Life
After Death
by
C. W.
Leadbeater
THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING HOUSE
Adyar, Chennai 600 020, India • Wheaton, IL, USA
First Edition 1912
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Contents |
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I
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Is there any Certain Knowledge?
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1
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II
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The True Fact
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9
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III
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Purgatory
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17
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IV
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The Heaven-World
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33
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V
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Many Mansions
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46
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VI
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Our Friends in Heaven
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55
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VII
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Guardian Angels
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67
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VIII
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Human Workers in the Unseen
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77
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IX
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Helping the Dead
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88
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IS THERE ANY CERTAIN KNOWLEDGE ?
This subject of life after death is one of great interest to all of us, not
only because we ourselves must certainly one day die, but far more because there
can scarcely be any one among us, except perhaps the very young, who has not
lost (as we call it) by death someone who is near and dear to us. So if there be
any information available with regard to the life after death, we are naturally
very anxious to have it. But the first thought which arises in the mind of the
man who sees such a title as this is usually 'Can anything be certainly known as
to life after death?' We have all had various theories put before us on the
subject by the various religious bodies, and yet even the most devoted followers
of these sects seem hardly to believe their
2
teachings about this matter, for they still speak of death as 'the king of
terrors', and seem to regard the whole question as surrounded by mystery and
horror. They may use the term 'falling asleep in Jesus', but they still employ
the black dresses and plumes, the horrible crape and the odious black-edged
notepaper, they still surround death with all the trappings of woe, and with
everything calculated to make it seem and dark and terrible. We have an evil
heredity behind us in this matter; we have inherited these funeral horrors from
forefathers, and so we are used to them, and do not see the absurdity and
monstrosity of it all. The ancients were in this respect wiser than we, for they
did not associate all these nightmares of gloom with the death of body — partly
perhaps because they had a much more rational method of disposing of the body —
a method which was not only infinitely better for the dead man and more healthy
for the living, but was also free from the gruesome suggestions connected with
slow decay. They knew much more about death in those days, and because
3
they knew more they mourned less.
The first thing that we must realize about death is that it is a perfectly
natural incident in the course of our life. That ought to be obvious to us
immediately, because if we believe at all in a God who is a loving Father we
should know that a fate which, like death, comes to all alike, cannot be evil,
and that whether we are in this world or the next we must be equally safe in His
hands. This consideration alone should have shown us that death is not something
to be dreaded, but simply a necessary step in our evolution. It ought not to be
necessary for Theosophy to come among Christian nations and teach death is a
friend and not an enemy. It would not be necessary if Christianity had not so
largely forgotten its own best traditions. It has come to regard the grave as
'the bourn from which no traveller returns', and the passage of it as a leap in
the dark, into some awful unknown void. On this point, as on many others,
Theosophy has a gospel for the western world; it has to announce that there is
no gloomy
4
impenetrable abyss beyond the grave, but instead a world of light and life,
which may be known to us as fully and accurately as the streets of our own city.
We have created the gloom and the horror for ourselves, like children who
frighten themselves with ghastly stories, and we have only to study the facts of
the case, and all these artificial clouds will roll away at once. Death is no
darksome king of terrors, no skeleton with a scythe to cut short the thread of
rife, but rather an angel bearing a golden key, with which he unlocks for us the
door into a fuller and higher life than this.
But men will naturally say 'This is very beautiful and poetic, but how can we
certainly know that it is really so?' You may know it in many ways; there is
plenty of evidence ready to the hand of anyone who will take the trouble to
gather it together. Shakespeare's statement is really a remarkable one when we
consider that ever since the dawn of history, and in every country of which we
know anything, travellers have always been returning from beyond the
5
grave, and showing themselves to their fellowmen. There is much evidence for
such apparitions, as they have been called. At one time it was fashionable to
ridicule all such stories; now it is no longer so, since scientific men like Sir
William Crookes, the discoverer of the metal thallium and the inventor of
Crookes's radiometer, and Sir Oliver Lodge, the great scientist, and eminent
public men like Mr Balfour, the late Premier of England, have joined and
actively worked with a Society-instituted for the investigation of such
phenomena. Read the reports of the work of the Society for Psychical Research,
and you will see something of the testimony which exists as to the return of the
dead. Read books like Mr Stead's Real Ghost Stories, or Camille Flammarion's
L'Inconnu, and you will find there plenty of accounts of apparitions, showing
themselves — not centuries ago in some faraway land, but here and now among
ourselves — to persons still living, who can be questioned and can testify to
the reality of their experiences.
6
Another line of testimony to the life after death is the study of modern
spiritualism. I know that many people think that there is nothing to be found
along that line but fraud and deception; but I can myself bear personal witness
that this is not so. Fraud and deception there may have been — nay, there has
been — in certain cases; but nevertheless I fearlessly assert that there are
great truths behind this, which may be discovered by any man who is willing to
devote the necessary time and patience to their unfolding. Here again there is a
vast literature to be studied, or the man who prefers it may make his
investigations for himself at firsthand as I did. Many men may not be willing to
take that trouble or to devote so much time; very well, that is their affair,
but unless they will examine, they have no right to scoff at those who have
seen, and therefore know that these things are true.
A third line of evidence, which is the one most commending itself to
theosophical students, is that of direct investigation. Every man has within
himself latent faculties, undeveloped senses, by
7
means of which the unseen world can be directly cognized, and to any one who
will take the trouble to evolve these powers the whole world beyond the grave
will lie open as the day. A good many theosophical students have already
unfolded these inner senses, and it is the evidence thus obtained that I wish to
lay before you. I know very well that this is a considerable claim to make — a
claim which would not be made by any minister of any church when he gave you his
version of the states after death. He will say, 'The Church teaches this', or
'The Bible tells you so', but he will never say,' I who speak to you, have seen
this, and know it to be true'. But in Theosophy we are able to say to you quite
definitely that many of us know personally that of which we speak, for we are
dealing with a definite series of facts which we have investigated, and which
you yourselves may investigate in turn. We offer you what we know, yet we say to
you 'unless this commends itself to you as utterly reasonable, do not rest
contented with our assertion; look into these things for
8
yourselves as fully as you can, and then you will be in a position to speak to
others as authoritatively as we do'. But what are the facts which are disclosed
to us by these investigations?
II
THE TRUE FACTS
The state of affairs found as actually existing is much more rational than most
of the current theories. It is not found that any sudden change takes place in
man at death, or that he is spirited away to some heaven beyond the stars. On
the contrary, man remains after death exactly what he was before it — the same
in intellect, the same in his qualities and powers; and the conditions in which
he finds himself are those which his own thoughts and desires have already
created for him. There is no reward or punishment from outside, but only the
actual result of what the man himself has done and said and thought while here
on earth. In fact, the man makes his bed during earth life and afterwards he has
to lie on it!
10
This is the first and most prominent fact — that we have not here a strange new
life, but a continuation of the present one. We are not separated from the dead,
for they are here about us all the time. The only separation is the limitation
of our consciousness, so that we have lost, not our loved ones, but the power to
see them. It is quite possible for us to raise our consciousness, that we can
see them and talk with them as before, and all of us constantly do that, though
we only rarely remember it fully. A man may learn to focus his consciousness in
his astral body while his physical body is still awake, but that needs special
development, and in the case of the average man would take much time. But during
the sleep of his physical body every man uses his astral vehicle to a greater or
lesser extent, and in that way we are daily with our departed friends. Sometimes
we have a partial remembrance of meeting them, and then we say we dreamt of
them; more frequently we have no recollection of such encounters and remain
ignorant that they have taken place. Yet it is a
11
definite fact that the ties of affection are still as strong as ever, and so the
moment the man is freed from the chains of his physical encasement he naturally
seeks the company of those whom he loves. So that in truth the only change is
that he spends the night with them instead of the day, and he is conscious of
them astrally instead of physically.
The bringing through of the memory from the astral plane to the physical is
another and quite separate consideration, which in no way affects our
consciousness on that other plane, nor our ability to function upon it with
perfect ease and freedom. Whether you recollect them or not, they are still
living their life close to you, and the only difference is that they have taken
off this robe of flesh which we call the body. That makes no change in them, any
more than it makes a change in your personality when you remove your overcoat.
You are somewhat freer, indeed, because you have less weight to carry, and
precisely the same is the case with them. The man's passions, affections,
emotions and
12
intellect are not in the least affected when he dies, for none of these belong
to the physical body which he has laid aside. He has dropped this vesture, and
is living in another, but he is still able to think and to feel just as before.
