Thought Power
Its Control and Culture
by
Annie Besant
THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING HOUSE
Adyar, Chennai 600 020, India • Wheaton, III., USA
First published in 1901 by The Theosophical Publishing Society, London and
Benares
FOREWORD
THIS little book is intended to help the student to study his own nature, so far
as its intellectual part is concerned. If he masters the principles herein laid
down, he will be in a fair way to cooperate with Nature in his own evolution,
and to increase his mental stature far more rapidly than is possible while he
remains ignorant of the conditions of his growth.
The Introduction may offer some difficulties to the lay reader, and may perhaps
be skipped by such at the first reading. It is necessary, however, as a
foundation for those who would see the relation of the intellect to the other
parts of their nature and to the outer world. And those who would fulfill the
maxim "Know thyself" must not shrink from a little mental exertion, nor must
expect mental food to drop ready-cooked from the sky into a lazily-opened mouth.
If the booklet helps even a few earnest students, and clears some difficulties
out of the way, its purpose will have been served.
ANNIE BESANT
CONTENTS
|
Page |
Foreword
...... |
v |
Introduction |
1 |
CHAPTER |
I. The Nature of
Thought |
9 |
II. The Creator of
Illusion |
18 |
III. Thought
Transference |
31 |
IV. The Beginnings
of Thought |
38 |
V. Memory
|
47 |
VI. The Growth of
Thought |
57 |
VII.
Concentration |
71 |
VIII. Obstacles to
Concentration |
86 |
IX. The
Strengthening of Thought Power |
97 |
X. Helping Others by
Thought |
111 |
Afterword
|
122 |
Index...... |
123 |
INTRODUCTION
THE value of knowledge is tested by its power to purify and ennoble the life,
and all earnest students desire to apply the theoretical knowledge acquired in
their study of Theosophy to the evolution of their own character and to the
helping of their fellow-men. It is for such students that is written this little
book, with the hope that a better understanding of their own intellectual nature
may lead to a purposeful cultivation of what is good in it and an eradication of
what is evil. The emotion which impels to righteous living is half wasted if the
clear light of the intellect does not illuminate the path of conduct; for as the
blind man strays from the way unknowing till he falls into the ditch, so does
the Ego, blinded by ignorance, turn aside from the road of right living till he
falls into the pit of evil action. Truly is Avidya—the privation of
knowledge-—the first step out of unity into separateness, and only as it lessens
does separateness diminish, until its disappearance restores the Eternal Peace.
THE SELF AS KNOWER
In studying the nature of man, we separate the from the vehicles which he uses,
the living Self
2
from the garments with which he is clothed. The Self is one, however varying may
be the forms of his manifestation, when working through and by means of the
different kinds of matter. It is, of course, true that there is but One Self in
the fullest sense of the words; that as rays flame forth from the sun, the
Selves that are the true Men are but rays of the Supreme Self, and that each
Self may whisper; " I am He ". But for our present purpose, taking a single ray,
we may assert also in its separation its own inherent unity, even though this be
hidden by its forms. Consciousness is a unit, and the divisions we make in it
are either made for purposes of study, or are illusions, due to the limitation
of our perceptive power by the organs through which it works in the lower
worlds. The fact that the manifestations of the Self proceed severally from his
three aspects of knowing, willing, and energising —from which arise severally
thoughts, desires, and actions-—must not blind us to the other fact that there
is no division of substance; the whole Self knows, the whole Self wills, the
whole Self acts. Nor are the functions wholly separated; when he knows, he also
acts and wills; when he acts, he also knows and wills; when he wills, he also
acts and knows. One function is predominant, and sometimes to such an extent as
to wholly veil the others; but even in the. intensest concentration of
knowing—the most separate of the three'— there is always present a latent
energising and
3
a latent willing, discernible as present by careful analysis.
We have called these three " the three aspects of the Self"; a little further
explanation may help towards understanding. When the Self is still, then is
manifested the aspect of Knowledge, capable of taking on the likeness of any
object presented. When the Self is concentrated, intent on change of state, then
appears the aspect of Will. When the Self, in presence of any object, puts forth
energy to contact that object, then shows forth the aspect of Action. It will
thus be seen that these three are not separate divisions of the Self, not three
things joined into one or compounded, but that there is one indivisible whole,
manifesting in three ways.
It is not easy to clarify the fundamental conception of the Self further than by
his mere naming. The Self is that conscious, feeling, ever-existing One, that in
each of us knows himself as existing. No man can ever think of himself as
non-existent, or formulate himself to himself in consciousness as "I am not". As
Bhagavan Das has put it: " The Self is the indispensable first basis of life.
... In the words of Vachaspati-Mishra, in his Commentary (the Bhamati) on the
Shariraka-Bhashya of Sankaracharya: 'No one doubts "Am I?" or " Am I not? " ' "
The Self-affirmation " I am " comes before everything else, stands above and
beyond all argument. No proof can make it
1 The Science of the Emotions, p. 20.
4
stronger; no disproof can weaken it. Both proof and disproof found themselves on
" I am", the unanalysable Feeling of mere Existence, of which nothing can be
predicated except increase and diminution. " I am more " is the expression of
Pleasure; " I am less " is the expression of Pain.
When we observe this " I am", we find that it expresses itself in three
different ways: (a) The internal reflection of a Non-Self, KNOWLEDGE, the root
of thoughts; (b) the internal concentration, WILL, the root of desires; (c) the
going forth to the external, ENERGY, the root of actions; " I know" or "I
think", "I will" or "I desire", " I energise " or "I act". These are the three
affirmations of the indivisible Self, of the " I am". All manifestations may be
classified under one or other of these three heads; the Self manifests in our
worlds only in these three ways; as all colours arise from the three primaries,
so the numberless manifestations of the Self all arise from Will, Energy,
Knowledge.
The Self as Wilier, the Self as Energiser, the Self as Knower—he is the One in
Eternity and also the root of individuality in Time and Space. It is the Self in
the Thought aspect, the Self as Knower, that we are to study.
THE NOT-SELF AS KNOWN
The Self whose " nature is knowledge " finds mirrored within himself a vast
number of forms, and
5
learns by experience that he cannot know and act and will in and through them.
These forms, he discovers, are not amenable to his control as is the form of
which he first becomes conscious, and which he (mistakenly, and yet necessarily)
learns to identify with himself. He knows, and they do not think; he wills, and
they show no desire; he energises, and there is no responsive movement in them.
He cannot say in them, " I know", "I act", "I will"; and at length he recognises
them as other selves, in mineral, vegetable, animal, human, and super-human
forms, and he generalises all these under one comprehensive term, the Not-Self,
that in which he, as a separated Self, is not, in which he does not know, and
act, and will. He thus answers for a long time the question:
" What is the Not-Self? " with
" All in which I do not know and will and act."
And although truly he will find, on successive analyses, that his vehicles, one
after another—save indeed, the finest film that makes him a Self—are parts of
the Not-Self, are objects of knowledge, arc the Known, not the Knower, for all
practical purposes his answer is correct. In fact he can never know, as
divisible from himself, this finest film that makes him a separated Self, since
its presence is necessary to that separation, and to know it as the Not-Self
would be to merge in the All.
6
KNOWING
In order that the Self may be the Knower and the Not-Self the Known, a definite
relationship must be established between them. The Not-Self must affect the
Self, and the Self must in return affect the Not-Self. There must be an
interchange between the two. Knowing is a relation between the Self and the
Not-Self, and the nature of that relation must be the next division of our
subject, but it is well first to grasp clearly the fact that knowing is a
relation. It implies duality, the consciousness of a Self and the recognition of
a Not-Self—and the presence of the two set over against each other is necessary
for knowledge.
The Knower, the Known, the Knowing-—these are the three in one which must be
understood if thought-power is to be turned to its proper purpose, the helping
of the world. According to Western terminology, the Mind is the Subject which
knows; the Object is that which is known; the Relationship between them is
knowing. We must understand the nature of the Knower, the nature of the Known,
and the nature of the relation established between them, and how that
relationship arises. These things understood, we shall indeed have made a step
towards that Self-knowledge which is wisdom. Then, indeed, shall we be able to
aid the world around us, becoming its helpers and saviours; for this is the true
end of wisdom, that, set on fire by
7
love, it may lift the world out of misery into the knowledge wherein all pain
ceases for evermore. Such is the object of our study, for truly is it said in
the books of that nation which possesses the earliest, and still the deepest and
subtlest, psychology, that the object of philosophy is to put an end to pain.
For that the Knower thinks; for that knowledge is continually sought. To put an
end to pain is the final reason for philosophy, and that is not true wisdom
which docs not conduce to the finding of PEACE.
CHAPTER I THE NATURE OF THOUGHT
THE nature of thought may be studied from two standpoints: from the side of
consciousness, which is knowledge, or from the side of the form by which
knowledge is obtained, the susceptibility of which to modifications makes
possible the attainment of knowledge. This possibility has led to the two
extremes in philosophy, both of which we must avoid, because each ignores one
side of manifested life. One regards everything as consciousness, ignoring the
essentiality of form as conditioning consciousness, as making it possible. The
other regards everything as form, ignoring the fact that form can only exist by
virtue of the life ensouling it. The form and the life, the matter and the
spirit, the vehicle and the consciousness, are inseparable in manifestation, and
are the indivisible aspects of THAT in which both inhere, THAT which is neither
consciousness nor its vehicle, but the ROOT of both. A philosophy which tries to
explain everything by the forms, ignoring the life, will find problems it is
utterly unable to solve. A philosophy which tries to explain everything by the
life, ignoring
10
the forms, will find itself faced by dead walls which it cannot surmount. The
final word on this is that consciousness and its vehicles, life and form, spirit
and matter, arc the temporary expressions of the two aspects of the one
unconditioned Existence, which is not known save when manifested as the
Root-Spirit—(called by the Hindus Pratyagatman), the abstract Being, the
abstract Logos—whence all individual selves, and the Root-Matter (Mula-prakriti)
whence all forms. Whenever manifestation takes place this Root-Spirit gives
birth to a triple consciousness, and this Root-Matter to a triple matter;
beneath these is the One Reality, for ever incognisable by the conditioned
consciousness. The flower sees not the root whence it grows, though all its life
is drawn from it and without it it could not be.
The Self as Knower has as his characteristic function the mirroring within
himself of the Not-Self. As a sensitive plate receives rays of light reflected
from objects, and those rays cause modifications in the material on which they
fall, so that images of the objects can be obtained, so is it with the Self in
the aspect of knowledge towards everything external. His vehicle is a sphere
whereon the Self receives from the Not-Self the reflected rays of the One Self,
causing to appear on the surface of this sphere images which are the reflections
of that which is not himself. The Knower does not know the things themselves in
the earlier stages of his
11
consciousness. He knows only the images produced in his vehicle by the action of
the Not-Self on his responsive casing, the photographs of the external world.
Hence the mind, the vehicle of the Self as Knower, has been compared to a
mirror, in which are seen the images of all objects placed before it. We do not
know the things themselves, but only the effect produced by them in our
consciousness; not the objects, but the images of the objects, are what we find
in the mind. As the mirror seems to have the objects within it, but those
apparent objects are only images, illusions caused by the rays of light
reflected from the objects, not the objects themselves; so does the mind, in its
knowledge of the outer universe, know only the illusive images and not the
things in themselves.
These images, made in the vehicle, arc perceived as objects by the Knower, and
this perception consists in his reproduction of them in himself. Now, the
analogy of the mirror, and the use of the word " reflection " in the preceding
paragraph, are a little misleading, for the mental image is a reproduction not a
reflection of the object which causes it. The matter of the mind is actually
shaped into a likeness of the object presented to it, and this likeness, in its
turn, is reproduced by the Knower. When he thus modifies himself into the
likeness of an external object, he is said to know that object, but in the case
we are considering that which he knows is only the image produced by the object
in his vehicle, and not
12
the object itself. And this image is not a perfect reproduction of the object,
for a reason we shall see in the next chapter.
"But", it may be said, "will that be so ever? shall we never know the things in
themselves? " This brings us to the vital distinction between the consciousness
and the matter in which the consciousness is working, and by this we may find an
answer to that natural question of the human mind. When the consciousness by
long evolution has developed the power to reproduce within itself all that
exists outside it, then the envelope of matter in which it has been working
falls away, and the consciousness that is knowledge identifies its Self with all
the Selves amid which it has been evolving, and sees as the Not-Self only the
matter connected alike with all Selves severally. That is the " Day be with us",
the union which is the triumph of evolution, when consciousness knows itself and
others, and knows others as itself. By sameness of nature perfect knowledge is
attained, and the Self realises that marvellous state where identity perishes
not and memory is not lost, but where separation finds its ending, and knower,
knowing, and knowledge are one.
It is this wondrous nature of the Self, who is evolving in us through knowledge
at the present time, that we have to study, in order to understand the nature of
thought, and it is necessary to see clearly the illusory side in order that we
may utilise
13
the illusion to transcend it. So let us now study how Knowing—the relation
between the Knower and the Known—is established, and this will lead us to see
more clearly into the nature of thought.
THE CHAIN OF KNOWER, KNOWING, AND KNOWN
There is one word, vibration, which is becoming more and more the keynote of
Western science, as it has long been that of the science of the East. Motion is
the root of all. Life is motion; consciousness is motion. And that motion
affecting matter is vibration. The One, the All, we think of as Changeless,
either as Absolute Motion or as Motionless, since in One relative motion cannot
be. Only when there is differentiation, or parts, can we think of what we call
motion, which is change of place in succession of time. When the One becomes the
Many, then motion arises; it is health, consciousness, life, when rhythmic,
regular, as it is disease, unconsciousness, death, when without rhythm,
irregular. For life and death are twin sisters, alike born of motion, which is
manifestation.
Motion must needs appear when the One becomes the Many; since, when the
omnipresent appears as separate particles, infinite motion must represent
omnipresence, or, otherwise put, must be its reflection or image in matter. The
essence of matter is separateness, as that of spirit is unity, and when the
14
twain appear in the One, as cream in milk, the reflection of the omnipresence of
that One in the multiplicity of matter is ceaseless and infinite motion.
Absolute motion'—the presence of every moving unit at every point of space at
every moment of time-—is identical with rest, being only rest looked at in
another way, from the standpoint of matter instead of from that of spirit. From
the standpoint of spirit there is always One, from that of matter there are
always Many.
This infinite motion appears as rnythmical movements, vibrations, in the matter
which manifests it, each Jiva, or separated unit of consciousness, being
isolated by an enclosing wall of matter from all other Jivas.1 Each Jiva further
becomes embodied, or clothed, in several garments of matter. As these garments
of matter vibrate, they communicate their vibrations to the matter surrounding
them, such matter becoming the medium wherein the vibrations are carried
outwards; and this medium, in turn, communicates the impulse of vibration to the
enclosing garments of another Jiva, and thus sets that Jiva vibrating like the
first. In this series of vibrations—beginning in one Jiva, made in the body that
encircles it, sent on by the body to the medium around it, communicated by that
to another body,
1 There is no convenient English word for " a separated unit of consciousness
"—" spirit " and " soul " connoting various peculiarities in different schools
of thought. I shall therefore venture to use the name Jiva, instead of the
clumsy " a separated unit of consciousness''.
15
and from that second body to the Jiva encircled by it—we have the chain of
vibrations whereby one knows another. The second knows the first because he
reproduces the first in himself, and thus experiences as he experiences. And yet
with a difference. For our second Jiva is already in a vibratory condition, and
his state of motion after receiving the impulse from the first is not a simple
repetition of that impulse, but a combination of his own original motion with
that imposed on him from without, and hence is not a perfect reproduction.
Similarities are obtained, ever closer and closer, but identity ever eludes us,
so long as the garments remain.
This sequence of vibratory actions is often seen in nature. A flame is a centre
of vibratory activity in ether, named by us heat; these vibrations or
heat-waves, throw the surrounding ether into waves like unto themselves, and
these throw the ether in a piece of iron lying near into similar waves, and its
particles vibrate under their impulse, and so the iron becomes hot and a source
of heat in its turn. So does a series of vibrations pass from one Jiva to
another, and all beings are interlinked by this network of consciousness.
So again in physical nature we mark off different ranges of vibrations by
different names, calling one set light, another heat, another electricity,
another sound, and so on; yet all are of the same nature, all are modes of
motion in ether,1 though they differ in
1 Sound is also primarily an etheric vibration.
16
rates of velocity and in the character of the waves. Thoughts, Desires, and
Actions, the active manifestations in matter of Knowledge, Will, and Energy, are
all of the same nature, that is, are all made up of vibrations, but differ in
their phenomena, because of the different character of the vibrations. There is
a series of vibrations in a particular kind of matter and with a certain
character, and these we call thought-vibrations. Another series is spoken of as
desire-vibrations, another series as action-vibrations. These names are
descriptive of certain facts in nature. There is a certain kind of ether thrown
into vibration, and its vibrations affect our eyes; we call the motion light.
