
conditions to hear far more in it than before, since here other and fuller
harmonies than our dull ears can grasp are now within his reach. The man whose
delight is in art, who loves beauty in form and color, has all the loveliness
of this higher world before him from which to choose. If his fancy turns
towards science or history, the libraries and the laboratories of the world are
at his disposal. »
This book was
published in 1912, but Leadbeater had been teaching this long before through
lectures he gave on his international tours.
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