I know how difficult it is for the average mind to grasp the reality of that
which we cannot see with our physical eyes. It is very hard for us to realize
how very partial our sight is — to understand that we are living in a vast world
of which we see only a tiny part. Yet science tells us with no uncertain voice
this is so, for it describes to us whole worlds of minute life (microbes) of
whose very existence we should be entirely ignorant as far as our senses are
concerned. Nor are the creatures of those worlds unimportant because minute, for
upon a knowledge of the condition and habits of some of those microbes depends
our ability to preserve health, and in many cases life itself. But our senses
are limited in another direction. We cannot see the very air that surrounds us;
our senses would give us no indication of its
13
existence, except that when it is in motion we are aware of it by the sense of
touch. Yet in it there is a force that can wreck our mightiest vessels and throw
down our strongest buildings. You see how all about us there are mighty forces
which yet elude our poor and partial senses; so obviously we must beware of
falling into the fatally common error of supposing that what we see is all there
is to see.
We are, as it were, shut up in a tower, and our senses are tiny windows opening
out in certain directions. In many other directions we are entirely shut in, but
clairvoyance or astral sight opens for us one or two additional windows, and so
enlarges our prospect, and spreads before us a new and wider world, which is yet
part of the old one, though before we did not know of it.
Looking out into this new world, what should we first see? Supposing that one of
us transferred his consciousness to the astral plane what changes would be the
first to strike him? To the first glance there would probably be very little
difference, and he would suppose himself to be
14
looking upon the same world as before. Let me explain to you why this is so —
partially at least, for to explain fully would need a whole treatise upon astral
physics. Just as we have different conditions of matter here, the solid, the
liquid, the gaseous, so are there different conditions or degrees of density of
astral matter, and each degree is attracted by and corresponds to that which is
similar to it on the physical plane. So that your friend would still see the
walls and the furniture to which he was accustomed, for though the physical
matter of which they are composed would no longer be visible to him, the densest
type of astral matter would still outline them for him as clearly as ever. True,
if he examined the object closely he would perceive that all the particles were
visible in rapid motion, instead of only invisibly, as is the case on this
plane; but very few men do observe closely, and so a man who dies often does not
know at first that any change has come over him.
He looks about him, and sees the same rooms with which he is familiar, peopled
still by those
15
whom he has known and loved — for they also have astral bodies, which are within
the range of his new vision. Only by degrees does he realize that in some ways
there is a difference. For example, he soon finds that for him all pain and
fatigue have passed away. If you can at all realize what that means, you will
begin to have some idea of what the higher life truly is. Think of it, you who
have scarcely ever a comfortable moment, you who in the stress of your busy life
can hardly remember when you last felt free from fatigue; what would it be to
you never again to know the meaning of the words weariness and pain? We have so
mismanaged our teaching in these Western countries on the subject of immortality
that usually a dead man finds it difficult to believe that he is dead, simply
because he still sees and hears, thinks and feels. 'I am not dead', he will
often say, 'I am alive as much as ever, and better than I ever was before'. Of
course, he is; but that is exactly what he ought to have expected, if he had
been properly taught. Realization may perhaps come to him in this way.
16
He sees his friends about him, but he soon discovers that he cannot always
communicate with them. Sometimes he speaks to them, and they do not seem to
hear; he tries to touch them, and finds that he can make no impression upon
them. Even then, for some time, he persuades himself that he is dreaming, and
will presently awake, for at other times (when they are what we call asleep) his
friends are perfectly conscious of him, and talk with him as of oldc But
gradually he discovers the fact that he is after all dead, and then he usually
begins to become uneasy. Why? Again because of the defective teaching which he
has received. He does not understand where he is, or what has happened, since
his situation is not what he expected from the orthodox standpoint. As an
English general once said on this occasion, 'But if I am dead, where am I? If
this is heaven I don't think much of it; and if it is hell, it is better than I
expected!'
III
PURGATORY
GREAT deal of totally unnecessary uneasiness nd even acute suffering has been
caused by those who still continue to teach the world silly fables about
nonexistent bugbears instead of using reason and common sense. The baseless and
blasphemous hellfire theory has done more harm than even its promoters know, for
it has worked evil beyond the grave as well as on this side. But presently the
'dead' man will meet with some other dead person who has been more sensibly
instructed, and will learn from him that there is no cause for fear, and that
there is a rational life to be lived in this new world, just as there was in the
old one. He will find by degrees that there is very much that is new as well as
much that is a counterpart of that which he
18
already knows; for in this astral world thoughts and desires express themselves
in visible forms though these are composed mostly of the finer matter of the
plane. As his astral life proceeds, these become more and more prominent, for we
must remember that he is all the while steadily withdrawing further and further
into himself. The entire period of an incarnation is in reality occupied by the
ego in first putting himself forth into matter, and then in drawing back again
with the results of his effort. If the ordinary man were asked to draw a line
symbolic of life, he would probably make it a straight one, beginning at birth
and ending at death; but the theosophical student should rather represent the
life as a great ellipse, starting from the ego on the higher mental level and
returning to him. The line would descend into the lower part of the mental
plane, and then into the astral. A very small portion, comparatively, at the
bottom of the ellipse, would be upon the physical plane, and the line would very
soon re-ascend into the astral and mental planes. The physical life would
therefore be
19
represented only by that small portion of the curve lying below the line which
indicated the boundary between the astral and physical planes, and birth and
death would simply be the points at which the curve crossed that line —
obviously by no means the most important points of the whole.
The real central point would clearly be that furthest removed from the ego — the
turning point, as it were — what in astronomy we should call the aphelion. That
is neither birth nor death, but should be a middle point in the physical life,
when the force from the ego has expended its outward rush, and turns to begin
the long process of withdrawal. Gradually his thoughts should turn upward, he
cares less and less for merely physical matters, and eventually he drops the
dense body altogether. His life on the astral plane commences, but during the
whole of it the process of withdrawal continues. The result of this is that as
time passes he pays less and less attention to the lower matter of which
counterparts of physical objects are composed,
20
and is more and more occupied with that higher matter of which thought-forms are
built — so far, that is, as thought-forms appear on the astral plane at all. So
his life becomes more and more a life in a world of thought, and the counterpart
of the world which he has left fades from his view, not that he has changed his
location in space, but that his interest is shifting its centre. His desires
still persist, and the forms surrounding him will be very largely the expression
of these desires, and whether his life is one of happiness or discomfort will
depend chiefly upon the nature of these.
A study of this astral life shows us very clearly the reason for many ethical
precepts. Most men recognize that sins which injure others are definitely and
obviously wrong; but they sometimes wonder why it should be said to be wrong for
them to feel jealousy, or hatred, or ambition, so long as they do not allow
themselves to manifest these feelings outwardly in deed or in speech. A glimpse
at this after-world shows us exactly how such feelings injure the man who
21
harbours them, and how they would cause him suffering of the most acute
character after his death. We shall understand this better if we examine a few
typical cases of astral life, and see what their principal characteristics are.
Let us think first of the ordinary colourless man, who is neither specially
good, nor specially bad, nor indeed specially anything in particular. The man is
in no way changed, so colourlessness will remain his principal characteristic
(if we can call it one) after his death. He will have no special suffering and
no special joy, and may very probably find astral life rather dull, because he
has not, during his time on earth, developed any rational interests. If he has
had no ideas beyond gossip or what is called sport, or nothing beyond his
business or his dress, he is likely to find time hanging heavy on his hands when
all such things are no longer possible. But the case of a man who has had strong
desires of a low material type, such as could be satisfied only on the physical
plane, is an even worse one. Think of the case of the drunkard or the
sensualist. He has been
22
the slave of over-mastering craving during earth-life, and it still remains
undiminished after death — rather, it is stronger than ever, since its
vibrations have no longer the heavy physical particles to set in motion. But the
possibility of gratifying this terrible thirst is for ever removed, because the
body, through which alone it could be satisfied, is gone. We see that the fires
of purgatory are no inapt symbols for the vibrations of such a torturing desire
at this. It may endure for quite a long time, since it passes only by gradually
wearing itself out, and the man's fate is undoubtedly a terrible one. Yet there
are two points that we should bear in mind in considering it. First, the man has
made it absolutely for himself, and determined the exact degree of its, power
and its duration. If he had controlled that desire during life there would have
been just so much the less of it to trouble him after death. Secondly, it is the
only way in which he can get rid of the vice. If he could pass from a life of
sensuality and 'drunkenness directly into his next incarnation, he would be born
a slave to his vice
23
— it would dominate him from the beginning, and there would be for him no
possibility of escape. But now that the desire has worn itself out, he will
begin his new career without that burden, and the soul, having had so severe a
lesson, will make every possible effort to restrain its lower vehicles from
repeating such a mistake.