There is another far subtler ether thrown into vibrations which are perceived,
i.e., are responded to, by the mind, and we call that motion thought. We are
surrounded by matter of different densities and we name the motions in it as
they affect ourselves, are answered to by different organs of our gross or
subtle bodies. We name " light " certain motions affecting the eye; we name "
thought" certain motions affecting another organ, the mind. " Seeing" occurs
when the light-ether is thrown into waves from an object to our eye; " thinking
" occurs when the thought-ether is thrown into waves between an object and our
mind. The one is not more—nor less—mysterious than the other.
In dealing with the mind we shall see that modifications in the arrangement of
its materials are caused by the impact of thought-waves, and that in
17
concrete thinking we experience over again the original impacts from without.
The Knower finds his activity in these vibrations, and all to which they can
answer, that is, all that they can reproduce, is Knowledge. The thought is a
reproduction within the mind of the Knower of that which is not the Knower, is
not the Self; it is a picture, caused by a combination of wave-motions, an
image, quite literally. A part of the Not-Self vibrates, and as the Knower
vibrates in answer that part becomes the known; the matter quivering between
them makes knowing possible by putting them into touch with each other. Thus is
the chain of Knower, Known, and Knowing established and maintained.
CHAPTER II
THE CREATOR OF ILLUSION
" HAVING become indifferent to objects of perception, the pupil must seek out
the Raja of the Senses, the Thought-Producer, he who awakes illusion.
" The Mind is the great slayer of the Real."
Thus is it written in one of the fragments translated by H. P. B. from The Book
of the Golden Precepts, that exquisite prose-poem which is one of her choicest
gifts to the world. And there is no more significant title of the mind than
this: the " creator of illusion".
The mind is not the Knower, and should ever be carefully distinguished from him.
Many of the confusions and the difficulties that perplex the student arise
because he does not remember the distinction between him who knows and the mind
which is his instrument for obtaining knowledge. It is as though the sculptor
were identified with his chisel.
The mind is fundamentally dual and material, being made up of an envelope of
fine matter, called the causal body and manas, the abstract mind, and of an
envelope of coarser matter, called the mental body and manas, the concrete
mind'—manas itself
19
being a reflection in atomic matter of that aspect of the Self which is
Knowledge. This mind limits the Jiva, which, as self-consciousness increases,
finds himself hampered by it on every side. As a man, to effect a certain
purpose, might put on thick gloves, and find that his hands in them had lost
much of their power of feeling, their delicacy of touch, their ability to pick
up small objects, and were only capable of grasping large objects and of feeling
heavy impacts, so is it with the Knower when he puts on the mind. The hand is
there as well as the glove, but its capacities are greatly lessened; the Knower
is there as well as the mind, but his powers are much limited in their
expression.
We shall confine the term mind in the following paragraphs to the concrete
mind—the mental body and manas.
The mind is the result of past thinking, and is constantly being modified by
present thinking; it is a thing, precise and definite, with certain powers and
incapacities, strength and weakness, which are the outcome of activities in
previous lives. It is as we have made it; we cannot change it save slowly, we
cannot transcend it by an effort of the will, we cannot cast it aside, nor
instantaneously remove its imperfections. Such as it is, it is ours, a part of
the Not-Self appropriated and shaped for our own using, and only through it can
we know.
All the results of our past thinkings are present with us as mind, and each mind
has its own rate of
20
vibration, its own range of vibration, and is in a state of perpetual motion,
offering an ever-changing series of pictures. Every impression coming to us from
outside is made on this already active sphere, and the mass of existing
vibrations modifies and is modified by the new arrival. The resultant is not,
therefore, an accurate reproduction of the new vibrations, but a combination of
it with the vibrations already proceeding. To borrow again an illustration from
light. If we hold a piece of red glass before our eyes and look at green
objects, they will appear to us to be black. The vibrations that give us the
sensation of red are cut off by those that give us the sensation of green, and
the eye is deceived into seeing the object as black. So also if we look at a
blue object through a yellow glass, shall we see it as black. In every case a
coloured medium will cause an impression of colour different from that of the
object looked at by the naked eye.. Even looking at things with the naked eye,
persons see them somewhat differently, for the eye itself modifies the
vibrations it receives more than many people imagine. The influence of the mind
as a medium by which the Knower views the external world is very similar to the
influence of the coloured glass on the colours of objects seen through it. The
Knower is as unconscious of this influence of the mind, as a man who had never
seen, except through red or blue glasses, would be unconscious of the changes
made by them in the colours of a landscape.
21
It is in this superficial and obvious sense that the mind is called the "
creator of illusion ". It presents us only with distorted images, a combination
of itself and the external object. In a far deeper sense, indeed, is it the "
creator of illusion", in that even these distorted images are but images of
appearances, not of realities; shadows of shadows are all that it gives us. But
it will suffice us at present to consider the illusions caused by its own
nature.
Very different would be our ideas of the world, if we could know it as it is,
even in its phenomenal aspect, instead of by means of the vibrations modified by
the mind. And this is by no means impossible, although it can only be done by
those who have made great progress in controlling the mind. The vibrations of
the mind can be stilled, the consciousness being withdrawn from it; an impact
from without will then shape an image exactly corresponding to itself, the
vibrations being identical in quality and quantity, unintermixed with vibrations
belonging to the observer. Or, the consciousness may go forth and ensoul the
observed object, and thus directly experience its vibrations. In both cases a
true knowledge of the form is gained. The idea in the world of noumena, of which
the form expresses a phenomenal aspect, may also be known, but only by the
consciousness working in the causal body, untrammelled by the concrete mind or
the lower vehicles.
22
The truth that we only know our impressions of things, not the things—except as
just stated—is one which is of vital moment when it is applied in practical
life. It teaches humility and caution, and readiness to listen to new ideas. We
lose our instinctive certainty that we are right in our observations, and learn
to analyse ourselves before we condemn others.
An illustration may serve to make this more clear.
I meet a person whose vibratory activity expresses itself in a way complementary
to my own. When we meet, we extinguish each other; hence we do not like each
other, we do not see anything in each other, and we each wonder why So-and-so
thinks the other so clever, when we find each other so preternaturally stupid.
Now, if I have gained a little self-knowledge, this wonder will be checked, so
far as I am concerned. Instead of thinking that the other is stupid, I shall ask
myself: " What is lacking in me that I cannot answer his vibrations? We are both
vibrating, and if I cannot realise his life and thought, it is because I cannot
reproduce his vibrations. Why should I judge him, since I cannot even know him
until I modify myself sufficiently to be able to receive him?" We cannot greatly
modify others, but we can greatly modify ourselves, and we should be continually
trying to enlarge our receptive capacity. We must become as the white light in
which all colours are present, which distorts none because it rejects none, and
has in itself the power
23
to answer to each. We may measure our approach to the whiteness by our power of
response to the most diverse characters.
THE MENTAL BODY AND MANAS
We may now turn to the composition of the mind as an organ of consciousness in
its aspect as Knower, and see what this composition is, how we have made the
mind in the past, how we can change it in the present.
The mind on the side of life is manas, and manas is the reflection, in the
atomic matter of the third —or mental—plane, of the cognitional aspect of the
Self—of the Self as Knower.
On the side of form it presents two aspects, severally conditioning the activity
of manas, the consciousness working on the mental plane. These aspects are due
to the aggregations of the matter of the plane drawn round the atomic vibratory
centre. This matter, from its nature and use, we term mind-stuff, or
thought-stuff. It makes one great region of the universe, interpenetrating
astral and physical matter, and exists in seven subdivisions, like the states of
matter on the physical plane; it is predominantly responsive to those vibrations
which come from the aspect of the Self which is Knowledge, and this aspect
imposes on it its specific character.
The first—and higher—aspect of the form-side of mind is that called the causal
body. It is composed
24
of matter from the fifth and sixth subdivisions of the mental plane,
corresponding to the finer ethers of the physical plane. This causal body is
little developed in the majority at the present stage of evolution, as it
remains unaffected by the mental activities directed to external objects, and we
may, therefore, leave it aside, at any rate for the present. It is, in fact, the
organ for abstract thought.
The second aspect is called the mental body, and is composed of thought-stuff
belonging to the four lower subdivisions of the mental plane corresponding to
the lowest ether, and the gaseous, liquid, and solid states of matter on the
physical plane. It might indeed be termed the dense mental body. Mental bodies
show seven great fundamental types, each of which includes forms at every stage
of development, and all evolve and grow under the same laws. To understand and
apply these laws is to change the slow evolution by nature to the rapid growth
by the self-determining intelligence. Hence the profound importance of their
study.
THE BUILDING AND EVOLUTION OF THE MENTAL BODY
The method by which consciousness builds up its vehicle is one which should be
clearly grasped, for every day and hour of life gives opportunity for its
application to high ends. Waking or sleeping,
25
we are ever building our mental bodies; for when consciousness vibrates it
affects the mind-stuff surrounding it, and every quiver of consciousness, though
it be due only to a passing thought, draws into the mental body some particles
of mind-stuff, and shakes out other particles from it. So far as the vehicle—the
body—is concerned, this is due to the vibration; but it should not be forgotten
that the very essence of consciousness is to constantly identify itself with the
Not-Self, and as constantly to re-assert itself by rejecting the Mot-Self;
consciousness consists of the alternating assertion and negation, " I am this",
" I am not this"; hence its motion is and causes, in matter, the attracting and
repelling that we call a vibration. The surrounding matter is also thrown into
waves, thus serving as a medium for affecting other consciousnesses.
Now, the fineness or coarseness of the matter thus appropriated depends on the
quality of the vibrations set up by the consciousness. Pure and lofty thoughts
are composed of rapid vibrations, and can only affect the rare and subtle grades
of mind-stuff. The coarse grades remain unaffected, being unable to vibrate at
the necessary speed. When such a thought causes the mental body to vibrate,
particles of the coarser matter are shaken out of the body, and their place is
taken by particles of the finer grades, and thus better materials are built into
the mental body. Similarly, base and evil thoughts draw into the mental body the
coarser materials
26
suitable for their own expression, and these materials repel and drive out the
finer kinds.
Thus these vibrations of consciousness are ever shaking out one kind of matter
and building in another. And it follows, as a necessary consequence, that
according to the kind of matter we have built into our mental bodies in the
past, will be our power of responding to the thoughts which now reach us from
outside. If our mental bodies are composed of fine materials, coarse and evil
thoughts will meet with no response, and hence can inflict no injury; whereas if
they are built up with gross materials, they will be affected by every evil
passer-by, and will remain irresponsive to and unbenefited by the good.
When we come into touch with one whose thoughts are lofty, his
thought-vibrations, playing on us, arouse vibrations of such matter in our
mental bodies as is capable of responding, and these vibrations disturb and even
shake out some of that which is too coarse to vibrate at his high rate of
activity. The benefit we receive from him is thus largely dependent on our own
past thinking, and our " understanding" of him, our responsiveness, is
conditioned by these. We cannot jhink for each other; he can only think his own
thoughts, thus causing corresponding vibrations in the mind-stuff around him,
and these play upon us, setting up in our mental bodies sympathetic vibrations.
These affect the consciousness. A thinker external
27
to ourselves can only affect our consciousness by arousing these vibrations in
our mental bodies.
But immediate understanding does not always follow on the production of such
vibrations, caused . from outside. Sometimes the effect resembles that of the
sun and the rain and the earth on the seed that lies buried in the ground. There
is no visible answer at first to the vibrations playing on the seed; but within
there is a tiny quiver of the ensouling life, and that quiver will grow stronger
and stronger day by day, till the evolving life bursts the seed-shell and sends
forth rootlet and growing point. So with the mind. The consciousness thrills
faintly within itself, ere it is able to give any external answer to the impacts
upon it; and when we are not yet capable of understanding a noble thinker, there
is yet in us an unconscious quivering which is the forerunner of the conscious
answer. We go away from a great presence a little nearer to the rich
thought-life flowing from it than we were ere we entered it, and germs of
thought have been quickened in us, and our minds helped in their evolution.
Something, then, in the building and evolution of our minds may be done from
outside, but most must result from the activities of our own consciousness; and
if we would have mental bodies which should be strong, well-vitalised, active,
able to grasp the loftier thoughts presented to us, then we must steadily work
at right thinking; for we are our own builders, and fashion our minds for
ourselves.
28
Many people are great readers. Now, reading does not build the mind; thought
alone builds it. Reading is only valuable as it furnishes materials for thought.
A man may read much, but his mental growth will be in proportion to the amount
of thought that he expends in his reading. The value to him of the thought which
he reads depends on the use he makes of it. Unless he takes up the thought and
works on it himself, its value to him will be small and passing. " Reading makes
a full man ", said Lord Bacon, and it is with the mind as with the body. Eating
fills the stomach, but as the meal is useless to the body unless it is digested
and assimilated, so also the mind may be filled by reading, but unless there is
thought, there is no assimilation of what is read, and the mind does not grow
thereby—nay, it is likely to suffer from overloading, and to weaken rather than
strengthen under a burden of unassimi-lated ideas.
We should read less, and think more, if we would have our minds grow, and our
intelligence develop. If we are in earnest in the culture of our minds, we
should daily spend an hour in the study of some serious and weighty book, and,
reading for five minutes, we should think for ten, and so on through the hour.
The usual way is to read quickly for the hour, and then to put away the book
till the next hour comes for reading. Hence people grow very slowly in thought
power.
29
One of the most marked things in the Theosophi-cal movement is the mental growth
observable year by year in its members. This is largely due to the fact that
they are taught the nature of thought; they begin to understand a little of its
workings, and set themselves to build their mental bodies instead of leaving
them to grow by the unassisted process of nature. The student eager for growth
should resolve that no day shall pass that shall not have in it at least five
minutes' reading and ten minutes' strenuous thinking on what is read. At first
he will find the effort tiresome and laborious, and he will discover the
weakness of his thinking power. This discovery marks his first step, for it is
much to discover that one is unable to think hard and consecutively. People who
cannot think, but who imagine that they can, do not make much progress. It is
better to know one's weakness than to imagine oneself strong when one is feeble.
The realisation of the weakness —the wandering of the mind, the feeling of heat,
confusion, and fatigue which comes on in the brain after a prolonged effort to
follow out a difficult line of thought, is on all fours with the similar feeling
in the muscles after a strong muscular exertion. With regular and
persistent'—but not excessive—exercise, the thought-power will grow as the
muscle-power grows. And as this thought-power grows, it also comes under
control, and can be directed to definite ends. Without this thinking, the mental
body will remain loosely formed and unorganised; and without
30
gaining concentration—the power of fixing the thought on a definite
point—thought-power cannot be exercised at all.
CHAPTER III THOUGHT-TRANSFERENCE
ALMOST everyone now-a-days is anxious to practise thought-transference, and
dreams of the delights of communicating with an absent friend without the
assistance of telegraph or post. Many people seem to think that they can
accomplish the task with very little effort, and are quite surprised when they
meet with total failure in their attempts. Yet it is clear that one must be able
to think ere one can transfer thought, and some power of steady thinking must be
necessary in order to send a thought-current through space. The feeble
vacillating thoughts of the majority of people cause mere flickering vibrations
in the thought-atmosphere, appearing and vanishing minute by minute, giving rise
to no definite form and endowed with the lowest vitality. A thought-form must be
clearly cut and well vitalised if it is to be driven in any definite direction,
and to be strong enough, on arriving at its destination, to set up there a
reproduction of itself.
There are two methods of thought-transference, one which may be distinguished -
as physical, the other as psychical, one, belonging to the brain as
32
well as the mind, the other to the mind only. A thought may be generated by the
consciousness, cause vibration in the mental body, then in the astral body, set
up waves in the etheric, and then in the dense molecules of the physical brain;
by these brain vibrations the physical ether is affected, and the waves pass
outwards, till they reach another brain and set up vibrations in its dense and
etheric parts. By that receiving brain vibrations are caused in the astral and
then in the mental bodies attached to it, and the vibrations in the mental body
draw out the answering quiver in consciousness. Such are the many stages of the
arc traversed by a thought. But this traversing of a " loopline " is not
necessary. The consciousness may, when causing vibrations in its mental body,
direct those vibrations straight to the mental body of the receiving
consciousness, thus avoiding the round just described.
Let us see what happens in the first case.
