Lecture thirty-one, read by the Master to the Youth Occult Class on the 27 of June 1923, Sofia
- Only the bright way of Wisdom leads to the Truth.
- It constantly cheers us.
A secret prayer
A synopsis of the essay “A method for correct breathing” was read.
A synopsis of the essay “The influence of the powerful and of the weak words” was read.
For the next time, write on the theme “Origin of the force and of the matter”. If you cannot write on this theme, don’t try to think up something. It is better not to write anything, than to deceive yourself that you know something.
Write on the following theme: “Is the human soul a principle or not.”
In order to be able to answer all the questions asked correctly, man should gradually open the windows of his mind, so that more Light can penetrate through it. Is this possible? As man can open and close the windows of his house, so can he open and close the windows of his Mental and of his Spiritual World. The spiritual world of the human is his inner world.
Imagine that within the material world the human stands in the centre C and in front of him a certain field of vision is revealed – he sees things only at the angle ACB (Figure 1). This angle is one fourth of the whole circle and it is equal to 90 degrees. If he wants to see something in the Spiritual World, man has to turn in a direction opposite to the material world and to enter in the field of this world, which can be represented by the angle MCN. The material, Figure 1, the outside world, gives only outer impressions of things; in order to penetrate into the essence you should enter in the Spiritual World. If you have one bottle, which is sealed and full of fluid, you can take it in your hand and you can examine its outside form; if you would like to understand what it contains, you should turn it with its mouth downwards. After the fluid, which was in it, flows out, you will be able to know what it contained. The contents of the bottle, stands for the Spiritual World. Consequently, when you want to understand the spiritual side of things, you should examine it from a position just opposite to the material world. That is why, whenever you would like to understand the inner contents of things, you should absolutely disregard the form and appearance. On the same grounds, in order to understand the essence of the human, you should temporarily disregard his appearance. The difference between the appearance of things and the contents of things is great.
Figure 1
Now let’s examine the practical side of this matter. Each man carries within himself ideas, thoughts, and desires from his past, which hinder him on his way. He reads, he is interested in the new ideas, he passes as a new type of man, but all this is only seemingly. As soon as they subject him to an exam, he cannot apply the new ideas and so he proceeds in the old way – according to what was put into him from his past. He has to work with the new ideas for a long time before they become flesh and blood for him. This is seen everyday in Life: you meet a learned man who has graduated three schools – on whatever subject you discuss with him, he knows everything, he knows all the philosophical systems, but if you put him in a fix, in spite of all his knowledge, he also will make the same mistakes as the uneducated man. In this case, the difference between the learned and the uneducated man is this – the learned man will do good or evil deeds as a learned man, while the uneducated man will act as an uneducated man. Consequently, it is not enough for a man to have knowledge; he should also know how to use it. The same applies to the occult students as well: it is not enough for the occult disciple to gain knowledge, but he should also be ready to put it into practice and to know how to cope with it. Otherwise, he will find himself in the position of the poor man who digs and works with the hoe against his will, instead of a conscious decision. Give money to this man in order to see what he will do with it – he will immediately leave the hoe, he will dress nicely and he will begin to visit theatres, he will begin to go to concerts and pubs with his friends – he will take to eating and drinking. Meanwhile he will wash himself, he will clean himself, he will take care to be clean from the outside – whether or not he is internally clean, he will not care. This man resembles the scientists who know the composition and the features of the foods, who know which foods are the best ones, but when it comes into question what foods they have to use, all their knowledge fails. This is not real knowledge, this is not science.