All this was known to the world even as lately as classical times. We see it
clearly imaged for us in the myth of Tantalus, who suffered always with raging
thirst, yet was doomed for ever to see the water recede just as it was about to
touch his lips. Many an other sin produces its result in a manner just as
gruesome, although each is peculiar to itself. See how the miser will suffer
when he can no longer hoard his gold, when he perhaps knows that it is being
spent by alien hands. Think how the jealous man will continue to suffer from his
jealousy, knowing that he has now no power to interfere upon the physical plane,
yet feeling more strongly than ever. Remember the fate of Sisyphus in Greek myth
— how he was condemned for ever to roll a heavy
24
rock up to the summit of a mountain, only to see it roll down again the moment
that success seemed within his reach. See how exactly this typifies the
afterlife of the man of worldly ambition. He has all his life been in the habit
of forming selfish plans, and therefore he continues to do so in the astral
world; he carefully builds up his plot until it is perfect in his mind, and only
then realizes that he has lost the physical body which is necessary for its
achievement. Down fall his hopes; yet so ingrained is the habit that he
continues again and again to roll the same stone up the same mountain of
ambition, until the vice is worn out. Then at last he realizes that he need not
roll his rock, and lets it rest in peace at the bottom of the hill.
We have considered the case of the ordinary man, and of the man who differs from
the ordinary because of his gross and selfish desires. Now let us examine the
case of the man who differs from the ordinary in the other direction, who has
some interests of a rational nature. In order to understand how the after-life
appears to
25
him, we must bear in mind that the majority of men spend the greater part of
their waking life and most of their strength in work that they do not really
like, that they would not do at all if it were not necessary in order to earn
their living, or support those who are dependent upon them. Realize the
condition of the man when all necessity for this grinding toil is over, when it
is no longer necessary to earn a living, since the astral body requires no food
nor clothing nor lodging. Then for the first time since earliest childhood that
man is free to do precisely what he likes, and can devote his whole time to
whatever may be his chosen occupation — so long, that is, as it is of such a
nature as to be capable of realization without physical matter. Suppose that a
man's greatest delight is in 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
26
person whose delight is in art, who loves beauty in form and colour, has all the
loveliness of this higher world before him from which to choose. If his delight
is in beauty in Nature, he has unequalled possibilities for indulging in it; for
he can readily and rapidly move from place to place, and enjoy in quick
succession wonders of Nature which the physical man would need years to visit.
If his fancy turns towards science or history, the libraries and the
laboratories of the world are at his disposal, and his comprehension of
processes in chemistry and biology would be far fuller than ever before, for now
he could see the inner as well as the outer workings, and many of the causes as
well as the effects. And in all the cases there is the wonderful additional
delight that no fatigue is possible. Here we know how constantly, when we are
making some progress in our studies or our experiments, we are unable to carry
them on because the brain will bear no more than a certain amount of strain;
outside of the physical no fatigue seems to exist, for it is in reality the
brain and not the mind that tires.
27
All this time I have been speaking of mere selfish gratification, even though it
be of the rational and intellectual kind. But there are those among us who would
not be satisfied without something higher than this — whose greatest joy in any
life would consist in serving their fellowmen. What has the astral life in store
for them? They will pursue their philanthropy more vigorously than ever, and
under better conditions than on this lower plane. There are thousands whom they
can help, and with far greater certainty of really being able to do good than is
usually possible in this life. Some devote themselves thus to the general good;
some are especially occupied with cases among their own family or friends,
either living or dead. It is a strange inversion of the facts, this employment
of those words living and dead; for surely we are the dead, we who are buried in
these gross cramping physical bodies; and they are truly the living, who are so
much freer and more capable, because less hampered. Often the mother who has
passed into that higher life will still watch
28
over her child and be to him a veritable guardian angel; often the 'dead'
husband still remains within reach, and in touch with his sorrowing wife,
thankful if even now and then he is able to make her feel that he lives in
strength and love beside her as of yore.
If all this be so, you may think, then surely the sooner we die the better; such
knowledge seems almost to place a premium on suicide! If you are thinking solely
of yourself and of your pleasure, then emphatically that would be so. But if you
think of your duty towards God and towards your fellows, then you will at once
see that this consideration negates that view. You are here for a purpose — a
purpose which can only be attained upon this physical plane. The soul has to
take much trouble, to go through much limitation, in order to gain this earthly
incarnation, and therefore its efforts must not be thrown away unnecessarily.
The instinct of self-preservation as divinely implanted in our breasts, and it
is our duty to make the most of this earthly life which is ours, and to retain
it as
29
long as circumstances permit. There are lessons to be learnt on this plane which
cannot be learnt anywhere else, and the sooner we learn them the sooner we shall
be free for ever from the need of return to this lower and more limited life. So
none must dare to die until his time comes, though when it does come he may well
rejoice, for indeed he is about to pass from labour to refreshment. Yet all this
which I have told you now is insignificant beside the glory of the life which
follows it — the life of the heaven-world. This is the purgatory — that is the
endless bliss of which monks have dreamed and poets sung — not a dream after
all, but a living and glorious reality. The astral life is happy for some,
unhappy for others, according to the preparation they have made for it; but what
follows it is perfect happiness for all, and exactly suited to the needs of
each.
Before closing this chapter let us consider one or two questions which are
perpetually recurring to the minds of those who seek information about the next
life. Shall we be able to make progress
30
there, some will ask? Undoubtedly, for progress is the rule of the Divine
Scheme. It is possible to us just in proportion to our "development. The man who
is a slave to desire can only progress by wearing out his desire; still, that is
the best that is possible at his stage. But the man who is kindly and helpful
learns much in many ways through the work which he is able to do in that astral
life; he will return to earth with many additional powers and qualities because
of the practice he has had in unselfish effort. So we need have no fear as to
this question of progress. Another point often raised is, shall we recognize our
loved ones who have passed on before us? Assuredly we shall, for neither they
nor we shall be changed; why, then, should we not recognize them? The attraction
is still there, and will act as a magnet to draw together those who feel it,
more readily and more surely there than here. True, that if the loved one has
left this earth very long ago, he may have already passed beyond the astral
plane, and entered the heaven-life; in that case we must wait until we
31
also reach that level before we can rejoin him, but when that is gained we shall
possess our friend more perfectly than, in this prison-house, we can ever
realize. But of this be sure, that those whom you have loved are not lost; if
they have died recently, then you will find them on the astral plane; if they
have died long ago, you will find them in the heaven-life, but in any case the
reunion is sure where the affection exists. For love is one of the mightiest
powers of the universe, whether it be in life or in death.
There is an infinity of interesting information to be given about this higher
life. You should read the literature; read Annie Besant's Death and After, and
my own books on The Astral Plane and The Other Side of Death. It is very well
worth your while to study this subject, for the knowledge of the truth takes
away all fear of death, and makes life easier to live, because we understand its
object and its end. Death brings no suffering, but only joy, for those who live
the true, the unselfish life. The old Latin saying is literally true — Mors
janua vita — death is the
32
gate of life. That is exactly what it is — a gate into a fuller and higher life.
On the other side of the grave, as well as on this, prevails the great law of
Divine Justice, and we trust as implicitly there as here to the action of that
law, with regard both to ourselves and to those we love.
IV
THE HEAVEN-WORLD
TILL religions agree in declaring the existence of heaven and in stating that
the enjoyment of its bliss follows upon a well-spent earthly life. Christianity
and Islam speak of it as a reward assigned by God to those who have pleased him,
but most other faiths describe it rather as the necessary result of the good
life, exactly as we should from the theosophical point of view. Yet though all
religions agree in painting this happy life in glowing terms, none of them have
succeeded in producing an impression of reality in their descriptions. All that
is written about heaven is so absolutely unlike anything that we have known,
that many of the descriptions seem almost grotesque to us. We should hesitate to
admit this with regard to the legends familiar to
34
us from our infancy, but if the stories of one of the other great religions were
read to us, we should see it readily enough. In Buddhist or Hindu books you will
find magniloquent accounts of interminable gardens, in which the trees are all
of gold and silver, and their fruits of various kinds of jewels, and you might
be tempted to smile, unless the thought occurred to you that after all, to the
Buddhist or Hindu our tales of streets of gold and gates of pearl might in truth
seem quite as improbable. The fact is that the ridiculous element is imported
into these accounts only when we take them literally, and fail to realize that
each scribe is trying the same task from his point of view, and that all alike
are failing because the great truth behind it all is utterly indescribable. The
Hindu writer had no doubt seen some of the gorgeous gardens of the Indian kings,
where just such decoration as he describes are commonly employed. The Jewish
scribe had no familiarity with such things, but he dwelt in a great and
magnificent city — probably Alexandria; and so his conception of splendour
35
was a city, but made unlike anything on earth by the costliness of its material
and its decorations. So each is trying to paint a truth which is too grand for
words by employing such similes as are familiar to his mind.