There is a small organ in the brain, the pineal gland, the function of which is
unknown to Western physiologists, and with which Western psychologists do not
concern themselves. It is a rudimentary organ in most people, but it is
evolving, not retrograding, and it is possible to quicken its evolution into a
condition in which it can perform its proper function, the function that, in the
future, it will discharge in all. It is the organ for thought-transference, as
much as the eye is the organ of vision or the ear of hearing.
33
If anyone thinks very intently on a single idea, with concentration and
sustained attention, he will become conscious of a slight quiver or creeping
feeling—it has been compared to the creeping of an ant—in the pineal gland. The
quiver takes place in the ether which permeates the gland, and causes a slight
magnetic current which gives rise to the creeping feeling in the dense molecules
of the gland. If the thought be strong enough to cause the current, then the
thinker knows that he has been successful in bringing his thought to a
pointedness and a strength which render it capable of transmission.
That vibration in the ether of the pineal gland sets up waves in the surrounding
ether, like waves of light, only much smaller and more rapid. These undulations
pass out in all directions, setting the ether in motion, and these etheric
waves, in turn, produce undulations in the ether of the pineal gland in another
brain, and from that are transmitted to the astral and mental bodies in regular
succession, thus reaching the consciousness. If this second pineal gland cannot
reproduce these undulations, then the thought will pass unnoticed, making no
impressions, any more than waves of light make an impression on the eye of a
blind person.
In the second method of thought-transference, the thinker, having created a
thought-form on his own plane, does not send it down to the brain, but directs
it immediately to another thinker on the mental plane. The power to do this
deliberately implies a
34
far higher mental evolution than does the physical method of
thought-transference, for the sender must be self-conscious on the mental plane
in order to exercise knowingly this activity.
But this power is being continually exercised by everyone of us indirectly and
unconsciously, since all our thinkings cause vibrations in the mental body, that
must, from the nature of things, be propagated through the surrounding
mind-stuff. And there is no reason to confine the word thought-transference to
conscious and deliberate transmissions of a particular thought from one person
to another. We are all continually affecting each other by these waves of
thought, sent out without definite intent, and what is called public opinion is
largely created in this way. Most people think along certain lines, not because
they have carefully thought a question out and come to a conclusion, but because
large numbers of people are thinking along those lines, and carry others with
them. The strong thought of a great thinker goes out into the world of thought,
and is caught up by receptive and responsive minds. They reproduce his
vibrations, and thus strengthen the thought-wave, affecting others who would
have remained unresponsive to the original undulations. These, answering again,
give added force to the waves, and they become still stronger, affecting large
masses of people.
Public opinion, once formed, exercises a dominant way over the minds of the
great majority, beating
35
unceasingly on all brains and awakening in them responsive undulations.
There are also certain national ways of thinking, definite and deeply cut
channels, resulting from the continual reproduction during centuries of similar
thoughts, arising from the history, the struggles, the customs of a nation.
These profoundly modify and colour all minds born into the nation, and
everything that comes from outside the nation is changed by the national
vibration-rate. As thoughts that come to us from the outer world are modified by
our mental bodies, and when we receive them we receive their vibrations plus our
own normal vibrations—a resultant—so do nations, receiving impressions from
other nations, receive them as modified by their own national vibration-rate.
Hence the Englishman and the Frenchman, the Indian and the African, see the same
facts, but add to them their own existing prepossessions, and quite honestly
accuse each other of falsifying the facts and practising unfair methods. If this
truth, and its inevitableness, were recognised, many international quarrels
would be smoothed more easily than is now the case, many wars would be avoided,
and those waged would be more easily put an end to. Then each nation would
recognise what is sometimes called " the personal equation", and instead of
blaming the other for difference of opinion, each would seek the mean between
the two views, neither insisting wholly on its own.
36
The very practical question for the individual that arises from the knowledge of
this continual and general thought-transference, is: How much can I gain of
good, and avoid of evil, seeing that I must live in a mixed atmosphere, wherein
good and evil thought-waves are ever active and are beating against my brain ?
How can I guard myself against injurious thought-transference, and how can I
profit by the beneficial ? The knowledge of the way in which the selective power
works is of vital importance.
Each man is the person who most constantly affects his own mental body. Others
affect it occasionally, but he always. The speaker to whom he listens, the
author whose book he reads, affect his mental body. But they are incidents in
his life; he is a permanent factor. His own influence over the composition of
the mental body is far stronger than that of anyone else, and he himself fixes
the normal vibration-rate of his mind. Thoughts which do not harmonise with that
rate will be flung aside when they touch the mind. If a man thinks truth, a lie
cannot make a lodgment in his mind; if he thinks love, hate cannot disturb him;
if he thinks wisdom, ignorance cannot paralyse him. Here alone is safety, here
real power. The mind must not be allowed to lie as it were fallow, for then any
thought-seed may take root and grow; it must not be allowed to vibrate as it
pleases, for that means that it will answer to any passing vibration.
37
There lies the practical lesson. The man that practises it will soon find its
value, and will discover that by thinking, life can be made nobler and happier,
and that it is true that by wisdom we can put an end to pain.
CHAPTER IV THE BEGINNINGS OF THOUGHT
FEW outside the circle of students of psychology have troubled themselves much
with the question: How does thought originate? When we now come into the world,
we find ourselves possessed of a large amount of thought ready made, a large
store of what are called "innate ideas". These are conceptions which we bring
with us into the world, the condensed or summarised results of our experiences
in lives previous to the present one. With this mental stock-in-hand we begin
our transactions in this life, and the psychologist is never able to study by
direct observation the beginnings of thought.
He can, however, learn something from the observation of an infant, for just as
the new physical body runs over in pre-natal life the long physical evolution of
the past, so does the new mental body swiftly traverse the stages of its long
development. It is true that " mental body " is not by any means identical with
"thought", and hence that even in studying the new mental body itself, we are
not really studying the " beginnings of thought" at all; to a still greater
degree is this
39
true, when we consider that few people can study even the mental body directly,
but are confined to the observation of the effects of the workings of that body
on its denser fellow, the physical brain and nervous system. " Thought " is as
distinct from the mental body as from the physical; it belongs to consciousness,
to the life side, whereas mental and physical bodies belong alike to the form,
to the matter side, and are mere transitory vehicles or instruments. As already
said, the student must ever keep before him " the distinction between him who
knows and the mind which is his instrument for obtaining knowledge", and the
definition of the word " mind", already given, as " the mental body and manas
"—a compound.
We can, however, by studying the effects of thought on these bodies, when the
bodies are new, infer by correspondence something of the beginnings of thought,
when a Self, in any given universe, comes first into contact with the Not-Self.
The observations may help us, according to the axiom, " As above, so below".
Everything here is but a reflection, and by studying the reflections, we may
learn something of the objects that cause them.
If an infant be closely observed, it will be seen that sensations—response to
stimuli by feelings of pleasure or pain, and primarily by those of pain— precede
any sign of intelligence. That is that vague sensations precede definite
cognitions. Before birth, the infant was sustained by the life-forces
40
flowing through the mother's body. On its being launched on an independent
existence, these arc cut off. Life flows away from the body and is not now
renewed; as the life-forces lessen, want is felt, and this want is pain. The
supply of the want gives ease, pleasure, and the infant sinks back into
unconsciousness. Presently sights and sounds arouse sensation, but still no
intellectual sign is given. The first sign of intelligence is when the sight or
voice of the mother or nurse is connected with the satisfaction of the ever
recurring want, with the giving of pleasure by food; the linking together in, or
by, memory of a group of recurring sensations with one external object, which
object is regarded as separate from, and as the cause of, those sensations.
Thought is the cognition of a relation between many sensations and a one, a
unity, linking them together. This is the first expression of intelligence, the
first thought—technically a " perception". The essence of this is the
establishing of such a relation as is above described between a unit of
consciousness'—a Jiva—and an object, and wherever such a relation is established
there thought is present.
This simple and ever-verifiable fact may serve as a general example of the
beginning of thought in a separated Self—that is, in a triple Self encased in an
envelope of matter, however fine, a Self as distinguished from the Self; in such
a separated Self sensations precede thoughts; the attention of the Self is
aroused by an impression made on him and
41
responded to by a sensation. The massive feeling of want, due to the diminution
of life-energy, does not by itself arouse thought; but that want is satisfied by
the contact of the milk, causing a definite local impression, an impression
followed by a feeling of pleasure. After this has been often repeated, the Self
reaches outwards, vaguely, gropingly; outwards, because of the direction of the
impression, which has come from outside. The life-energy thus flows into the
mental body and vivifies it, so that it reflects—faintly at first—the object
which, coming into contact with the body, has caused the sensation. This
modification in the mental body, being repeated time after time, stimulates the
Self in his aspect of knowledge, and he vibrates correspondingly. He has felt
want, contact, pleasure, and with the contact an image presents itself, the eye
being affected as well as the lips, two sense-impressions blending. His own
inherent nature links these three, the want, the contact-image, the pleasure,
together, and this link is thought. Not till he thus answers is there any
thought; it is the Self that perceives, not any other or lower.
This perception specialises the desire, which ceases to be a vague craving for
something, and becomes a definite craving for a special thing—milk. But the
perception needs revision, for the Knower has associated three things together,
and one of them has to be disjoined—the want. It is significant that at an early
stage the sight of the milk-giver arouses
42
the want, the Knower calling up the want when the image associated with it
appears; the child who is not hungry will cry for the breast on seeing the
mother; later this mistaken link is broken, and the milk-giver is associated
with the pleasure as cause, and seen as the object of pleasure. Desire for the
mother is thus established, and then becomes a further stimulus to thought.
THE RELATION OF SENSATION AND THOUGHT
It is very clearly stated in many books on psychology, Eastern and Western, that
all thought is rooted in sensation, that until a large number of sensations have
been accumulated there can be no thinking. " Mind, as we know it", says H. P.
Blavatsky, " is resolvable into states of consciousness, of varying duration,
intensity, complexity, etc., all, in the ultimate, resting on sensation." i Some
writers have gone farther than this, declaring that not only are sensations the
materials out of which thoughts are constructed, but that thoughts are produced
by sensations, thus ignoring any Thinker^ any Knower. Others, at the opposite
extreme, look on thought as the result of the activity of the Thinker, initiated
from within instead of receiving its first impulse from without, sensations
being materials on which he employs his own inherent specific capacity, but not
a necessary condition of his activity.
* Secret Doctrine i, 31, note.
43
Each of the two views, that thought is the pure product of sensations and that
thought is the pure product of the Knower, contains truth, but the full truth
lies between the two. While it is necessary for the awakening of the Knower that
sensations should play upon him from without, and while the first thought will
be produced in consequence of impulses from sensation, and sensations will serve
as its necessary antecedent; yet unless there were an inherent capacity for
linking things together, unless the self were knowledge in his own nature,
sensations might be presented to him continually and never a thought would be
produced. It is only half the truth that thoughts have their beginning in
sensations; there must work on the sensations the power of organising them, and
of establishing connecting links, relations between them, and also between them
and the external world. The Thinker is the father, Sensation the mother, Thought
the child.
If thoughts have their beginnings in sensations, and those sensations are caused
by impacts from without, then it is most important that when the sensation
arises, the nature and extent of that sensation shall be accurately observed.
The first work of the knower is to observe; if there were nothing to observe he
would always remain asleep; but when an object is presented to him, when as the
Self he is conscious oi an impact, then as Knower he observes. On the accuracy
of that observation depends the
44
thought which he is to shape out of many of these observations put together. If
he observes inaccurately, if he establishes a mistaken relation between the
object that made the impact and himself who is observing the impact, then out of
that error in his own work will grow a number of consequent errors that nothing
can put right save going back to the very beginning.
Let us see now how sensation and perception work in a special case. Suppose I
feel a touch 011 my hand, the touch causes, is answered by, a sensation; the
recognition of the object which caused the sensation is a thought. When I feel a
touch, I feel, and nothing more need be added as far as that pure sensation is
concerned; but when from the feeling I pass to the object that caused the
feeling, I perceive that object and the perception is a thought. This perception
means that as Knower I recognise a relation between myself and that object, as
having caused a certain sensation in my Self. This, however, is not all that
happens. For I also experience other sensations, from colour, form, softness,
warmth, texture; these are again passed on to me as Knower, and, aided by the
memory of similar impressions formerly received, i.e., comparing past images
with the image of the object touch-.ing the hand, I decide on the kind of object
that has touched it.
In this perception of things that makes us feel, lies the beginning of
thought; putting this into the
45
ordinary metaphysical terms—the perception of a Not-Self as the cause of certain
sensations in the Self is the beginning of cognition. Feeling alone, if such
were possible, could not give consciousness of the Not-Self; there would be only
the feeling of pleasure or pain in the Self, an inner consciousness of expansion
or contraction. No higher evolution would be possible if a man could do nothing
more than feel; only when he recognises objects as causes of pleasure or pain
does his human education begin. In the establishing of a conscious relation
between the Self and the Not-Self, the whole future evolution depends, and that
evolution will largely consist in these relations becoming more and more
numerous, more and more complicated, more and more accurate on the side of the
Knower. The Knower begins his outer unfolding when the awakened consciousness,
feeling pleasure or pain, turns its gaze on the external world and says: "That
object gave me pleasure; that object gave me pain."
There must have been experienced a large number of sensations before the Self
answers externally at all. Then came a dull, confused groping after the
pleasure, due to a desire in the willing Self to experience a repetition of the
pleasure. And this is a good example of the fact mentioned before, that there is
no such thing as pure feeling or pure thought; for " desire for the repetition
of a pleasure", implies that the picture of the pleasure remains, however
faintly, in the consciousness, and this is memory,
46
and belongs to thought. For a long time the half-awakened Self drifts from one
thing to another, striking against the Not-Self in haphazard fashion, without
any direction being given to these movements by consciousness, experiencing
pleasure and pain without any perception of the cause of either. Only when this
has gone on for a long time is the perception above-mentioned possible, and the
relation between the Knower and the Known begun.
CHAPTER V MEMORY
THE NATURE OF MEMORY
WHEN a connection between a pleasure and a certain object is established, there
arises the definite desire to again obtain that object, and so repeat the
pleasure. Or, when a connection between a pain and a certain object is
established, there arises a definite desire to avoid that object, and so escape
the pain. On stimulation, the mental body readily repeats the image of the
object; for, owing to the general law that energy flows in the direction of
least resistance, the matter of the mental body is shaped most easily into the
form already frequently taken; this tendency to repeat vibrations once started,
when acted on by energy, is due to Tamas, to the inertia of matter, and is the
germ of Memory. The molecules of matter, having been grouped together, fall
slowly apart as other energies play on them, but retain for a considerable time
the tendency to resume their mutual relation; if an impulse such as grouped them
be given to them, they promptly
48
fall again into position. Further, when the Knower has vibrated in any
particular way, that power of vibration remains in him, and, in the case of the
pleasure-giving, or pain-giving object, the desire for the object, or for
avoiding the object, sets that power free, pushes it outwards, one might say,
and thus gives the necessary stimulation to the mental body. The image thus
produced is recognised by the Knower, and in the one case the attachment caused
by pleasure makes him reproduce also the image of the pleasure. In the other,
the repulsion caused by pain equally causes the image of the pain. The object
and the pleasure, or the object and the pain, are connected together in
experience, and when the set of vibrations that compose the image of the object
is made, the set of vibrations that make up the pleasure or the pain is also
started, and the pleasure or the pain is retasted in the absence of the
object. That is memory in its simplest form: a self-initiated vibration,
of the same nature as that which caused the feeling of pleasure or
pain, again causing that feeling. These images are less massive, and hence to
the partially-developed Knower less vivid and living, than those caused by
contact with an external object, heavy physical vibrations lending much energy
to the mental and desire images, but fundamentally the vibrations are identical,
and memory is the reproduction in mental matter by the Knower of objects
previously contacted. This reflection may be—and is—repeated
49
over and over again, in subtler and subtler matter, without regard to any
separated Knower, and these in their totality are the partial contents of the
memory of the Logos, the Lord of a Universe. These images of images may be
reached by any separated Knower in proportion as he has developed within himself
the " power of vibration " above mentioned. As in wireless telegraphy, a series
of vibrations composing a message may be caught by any suitable receiver—i.e.,
any receiver capable of reproducing them—so can a latent vibratory potency
within a Knower be made active by a vibration similar to it in these kosmic
images. These, on the akashic plane, form the "akashic records" often spoken of
in Theosophical literature, and they last through the life of the system.
BAD MEMORY
In order that we may clearly understand what lies at the root of " bad memory",
we must examine the mental processes which go to make up what is called memory.