The first thing that is required of the occult disciple is that he understands himself. To keep those feelings of his which constitute the foundation of his life. Which feelings are fundamental for him? For instance, one of the basic feelings of the disciple is that he should sympathize with all living beings and he should know that they too suffer at least as much as he suffers. No matter how small some being is, it still suffers. It is easy to say, “This is just a fly, this is just a mosquito,” etc. These creatures are small, but they also have torments and sufferings. That they do not posses the consciousness and intelligence of man is another question. The difference among all living creatures is in the degree of their consciousness; it is in the degree of their intelligence. As you study the life of vermin you see that they also have some degree of intelligence through which they understand; they know which parts of the human body has meat, which part is more soft and more greasy and in which spots of the body the blood is more clean and they attack there. The scientists call this special intelligence of the vermin an instinct. This is how you should look upon all living beings. If you deny the existence of any consciousness in small beings, if you deny even their smallest intelligence, then you cannot be called a noble man, still less can you be called an occult disciple. A disciple is the one, who follows the steps of the White Brothers. White Brothers view all living beings with the proper respect and esteem. They respect the life of even the smallest creatures because all living beings in Nature have their own great purpose.
So, as disciples you should understand all living beings, no matter how small they are. If you understand the small creatures, so much more will you understand man himself. How much more should you understand each other as disciples of one and the same School! To understand all living beings – this is one of the tender and noble feelings of the human, which can be distinguished by its form and by its composition. If you analyze the tender and noble feelings in man, you will see that they fundamentally differ from his other feeling as regards form and composition. However, the tender and noble feelings are subject to constant changes. Such is the nature of the Spiritual world to which the feelings belong– everything changes and everything is in constant movement there. Changes happen also with the physical bodies – they also move, but all this happens slowly, almost unnoticed. If you build a house on the ground and after one hundred years you decide to destroy it, you will see that each brick, each stone, each beam is still almost in the same place as when it was first built. They have shifted slightly, they have shifted to one side or another, but this movement, this change remains almost unnoticed to the normal eye. Consequently, the continents, the rivers and the mountains are also shifting, but this change remains unnoticed. Thousands of years ago, the continents were not in the places that they are in today. In the future they will move, they will shift, but again they will not occupy the present places. But in the Spiritual World this movement is much faster – there things are moving so fast, that if someone suddenly comes into this world, he by no means would be able to find his way on his own. Where there is movement there is Life.
The same movement occurs also within the cells of all the organisms. Such movement, such displacement occurs also with the cells of the human organism. For instance, after thousands of years the cells of the human legs will be in the brain and will change its function. The function, as well as the composition of the cells depends on its place within the human organism. No matter how much the cells resemble each other in the composition of material or matter from which they are made, there always exists, one delicate, scarcely perceptible difference. For example, oxygen, which is an ingredient in the cells of the human legs, differs in some way from the oxygen that is an ingredient of the blood. In its turn oxygen, which is an ingredient of the blood, differs from the oxygen that is an ingredient of the brain cells, etc. In its physical state, though, there is no difference and everywhere it is one and the same – everywhere it is the element oxygen. In the organic and psychic respect, oxygen differs in its properties from physical oxygen. Therefore, we can say that oxygen has external or physical properties, but it also has internal or psychic properties, which scientists call chemical properties. Both the physical as well as the chemical properties of various types of oxygen differ in place and function, though.
In order to see where the force which forms, that is, which creates the things, hides – whether it is inside or outside, make the following experiment: take the valve of a mussel, cut it into small pieces, put it into water and see if you can restore its original shape. Whatever you do, you cannot restore the shape є; this shows that the force, which has worked for the creation of the mussel valve, is external to it. But if you dissolve several crystals of sea-salt in water and then you evaporate the water, the crystals of the salt will be restored; this shows that the salt, which has functioned for the formation of the crystals, is within them. This means that in some cases the forces of Nature function outside the bodies, while in other cases they function within the bodies. The same thing can be said for atoms as well; there are atoms with life outside; there are atoms with life within them. This is also noticeable in the realm of your ideas: for instance, there exist some ideas, in which the oxygen atom is from the outside; there exist other ideas, in which the oxygen atom is within them. This creates a difference in the ideas themselves. The atoms of elements change places and function in different ways, as well as the cells of the human organism that change places and functions. For example, after one thousand years the cells of the human legs will enter the human brain – people call this evolution. If the cells of the human brain cannot utilize the favourable conditions, though, after thousands of years, will descend to the legs and will occupy a lower position – this is what people call karma or doom. Based on the same law the human can be in the legs or in the head of the Cosmic Man as well - as a result of this he will occupy better or worse Life conditions. If he utilizes rationally the unfavourable conditions, he will proceed to more favourable Life conditions.