There have been those since that day who have seen the glory of heaven, and have
tried in their feeble way to describe it. Some of our own students have been
among these, and in the Theosophical Manual No. 6 you may find an effort of my
own in that direction. We do not speak now of gold and silver, of rubies and
diamonds, when we wish to convey the idea of the greatest possible refinements
and beauty of colour and form; we draw our similies rather from the colours of
the sunset, and from all the glories of sea and sky, because to us these are the
more heavenly. Yet those of us who have seen the truth know well that in all our
attempts at description we have failed as utterly as the oriental scribes to
convey any idea of a reality
The Devachanic Plane, or the Heaven -World.
36 *
which no words can ever picture, though every man one day shall see it and know
it for himself. For this heaven is not a dream; it is a radiant reality; but to
comprehend anything of it we must first change one of our initial ideas on the
subject. Heaven is not a place, but a state of consciousness. If you ask me
'Where is heaven?' I must answer you that it is here — round you at this very
moment, near to you as the air you breath. The light is all about you, as the
Buddha said so long ago; you have only to cast the bandage from your eyes and
look. But what is this casting away of a bandage? Of what is it symbolical? It
is simply a question of raising the consciousness to a higher level, of learning
to focus it in the vehicle of finer matter. I have already spoken of the
possibility of doing this with regard to the astral body, thereby seeing the
astral world; this needs simply a further stage of the same process, the raising
of consciousness to the mental plane, for man has a body for that level also,
through which he may receive its vibrations, and so live in the glowing
splendour
37
of heaven while still possessing a physical body ___ though indeed after such an
experience he will have little relish for the return to the latter. The ordinary
man reaches this state of bliss only after death, and not immediately after it
except in very rare cases. I have explained how after death the Ego steadily
withdraws into himself. The whole astral life is in fact a constant process of
withdrawal, and when in course of time the soul reaches the limit of that plane,
he dies to it in just the same way as he did to the physical plane. That is to
say, he casts off the body of that plane, and leaves it behind him while he
passes on to higher and still fuller life. No pain or suffering of any kind
precedes this second death, but just as with the first, there is usually a
period of unconsciousness, from which the man awakes gradually. Some years ago I
wrote a book called The Devachanic Plane, in which I endeavoured to some extent
to describe what he would see, and to tabulate as far as I could the various
subdivisions of this glorious Land of Light, giving instances which had been
38
observed in the course of our investigations in connection with this
heaven-life. For the moment I shall try to put the matter before you from
another point of view, and those who wish may supplement the information by
reading that book as well. Perhaps the most comprehensive opening statement is
that this is the plane of the Divine Mind, that here we are in the very realm of
thought itself, and that everything that man possibly could think is here in
vivid living reality. We labour under a great disadvantage from our habit of
regarding material things as real, and those which are not material as
dream-like and therefore unreal; whereas the fact is that everything which is
material is buried and hidden in this matter, and so whatever of reality it may
possess is far less obvious and recognizable than it would be when regarded from
a higher standpoint. So that when we hear of a world of thought, we immediately
think of an unreal world, built out of 'such stuff as dreams are made of, as the
poet says.
Try to realize that when a man leaves his
39
physical body and opens his consciousness to astral life, his first sensation is
of the intense vividness and reality of that life, so that he thinks 'Now for
the first time I know what it is to live'. But when in turn he leaves that life
for the higher one, he exactly repeats the same experience, for this life is in
turn so much fuller and wider and more intense than the astral that once more no
comparison is possible. And yet there is another life beyond all this, unto
which even this is but as moonlight unto sunlight; but it is useless at present
to think of that.
There may be many to whom it sounds absurd that a realm of thought should be
more real than the physical world; well, it must remain so for them until they
have some experience of a life higher than this, and then in one moment they
will know far more than any words can ever tell them.
On this plane, then, we find existing the infinite fullness of the Divine Mind,
open in all its limitless affluence to every soul, just in proportion as that
soul has qualified himself to
40
receive. If man had already completed his destined evolution, if he had fully
realized and unfolded the divinity whose germ is within him, the whole of this
glory would be within his reach; but since none of us has yet done that, since
we are only gradually rising towards that splendid consummation, it comes that
none as yet can grasp that entirely, but each draws from it and cognizes only so
much as he has by previous effort prepared himself to take. Different
individuals bring very different capabilities; as the eastern simile has it,
each man brings his own cup, and some of the cups are large and some are small,
but small or large, every cup is filled to its utmost capacity; the sea of bliss
holds far more than enough for all.
All religions have spoken of this bliss of heaven, yet few of them have put
before us with sufficient clearness and precision this leading idea which alone
explains rationally how for all alike such bliss is possible — which is, indeed,
the keynote of the conception — the fact that each man makes his own heaven by
selection
41
from the ineffable splendours of the Thought of God Himself. A man decides for
himself both the length and character of his heaven-life by the causes which he
himself generates during his earth-life; therefore he cannot but have exactly
the amount which he has deserved, and exactly the quality of joy which is best
suited to his idiosyncrasies, for this is a world in which every being must,
from the very fact of his consciousness there, be enjoying the highest spiritual
bliss of which he is capable — a world whose power of response to his
aspirations is limited only by his capacity to aspire.
He had made himself an astral body by his desires and passions during
earth-life, and he had to live in it during his astral existence, and that time
was happy or miserable i for him according to its character. Now this time of
purgatory is over, for that lower part of his nature has burnt itself away: now
the.re remain only the higher and more refined thoughts, the noble and unselfish
aspirations that he poured out during earth-life. These cluster round him, and
make a
42
sort of shell about him, through the medium of which he is able to respond to
certain types of vibration in this refined matter. These thoughts which surround
him are the powers by which he draws upon the wealth of the heaven-world, and he
finds it to be a storehouse of infinite extent upon which he is able to draw
just according to the power of those thoughts and aspirations which he generated
in the physical and astral life. All the highest of his affection and his
devotion is now producing its results, for there is nothing else left; all that
was selfish or grasping has been left behind in the plane of desire.
For there are two kinds of affection. There is one, hardly worthy of so sublime
a name, which thinks always of how much love it is receiving in return for its
investment in attachment, which is ever worrying as to the exact amount of
affection which the other person is showing for it, and so is constantly
entangled in the evil meshes of jealousy and suspicion. Such feeling, grasping
and full of greed, will work out its results of doubt and misery upon the plane
of desire, to which it
43
so clearly belongs. But there is another kind of love, which never stays to
think how much it is loved, but has only the one object of pouring itself out
unreservedly at the feet of the object of its affection, and considers only how
best it can express in action the feeling which fills its heart so utterly. Here
there is no limitation, because there is no grasping, no drawing towards the
self, no thought of return, and just because of that there is a tremendous
outpouring of force, which no astral matter could express, nor could the
dimensions of the astral plane contain it. It needs the finer matter and the
wider space of the higher level, and so the energy generated belongs to the
mental world. Just so, there is a religious devotion which thinks mainly of what
it will get for its prayers, and lowers its worship into a species of
bargaining; while there is also a genuine devotion, which forgets itself
absolutely in the contemplation of its deity. We all know well that in our
highest devotion there is something which has never yet been satisfied, that our
grandest aspirations have never yet been
44
realized, that when we really love unselfishly, our feeling is far beyond all
power of expression on this physical plane, that the profound emotion stirred
within our hearts by the noblest music or the most perfect art reaches to
heights and depths unknown to this dull earth. Yet all of this is a wondrous
force of power beyond our calculation, and it must produce its result somewhere,
somehow, for the law of the conservation of energy holds good upon the higher
planes of thought and aspiration just as surely as in ordinary mechanics. But
since it must react upon him who set it in motion, and yet it cannot work upon
the physical plane because of its narrowness and comparative grossness of
matter, how and when can it produce its inevitable result? It simply waits for
the man until it reaches its level; it remains as so much stored-up energy until
its opportunity arrives. While his consciousness is focussed upon the physical
and astral planes it cannot react upon him, but as soon as he transfers himself
entirely to the mental it is ready for him,
45
its floodgates are opened, and its action commences. So perfect justice is done,
and nothing is ever lost, even though to us in this lower world it seems to have
missed its aim and come to nothing.
MANY MANSIONS
THE keynote of the conception is the I comprehension of how man makes his own
heaven. Here upon this plane of the Divine Mind exists, as we have said, all
beauty and glory conceivable; but the man can look out upon it all only through
the windows he himself has made. Every one of his thought-forms is such a
window, through which response may come to him from the forces without. If he
has chiefly regarded physical things during his earth-life, then he has made for
himself but few windows through which this higher glory can shine in upon him.