Although in many psychological books memory is spoken of as a mental faculty,
there is really no one faculty to which that name should be given. The
persistence of a mental image is not due to any special faculty, but belongs to
the general quality of the mind; a feeble mind is feeble in persistence as in
all else, and—like a substance too fluid to retain the shape of the mould
50
into which it has been poured—falls quickly out of the form it has taken. Where
the mental body is little organised, is a mere loose aggregate of the molecules
of mind-stuff, a cloud-like mass without much coherence, memory will certainly
be very weak. But this weakness is general, not special; it is common to the
whole mind, and is due to its low stage of evolution.
As the mental body becomes organised and the powers of the Jiva work on it, we
yet often find what is called " a bad memory ". But if we observe this "bad
memory", we shall find that it is not faulty in all respects, that there are
some things which are well remembered, and which the mind retains without
effort. If we then examine these remembered things, we shall find that they are
things which greatly attract the mind, that the things that are much liked are
not forgotten. I have known a woman complain of a bad memory with respect to
matters that were being studied, while I have observed in her a very retentive
memory with regard to the details of a dress that she admired. Her mental body
was not lacking in a fair amount of retentiveness, and when she observed
carefully and attentively, producing a clear mental image, the image was fairly
long-lived. Here we have the key to " bad memory ". It is due to lack of
attention, to lack of accurate observation, and therefore to confused thought.
Confused thought is the blurred impression caused by careless observation
51
and lack of attention, while clear thought is the sharply-cut impression due to
concentrated attention and careful, accurate observation. We do not remember the
things to which we pay little heed, but we remember well the things that keenly
interest us.
How, then, should a " bad memory " be treated? First, the things should be
noticed with regard to which it is bad and with regard to which it is good, so
as to estimate the general quality of adhesiveness. Then the things with regard
to which it is bad should be scrutinised, in order to see if they are worth
remembering, and if they are things for which we do not care. If we find that we
care little for them, but that in our best moments we feel we ought to care for
them, then we should say to ourselves: " I will pay attention to them, will
observe them accurately, and will think carefully and steadily on them." Doing
this, we shall find our memory improve. For, as said above, memory is really
dependent on attention, accurate observation, and clear thought; the element of
attraction is valuable as fixing the attention, but if that be not present, its
place must be taken by the will.
Now, it is just here that a very definite and widely-felt difficulty arises. How
can " the will " take the place of the attraction? What is to move the will
itself? Attraction arouses desire, and desire impels the moving towards the
attractive object, This is, in the case supposed, absent. How is this
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absence of desire to be made good by the will? The will is the force prompting
action when that force is determined in its direction by the deliberate Reason,
and not by the influence of external objects felt as attractive. When the
impulse to action, that which I have often called the outgoing energy of the
Self, is motived by external objects, is drawn forth, we call the impulse
desire; when it is motived by the Pure Reason, is sent forth, we call it will.
What is needed then, in the absence of felt attraction from without, is
illumination from within, and the motive for the will must be obtained by an
intellectual survey of the field, and an exercise of the judgment as to the
highest good, the goal of effort. That which the Reason selects as the thing
most conducive to the good of the Self, serves as motive to the will. And when
this has once been definitely done, then in moments of lassitude, of weakness,
the recalling of the train of thought which led to the choice, again stimulates
the will. Such a thing, deliberately chosen, may then be rendered attractive,
i.e., an object of desire, by setting the imagination to picture its pleasing
qualities, the beneficial—happiness-giving—effects of its possession. But as he
who wills an object wills the means, we become able to overcome the natural
shrinking from effort and unpleasant discipline, by an exercise, thus motived,
of the will. In the case under consideration, having determined that certain
objects are eminently desir able as conducive to prolonged happiness, we set the
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will to work to carry out the activities which will lead to their obtaining.
In cultivating the power of observation, as in everything- else, a little
practice repeated daily is much more effective than a great effort followed by a
period of inaction. We should set ourselves a little daily task of observing a
thing carefully, imagining it in the mind in all its details, keeping the mind
fixed on it for a short time, as the physical eye might be fixed on an object.
On the following day we should call up the image, reproducing it as accurately
as we can, and should then compare it with the object, and observe any
inaccuracies. If we gave five minutes a day to this practice, alternately
observing an object and picturing it in the mind, and recalling the previous
day's image, and comparing our picture with the object, we should " improve our
memory" very rapidly, and we should really be improving our powers of
observation, of attention, of imagination, of concentration; in fact, we should
be organising the mental body, and fitting it, far more rapidly than nature will
fit it without assistance, to discharge its functions effectively and usefully.
No man can take up such a practice as this, and remain unaffected by it; and he
will soon have the satisfaction of knowing that his powers have increased, and
that they have come much more under the control of the will.
The artificial ways of improving the memory present things to the mind in an
attractive form, or
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associate with such a form the things to be remembered. If a person visualises
easily, he will aid a bad memory by constructing a picture, and attaching to
points in that picture the things he wants to remember; then the calling up of
the picture brings up also the things that were to be remembered. Other people,
in whom the auditory power is dominant, remember by the jingle of rhymes, and,
for instance, weave a series of dates, or other unattractive facts, into verses
that " stick in the mind ". But far better than any of these ways is the
rational method detailed above, by the use of which the mind-body becomes better
organised, more coherent as to its materials.
MEMORY AND ANTICIPATION
Let us return to our undeveloped Knower.
When memory begins to function anticipation quickly follows, for anticipation is
only memory thrown forwards. When memory gives the retasting of a pleasure
experienced in the past, desire seeks to again grasp the object which gave the
pleasure, and when this retasting is thought of as the result of finding that
object in the outer world and enjoying it, we have anticipation. The image of
the object and the image of the pleasure are dwelt on by the Knower in relation
to each other; if he adds to this contemplation the element of time, of past and
future, two names are given to such contemplation:
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the contemplation plus the idea of the past is memory, plus the idea of
the future it is anticipation. As we study these images, we begin to understand
the full force of the aphorism of Patanjali, that for the practice of Yoga a man
must stop the " modifications of the thinking principle ". Looked at from the
standpoint of occult science, every contact with the Not-Self modifies the
mental body. Part of the stuff of which that body is composed is re-arranged
as a picture or image of the external object. When relations are established
between these images, that is thinking, as seen on the form side.
Correspondent with this are vibrations in the Knower himself, and these
modifications within himself are thinking as seen on the life-side. It must
not be forgotten that the establishing of these relations is the peculiar work
of the Knower, his addition to the images, and that this addition changes the
images into thoughts. The pictures in the mental body very much resemble in
their character the impressions made on a sensitive plate by the etheric waves
which lie beyond the light spectrum and which act chemically on the silver
salts, re-arranging the matter on the sensitive plate, so that pictures are
formed on it of the objects to which it has been exposed. So on the
sensitive plate that we call the mental body, the materials are re-arranged as a
picture of the objects that have been contacted. The Knower perceives these
pictures by his own responsive vibrations, studies them, and after a while
begins to arrange them and
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Thought Power
to modify them by the vibrations he sends out on them from himself. By the law
already spoken of, that energy follows the line of least resistance; he re-forms
over and over again the same images, makes images of images; so long as he
confines himself to this simple reproduction, with the sole addition of the
time-element, we have, as said, memory and anticipation.
Concrete thinking is, after all, only a repetition in subtler matter of
every-day experiences, with this difference, that the Knower can stop and change
their sequence, repeat them, hurry or slacken them as he will. He can delay on
any image, brood over it, dwell on it, and can thus gain from his leisurely
re-examination of experiences much that had escaped him as he passed through
them, bound to the unresting, unhasting wheel of time. Within his own domain, he
can make his own time, so far as its measures are concerned, as does the Logos
for His worlds; only he cannot escape from the essence of time, succession,
until he can touch the Logoic consciousness, freeing himself from the bonds of
the world-matter; and then, even, only so far as this system is concerned.
CHAPTER VI THE GROWTH OF THOUGHT
OBSERVATION AND ITS VALUE
THE first requisite for competent thinking is attentive and accurate
observation. The Self as Knower must observe the Not-Self with attention and
with accuracy, if it is to become the Known, and thus merge in the Self.
The second requisite is receptivity and tenacity in the mental body, the power
of yielding quickly to impressions and of retaining them when made. .
In proportion to the attention and accuracy of vhe Knower's observation, and the
receptivity and tenacity of his mental body, will be the rapidity of his
evolution, the speed at which his latent potencies become active powers.
If the Knower has not accurately observed the thought-image, or if the mental
body, being undeveloped, has been insensitive to all but the stronger vibrations
of an external object, and so has been modified into an imperfect reproduction,
the material for thought is inadequate and misleading The broad outline is at
first all that is obtained,
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the details being blurred or even omitted. As we evolve our faculties, and as we
build finer stuff into the mental body, we find that we receive from the same
external object much more than we received in our undeveloped days. Thus we find
much more in an object than we before found in it.
Let two men stand in a field, in presence of a splendid sunset. Let one of these
be an undeveloped agricultural labourer, who has not been in the habit of
observing nature save with reference to his crops, who has only looked at the
sky to see if it promises rain or sunshine, caring nothing for its aspects save
as they bear on his own livelihood and employment. Let the second be an artist,
a painter of genius, full of the love of beauty, and trained to see and enjoy
every shade and tone of colour. The labourer's physical, astral, and mental
bodies are all in presence of that gorgeous sunset, and all the vibrations
caused by it are playing upon the vehicles of his consciousness; he sees
different colours in the sky, and observes that there is much red, promising a
fine day for the morrow, good or bad for his crops, as the case may be. This is
all he gets out of it. The painter's physical, astral, and mental bodies are all
exposed to exactly the same pulsations as those of the labourer, but how
different is the result! The fine material of his bodies reproduces a million
vibrations too rapid and subtle to move the coarse material of the other. His
image of the sunset is consequently quite different from the image
59
produced in the labourer. The delicate shades of colour, hue melting into hue,
translucent blue and rose and palest green lighted with golden gleams and
flecked with royal purple—all these are tasted with a lingering joy, an ecstasy
of sensuous delight; there are awakened all fine emotions, love and admiration
merging into reverence and joy that such beauty can be; ideas of the most
inspiring character arise, as the mental body modifies itself under the
vibrations playing on it on the mental plane from the mental aspect of the
sunset. The difference of the images is not due to an external cause, but to an
internal receptivity. It does not lie in the outside, but in the capacity to
respond. It is not in the Not-Self, but in the Self and its sheaths. According
to these differences is the result produced; how little flows into the one, how
much into the other!
Here we see with startling force the meaning of the evolution of the Knower. A
universe of beauty may be around us, its waves playing on us from every side,
and yet for us it may be non-existent. Everything that is in the mind of the
Logos of our system is playing on us and on our bodies now. Haw much of it we
can receive marks the stage of our evolution. What is wanted for growth is not a
change without us, but a change within us. Everything is already given us, but
we have to develop the capacity to receive.
It will be gathered from what has just been said that one element in clear
thinking is accurate
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observation. We have to begin this work on the physical plane, where our bodies
come into contact with the Not-Self. We climb upwards, and all evolution begins
on the lower plane and passes on into the higher; on the lower we first touch
the external world, and thence the vibrations pass upwards—or inwards—calling
out the inner powers.
Accurate observation, then, is a faculty to be definitely cultivated. Most
people go through the world with their eyes half closed, and we can each test
this for ourselves by questioning ourselves on what we have observed while
passing along a street. We can ask: " What have I observed while walking down
this street ? " Many persons will have observed next to nothing, no clear images
have been formed. Others will have observed a few things; some will have
observed many. It is related by Houdin that he trained his child in observing
the contents of the shops he passed, walking along the streets of London, until
he could give the whole contents of a shop-front which he had passed by without
stopping, having thrown over it a mere glance. The normal child and the savage
are observant, and according to the extent of their capacity for observation is
the measure of their intelligence. The habit of clear, quick observation lies in
the average man at the root of clear thinking. Those who think most confusedly
are generally those who observe least accurately; except where intelligence is
highly developed and is turned inwards habitually, and the bodies
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have not been trained in the way spoken of below.
But the answer to the above question may be: " I was thinking of something else,
and therefore did not observe." And the answer is a good one, if the answerer
was thinking of something more important than the training of the mental body
and of the power of attention by careful observation. Such a one may have done
well in his lack of observation; but if the answerer has only been dreaming,
drifting about aimlessly, then he has wasted his time much more than if he had
turned his energy outwards.
A man deeply engaged in thought will be unobservant of passing objects, turned
inwards and not outwards, and will not attend to what is going on before him. It
may not be worth his while, in this life, to train his bodies to make
quasi-independent observations, for the highly developed and the partially
developed need different training.
But how many of the unobservant people are really "deeply engaged in thought"?
In most people's minds all that is going on is an idle looking at any
thought-image that happens to present itself, a turning over of the contents of
the mind in an aimless fashion, as an idle woman turns over the contents of her
wardrobes or her jewel-box. This is not thinking, for thinking means, as we have
seen, the establishing of relations, the adding of something not previously
present. In thinking, the attention of the Knower
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is deliberately directed to the thought-images, and he exerts himself actively
upon them.
The development, then, of the habit of observation is part of the training of
the mind, and those who practise it will find that the mind
becomes clearer, increases in power, and becomes more easily manageable, so that
they can direct it on any given object much better than they had been able
previously to do. Now, this power of •observation, once definitely
established, works automatically, the mental and other bodies registering images
which are available if wanted later, without calling at the time on the
attention of their owner. It is, then, no longer necessary that the attention of
the person should be directed to objects presented to the sense-organs in order
that an impression of those objects may be made and preserved. A very trivial
but significant case of this kind happened in my own experience. While I
was travelling in America, a question arose one day about the number on the
engine of a train by which we had been travelling. The number was instantly
presented to me by my mind, but this was not, in any sense, a case of
clairvoyance. For clairvoyant perception it would have been necessary to have
hunted up the train and looked for the number. Without any conscious action on
my part, the sense-organs, senses, and mind had observed and registered the
number as the train came into the station, and when the number was wanted the
mental image of the incoming train,
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with the number on the front of the engine, at once came up. This faculty, once
established, is a useful one, for it means that when things that have been
passing around you have not attracted your attention at the time, you can
nonetheless recall them by looking at the record which the mental, astral, and
physical bodies have made of them on their own account.
This automatic activity of the mental body, outside the conscious activity of
the Jiva, goes on, however, more extensively in all of us than might be
supposed; for it has been found that when a person is hypnotised he will report
a number of small events which had passed him by without arousing his attention.
These impressions reach the mental body through the brain, and are impressed on
the latter as well as on the former. Many impressions thus reach the mental body
that are not sufficiently deep to enter into consciousness—not because
consciousness cannot cognise them, but because it is not normally awake enough
to notice any but the deeper impressions. In the hypnotic trance, in delirium,
in physical dreams, when the Jiva is away, the brain yields up these
impressions, which are usually overpowered by the far stronger impressions
received by and made by the Jiva himself; but if the mind is trained to observe
and record, then the Jiva can recover from it, at will, the impressions thus
made.
Thus, if two people walked down a street, one trained in observation and the
other not, both would
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receive a number of impressions, and neither might be conscious of the receipt
of these at the time; but afterwards, the trained observer would be able to
recover these impressions, while the other would not. As this power lies at the
root of clear thinking, those who desire to culture and control thought-power
will do well to cultivate the habit of observation, and to sacrifice the mere
pleasure of drifting idly along whithersoever the stream of fancy may carry
them.
THE EVOLUTION OF MENTAL FACULTIES
As images accumulate, the work of the Knower becomes more complicated, and his
activity upon them draws out one power after another, inherent in his divine
nature. He no longer accepts the external world only in its simple relation to
himself, as containing objects that are causes of pleasure or pain to himself;
but he arranges side by side the images representing them, studies them in their
various aspects, shifts them about, and reconsiders them. He begins also to
arrange his own observations. He observes, when one image brings up another, the
order of their succession. When a second has followed a first many times, he
begins to look for the second when the first appears, and thus links the two
together. This is his first attempt at reasoning, and here again we have the
calling out of an inherent faculty. He argues that because A and B have
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always appeared successively, therefore when A appears B will appear. This
forecast being continually verified, he comes to link them together as " cause "
and " effect", and many of his early errors are due to a too hasty establishment
of this relation. Further, setting images side by side, he observes their
unlikenesses and likenesses, and develops a power of comparison. He chooses one
or another as pleasure-giving, and moves the body in search of them in the
external world, developing judgment by these selections and their consequences.
He evolves a sense of proportion in relation to the likenesses and unlikenesses,
and groups objects together by their prominent likenesses, separating them from
others by their prominent unlikenesses; here also he makes many errors,
corrected by later observations, being easily misled at first by surface
similarities.
Thus observation, discrimination, reason, comparison, judgment, are evolved one
after another, and these faculties grow with exercise, and thus the aspect of
the Self as Knower is developed by the activity of thoughts, by the action and
re-action continually repeated between the Self and the Not-Self.