Yet every man will have had some touch of pure, unselfish feeling, even if it
were but once in all his life, and that will be a window for him now. Every man,
except the utter savage at a very early
47
stage, will surely have something of this wonderful time of bliss. Instead of
saying, as orthodoxy does, that some men will go to heaven and some to hell, it
would be far more correct to say that all men will have their share of both
states (if we are to call even the lowest astral life by so horrible a name as
hell), and it is only their relative proportions which differ. It must be borne
in mind that the soul of the ordinary man is as yet but at an early stage of his
development. He has learnt to use his physical vehicle with comparative ease,
and he can also function tolerably freely in his astral body, though he is
rarely able to carry through the memory of its activities to his physical brain;
but his mental body is not yet in any true sense a vehicle at all, since he
cannot utilize it as he does those lower bodies, cannot travel about in it, nor
employ its senses for the reception of information in the normal way.
We must not think of him, therefore, as in a condition of any great activity, or
as able to move about freely, as he did upon the astral levels. His
48
condition here is chiefly receptive, and his communication with the world
outside him is only through his own windows, and therefore exceedingly limited.
The man who can put forth full activity there is already almost more than man,
for he must be a glorified spirit, a great and highly evolved entity. He would
have full consciousness there, and would use his mental vehicle as freely as the
ordinary man employs his physical body, and through it vast fields of higher
knowledge would lie open to him.
But we are thinking of one as yet less developed than this — one who has his
windows, and sees only through them. In order to understand his heaven we must
consider two points: his relation to the plane itself, and his relation to his
friends. The question of his relation to his surroundings upon the plane divides
itself into two parts, for we have to think first of the matter of the plane as
moulded by his thought, and secondly of the forces of the plane as evoked in
answer to his aspirations.
I have mentioned how man surrounds himself
49
with thought-forms; here on this plane we are in the very home of thought, so
naturally those forms are all-important in connection with these considerations.
There are living forces about him, mighty angelic inhabitants of the plane, and
many of their orders are very sensitive to certain aspirations of man, and
readily respond to them. But naturally both his thoughts and his aspirations are
only along the lines which he has already prepared during earth-life. It might
seem that when he was transferred to a plane of such transcendent force and
vitality he might well be stirred up to entirely new activities along hitherto
unwonted lines; but this is not possible. His mind-body is not in by any means
the same order as his lower vehicles, and is by no means so fully under his
control. All through a past of many lives it has been accustomed to receive its
impressions and incitements to ' action from below, through the lower vehicles,
chiefly from the physical body, and sometimes from the astral; it has done very
little in the way of receiving direct mental vibrations at its own level,
50
arid it cannot suddenly begin to accept and respond to them. Practically, then,
the man does not initiate any new thoughts, but those which he has already
formed, the windows through which he looks out on his new world.
With regard to these windows there are two possibilities of variation — the
direction in which they look, and the kind of glass of which they are composed.
There are very many directions which the higher thought may take. Some of these,
such as affection and devotion, are so generally of a personal character that it
is perhaps better to consider them in connection with the man's relation to
other people; let us rather take first an example where that element does not
come in — where we have to deal only with the influence of his surroundings.
Suppose that one of his windows into heaven is that of music. Here we have a
very mighty force; you know how wonderfully music can uplift a man, can make him
for the time a new being in a new world; if you have ever experienced its effect
you will realize that here we are in the presence of a
51
stupendous power. The man that has not music in his soul has no window open in
that direction; but a man who has a musical window will receive through it three
entirely distinct sets of impressions, all of which, however, will be modified
by the kind of glass he has in his window. It is obvious that his glass may be a
great limitation to his view; it may be coloured, and so admit only certain rays
of light, or it may be of poor material, and so distort and darken all the rays
as they enter. For example, one man may have been able while on earth to
appreciate only one class of music and so on. But suppose his musical window to
be a good one, what will he receive through it?
First, he will sense that music which is the expression of the ordered movement
of the forces of the plane. There was a definite face behind the poetic idea of
the music of the spheres, for on these higher planes all movement and action of
any kind produce glorious harmonies both of sound and colour. All thought
expresses itself in this way — his own as well as
52
that of others — in a lovely yet indescribable series of ever-changing chords,
as of a thousand aeolian harps. This musical manifestation of the vivid and
glowing life of heaven would be for him a kind of ever present and
ever-delightful background to all his other experiences.
Secondly, there is among the inhabitants of the plane one class of entities —
one great order of angels, as our Christian friends would call them, who are
specially devoted to music, and habitually express themselves by its means to a
far fuller extent than the rest. They are spoken of in old Hindu books under the
name of Gandharvas. The man whose soul is in tune with music will certainly
attract their attention, and will draw himself into connection with some of
them, and so will learn with ever-increasing enjoyment all the marvellous new
combinations which they employ. Thirdly, he will be a keenly appreciative
listener to the music made by his fellowmen in the heaven-world. Think how many
great composers have preceded him: Bach, Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Handel, Mozart,
53
Rossini — all are there, not dead but full of vigorous life, and ever pouring
forth far grander strains, far more glorious harmonies, than any which they knew
on earth. Each of these is indeed a fountain of wondrous melody, and many an
inspiration of our earthly musicians is in reality but a faint and far-off echo
of the sweetness of their song. Very far more than we realize of the genius of
this lower world is nothing but a reflection of the untrammelled powers of those
who have gone before us; oftener than we think the man who is receptive here can
catch some thought from them, and reproduce it, so far as may be possible, in
this lower sphere. Great masters of music have told us how,they sometimes hear
the whole of some grand oratorio, some stately march, some noble chorus in one
resounding chord; how it is in this way that the inspiration comes to them,
though when they try to write it down in notes, many pages of music may be
necessary to express it. That exactly expresses the manner in which the heavenly
music differs from that which we know
54 j
here; one mighty chord there will convey what \ here would take hours to
render far less effectively.
Very similar would be experiences of the man whose window was art. He also would
have the same three possibilities of delight, for the order of the plane
expresses itself in colour as well as in sound, and all theosophical students
are familiar with the fact that there is a colour language of the Devas — an
order of spirits whose very communication one with another is by flashings of
splendid colour. Again, all the great artists of medieval times are working
still — not with brush and canvas, but with the far easier, yet infinitely more
satisfactory, moulding of mental matter by the power of thought. Every artist
knows how far below the conception in his mind is the most successful expression
of it upon paper or canvas; but here to think is to realize, and disappointment
is impossible. The same is true of all directions of thought, so that there is
in truth an infinity to enjoy and to learn, far beyond all that our limited
minds can grasp down here.
I
VI
OUR FRIENDS IN HEAVEN
8UT let us turn to the second part of our subject, the question of the man's
relations with persons whom he loves, or with those for whom he feels devotion
or adoration. Again and again people ask us whether they will meet and know
their loved ones in this grander life, whether amid all this unimaginable
splendour they will look in vain for the familiar faces without which all would
for them seem vanity. Happily to this question the answer is clear and
unqualified; the friends will be there without the least shadow of doubt, and
far more fully, far more really, than ever they have been with us yet.
Yet again, men often ask: 'What of our friends already in the enjoyment of the
heaven-life; can
56
they see us here below? Are they watching us and waiting for us?' Hardly; for
there would be difficulties in the way of either of these theories. How could
the dead be happy if he looked back and saw those whom he loved in sorrow or
suffering, or, far worse still, in the commission of sin? And if we adopt the
other alternative, that he does not see, but is waiting, the case is scarcely
better. For then the man will have a long and wearisome period of waiting, a
painful time of suspense, often extending over many years, while the friend
would in many cases arrive so much changed as to be no longer sympathetic. In
the system so wisely provided for us by Nature all these difficulties are
avoided; those whom the man loves most he has ever with him, and always at their
noblest and best, while no shadow of discord or change can ever come between
them, since he receives from them all the time, exactly what he wishes. The
arrangement is infinitely superior to anything which the imagination of man has
been able to offer us in its place — as indeed we might have expected — for all
those
57
speculations were man's idea of what is best, but the truth is God's idea. Let
me try to explain it. Whenever we love a person very deeply we form a strong
mental image of him, and he is often present in our mind. Inevitably we take his
mental image into the heaven-world with us, because it is to that level of
matter that it naturally belongs. But the love which forms and retains such an
image is a very powerful force — a force which is strong enough to reach and act
upon the soul of that friend, the real man whom we love. That soul at once and
eagerly responds, and pours himself into the thought-form which we have made for
him, and in that way we find our friend truly present with us, more vividly than
ever before. Remember, it is the soul we love, not the body; and it is the soul
that we have with us here. It may be said, 'Yes, that would be so if the friend
were also dead; but suppose he is still alive; he cannot be in two places at
once.' The fact is that, as far as this is concerned, he can be in two places at
once, and often many more than two; and whether he is what we
58
commonly call living, or what we commonly call dead, makes not the slightest
difference. Let us try to understand what a soul really is, and we shall see
better how this may be.
The soul belongs to a higher plane, and is a much greater and grander thing than
any manifestation of it can be. Its relation to its manifestations is that of
one dimension to another — that of a line to a square, or a square to a cube. No
number of squares could ever make a cube, because the square has only two
dimensions, while the cube has three. So no number of expressions on any lower
plane can ever exhaust the fullness of the soul, since he stands upon an
altogether higher level. He puts down a small portion of himself into a physical
body in order to acquire experience which can only be had on this plane; he can
take only one such body at a time, for that is the law; but if he could take a
thousand, they would not be sufficient to express what he really is. He may have
only one physical body, but if he has evoked such love from a friend, that that
friend has a
59
strong mental image of him always present in his thought, then he is able to
respond to that love by pouring into that thought-form his own life, and so
vivifying it into a real expression of him on this level, which is two whole
planes higher than the physical, and therefore so much the better able to
express his qualities.
If it still seems difficult to realize how his consciousness can be active in
that manifestation as well as in this, compare with this an ordinary physical
experience. Each of us, as he sits in his chair, is conscious at the same
instant of several physical contacts. He touches the seat of the chair, his feet
rest on the ground, his hands feel the arms of the chair, or perhaps hold a
book; and yet his brain has no difficulty in realizing all these contacts at
once; why, then, should it be harder for the soul, which is so much greater than
the mere physical consciousness, to be consciousness simultaneously in more than
one of these manifestations on planes so entirely below him? It is really the
one man who feels all those different contacts; it is really the one man
60
who feels all these different thought-images, and is real, living and loving in
all of them. You have him there always at his best, for this is a far fuller
expression than the physical plane could give, even under the best of
circumstances.
Will this affect the evolution of the friend in any way, it may be asked?
Certainly it will, for it allows him an additional opportunity of manifestation.
If he has a physical body he is already learning physical lessons through it,
but this enables him at the very same time to develop the quality of affection
much more rapidly through the form on the mental plane which you have given him.
So your love for him is doing great things for him. As we have said, the soul
may manifest in many images if he is fortunate enough to have them made for him.
One who is much loved by many people may have part in many heavens
simultaneously, and so may evolve with far greater rapidity; but this vast
additional opportunity is the direct result and reward of those lovable
qualities which drew towards him the affectionate regard of so many
61
of his fellow men. So not only does he receive love from all these, but through
that receiving he himself grows in love, whether these friends be living or
dead.
We should observe, however, that there are two possible limitations to the
perfection of this intercourse. First, your image of your friend may be partial
and imperfect, so that many of his higher qualities may not be represented, and
may therefore be unable to show themselves forth through it. Then, secondly,
there may be some difficulty from your friend's side. You may have formed a
conception somewhat inaccurately; if your friend be as yet not a highly evolved
soul, it is possible that you may even have overrated him in some direction, and
in that case there might be some aspect of your thought image which he could not
completely fill. This, however, is unlikely, and could only take place when a
quite unworthy object had been unwisely idolized. Even then the man who made the
image would not find any change or lack in his friend, for the latter is at
least better able to fulfil his
62
ideal than he has ever been during physical life. Being undeveloped, he may not
be perfect, but at least he is better than ever before, so nothing is wanting to
the joy of the dweller in heaven. Your friend can fill hundreds of images with
those qualities which he possesses, but when a quality is as yet underdeveloped
in him, he does not suddenly evolve it because you have supposed him already to
have attained it. Here is the enormous advantage which those have who form
images only of those who cannot disappoint them — or, since there could be no
disappointment, we should rather say, of those capable of rising above even the
highest conception that the lower mind can form of them. The Theosophist who
forms in his mind the image of the Master knows that all the inadequacy will be
on his own side, for he is drawing thereupon a depth of love and power which his
mental plummet can never sound.
But, it may be asked, since the soul spends so large a proportion of his time in
the enjoyment of the bliss of this heaven-world, what are his
63
opportunities of development during his stay there? They may be divided into
three classes, though of each there may be many varieties. First, through
certain qualities in himself he has opened certain windows into this
heaven-world; by the continued exercise of those qualities through so long a
time he will greatly strengthen them, and will return to earth for his next
incarnation very richly endowed in that respect. All thoughts are intensified by
reiteration, and the man who spends a thousand years principally in pouring
forth unselfish affection will assuredly at the end of that period know how to
love strongly and well.
Secondly, if through his window he pours forth an aspiration which brings him
into contact with one of the great orders of spirits, he will certainly acquire
much from his intercourse with them. In music they will use all kinds of
overtones and variants which were previously unknown to him; in art they are
familiar with a thousand types of which he has had no conception. But all of
these will gradually impress themselves upon him, and
66
unimaginable splendour which surrounds you here and now in this dull daily life.
This is part of the gospel which Theosophy brings to you — the certainty of this
sublime future for all. It is certain because it is here already, because to
inherit it we have only to fit ourselves for it.
vn
GUARDIAN ANGELS
To my mind it is one of the most beautiful I points about our theosophical
teaching that it gives back to man all of the most useful and helpful beliefs of
the religions which he has outgrown. There are many who, though they feel that
they cannot bring themselves to accept much that they used to take as a matter
of course, nevertheless look back with a certain amount of regret to some of the
prettier ideas of their mental childhood. They have come up out of twilight into
fuller light, and they are thankful for the fact, and they could not return into
their former attitude if they would; yet some of the dreams of the twilight were
lovely, and the fuller light seems sometimes a little hard in comparison with
its softer tints. Theosophy comes to their rescue
68
here, and shows them that all the glory and the beauty and the poetry, glimpses
of which they used dimly to catch in their twilight, exist as a living reality,
and that instead of disappearing before the noonday glow, its splendour will be
only the more vividly displayed thereby. But our teaching gives them back their
poetry on quite a new basis — a basis of scientific fact instead of uncertain
tradition. A very good example of such belief is to be found under our title
of'Guardian Angels'. There are many graceful traditions of spiritual
guardianship and angelic intervention which we should all very much like to
believe if we could only see our way to accept them rationally, and I hope to
explain that to a very large extent we may do this.
The belief in such intervention is a very old one. Among the earliest Indian
legends we find accounts of the occasional appearances of minor deities at
critical points in human affairs; the Greek epics are full of similar stories,
and in the history of Rome itself we read how the heavenly twins, Castor and
Pollux, led the armies of the
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infant republic at the battle of Lake Regillus. In medieval days St James is
recorded to have led the Spanish troops to victory, and there are many tales of
angels who watched over the pious wayfarer, or interfered at the right moment to
protect him from harm. 'Merely a popular superstition', the superior person will
say; perhaps, but wherever we encounter a popular superstition which is widely
spread and persistent, we almost invariably find some kernel of truth behind it
— distorted and exaggerated often, yet a truth still. And this is a case in
point. Most religions speak to men of guardian angles, who stand by them in
times of sorrow and trouble; and Christianity was no exception to this rule. But
for its sins there came upon Christendom the blight which by an extraordinary
inversion of truth was called the Reformation, and in that upheaval very much
was lost that for the majority of us has not even yet been regained. That
terrible abuses existed, and that a reform was needed in the church I should be
the last to deny: yet surely the
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Reformation was a very heavy judgement for the sins which had preceded it. What
is called Protestantism has tempted and darkened the world for its votaries, for
among many strange and gloomy falsehoods it has endeavoured to propagate the
theory that nothing exists to occupy the infinity of stages between the Divine
and the human. It offers us the amazing conception of a constant capricious
interference by the Ruler of the universe with the working of his own laws and
the result of his own decrees, and this usually at the request of his creatures,
who are apparently supposed to know better than he what is good for them. It
would be impossible, if one could ever come to believe this, to divest one's
mind of the idea that such interference might be, and indeed must be, partial
and unjust. In Theosophy we have no such thought, for we hold the belief in
perfect Divine justice, and therefore we recognize that there can be no
intervention unless the person involved has deserved such help. Even then, it
would come to him through agents, and never by direct Divine
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interposition. We know from our study, and many of us from our experience also,
that many intermediate stages exist between the human and the Divine. The old
belief in angels and archangels is justified by the facts, for just as there are
various kingdoms below humanity, so there are also kingdoms above it in
evolution. We find next above us, holding much the same position with regard to
us that we in turn hold to the animal kingdom, the great kingdom of devas or
angels, and above them again an evolution which has been called that of the
Dhyan Chohans, or archangels (though the names given to these orders matter
litde), and so onward and upward to the very feet of Divinity. All is one
graduated life, from God Himself to the very dust beneath our feet — one long
ladder, of which humanity occupies only one of the steps. There are many steps
below and above us and every one of them is occupied. It would indeed be absurd
for us to suppose that we constitute the highest possible form of development —
the ultimate achievement of evolution. The
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occasional appearance among humanity of men much further advanced shows us our
next stage, and furnishes us with an example to follow. Men such as Buddha and
the Christ, and many other lesser teachers, exhibit before our eyes a grand
ideal towards which we may work, however far from its attainment we may find
ourselves at the present moment.