To quicken the evolution of these faculties, we must deliberately and
consciously exercise them, using the circumstances of daily life as
opportunities for developing them. Just as we saw that the power of observation
might be trained in every day life, so can we accustom ourselves to see
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the points of likeness and unlikeness in the objects round us, we can draw
conclusions and test them by events, we can compare, and judge, and all this
consciously and of set purpose. Thought-power grows rapidly under this
deliberate exercise, and becomes a thing that is consciously wielded, felt as a
definite possession.
THE TRAINING OF THE MIND
To train the mind in any one direction is to train it altogether to some extent,
for any definite kind of training organises the mind-stuff of which the mental
body is composed, and also calls out some of the powers of the Knower. The
increased capacity can be directed to any end, and is available for all
purposes. A trained mind can be applied to a new subject, and will grapple with
it and master it in a way impossible to the untrained, and this is the use of
education.
But it should always be remembered that the training of the mind does not
consist in cramming it with facts, but in drawing out its powers. The mind does
not grow by being gorged with other people's thoughts, but by exercising its own
faculties. It is said of the great Teachers who stand at the head of human
evolution that They know everything which exists within the solar system. This
does not mean that every fact therein is always within Their consciousness, but
that They have so developed the
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aspect of knowledge in Themselves that whenever They turn Their attention in any
direction, They know the object to which it is turned. This is a much greater
thing than the storage in the mind of any number of facts, as it is a greater
thing to see any object on which the eye is turned than to be blind and to know
it only by the description given of it by others. The evolution of the mind is
measured not by the images it contains, but by the development of the nature
which is knowledge, the power to reproduce within itself anything that is
presented to it. This will be as useful in any other universe as in this, and
once gained is ours to use wherever we may be.
ASSOCIATION WITH SUPERIORS
Now, this work of training the mind may be very much helped forward by coming
into touch with those who are more highly evolved than ourselves. A thinker who
is stronger than we are can materially aid us, for he sends out vibrations of a
higher order than we are able to create. A piece of iron lying on the ground
cannot start heat-vibrations on its own account; but if it happens to be placed
near a fire, it can answer to the heat-vibrations of the fire, and thus became
hot. When we come near a strong thinker, his vibrations play on our mental
bodies and set up in them corresponding vibrations, so that we vibrate
sympathetically with him. For the time
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Thought Power
being we feel that our mental power is increased and that we are able to grasp
conceptions that normally elude us. But when we are again alone, we find that
-these very conceptions have become blurred and confused.
People will listen to a lecture, and follow it intelligently, for the time being
understanding the teaching it conveys. They go away satisfied, feeling that they
have made a substantial gain in knowledge. On the following day, wishing to
share with a friend what had been gained, they find to their mortification that
they cannot reproduce the conceptions which seemed to be so clear and luminous.
Often they will exclaim impatiently: " I am sure I know it; it is there, if I
could only get hold of it." This feeling arises from the memory of the
vibrations which both mental body and Jiva have experienced; there is the
consciousness of having realised the conceptions, the memory of the forms taken,
and the feeling that, having produced them, reproduction should be easy. But on
the previous day it was the masterful vibrations of the stronger thinker that
shaped the forms taken by the mental body; they were moulded from without, not
from within. The sense of inability experienced on the attempt to reproduce them
means that this shaping must be done for them a few times, before they will have
sufficient strength to reproduce those forms by self-initiated vibrations. The
Knower must have vibrated in these higher
69
ways several times, ere he can reproduce the vibrations at will. By virtue of
his own inherent nature he can evolve the power within himself to reproduce
them, when he has been made to answer several times by impact from without. The
power in both Knowers is the same, but one has evolved it, while in the other it
is latent. It is brought out of latency by the contact with a similar power
already in activity, and thus the stronger quickens the evolution of the weaker.
Herein lies one of the values of associating with persons more advanced than
ourselves. We profit by their contact, and grow under their stimulating
influence. A true Teacher will thus aid his disciples far more by keeping them
near him than by any spoken words.
For this influence direct personal contact affords the most effective channel.
But failing this, or in association with it, much may also be gained from books,
if the books be wisely chosen. In reading the work of a really great writer, we
should try for the time to put ourselves into a negative or receptive condition,
so as to receive as many of his thought-vibrations as possible. When we have
read the words, we should dwell on them, ponder over them, try to sense the
thought they partially express, draw out of them all their hidden relationships.
Our attention must be concentrated, so as to pierce the mind of the writer
through the veil of his words. Such reading serves as an education, and helps
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Thought Power
forward our mental evolution. Less strenuous reading may serve as a pleasant
pastime, may store our minds with valuable facts, and so subserve our
usefulness. But such reading as is described means a stimulus to our evolution,
and should not be neglected by those who seek to grow in order to serve.
CHAPTER VII CONCENTRATION
FEW things more tax the powers of the student who is beginning to train his mind
than does concentration. In the early stages of the activity of the mind,
progress depends on its swift movements, on its alertness, on its readiness to
receive impacts from sensation after sensation, turning its attention quickly
from one to another. Versatility is, at that stage, a most valuable quality, and
the constant turning outwards of the attention is essential to progress. While
the mind is collecting materials for thought, extreme mobility is an advantage,
and for many, many lives the mind grows through this mobility, and increases it
by exercise. The stoppage of this habit of running outwards in every direction,
the imposition of fixed attention on a single point'— this change naturally
comes with a jar and a shock, and the mind plunges wildly, like an unbroken
horse when it first feels the bit.
We have seen that the mental body is shaped into images of the objects towards
which attention is
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directed. Patanjali speaks of stopping the modifications of the thinking
principle, i.e., of stopping these ever-changing reproductions of the outer
world. To stop the ever-changing modifications of the mental body, and to keep
it shaped to one steady image, is concentration so far as the form is concerned;
to direct the attention steadily to this form so as to reproduce it perfectly
within itself is concentration so far as the Knower is concerned.
In concentration, the consciousness is held to a single image; the whole
attention of the Knower is fixed on a single point, without wavering or
swerving. The mind—which runs continually from one thing to another, attracted
by external objects and shaping itself to each in swift succession—is checked,
held in, and forced by the will to remain in one form, shaped to one image,
disregarding all the impressions thrown upon it.
Now, when the mind is thus kept shaped to one image, and the Knower steadily
contemplates it, he obtains a far fuller knowledge of the object than he could
obtain by means of any verbal description of it. Our idea of a picture, of a
landscape, is far more complete when we have seen it, than when we have only
read of it, or heard it described. And if we concentrate on such a description
the picture is shaped in the mental body, and we gain a fuller knowledge of it
than is gained by mere reading of the words. Words are symbols of things, and
concentration on the rough outline of a thing produced
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by a word descriptive of it fills in more and more detail, as the consciousness
comes more closely into touch with the thing described.
It must be remembered that concentration is not a state of passivity, but, on
the contrary, one of intense and regulated activity. It resembles, in the mental
world, the gathering up of the muscles for a spring in the physical world, or
their stiffening to meet a prolonged strain. In fact, this tension always shows
itself in a corresponding physical tension with beginners, and physical fatigue
follows the exercise of concentration—fatigue of the muscles, not only of
nervous system. As fixing the eye steadily on an object enables us to observe
its details, unnoticed in a hasty glance, so does concentration enable us to
observe the details of an idea. And as we increase the intensity of the
concentration, we take in more in the time, as a runner passes more objects-in a
minute than does a walker. The walker will expend exactly the same amount of
muscular encrgy in passing twenty objects as will the runner, but the swifter
pouring out of energy corresponds to the shorter time of passage.
At the beginning two difficulties have to be overcome. First, the Knower must
disregard the impressions continually being thrown on the mind. The mental body
must be prevented from answering these contacts, and the tendency to respond to
these outside impressions must be resisted; but this necessitates the partial
direction of the attention to the
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resistance itself, and when the tendency to respond has been overcome the
resistance itself must pass; perfect balance is needed, neither resistance nor
non-resistance, but a steady quietude so strong ihat waves from outside will not
produce any result, not even the secondary result of the consciousness of
something to be resisted.
Secondly, the mind itself must hold as sole image, for the time, the object of
concentration; it must not only refuse to modify itself in response to impacts
from without, but must also cease its own inner activity, wherewith it is
constantly re-arranging its contents, thinking over them, establishing new
relations, discovering hidden likenesses and unlikenesses. It has now to confine
its attention to a single object, to fix itself on that. It does not, of course,
cease its activity, but sends it all along a single channel. Water flowing over
a surface wide in comparison with the amount of water will have little motor
power. The same water sent along a narrow channel, with the same initial
impulse, will carry away an obstacle. Hence the value of the " one-pointedness "
so continually insisted on by the teachers of meditation. Without adding to the
strength of the mind, the effective strength of it is immensely increased. Steam
allowed to expand in the free air does not move a midge out of its path; but
along a pipe, the same steam would drive a piston. This imposition of inner
stillness is even more difficult than the ignoring of outside impacts, being
concerned with its
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own deeper and fuller life. To turn the back on the outside world is more easy
than to quiet the inner, for this inner world is more identified with the Self,
and, in fact, to most people at the present stage of evolution, represents the "
I". The very attempt, however, thus to still the mind soon brings about a step
forward in the evolution of consciousness, for we quickly feel that the Ruler
and the ruled cannot be one, and instinctively identify ourselves with the
Ruler. "quiet my mind", is the expression of the consciousness, and the mind is
felt as belonging to, as a possession of, the "I".
This distinction grows up unconsciously, and the student finds himself becoming
conscious of a duality, of something which is controlling, and something which
is controlled. The lower concrete mind is separated off, and the " I " is felt
as of greater power, clearer vision, and there is evolved a feeling that this "
I " is not dependent on either body or mind. This is the first realisation,
i.e., feeling, in consciousness of the true immortal nature, already
intellectually seen as existing, such vision having, in fact, prompted the very
concentration which is thus rewarded. As the practice goes on, the horizon
widens out, but as though inwards, not outwards, inwards and inwards
continually, inimitably. There unfolds a power of knowing Truth at sight, which
only shows itself when the mind, with its slow processes of reasoning, is
transcended. [The reader must never forget that " the mind " is used throughout
as meaning " the
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lower mind", the mental body, plus manas.] For the " I " is the expression of
the Self whose nature is knowledge, and whenever he comes into contact with a
truth, he finds its vibrations regular, and therefore capable of producing a
coherent image in himself, whereas the false causes a distorted image, out of
proportion, by its very reflection announcing its nature. As the mind assumes a
more and more subordinate position, these powers of the Ego assert their own
predominance, and intuition-—analogous to the direct vision of the physical
plane—takes the place of reasoning, which may perhaps be compared to the
physical plane sense of touch. In fact, the analogy is closer than at the first
glance may appear. For intuition develops out of reasoning in the same unbroken
manner, and without change of essential nature, as the eye develops out of
touch. There is certainly a great change of " manner", but this should not blind
us to the orderly and sequential evolution. The intuition of the unintelligent
is impulse, born of desire, and is lower, not higher, than reasoning.
When the mind is well trained in concentrating on an object, and can maintain
its one-pointedness —as this state is called—for some little time, the next
stage is to drop the object, and to maintain the mind in this attitude of fixed
attention without the attention being directed to anything. In this state the
mental body shows no image; its own material is there, held steady and firm,
receiving no impressions,
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in a condition of perfect calm, like a waveless lake. This is not a
state which can last for more than a very brief period, like the " critical
state " of the chemist, the point of contact between two recognised and
defined sub-states of matter. Otherwise put, the consciousness, as the mental
body is stilled, escapes from it, and passes into and out of the " laya centre",
the neutral points of contact between the mental body and the causal body; the
passage is accompanied by a momentary swoon, or loss of consciousness'—the
inevitable result of the disappearance of objects of consciousness—followed by
consciousness in the higher. The dropping out of objects of consciousness
belonging to the lower worlds is thus followed by the appearance of objects of
consciousness in the higher. Then can the Ego shape that mental body according
to his own lofty thoughts and permeate it with his own vibrations. He can mould
it after the high visions of the planes beyond his own, that he has caught a
glimpse of in his own highest moments, and can thus convey downwards and
outwards ideas to which the mental body would otherwise be unable to respond.
These are the inspirations of genius, that flash down into the mind with
dazzling light, and illuminate a world. The very man who gives them to the world
can scarce tell in his ordinary mental state how they have reached him; only he
knows that in some strange way "...... the power within me pealing
Lives on my lip and beckons with my hand."
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CONSCIOUSNESS is WHEREVER THERE is AN OBJECT TO WHICH IT RESPONDS
In the world of form, a form occupies a definite place, and cannot be said to
be—if the expression may be pardoned—in a place where it is not. That is,
occupying a certain place, it is closer to or more distant from other forms also
occupying certain places in relation to its own. If it would change from one
place to another, it must cross over the intervening space; the transit may be
swift or slow, rapid as the lightning flash, sluggish as the tortoise, but it
must be made, and it occupies some time, whether the time be brief or long.
Now, with regard to consciousness, space has no such existence. Consciousness
changes its state, not its place, and embraces more or less, knows or does not
know of that which is not itself, just in proportion as it can or cannot answer
to the vibrations of the not-selves. Its horizon enlarges with its receptivity,
i.e., with its power of response, with its powers to reproduce vibrations. In
this there is no question of travelling, crossing over intermediate intervals.
Space belongs to forms, which affect each other most when near each other, and
whose power over each other diminishes as their distance from each other
increases.
All successful students in concentration rediscover for themselves this
non-existence of space for consciousness. An Adept can acquire knowledge
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of any object within His limit by concentrating upon it, and distance in no way
affects such concentration. He becomes conscious of an object, say on another
planet, not because his astral vision acts telescopically, but because in the
inner region the whole universe exists as a point; such a man reaches the Heart
of Life, and sees all things therein.
It is written in the Upanishads that within the heart there is a small chamber,
and therein is the "inner ether", which is co-extensive with space; this is the
Atma, the Self, immortal, beyond grief:
" Within this abide the sky and the world; within this abide fire and air, the
sun and the moon, the lightning and the stars, all that is and all that is not
in this [the universe]." 1
This " inner ether of the heart " is an ancient mystic term descriptive of the
subtle nature of the Self, which is truly one and all-pervading, so that anyone
who is conscious in the Self is conscious at all points of the universe. Science
says that the movement of a body here affects the farthest stars, because all
bodies are plunged in, interpenetrated by. ether, a continuous medium which
transmits vibrations without friction, therefore without loss of energy,
therefore to any distance. This is on the form side of Nature. How natural,
then, that consciousness, the life side of Nature, should be similarly
all-pervading and continuous. 1 Chhandogyopnishad, VIII. i. 3.
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We feel ourselves to be " here " because we are receiving impressions from the
objects around us. So when consciousness vibrates in response to " distant "
objects as fully as to " near " objects, we feel ourselves to be with them. If
consciousness responds to an event taking place in Mars as fully as to an event
taking place in our own room, there is no difference in its knowledge of each,
and it feels itself as "here" in each case equally. There is no question of
place, but a question of evolution of capacity. The Knower is wherever his
consciousness can answer, and increase in his power to respond means inclusion
within his consciousness of all to which he responds, of all that is within his
range of vibration.
Here again physical analogy is helpful. The eye sees all which can send into it
light-vibrations, and nothing else. It can answer only within a certain range of
vibrations; all beyond that range, above or below it, is to it darkness. The old
Hermetic axiom: "As above so below", is a clue in the labyrinth which surrounds
us, and by a study of the reflection below we can often learn something of the
object above which casts that reflection.
One difference between this power of being conscious at any place and "going to"
the higher planes is that in the first case the Jiva, whether encased in its
lower vehicles or not, feels himself at once in the presence of the " distant "
objects, and in the second, clothed in the mental and astral bodies, or in the
mental only, travels swiftly from point to point and
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is conscious of translation. A far more important
difference is that in the second case the Jiva may
find himself in the midst of a crowd of objects which
he does not in the least understand, a new and
strange world which bewilders and confuses him;
while in the first case he understands all he sees,
and knows in every case the life as well as the form.
Thus studied, the light of the One Self shines
through all, and a serene knowledge is enjoyed
which can never be gained by spending numberless
ages amid the wilderness of forms.
Concentration is the means whereby the Jiva escapes from the bondage of forms
and enters the Peace. " For him without concentration there is no peace," quoth
the Teacher,1 for peace hath her nest on a rock that towers above the tossing
waves of form.
How TO CONCENTRATE
Having understood the theory of concentration, the student should begin its
practice.