If special interventions in human affairs occasionally take place, is it then to
the angelic hosts that we may look as the probable agents employed in them?
Perhaps sometimes, but very rarely, for these higher beings have their own work
to do, connected with their place in the mighty scheme of things, and they are
little likely either to notice or to interfere with us. Man is unconsciously so
extraordinarily conceited that he is prone to think that all the greater powers
in the universe ought to be watching over him, and ready to help him whenever he
suffers through his own folly or ignorance. He forgets that he is not engaged in
acting as a beneficent providence to the kingdoms below him, or going out of his
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to look after and help the wild animals. Sometimes he plays to them the part of
the orthodox devil, and breaks into their innocent and harmless lives with
torture and wanton destruction, merely to gratify his own degraded lust of
cruelty, which he chooses to denominate 'sport'; sometimes he holds animals in
bondage, and takes a certain amount of care of them, but it is only that they
may work for him — not that he may forward their evolution in the abstract. How
can he expect from those above him a type of supervision which he is so very far
from giving to those below him? It may well be that the angelic kingdom goes
about its own business, taking little more notice of us than we take of the
sparrows in the trees. It may now and then happen that an angel becomes aware of
some human sorrow or difficulty which moves his pity, and he may try to help us,
just as we may try to assist an animal in distress; but certainly his wider
vision would recognize the fact that at the present stage of evolution such
interpositions would in the vast majority of cases be productive
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of infinitely more harm than good. In the far distant past man was frequently
assisted by these non-human agencies because then there were none as yet among
our infant humanity capable of taking the lead as teachers; but now that we are
attaining our adolescence, we are supposed to have arrived at a stage when we
can provide leaders and helpers from among our own ranks. There is another
kingdom of Nature of which little is known — that of Nature-spirits or fairies.
Here again popular tradition has preserved a trace of the existence of an order
of beings unknown to science. They have been spoken of under many names —
pixies, gnomes, kobolds, brownies, sylphs, undines, good people, etc., and there
are few lands in whose folklore they do not play a part. They are beings
possessing either astral or etheric bodies, and consequently it is only rarely
and under peculiar circumstances that they become visible to man. They usually
avoid his neighbourhood, for they dislike his wild outbursts of passion and
desire, so that when they are seen it is generally in some
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lonely spot, and by some mountaineer or shepherd whose work takes him far from
the busy haunts of the crowd. It has sometimes happened that one of these
creatures has become attached to some human being and devoted himself to his
service as will be found in stories of the Scottish Highlands; but as a rule
intelligent assistance is hardly to be expected from entities of this class.
Then there are the great Adepts, the Masters of Wisdom — men like ourselves, yet
so much more highly evolved that to us they seem as gods in power, in wisdom and
in compassion. Their whole life is devoted to the work of helping evolution;
would they therefore be likely to intervene sometimes in human affairs? Possibly
occasionally, but only very rarely, because they have other and far greater work
to do. The ignorant sometimes have suggested that the Adepts ought to come down
into our great towns and help the poor — the ignorant, I say, because only one
who is exceedingly ignorant and incredibly presumptuous ever ventures to
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criticize thus the action of those so infinitely wiser and greater than himself.
The sensible and modest man realizes that what they do they must have good
reason for doing, and that for him to blame them would be the height of
stupidity and ingratitude. They have their own work on planes far higher than we
can reach; they deal directly with the souls of men, and shine upon them as
sunlight upon a flower, drawing them upwards and onwards, and filling them with
power and life; and that is a grander work by far than healing or caring for or
feeding their bodies, good though this also may be in its place. To employ them
in working on the physical plane would be a waste of force infinitely greater
than it would be to set our most learned men of science to the labour of
breaking stones upon the road, upon the plea that that was a physical work for
the good of all, while scientific work was not immediately profitable to the
poor! It is not from the Adept that physical intervention is likely to come, for
he is far more usefully employed.
VIII
HUMAN WORKERS IN THE UNSEEN
are two classes from whom intervention in human affairs may come, and in both
cases they are men like ourselves, and not far removed from our own level. The
first class consists of those whom we call the dead. We think of them as far
away, but that is a delusion; they are very near us, and though in their new
life they cannot usually see our physical bodies, they can and do see our astral
vehicles, and therefore they know all our feelings and emotions. So they know
when we are in trouble, and when we need help, and it sometimes happens that
they are able to give it. Here, then, we have an enormous number of possible
helpers, who may occasionally intervene in human affairs. Occasionally, but not
very often; for the dead man is all the while
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steadily withdrawing into himself, and therefore passing rapidly out of touch
with earthly things; and the most highly developed, and therefore the most
helpful of men, are precisely those who must pass away from earth most quickly.
Still there are undoubted cases in which the dead have intervened in human-
affairs; indeed, perhaps such cases are more numerous than we imagine, for in
very many of them the work done is only the putting of a suggestion into the
mind of some person still living on the physical plane, and he often remains
unconscious of the source of his happy inspiration. Sometimes it is necessary
for the dead man's purpose that he should show himself, and it is only then that
we who are so blind are aware of his loving thought for us. Besides, he cannot
always show himself at will; there may be many times when he tries to help, but
is unable to do so, and we all the time know nothing of his offer. Still there
are such cases, and some of them will be found recounted in my book, The Other
Side of Death. The second class among which helpers may
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be found consists of those who are able to function consciously upon the astral
plane while still living — or perhaps we had better say, while still in the
physical body, for the words 'living' and 'dead' are in reality ludicrously
misapplied in ordinary speech.
It is we, enmeshed as we are in this physical matter, buried in the dark and
noisome mist of earth-life, blinded by the heavy veil that shuts out from us so
much of the light and the glory that are shining around us — it is surely we who
are the dead; not those who, having cast off for the time the burden of the
flesh, stand amongst us radiant, rejoicing, strong, so much freer, so much more
capable than we.
Those who, while still in the physical world, have learnt to use their astral
bodies, and in some cases their mental bodies also, are usually the pupils of
the great Adepts before-mentioned. They cannot do the work which the Master
does, for their powers are not developed; they cannot yet function freely on
those lofty planes where he can produce such magnificnt results; but they
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can do something at lower levels, and they are thankful to serve in whatever way
he thinks best for them, and to undertake such work as is within their power. So
sometimes it happens that they see some human trouble or suffering which they
are able to alleviate, and they gladly try to do what they can. They are often
able to help both the living and the dead, but it must always be remembered that
they work under conditions. When such power and such training are given to a
man, they are given to him under restrictions. He must never use them selfishly,
never display them to gratify curiosity, never employ them to pry into the
business of others, never give what at spiritualistic seances are called tests —
that is to say, he must never do anything which can be proved as a phenomenon on
the physical plane. He might if he chose take a message to a dead man, but it
would be beyond his province to bring back a reply from the dead to the living,
unless it were under direct instructions from the Master. Thus the band of
invisible helpers does not constitute itself into a detective office, nor
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into an astral information bureau, but it simply and quietly does such work as
is given to it to do, or as comes in its way.
Let us see how a man is able to do such work and give such help as we have
described, so that we may understand what are the limits of this power, and see
how we ourselves may to some extent attain it. We must first think how a man
leaves his body in sleep. He abandons the physical body, in order that it may
have complete rest; but he himself, the soul, needs no rest, for he feels no
fatigue. It is only the physical body that ever becomes tired. When we speak of
mental fatigue, it is in reality a misnomer, for it is the brain and not the
mind that is tired. In sleep, then the man is simply using his astral body
instead of his physical, and it is only that body that is asleep, not the man
himself. If we examine a sleeping savage with clairvoyant sight, indeed, we
shall probably find that he is nearly as much asleep as his body — that he has
very little definite consciousness in the astral vehicle which he is inhabiting.