If he be of a devotional temperament, his work will be much simplified, for then
he can take the object of his devotion as the object of contemplation, and the
heart being powerfully attracted to that object, the mind will readily dwell on
it, presenting the beloved image without effort and excluding others with equal
ease. For the mind
1Bhagwad-Gita,ii, 66.
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is continually impelled by desire, and serves constantly as the minister of
pleasure. That which gives pleasure is ever being sought by the mind, and it
ever seeks to present images that give pleasure and to exclude those that give
pain. Hence it will dwell on a beloved image, being steadied in that
contemplation by the pleasure experienced in it, and if forcibly dragged away
from it, will return to it again and again. A devotee can then very readily
reach a considerable degree of concentration; he will think of the object of his
devotion, creating by the imagination, as clearly as he can, a picture, an image
of that object, and he will then keep his mind fixed on that image, on the
thought of the Beloved. Thus a Christian would think of the Christ, of the
Virgin-Mother, of his Patron Saint, of his Guardian Angel; a Hindu would think
of Maheshvara, of Vishnu, of Uma, of Shri Krishna; a Buddhist would think of the
Buddha, of the Bodhisattva; a Parsi of Ahura-mazda, of Mithra; and so on. Each
and all of these objects appeal to the devotion of the worshipper, and the
attraction exercised by them over the heart binds the mind to the
happiness-giving object. In this way the mind becomes concentrated with the
least exertion, the least loss of effort.
Where the temperament is not devotional, the element of attraction can still be
utilized as a help, but in this case it will bind to an Idea not to a Person.
The earliest attempts at concentration should always be made with this help.
With the
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non-devotional the attractive image will take the form of some profound idea,
some high problem; such should form the object of concentration, and on that the
mind should be steadily bent. Herein the binding power of attraction is
intellectual interest, the deep desire for knowledge, one of the profoundest
loves of man.
Another very fruitful form of concentration, for one who is not attracted to a
personality as an object of devotion, is to choose a virtue and concentrate upon
that. A very real kind of devotion may be aroused by such an object, for it
appeals to the heart through the love of intellectual and moral beauty. The
virtue should be imaged by the mind in the completest possible way, and when a
general view of its effects has been obtained, the mind should be steadied on
its essential nature. A great subsidiary advantage of this kind of concentration
is that as the mind shapes itself to the virtue and repeats its vibrations, the
virtue will gradually become part of the nature, and will be firmly established
in the character. This shaping of the mind is really an act of self-creation,
for the mind after a while falls readily into the forms to which it has been
constrained by concentration, and these forms become the organs of its habitual
expression. True is it, as written of old:
Man is the creation of thought; what he thinks upon in this life, that,
hereafter, he becomes.1
1 Chhandogyopnishad, III, xiv, i.
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When the mind loses hold of its object, whether devotional or intellectual-—-as
it will do, time after time—it must be brought back, and again directed to the
object. Often at first it will wander away without the wandering being noticed,
and the student suddenly awakes to the fact that he is thinking about something
quite other than the proper object of thought. This will happen again and again,
and he must patiently bring it back—a wearisome and tiring process, but there is
no other way by which concentration can be gained.
It is a useful and instructive mental exercise, when the mind has thus slipped
away without notice, to take it back again by the road along which it travelled
in its strayings. This process increases the control of the rider over his
runaway horse, and thus diminishes its inclination to escape.
Consecutive thinking, though a step towards concentration, is not identical with
it, for in consecutive thinking the mind passes from one to another of a
sequence of images, and is not fixed on one alone. But as it is far easier than
concentration, the beginner may use it to lead up to the more difficult task. It
is often helpful for a devotee to select a scene from the life of the object of
his devotion, and to picture the scene vividly in its details, with local
surroundings of landscape and colour. Thus the mind is gradually steadied on one
line, and it can be led to and finally fixed on the central figure of the scene,
the object of devotion. As the scene is reproduced
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in the mind, it takes on a feeling of reality, and it is quite possible in this
way to get into magnetic touch with the record of that scene on a higher
plane—the permanent photograph of it in the kosmic ether—and thus to obtain very
much more knowledge of it than is supplied by any description of it that may
have been given. Thus also may the devotee come into magnetic touch with the
object of devotion and enter by this direct touch into far more intimate
relations with him than are otherwise possible. For consciousness is not under
the physical space-limitations, but is wheresoever it is conscious —a statement
that has already been explained.
Concentration itself, however, it must be remembered, is not this sequential
thinking, and the mind must finally be fastened to the one object and remain
fixed thereunto, not reasoning on it, but, as it were, sucking out, absorbing,
its content..
CHAPTER VIII OBSTACLES TO CONCENTRATION
WANDERING MINDS
THE universal complaint which comes from those who are beginning to practise
concentration is that the very attempt to concentrate results in a greater
restlessness of the mind. To some extent this is true, for the law of action and
reaction works here as everywhere, and the pressure put on the mind causes a
corresponding reaction. But while admitting this, we find, on closer study, that
the increased restlessness is largely illusory. The feeling of such increased
restlessness is chiefly due to the opposition suddenly set up between the Ego,
willing steadiness, and the mind in its normal condition of mobility. The Ego
has, for a long series of lives, been carried about by the mind in all its swift
movements, as a man is ever being carried through space by the whirling earth.
He is not conscious of movement; he does not know that the world is moving, so
thoroughly is he part of it, moving as it moves. If he were able to separate
himself from the earth and stop his own movement without being shivered into
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pieces, he would only then be conscious that the earth was moving at a high rate
of speed. So long as a man is yielding to every movement of the mind, he does
not realise its continual activity and restlessness; but when he steadies
himself, when he ceases to move, then he feels the ceaseless motion of the mind
he has hitherto obeyed.
If the beginner knows these facts, he will not be discouraged at the very
commencement of his efforts by meeting with this universal experience, but will,
taking it for granted, go quietly on with his task. And, after all, he is but
repeating the experience voiced by Arjuna five thousand years ago:
This Yoga which Thou hast declared to be by equanimity, O slayer of Madhu, I see
no stable foundation for it, owing to restlessness; for the mind is verily
restless, O Krishna! it is impetuous, strong, and difficult to bend; I deem it
as hard to curb as the wind.
And still is true the answer, the answer pointing out the only way to success:
Without doubt, O mighty armed, the mind is hard to curb and restless; but it may
be curbed by constant practice and by indifference.1
The mind thus steadied will not be so easily thrown off its balance by the
wandering thoughts from other minds, ever seeking to effect a lodgment, the
vagrant crowd which continually encircles us. The mind used to concentration
retains always a certain positiveness, and is not readily shaped by unlicensed
intruders.
1 Bhagawad-Gita, vi, 35, 36.
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All people who are training their minds should maintain an attitude of steady
watchfulness with regard to the thoughts that " come into the mind", and should
exercise towards them a constant selection. The refusal to harbour evil
thoughts, their prompt ejection if they effect an entry, the immediate
replacement of an evil thought by a good one of the opposite character—this
practice will so tune the mind that after a time it will act automatically,
repelling the evil of its own accord. Harmonious, rhythmical vibrations repel
the inharmonious and irregular; they fly off from the rhythmically vibrating
surface as a stone that strikes against a whirling wheel. Living, as we all do,
in a continual current of thoughts, good and evil, we need to cultivate the
selective action of the mind, so that the good may be automatically drawn in,
the evil automatically repelled.
The mind is like a magnet, attracting and repelling, and the nature of its
attractions and repulsions can be determined by ourselves. If we watch the
thoughts which come into our minds, we shall find that they are of the same kind
as those which we habitually encourage. The mind attracts the thoughts which are
congruous with its normal activities. If we, then, for a time, deliberately
practise selection, the mind will soon do this selection for itself on the lines
laid down for it, and so evil thoughts will not penetrate into the mind, while
the good will ever find an open door.
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Most people are only too receptive, but the receptivity is due to feebleness,
not to deliberate self-surrender to the higher influences. It is, therefore,
well to learn how we may render ourselves normally positive, and how we may
become negative when we decide that it is desirable that we should be so.
The habit of concentration will by itself tend to strengthen the mind, so that
it will readily exercise control and selection with regard to the thoughts that
come to it from outside, and it has already been stated how it can be trained
automatically to repel the bad. But it may be well to add to what has been said,
that when an evil thought enters the mind, it is better not to fight with it
directly, but to utilize the fact that the mind can only think of one thing at a
time; let the mind be at once turned to a good thought, and the evil one will be
necessarily expelled. In fighting against anything, the very force we send out
causes a corresponding reaction, and thus increases our trouble; whereas the
turning of the mental eye to an image in a different direction causes the other
image to drop silently from the field of vision. Many a man wastes years in
combating impure thoughts, when quiet occupation of the mind with pure ones
would leave no room for his assailants; further, as the mind thus draws to
itself matter which does not respond to the evil, he is gradually becoming
positive, unreceptive, to that kind of thought.
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This is the secret of right receptivity; the mind responds according to its
constitution; it answers to all that is of like nature with itself; we make it
positive towards evil, negative towards good, by habitual good thinking, thus
building into its very fabric materials that are receptive of good, unrecep-tive
of evil. We must think of that which we desire to receive, and refuse to think
of that which we desire not to receive. Such a mind, in the thought-ocean which
surrounds it, draws to itself the good thoughts, repels the evil, and thus ever
grows purer and stronger amid the very same thought conditions which render
another fouler and weaker.
The method of replacing one thought by another is one that may be utilised to
great advantage in many ways. If an unkind thought about another person enter
the mind, it should at once be replaced by a thought of some virtue he
.possesses, of some good action he has done. If the mind is harassed by anxiety,
turn it to the thought of the purpose that runs through life, the Good Law which
"mightily and sweetly ordereth all things". If a particular kind of undesirable
thought persistently obtrudes itself then it is wise to provide a special
weapon; some verse or phrase that embodies the opposite idea should be chosen,
and whenever the objectionable thought presents itself, this phrase should be
repeated and dwelt upon. In a week or two the thought will cease to trouble.
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It is a good plan constantly to furnish the mind with some high thought, some
word of cheer, some inspiration to noble living. Ere we go forth into life's
turmoil day by day, we should give the mind this shield of good thought. A few
words are enough, taken from some Scripture of the race, and this, fixed in the
mind by a few recitations in the early morning, will recur to the mind again and
again during the day, and will be found repeating itself in the mind, whenever
the mind is disengaged.
THE DANGERS OF CONCENTRATION
There are certain dangers connected with the practice of concentration as to
which the beginner should be warned, for many eager students, in their wish to
go far go too fast, and so hinder themselves instead of helping.
The body is apt to suffer owing to the ignorance and inattention of the student.
When a man concentrates his mind, his body puts itself into a state of tension,
and this is not noticed by him, is involuntary so far as he is concerned. This
following of the mind by the body may be noticed in very many trivial things; an
effort to remember causes a wrinkling of the forehead, the eyes are fixed, and
the eyebrows drawn down; tense attention is accompanied by fixity of the eyes,
anxiety by an eager, wistful gaze. For ages, effort of the mind has been
followed by effort of the body, the mind being
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directed entirely towards the supply of bodily needs by bodily exertions, and
thus an association has been set up, which works automatically.
When concentration is commenced, the body, according to its wont, follows the
mind, and the muscles become rigid and the nerves tense; hence great physical
fatigue, muscular and nervous exhaustion, acute headache, are very apt to follow
in the wake of concentration, and thus people are led to give it up, believing
that these ill effects are inevitable.
As a matter of fact they can be avoided by a simple precaution. The beginner
should now and again break off his concentration sufficiently to notice the
state of his body, and if he finds it strained, tense, or rigid, he should at
once relax; when this has been done several times, the links of association will
be broken, and the body will remain pliant and resting while the mind is
concentrated. Patanjali said that in meditation the posture adopted should be
"easy and pleasant"; the body cannot help the mind by its tension, and it
injures itself.
Perhaps a personal anecdote may be pardoned as an illustration. One day, while
under H. P. Blavatsky's training, I was desired by her to make an effort of the
will; I did do so with much intensity, and with the result of much swelling in
the blood-vessels of the head. " My dear," she said drily, " you do not will
with your blood-vessels."
Another physical danger arises from the effect produced by concentration on the
nerve-cells of the
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brain. As the power of concentration increases, as the mind is stilled, and the
Ego begins to work through the mind, he makes a new demand on the brain
nerve-cells. These cells are, of course, ultimately constituted of atoms, and
the walls of these atoms consist of whorls of spirillae, through which run
currents of life-energy. Of these spirillae there are seven sets, four only of
which are in use; the remaining three are as yet unused—practically rudimentary
organs. As the higher energies pour down, seeking a channel in the atoms, the
set of spirillae which-—later in evolution—will serve as their channel is forced
into activity. If this be done very slowly and carefully, no harm results, but
over-pressure means injury to the delicate structure of the spirillae. These
minute, delicate tubes, when unused, have their sides in contact, like tubes of
soft india-rubber ; if the sides are violently forced apart, rupture is apt to
result. The feeling of dullness and heaviness all over the brain is the
danger-signal; if this be disregarded acute pain will follow, and obstinate
inflammation may ensue. Concentration should therefore be practised very
sparingly at first and should never be carried to the point of brain-fatigue. A
few minutes at a time is enough for a beginning, the time being lengthened
gradually as the practice goes on.
But, however short the time which is given to it, it should be given regularly;
if a day's practice be missed the previous condition of the atom reasserts
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itself, and the work has to be re-commenced. Steady and regular, but not
prolonged, practice ensures the best results and avoids danger. In some schools
of what is called Hatha Yoga the students are recommended to assist
concentration by fixing the eyes on a black spot on a white wall, and to
maintain this fixity of gaze until trance supervenes. Now, there are two reasons
why this should not be done. First, the practice, after a while, injures the
physical sight, and the eyes lose their power of adjustment. Secondly, it brings
about a form of brain paralysis. This begins with the fatigue of the retinal
cells, as the waves of light beat on them, and the spot disappears from view,
the place on the retina where its image is formed becoming insensitive, the
result of prolonged response. This fatigue spreads inwards, until finally a kind
of paralysis supervenes, and the person passes into a hypnotic trance. In fact,
excessive stimulation of a sense-organ is, in the West, a recognised means for
producing hypnosis—the revolving mirror, the electric light, etc., being used
with this object.
But brain paralysis not only stops all thinking on the physical plane, but
renders the brain insensitive to non-physical vibrations, so that the Ego cannot
impress it; it does not set him free, but merely deprives him of his instrument.
A man may remain for weeks in a trance thus induced, but when he awakes he is no
wiser than at the beginning of the trance. He has not gained knowledge; he has
merely
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wasted time. Such methods do not gain spiritual power, but merely bring about
physical disability.
MEDITATION
Meditation may be said to have been already explained, for it is only the
sustained attitude of the concentrated mind in face of an object of devotion, of
a problem that needs illumination to be intelligible, of anything whereof the
life is to be realized and absorbed, rather than the form.
Meditation cannot be effectively performed until concentration is, at least
partially, mastered. For concentration is not an end, but a means to an end; it
fashions the mind into an instrument which can be used at the will of the owner.
When a concentrated mind is steadily directed to any object, with the view of
piercing the veil, and reaching the life, and drawing that life into union with
the life to which the mind belongs—then meditation is performed. Concentration
might be regarded as the shaping of the organ, meditation as its exercise. The
mind has been made one-pointed; it is then directed to and dwells steadily on
any object of which knowledge is desired.
Anyone who determines to lead a spiritual life must daily devote some time to
meditation. As soon may the physical life be sustained without food as the
spiritual without meditation. Those who cannot spare half an hour a day during
which
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the world may be shut out and the mind may receive from the spiritual planes a
current of life, cannot lead the spiritual life.
Only to the mind concentrated, steady, shut out from the world, can the Divine
reveal itself. God shows Himself in His universe in endless forms; but within
the human heart He shows Himself in His Life and Nature, revealing Himself to
that which is a fragment of Himself. In that silence, peace and strength and
force flow into the soul, and the man of meditation is ever the most efficient
man of the world.
Lord Rosebery, speaking of Cromwell, described him as " a practical mystic ",
and declared that a practical mystic is the greatest force in the world. It is
true. The concentrated intelligence, the power of withdrawing outside the
turmoil, mean immensely increased energy in work, mean steadiness, self-control,
serenity; the man of meditation is the man who wastes no time, scatters no
energy, misses no opportunity. Such a man governs events, because within him is
the power whereof events are only the outer expression; he shares the divine
life, and therefore shares the divine power.
CHAPTER IX
THE STRENGTHENING OF THOUGHT POWER
WE may now proceed to turn our study of Thought Power to practical account, for
study that does not lead to practice is barren. The old declaration still holds
good: " The end of philosophy is to put an end to pain." We are to learn to
develop and then to use our developed thought power to help those around us, the
living and the so-called dead, to quicken human evolution, and to hasten also
our own progress.
Thought power can only be increased by steady and persistent exercise; as
literally and as truly as muscular development depends on the exercise of the
muscles we already possess, so does mental development depend on the exercise of
the mind already ours.
It is a law of life that growth results from exercise. The life, our Self, is
ever seeking increased expression outwardly by means of the form in which it is
contained. As it is called out by
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exercise, its pressure on the form causes the form to expand, and fresh matter
is laid down in the form, and part of the expansion is thus rendered permanent.
When the muscle is stretched by exercise more life flows into it, the cells
multiply, and the muscle thus grows. When the mental body vibrates under the
action of thought, fresh matter is drawn in from the mental atmosphere, and is
built into the body, which thus increases in size as well as in complexity of
structure. A mental body continually exercised grows, whether the thought
carried on in it be good or evil. The amount of the thought determines the
growth of the body, the quality of the thought determines the kind of matter
employed in that growth.
Now the cells of the grey matter of the physical brain multiply as the brain is
exercised in thinking. Post-mortem examinations have shown that the brain of the
thinker is not only larger and heavier than the brain of the ploughman, but also
that it has a very much larger number of convolutions. These afford a much
increased surface for the grey nervous matter, which is the immediate physical
instrument of thought.
Thus both the mental body and the physical brain grow by exercise, and those who
would improve and enlarge them must have recourse to regular daily thinking,
with the deliberately chosen object of improving their mental capacities.
Needless to add that the inherent powers of the Knower are also
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evolved more rapidly by this exercise, and ever play upon the vehicles with
increasing force.
In order that it may have its full effect this practice should be methodical.
Let a man choose an able book on some subject which is attractive to him, a book
written by a competent author, containing fresh, strong thought. A sentence, or
a few sentences, should be read slowly, and then the reader should think closely
and intently over what he has read. It is a good rule to think twice as long as
one reads, for the object of the reading is not simply to acquire new ideas, but
to strengthen the thinking faculties. Half an hour should be given to this
practice if possible, but the student may begin with a quarter of an hour, as he
will find the close attention a little exhausting at first.
Any person who takes up this practice and follows it regularly for a few months
will at the end of that time be conscious of a distinct growth of mental
strength, and he will find himself able to deal with the ordinary problems of
life far more effectively than heretofore. Nature is a just pay-mistress, giving
to each exactly the wages he has earned, but not an unearned farthing. Those who
would have the wages of increased faculty must earn them by hard thinking.
The work is twofold, as has been already pointed out. On the one side the powers
of consciousness are drawn out; on the other the forms through which it is
expressed are developed; and the first
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of these must never be forgotten. Many people recognize the value of definite
thinking as affecting the brain, but forget that the source of all thought is
the unborn, undying Self, and that they are only drawing out what they already
possess. Within them, is all power, and they have only to utilize it, for the
divine Self is the root of the life of each, and the aspect of the Self which is
knowledge lives in everyone, and is ever seeking opportunity for his own fuller
expression. The power is within each, uncreate, eternal; the form is moulded and
changed, but the life is the man's Self, illimitable in his powers. That power
within each is the same power as shaped the universe; it is divine, not human, a
portion of the life of the Logos, and inseparate from Him.
If this were realized, and if the student remembered that it is not the
scantiness of the power but the inadequacy of the instrument that makes the
difficulty, he would often work with more courage and hope, and therefore with
more efficiency. Let him feel that his essential nature is knowledge, and that
it lies with him how far that essential nature shall find expression in this
incarnation. Expression is, indeed, limited by the thinkings of the past, but
can be now increased and made more efficient by the same power which in that
past shaped the present. Forms are plastic and can be re-moulded, slowly, it is
true, by the vibrations of the life.
Above all, let the student remember that for steady growth, regularity of
practice is essential.
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When a day's practice is omitted, three or four days' work are necessary to
counter-balance the slipping back, at least during the earlier stages of growth.
When the habit of steady thought is acquired, then the regularity of practice is
less importaut. But until this habit is definitely established, regularity is of
the utmost moment, for the old habit of loose drifting re-asserts itself, and
the matter of the mental body falls back into its old shapes, and has to be
again shaken out of them on the resumption of the practice. Better five minutes
of work done regularly, than half an hour on some days and none on others.
WORRY—ITS MEANING AND ERADICATION
It has been said truly enough that people age more by worry than by work. Work,
unless excessive, does not injure the thought-apparatus, but, on the contrary,
strengthens it. But the mental process known as " worry " definitely injures it,
and after a time produces a nervous exhaustion and irritability which render
steady mental work impossible.
What is " worry " ? It is the process of repeating the same train of thought
over and over again with small alterations, coming to no result, and not even
aiming at the reaching of a result. It is the continued reproduction of
thought-forms, initiated by the mental body and the brain, not by the
consciousness, and imposed by them on the consciousness. As overtired muscles
cannot keep still, but move restlessly
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even against the will, so do the tired mental body and brain repeat over and
over again the very vibrations that have wearied them, and the Thinker vainly
tries to still them and thus obtain rest. Once more automatism is seen, the
tendency to move in the direction in which movement has already been made. The
Thinker has dwelt on a painful subject, and has endeavoured to reach a definite
and useful conclusion. He has failed and ceases to think, but remains
unsatisfied, wishing to find a solution, and dominated by the fear of the
anticipated trouble. This fear keeps him in an anxious and restless condition,
causing an irregular outflow of energy. Then the mental body and brain, under
the impulse of this energy and of the wish, but undirected by the Thinker,
continue to move and throw up the images already shaped and rejected. These are,
as it were, forced on his attention, and the sequence recurs again and again. As
weariness increases irritability is set up, and reacts again on the wearied
forms, and so action and reaction continue in a vicious circle. The Thinker is,
in worry, the slave of his servant-bodies, and is suffering under their tyranny.
Now, this very automatism of the mental body and brain, this tendency to repeat
vibrations already produced, may be used to correct the useless repetition of
thoughts that cause pain. When a thought current has made for itself a channel—a
thought-form—new thought currents tend to flow along the same track, that being
the line of least
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resistance. A thought that causes pain readily thus recurs by the fascination of
fear, as a thought that gives pleasure recurs by the fascination of love. The
object of fear, the picture of what will happen when anticipation becomes
reality, makes thus a mind-channel, a mould for thought, and a brain-track also.
The tendency -of the mental body and the brain, released from immediate work, is
to repeat the form, and to let unemployed energy flow into the channel already
made.
Perhaps the best way to get rid of a " worry-channel " is to dig another, of an
exactly opposite character. Such a channel is, as we have already seen, made by
definite, persistent, regular thought. Let, then, a person, who is suffering
from worry, give three or four minutes in the morning, on first rising, to some
noble and encouraging thought: "The Self is Peace; that Self am I. The Self is
Strength; that Self am I." Let him think how, in his innermost nature, he is one
with the Supreme Father; how in that nature he is undying, unchanging, fearless,
free, serene, strong; how he is clothed in perishable vestures that feel the
sting of pain, the gnawing of anxiety; how he mistakenly regards these as
himself. As he thus broods, the Peace will, enfold him, and he will feel it is
his own, his natural atmosphere.
As he does this, day by day, thought will dig its own channel in mental body and
in brain, and ere long, when the mind is loosed from labour, the
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thought of the Self that is Peace and Strength will present itself unbidden, and
fold its wings around the mind in the very turmoil of the world. Mental energy
will flow naturally into this channel, and worry will be of the past.
Another way is to train the mind to rest on the Good Law, thus establishing a
habit of content. Here the man dwells on the thought that all circumstances work
within the Law, and that naught happens by chance. Only that which the Law
brings to us can reach us, by whatever hand it may outwardly come. Nothing can
injure us that is not our due, brought to us by our own previous willing and
acting; none can wrong us, save as an instrument of the Law, collecting a debt
due from us. Even if an anticipation of pain or trouble come to the mind, it
will do well to face it calmly, accept it, agree to it. Most of the sting
disappears when we acquiesce in the finding of the Law, whatever it may be. And
we may do this the more easily if we remember that the Law works ever to free
us, by exacting the debts that keep us in prison, and though it bring us pain,
the pain is but the way to happiness. All pain, come it how it may, works for
our ultimate bliss, and is but breaking the bonds which keep us tied to the
whirling wheel of births and deaths.
When these thoughts have become habitual, the mind ceases to worry, for the
claws of worry can find no hold on that strong panoply of peace.
105 THINKING AND CEASING TO THINK
Much gain of strength may be made by learning both to think and to cease
thinking at will. While we are thinking we should throw our whole mind into the
thought, and think our best. But when the work of thought is over, it should be
dropped completely, and not allowed to drift on vaguely touching the mind and
leaving it, like a boat knocking itself against a rock. A man does not keep a
machine running when it is not turning out work, needlessly wearing the
machinery. But the priceless machinery of the mind is allowed to turn and turn
aimlessly, wearing itself out without useful result. To learn to cease thinking,
to let the mind rest, is an acquisition of the greatest value. As the tired
limbs luxuriate when stretched in repose, so may the tired mind find comfort in
complete rest. Constant thinking means constant vibration; constant vibration
means constant waste. Exhaustion and premature decay result from this useless
expenditure of energy, and a man may preserve both mental body and brain longer
by learning to cease thinking, when thought is not being directed to useful
result.
It is true that " ceasing to think " is by no means an easy achievement. Perhaps
it is even more difficult than thinking. It must be practised for very brief
periods until the habit is established, for it means at first an expenditure of
force in holding the mind still. Let the student, when he has been
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thinking steadily, drop the thought, and as any thought appears in the mind turn
the attention away from it. Persistently turn away from each intruder; if need
be, imagine a void, as a step to quiescence, and try to be conscious only of
stillness and darkness. Practise on these lines will become more and more
intelligible if persisted in, and a sense of quiet and peace will encourage the
student to persist.
Nor should it be forgotten that the cessation of thought, busied in outward
activities, is a necessary preliminary to work on the higher planes. When the
brain has learned to be quiescent, when it no longer restlessly throws up the
broken images of past activities, then the possibility opens of the withdrawal
of the consciousness from its physical vesture, and of its free activity in its
own world. Those who hope to take this forward step within the present life must
learn to cease thinking, for only when " the modifications of the thinking
principle" are checked on the lower plane can freedom on the higher be obtained.
Another way of giving the rest to the mental body and the brain—a far easier way
than the cessation of thinking—is by change of thought. A man who thinks
strenuously and persistently along one line should have a second line of
thought, as different as possible from the first, to which he can turn his mind
for refreshment. The extraordinary freshness and youthfulness of thought which
characterized
107
William Ewart Gladstone in his old age was largely the result of the subsidiary
intellectual activities of his life. His strongest and most persistent thought
went to politics, but his studies in theology and in Greek filled many a leisure
hour. Truly he was but an indifferent theologian, and what he was as a Greek
scholar I am not competent to say; but though the world cannot be said to be
much the richer for his theological pronouncements, his own brain was kept fresh
and receptive by these and his Grecian studies. Charles Darwin, on the other
hand, lamented in his old age that he had allowed those of his faculties to
atrophy by disuse, that would have been concerned with subjects outside his own
specialized work. Literature and art for him had no attraction, and he keenly
felt the limitations he had imposed on himself by his over-absorption in one
line of study. A man needs change of exercise in thought as well as in body,
else he may suffer from mental cramp as do some from writer's cramp.
Especially, perhaps, is it important for men engaged in absorbing worldly
pursuits, that they should take up a subject which engages faculties of the mind
not evolved in business activities, related to art, science, or literature, in
which they may find mental recreation and polish. Above all, the young should
adopt some such pursuit, ere yet their fresh and active brains grow jaded and
weary, and in age they will then find within themselves resources which will
enrich and brighten their declining days. The form
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will preserve its elasticity for a much longer period of time when it is thus
given rest by change of occupation.
THE SECRET OF PEACE OF MIND
Much of that which we have already studied tells us something of the way in
which peace of mind may be ensured. But its fundamental necessity is the clear
recognition and realization of our place in the universe.
We are part of one great Life, which knows no failure, no loss of effort or
strength, which " mightily and sweetly ordering all things " bears the worlds
onwards to their goal. The notion that our little life is a separate independent
unit, fighting for its own hand against countless separate independent units, is
a delusion of the most tormenting kind. So long as we thus see the world and
life, peace broods far off on an inaccessible pinnacle. When we feel and know
that all selves are one, then peace of mind is ours without any fear of loss.
All our troubles arise from thinking of ourselves as separated units, and then
revolving on our own mental axes, thinking only of our separate interests, our
separate aims, our separate joys and sorrows. Some do this as regards the lower
things of life, and they are the most dissatisfied of all, ever restlessly
snatching at the general stock of material goods, and piling up useless
treasures. Others seek ever their
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own separate progress in the higher life, good earnest people, but ever
discontented and anxious. They are ever contemplating and analysing themselves:
"Am I getting on? do I know more than I did last year? " and so on, fretting for
continual assurances of progress, their thoughts centred on their own inner
gain.
Peace is not to be found in the continual seeking for the gratification of the
separate self, even though the gratification be of the higher kind. It is found
in renouncing the separated self, in resting on the Self that is One, the Self
that is manifesting at every stage of evolution, and in our stage as much as in
every other, and is content in all.
Desire for spiritual progress is of great value so long as the lower desires
entangle and fetter the aspirant; he gains strength to free himself from them by
the passionate longing for spiritual growth; but it does not, it cannot, give
happiness, which is only found when the separate self is cast away and the great
Self is recognized as that for the sake of which we are living in the world.
Even in ordinary life the unselfish people are the happiest'—those who work to
make others happy, and who forget themselves. The dissatisfied people are those
who are ever seeking happiness for themselves.
We are the Self, and therefore the joys and the sorrows of others are ours as
much as theirs, and in proportion as we feel this, and learn to live so that the
whole world shares the life that flows
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through us, do our minds learn the Secret of Peace. " He attaineth Peace, into
whom all desires flow as rivers flow into the ocean, which is filled with water
but remaineth unmoved—not he who desireth desire." 1 The more we desire, the
more the craving for happiness—which is unhappiness—must grow. The Secret of
Peace is the knowledge of the Self, and the thought "That Self am I" will help
towards the gaining of a peace of mind that nothing can disturb.
1 Bhagavad-Gita, ii. 70.
CHAPTER X HELPING OTHERS BY THOUGHT
MOST valuable of all the gains made by the worker for thought power, is the
increased ability to help those around him, those weaker ones who have not yet
learned to utilize their own powers. With his own mind and heart at peace, he is
fitted to help others.
A mere kind thought is helpful in its measure, but the student will wish to do
far more than drop a mere crumb to the starving.
Let us take first the case of a man who is under the sway of an evil habit, such
as drink, and whom a student wishes to help. He should first ascertain if
possible, at what hours the patient's mind is likely to be unemployed—-such as
his hour for going to bed. If the man should be asleep, it would be all the
better. At such a time, he should sit down alone, and picture the image of his
patient as vividly as he can, seated in front of him—picture him clearly and in
detail, so that he may see the image as he would see the man. (This very clear
picturing is not essential, although the process is thereby rendered more
effective.) Then he should fix his attention
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on this image, and address to it, with all the concentration of which he is
capable, the thoughts, one by one and slowly, which he wishes to impress on his
patient's mind. He should present them as clear mental images, just as he would
do if laying arguments before him in words. In the case taken, he might place
before him vivid pictures of the disease and misery entailed by the drink-habit,
the nervous breakdown, the inevitable end. If the patient is asleep, he will be
drawn to the person thus thinking of him, and will animate the image of himself
that has been formed. Success depends on the concentration and the steadiness of
the thought directed to the patient, and just in proportion to the development
of the thought power will be its effect.
Care must be taken in such a case not to try to control, in any way, the
patient's will; the effort should be wholly directed towards placing before his
mind the ideas which, appealing to his intelligence and emotions, may stimulate
him to come to a right judgment and to make an effort to carry it out in action.
If an attempt is made to impose on him a particular line of conduct, and the
attempt succeed even then little has been gained. The mental tendency towards
vicious self-indulgence will not be changed by opposing an obstacle in the way
of indulging in a particular form of it; checked in one direction it will find
another, and a new vice will supplant the old. A man forcibly constrained to
temperance by the domination of his will is no more
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cured of the vice than if he were locked up in prison. Apart from this, no man
should try to impose his will on another, even in order to make him do right.
Growth is not helped by such external coercion; the intelligence must be
convinced, the emotion aroused and purified, else no real gain is made.