He is unable to move
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away from the immediate neighbourhood of the sleeping physical body, and if an
attempt were made to draw him away he would wake in terror. If we examine a more
civilized man, as for example one of ourselves, we shall find a very great
difference. In this case the man in his astral body is by no means unconscious,
but quite actively thinking. Nevertheless, he may be taking very little more
notice of his surroundings than the savage, though not at all for the same
reason. The savage is incapable of seeing; the civilized man is so wrapped up in
his own thoughts that he does not see, though he could. He has behind him the
immemorial custom of a long series of lives in which the astral faculties have
not been used, for these faculties have been gradually growing inside a shell,
something as a chicken grows inside the egg. The shell is composed of the great
mass of self-centred thought in which the ordinary man is so hopelessly
entombed. Whatever may have been the thoughts chiefly engaging his mind during
the past day, he usually continues them when falling asleep, and
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he is thus surrounded by so dense a wall of his own making that he practically
knows nothing of what is going on outside. Occasionally some violent impact from
without, or some strong desire of his own from within, may tear aside this
curtain of mist for the moment and permit him to receive some definite
impression; but even then the fog closes in again almost immediately, and he
dreams on unobservantly as before.
Can he be awakened, you will say? Yes, that may happen to him in four different
ways. First, in the far distant future the slow, but sure, evolution of the man
will undoubtedly gradually dissipate the curtain of the mist. Secondly, the man
himself, having learnt the fact of the case, may by steady and persistent effort
clear away the mist from within, and by degrees overcome the inertia resulting
from ages of inactivity. He may resolve before going to sleep to try when he
leaves his body to awaken himself and see something. This is merely a hastening
of the natural process, and there will be no harm in it if the man has
previously developed common
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sense and the moral qualities. If these are defective, he may come very sadly to
grief, for he runs the double danger of misusing such powers as he may acquire,
and of being overwhelmed by fear in the presence of forces which he can neither
understand nor control. Thirdly, it has sometimes happened that some accident,
or some unlawful use of magical ceremonies, has so rent the veil that it can
never wholly be closed again. In such a case the man may be left in the terrible
condition so well described by Madame Blavatsky in her story of 'A Bewitched
Life', or by Lord Lytton in his powerful novel, Zanoni. Fourthly, some friend
who knows the man thoroughly, and believes him capable effacing the dangers of
the astral plane and doing good, unselfish work there, may act upon this
cloud-shell from without and gradually arouse the man to his higher
possibilities. But he will never do this unless he feels absolutely sure of him,
of his courage and devotion, and of his possession of the necessary
qualifications for good work. If in all these ways he is judged
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satisfactory, he may thus be invited and enabled to join the band of helpers.
Now, as to the work such helpers can do. I have given many illustrations of this
in the little book which I have written, bearing the tide of Invisible Helpers,
so I will not report those stories now, but rather give you a few leading ideas
as to the different types of work which are most usually done. Naturally it is
of varied kinds, and most of it is not in any way physical; perhaps it may best
be divided into work with the living and work with the dead.
The giving of comfort and consolation in sorrow or sickness at once suggests
itself as a comparatively easy task, and one that can constantly be performed
without any one knowing who does it.
Often efforts are made to patch up quarrels — to effect a reconciliation between
those who long have been separated by some difference of opinions or of
interests. Sometimes it has been possible to warn men of some great danger which
impended over their heads and thus to avert an
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accident. There have been cases in which this has been done even with regard to
a purely physical matter, though more generally it is against moral danger that
such warnings are given. Occasionally it has been permissible to offer a solemn
warning to one who was leading an immoral life, and so to help him back into the
path of rectitude. If the helpers happen to know of a time of special trouble
for a friend, they will endeavour to stand by him through it, and to give him
strength and comfort.
In great catastrophes, too, there is often much that can be done by those whose
work is unrecognized by the outer world. Sometimes it may be permitted that some
one or two persons may be saved; and so it comes that in accounts of terrible
wholesale destruction we hear now and then of escapes which are esteemed
miraculous. But this is only when among those who are in danger there is one who
is not to die in that way — one who owes to the Divine law no debt that can be
paid in that fashion. In the great majority of cases all that can be done is to
make
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some effort to impart strength and courage to face what must happen, and then
afterwards to meet the souls as they arrive upon the astral plane, and welcome
and assist them there.
IX
HELPING THE DEAD
THIS brings us to the consideration of what is | by far the greatest and most
important part of the work — the helping of the dead. Before we can understand
this we must throw aside altogether the ordinary clumsy and erroneous ideas
about death and the condition of the dead. They are not far away from us, they
are not suddenly entirely changed, they have not become angels or demons. They
are just human beings, exactly such as they were before, neither better nor
worse, and they stand close by us still, sensitive to our feelings and our
thoughts even more than before. That is why uncontrolled grief for the dead is
so wrong as well as so selfish. The dead man feels every emotion which passes
through the heart of his loved ones, and if they
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uncomprehendingly give way to sorrow, that throws a corresponding cloud of
depression over him, and makes his way harder than it need be if his friends had
been better taught.
So there is much help that may be given to the dead in very many ways. First of
all, many of them — indeed, most of them — need much explanation with regard to
the new world in which they find themselves. Their religion ought to have taught
them what to expect, and how to live amid these new conditions; but in most
cases it has not done anything of the kind. So it comes that very many of them
are in a condition of considerable uneasiness, and others of positive terror.
They need to be soothed and comforted, for when they encounter the dreadful
thought-forms which they and their kind have been making for centuries —
thoughts of a personal devil and an angry and cruel Deity — they are often
reduced to a pitiable state of fear, which is not only exceedingly unpleasant,
but very bad for their evolution; and it often costs the helper much time and
trouble to bring them
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into a more reasonable frame of mind.
There are men to whom this entry into a new life seems to give for the first
time an opportunity to see themselves as they really are, and some of them are
therefore filled with remorse. Here again the helper's services are needed to
explain that what is past is past, and that the only effective repentance is the
resolve to do this thing no more — that whatever the dead man may have done, he
is not a lost soul, but that he must simply begin from where he finds himself,
and try to live the true life for the future. Some of them cling passionately to
earth, where all their thoughts and interests have been fixed, and they suffer
much when they find themselves losing hold and sight of it. Others are
earth-bound by the thoughts of crimes that they have committed, or duties that
they have left undone, while others in turn are worried about the condition of
those whom they have left behind. All these are cases which need explanation,
and sometimes it is also necessary for the helper to take steps on the physical
plane in order to carry out the wishes
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of the dead man, and to leave him free and untroubled to pass on to higher
matters. People are inclined to look at the dark side of spiritualism: but we
must never forget that it has done an enormous amount of good in this sort of
work — in giving to the dead an opportunity to arrange their affairs after a
sudden and unexpected departure.
It is surely a happy thought that the time of much needed repose for the body is
not necessarily a period of inactivity for the true man within. I used at one
time to feel that the time given to sleep was sadly wasted time; now I
understand that Nature does not so mismanage her affairs as to lose one-third of
the man's life. Of course there-are qualifications required for this work; but I
have given them so carefully and at length in my little book on the subject that
I need only just mention them here. First, he must be one-pointed, and the work
of helping others must be ever the first and highest duty for him. Secondly, he
must have perfect self-control — control over his temper and his nerves. He must
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never allow his emotions to interfere with his work in the slightest degree; he
must be above anger, and above fear. Thirdly, he must have perfect calmness,
serenity and joyousness. Men subject to depression and worry are useless, for
one great part of the work is to soothe and to calm others, and how can they do
that if they are all the time in a whirl of excitement or worry themselves?
Fourthly, the man must have knowledge; he must have already learnt down here on
this plane all that he can about the other, for he cannot expect that men there
will waste valuable time in teaching him what he might have acquired for
himself. Fifthly, he must be perfectly unselfish. He must be above the
foolishness of wounded feelings, and must think not of himself but of the work
that he has to do, so that he will be glad to take the humblest duty or the
greatest duty without envy on the one hand or conceit on the other. Sixthly, he
must have a heart filled with love — not sentimentalism, but the intense desire
to serve, to become a channel for that love of God which, like the peace
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of God, passeth man's understanding.
You may think that this is an impossible standard; on the contrary, it is
attainable by every man. It will take time to reach it, but assuredly it will be
time well spent. Do not turn away disheartened, but set to work here and now,
and strive to become fit for this glorious task, and while we are striving, do
not let us wait idly, but try to undertake some little piece of work along the
same lines. Every one knows some case of sorrow or distress, whether among the
living or the dead does not matter; if you know such a case, take it into your
mind when you lie down to sleep, and resolve as soon as you are free from this
body to go to that person and endeavour to comfort him. You may not be conscious
of the result, you may not remember anything of it in the morning; but be well
assured that your resolve will not be fruitless, and that whether you remember
what you have done or not, you will be quite sure to have done something. Some
day, sooner or later, you will find evidence that you have been successful.
Remember that as we
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help, we can be helped; remember that from the lowest to the highest we are
bound together by one long chain of mutual sendee, and that although we stand on
the lower steps of the ladder, it reaches up above these earthly mists to where
the light of God is always shining.
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