If the student wishes to give any other kind of thought-help, he should proceed
in the same way, picturing his friend, and clearly presenting the ideas he
wishes to convey. A strong wish for his good, sent to him as a general
protective agency, will remain about him as a thought-form for a time
proportionate to the strength of the thought, and will guard him against evil,
acting as a barrier against hostile thoughts, and even warding off physical
dangers. A thought of peace and consolation similarly sent will soothe and calm
the mind, spreading around its object an atmosphere of calm.
The aid which is often rendered to another by prayer is largely of the character
described above, the frequent effectiveness of prayer over ordinary good wishes
being due to the greater concentration and intensity thrown by the pious
believer into his prayer. Similar concentration and intensity would bring about
similar results, without the use of prayer.
There is, of course, another way in which prayer is sometimes effective: it
calls the attention of some superhuman, or evolved human, intelligence to the
person for whom it is offered, and direct aid may
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Thought Power
then be rendered to him by a power surpassing that of the offerer of the prayer.
Perhaps it is as well here to interject the remark that the half-instructed
Theosophist should not take alarm, and refrain from giving to a friend any
thought-assistance of which he is capable, by the fear lest he should be
"interfering with karma" Let him leave karma to take care of itself, and have no
more fear of interfering with it than of interfering with the law of
gravitation. If he can help his friend, let him do so fearlessly, confident in
the fact that, if he can do so, that help is within his friend's karma, and that
he is himself the happy agent of the Law.
HELPING THE SO-GALLED DEAD
All that we can do for the living by thought we can do even more easily for
those who have gone in front of us through death's gateway, for in their case
there is no heavy physical matter to be set vibrating ere the thought can reach
the waking consciousness.
After death is passed through, the tendency of the man is to turn his attention
inwards, and to live in the mind rather than in an external world. The
thought-currents that used to rush outwards, seeking the external world through
the sense-organs, now find themselves blocked by an emptiness, caused by the
disappearance of their instruments. It is as though a man, rushing towards an
accustomed bridge
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over a ravine, suddenly found himself stopped by the bridgeless gulf, the bridge
having vanished.
The re-arrangement of the astral body that quickly follows on the loss of the
physical body further tends to shut in the mental energies, to prevent their
outer expression. The astral matter, if not disturbed by any action of those
left behind on earth, forms an enclosing shell instead of a plastic instrument,
and the higher and purer the earth-life that has ended, the more complete is the
barrier against impressions from without, or emergence from within. But the
person thus checked as to his outward-going energies is all the more receptive
of influences from the mental world, and he can therefore be helped, cheered,
and counselled far more effectively than when he. was on earth.
In the world into which those freed from the physical body have gone, a loving
thought is as palpable to the senses as is here a loving word of tender caress.
Everyone who passes over should, therefore, be followed by thoughts of love and
peace, by aspirations for his swift passage onwards through the valley of death
to the bright land beyond. Only too many remain in the intermediate state longer
than they otherwise would, because it is their bad karma not to have friends who
know how to help them from this side of death. And if people on earth knew how
much of comfort and of happiness is experienced by the wayfarers to the heavenly
worlds from these truly angelic messengers, these
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thoughts of love and cheer, if they knew the force they had to strengthen and
console, none would be left lonely by those who remain behind. The beloved "
dead " have surely a claim on our love and care, and even apart from this how
great is the consolation to the heart, bereaved of the presence that gave
sunshine to life, to be able still to serve the loved one, and surround him on
his way by the guardian angels of thought.
The occultists who founded the great religions were not unmindful of this
service due from those left on earth to those who had passed onwards. The Hindu
has his Shraddha, by which he helps on their way the souls that have passed into
the next world, quickening their passage into Svarga. The Christian Churches
have Masses and Prayers for the " dead ". " Grant him, O Lord, eternal peace,
and let light perpetual shine on him", prays the Christian for his friend in the
other world. Only the Protestant section of Christians have lost this gracious
custom, with so much else that pertains to the higher life of the Christian man.
May knowledge soon restore to them the useful and helpful practice of which
ignorance has robbed them!
THOUGHT-WORK OUT OF THE BODY
We need not confine our thought activities to the hours which we spend in the
physical body, for very
117
much effective work may be done by thought when our bodies are lying peacefully
asleep.
The process of " going to sleep " is simply the withdrawal of the consciousness,
clad in its subtle bodies, from the physical body, which is left wrapped in
sleep, while the man himself passes into the astral world. Freed from the
physical body, he is much more powerful as regards the effects he can produce by
his thought, but for the most part he does not send it outwards, but uses it
within himself on subjects that interest him in his waking life. His
thought-energies run into accustomed moulds, and work on the problems that his
waking consciousness is busy in solving.
The proverb that " the night brings counsel ", the advice when an important
decision is to be made " to sleep on it before deciding ", are vague intuitions
of this fact of mental activity during the hours of slumber. Without any
deliberate attempt to utilize the freed intelligence, men gather and harvest the
fruit of its labour.
Those, however, who seek to steer their evolution instead of allowing it to
drift, should consciously avail themselves of the greater powers they can
exercise when unimpeded by the weight of the body. The way to do this is simple.
Any problem needing solution should be quietly held in the mind when going to
sleep; it must not be debated on, argued over, or sleep will be prevented, but,
as it were, simply stated and left. This is sufficient to give the
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required direction to thought, and the Thinker will take it up and deal with it
when freed from the physical body. The solution will generally be in the mind on
waking, i.e., the Thinker will have impressed it on the brain—and it is a good
plan to keep paper and pencil by the bed to note down the solution immediately
on waking, as a thought thus obtained is very readily erased by the thronging
stimuli from the physical world, and is not easily recovered. Many a difficulty
in life may be seen clearly in this way, and a tangled path rendered open. And
many a mental problem may also find its solution, when submitted to the
intelligence unweighted by the dense brain.
Much in the same way may a student help during the hours of sleep any friend in
this world or in the next. He must picture his friend in his mind, and determine
to find and help him. That mental image will draw him and his friend together,
and they will communicate with each other in the astral world. But in any case
in which any emotion is aroused by the thought of the friend—as in the case of
one who has passed on—the student must seek to calm it ere going to sleep. For
emotion causes a swirl in the astral body, and if that body be in a state of
strong agitation, it isolates the consciousness, and makes it impossible for
mental vibrations to pass outwards.
In some cases of such communication in the astral world, a " dream " may remain
in the waking memory, while in others no trace may appear. The
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dream is the record—often confused and mixed with alien vibrations—of the
meeting out of the body, and should be so regarded. But if no trace appears in
the brain, it does not matter, since the activities of the freed intelligence
arc not hindered by the ignorance of the brain that docs not share them. A man's
usefulness in the astral world is not governed by the memories imprinted on the
brain by the returning consciousness, and these memories may be entirely absent,
while most beneficent work is occupying the hours of the body's sleep.
Another form of thought-work that is little remembered, and that can be done
either in or out of the physical body, is the helping of good causes, of public
movements beneficial to mankind. To think of these in a definite way is to start
currents of aid from the inner planes of being, and we may especially consider
this in relation to
THE POWER OF COMBINED THOUGHT
The increased force that may be obtained by the union of several people to help
a common object is recognized not only by occultists, but by all who know
anything of the deeper science of the mind. It is the custom, in some parts at
least of Christendom, to preface the sending of a mission to evangelize some
special district by definite and sustained thinking. A small band of Roman
Catholics, for instance, will meet together for some weeks or
120 Thought Power
months before a mission is sent out, and will prepare the ground where it is to
work by imaging the place, thinking of themselves as present there, and then
intently meditating on some definite dogma of the Church. In this way a
thought-atmosphere is created in that district most favourable to the spread of
Roman Catholic teachings, and receptive brains arc prepared to wish to receive
instruction in them. The thought-work will be aided by the added intensity given
to it by fervent prayer, another form of thought-work, fired by religious
fervour.
The contemplative orders of the Roman Catholic Church do a large amount of good
and useful work by thought, as do__the recluses of the Hindu and Buddhist
faiths. Wherever a good and pure intelligence sets itself to work to aid the
world by diffusing through it noble and lofty thoughts, there definite service
is done to man, and the lonely thinker becomes one of the lifters of the world?
A group of like-minded thinkers, such as a group of Theosophists, may do much to
spread theoso-phical ideas in their own neighbourhood by agreeing to give a
fixed ten minutes a day to thinking on a theosophical teaching. It is not
necessary that their bodies should be gathered in one place provided that their
minds are together. Suppose such a group decided to think about reincarnation
daily for ten minutes at a fixed time for three or six months. Powerful
thought-forms would then throng the selected district, and the idea of
reincarnation would
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come into a considerable number of minds. Enquiries would be made, books on the
subject would be sought for, and a lecture on the subject, after such a
preparation, would attract an eager and interested audience. Progress, out of
all proportion to the physical agencies employed, is made where earnest men and
women combine in this mental propaganda.
AFTERWORD
THUS we may learn to utilize these great forces that lie within us all, and to
utilize them to the best possible effect. As we use them they will grow, until,
with surprise and delight, we shall find how great a power of service we
possess.
Let it be remembered that we are continually using these powers, unconsciously,
spasmodically, feebly, affecting ever for good or ill all who surround our path
in life. It is here sought to induce the reader to use these same forces
consciously, steadily, and strongly. We cannot help thinking to some extent,
however weak may be the thought-currents we generate. We must affect those
around us, whether we will or not; the only question we have to decide is
whether we will do it beneficially or mischievously, feebly or strongly,
driftingly or of set purpose. We cannot help the thoughts of others touching our
minds; we can only choose which we will receive, which reject. We must affect
and be affected; but we may affect others for their benefit or their injury, we
may be affected by the good or by the evil. Here lies our choice, a choice
momentous for ourselves and for the world:
Choose well; for your choice is brief and yet endless.
PEACE TO ALL BEINGS
INDEX
ABSENTMINDEDNESS, 61
Accurate Observation, Importance of, 60
Action—an Aspect of the Self, 2
Akashic Records, 49
Anticipation and Memory, 54
Artificial Aids to Memory, 53
Association with Developed Thinkers, 26
,, with Superiors, 67
Astral Body, Re-arrangement of, 115
Automatism of Brain Action, 102
Avidya—the Privation of Knowledge, 1
B
BAD Memory, 49
,, How to Treat, 51
,, ., Key to, 51
Beginning of Reasoning, 64
Beginnings of Thought, 38
Bhagavad-Gita, Quoted, 89, 96, 110
Books, Value of, 69
Brain Fatigue, 93
,, Paralysis, 94
,, Structure, 98
C
CATHOLIC Missions, Method of, 120
Causal Body, Nature of, 23
Ceasing to Think, 105
Change of Thought, 106
,, ,, Exercise Needed, 107
Chhandogyopanishad Quoted, 79, 83
Combating Evil Thought, 89
Combined Thought, 119
„ Value of, in Theosophy, 120
124
Complementary Personalities, 22
Concentration, 71
Effect of, on Nerve Cells, 93
Dangers of, 91
„ to Body, 91
Difficulties of, 73
Obstacles to, 86
Produces Physical Fatigue. 73
Not Passivity, 73
Not Consecutive Thinking, 84
Value of Devotion in, 81
Value of an Ideal in, 83
Virtue as an Object of, 83
Concrete Thinking, 17, 56
Consecutive Thinking, not Concentration, 84
Consciousness, a Unit, 2
„ Independent of Place, 78
,, at a Distance, 79
,, of an Adept, 78
,, Unfolds Inwards, 75
Conclusion, 122
Contemplative Orders, 120
Cromwell as a Practical Mystic, 96
Cure of Worry, 104
Cultivation of Will, 53
D
DANGERS of Concentration, 91
Darwin, Charles, Referred to, 107
"Day be with us", 12
Definition of Memory, 55
Desire—Replaced by Reason, 52
Dreams, 118
Drink Habit, How to Cure, 111
E
EGO, Influenced by the Lower Mind, 86
Evolution of Knower, 59
of Mind, 67
Exercise of Thought Needed, 97
G
GLADSTONE, W. E., Referred to, 107
" Going to Sleep ", 117
Good Wishes, Value of, 113
Great Teachers, 66
125
H
HATHA Yoga, 94
Helping Others by Thought, 111.
the Dead, 114
Houdin—Anecdote of, 60
How to Concentrate, 81
Human Education, Beginning of, 44
Hypnosis, Produced by Fatigue, 94
Hypnotism. 63
To be Avoided, 112
I
INFLUENCE of Thought, 122
Innate Ideas, 38
Inner " Ether of the Heart ", 79
Inspiration, 77
Intuition, Development of, 76
J
JIVA, Definition of a, 14
K
KARMA, Interfering with, 114
Knower, Evolution of the, 59
,, Knowing, and Known, 13
Knowing, Definition of, 9
Knowledge—Aspect of the Self, 3
L
LAW of Mind Growth, 98
Life and Form, 9
Life as Motion, 13
M
MANAS, 18
,, and mental Body, 19
Matter of the Mental Plane, 25
Meditation, 95
,, Concentration Necessary for, 95
,, Need for in Spiritual Life, 95
Memory, Artificial Aids, to, 53
,, and Anticipation. 54
126
Memory, Bad, 49
,, Key to, 50
,, How to Treat, 51
Definition of, 55
Nature of, 47
of the Logos, 49
Not Special Faculty, 49
Weak, Cause of, 50
Mental Body, 19
and Manas, 23
as a Sensitive Plate, 55
Building and Evolution of, 24
of Infant, 39
Nature of, 24
Seven Types of, 24
Bodies, Differences in, 58
Cramp, 107
Development Two-fold, 99
Faculties, Evolution of, 64
Growth from Within, 28
Growth, Law of, 98
Images, 55, 64
Method, N:ed of in Mental Training, 99
Mind as a Mirror, 11
Critical State of, 77
Definition of, 75
Distinct from Knower, 18
Dual and Material, 18
Duality of, 75
Evolution of, 66
Law of Growth of, 98
Like a Magnet, 88
Modification of, 19
the " Creator of Illusion ", 21
Minds, Wandering, a Universal Experience, 87
Mind-stuff, 23
Mulaprakriti, 10
N
NATIONAL Ways of Thinking, 35
Not-Self, Definition of the, 5
O
OBSERVATION, Accurate, Importance of, 43, 60
,, and Its Value, 57
„ Habit of, 62
Index 127
Observation, Personal Illustration, 62
„ Power of, 53
" One and the Many ", 13
P
PATANJALI, Quoted, 55, 92
,, Referred, 72
Perception, 40
Personal Anecdote, 92
Philosophy, The Object of, 7, 97
Pineal Gland, 32
Power of Observation, 53
Pratyagatman, 10
Prayer, 113
Prayers for the Dead, 116
Public Opinion, Formation of, 34
Q
QUIETING the Mind, 74
R
READING, Effect of, 28
Reasoning, Beginning of, 64
Receptivity, 89
Reflection, Meaning of, 11
Regularity in Thought Required, 101
S
SCIENCE of Emotions Referred to, 3
Secret Doctrine, Quoted, 42
Secret of Peace of Mind, 120
Self, The, as Knower, 2, 10
,, Three Aspects of the, 3
,, The, 115, 122
,, The Separated, 40
„ The Divine, 100
Sensation and Perception, 44
„ and Thought, 42
„ Two Views of, 43
Sleep, Value of, 117
,, Visiting Others During, 118
,, Solutions in, 118
Spirillae of Atoms, 93
128
Strengthening of Thought Power, 97
Subject and Object, 6
Superiors, Association with, 67
Supreme Self, The, 2
T
TAMAS, 47
Theosophical Movement, Effect on the Mind, 29
Thinker, Limited by tne Past, 100
,, in Worry, 102
,, Work of in Sleep, 118
Thinking and Ceasing to Think, 105
Thought, Beginnings of, 38
,, Belongs to Consciousness, 39
,, Relation of Sensation to, 42
Thought, Permanent Factor in, 36
Thoughts—Need for Selective Action, 88
,, Fighting Evil, 89
Thought-forms, 31
Thought-transference, 31
,, ,, Two Methods of, 32
,, ,, Practical Effect of, 36
„ ,, Unconscious, 34
Thought-vibrations, Combination of, 20
Thought-work, out of the Body, 116
V
VALUE of a Set Thought, 90
,, ,, Devotion in Concentration, 81
,, ,, an Ideal in, 82
Versatility, 71
Virtue as an Object of Concentration, 83
Vibrations Between Jivas, 14
Etheric, 16
Heat, 15
of Consciousness, Effects of, 26
of Mental Body, 25
Thought, 16, 20
Voice of the Silence, Quoted, 18
W
WANDERING Minds, 86
Weak Memory, 50
Will, an Aspect of the Self, 3
,, Cultivation of the, 53
Worry Denned, 101
,, Its Meaning and Eradication, 101
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