When they hear such things, many people wish that they could be smarter, better, and that they could develop faster. The human being can be neither smart nor stupid; the human being can be neither good nor bad. Why? Because the part cannot be equal to the whole, the mind stands for the totality of the Great, for the Divine in the world. Consequently, only this person can be wise enough who know God - the person through which God manifests Himself. Without these conditions, no man can be wise – he will always remain a small particle, which has nothing in common with the whole. Imagine that you are looking at yourselves in a flat mirror and you see your reflection in it; does your reflection have the same characteristics as you have? Seemingly, the reflection bears some resemblance to you, but it doesn’t posses the characteristics which you have. You hear the speech of a notorious orator voiced by a gramophone; does the gramophone itself posses the characteristics of the man whose speech it reproduces, does it posses any rationality? There isn’t any rationality in the gramophone – it can only be a reflection of the human. Consequently, the reflection cannot be equal to the reality. Likewise, the human cannot be like God. It is said in the Scriptures: “Be like God.” This does not mean that the human can be like God, it means that he should strive to attain the manifestations of God. One of the characteristics of God is that despite the fact that He does great things – He makes suns and universes, He nevertheless takes charge of the ant as well; when He sees that an ant is drowning He immediately comes to the assistance of this ant. The Eye of God, the Consciousness of God is awake for all things that happen within the Universe. He sees everything; he puts everything in its place. If man cannot manifest these characteristics within the small world in which he lives, what can we say for his manifestations in the great world?
As disciples you should work over yourselves, you should develop your attentiveness and your delicacy. This feeling is like the seeds of the plants; it needs certain conditions – just like the seeds, which need soil, water, air, and light. As you know this, you should grow the seed without getting discouraged. If in the first several years this seed does not bear fruit, it will produce fruits during the fifth or during the sixth year. The seed should be planted on time and in conditions favourable for it. Each lecture, which you listen to, stands for the favourable conditions for seed planting. Utilize these conditions, so that the seed planted can grow and develop. The Divine provides the conditions for growing. There is no respite and there isn’t any neutral zone in it. As you enter in the Divine world, you should by all means, take a certain direction. No one is allowed any rest there – all the beings there are engaged with work. Whoever tries to stay without working and rests, will get out of this world before he knows where he is. In whatever world the man is, he should work on himself. If he doesn’t work on himself then others will work on him.
What is the Divine world? The Divine world is a rational, a conscious world – it is not mechanical, as some people imagine. If you are weak, but you utilize the conditions of this world rationally, you will become strong. But if you are strong, but careless, then you might experience greatest disappointments. Why? Because even the smallest mistake in the Divine world is able to produce bad results. In order not to reach such a condition, man should utilize the favourable conditions; otherwise, he will go to extremes as some people often do. If you hear someone saying, “God will think out everything.” It means that this man will stay and he will wait for God to think out everything for him – this is an extreme. Another one says, “I should work personally, I should not rely on anyone.” And you see, that this man strains, he makes efforts to overcome the difficulties in Life, but he doesn’t succeed – this is another extreme. One thing you should know, in some cases God will think out, in other cases man should think out; in some cases God will work, in other cases man should work. What do we understand when we say God works – when does God work? When man is weak, in other words, when the son is weak – his mother works for him; when the mother is weak – her son works for her. In the first case the child, the son stands for the man, while the mother stands for God who works for him. In the second case, the mother is the man, while her son is God who works for her. In this way an exchange occurs, when one of them rests – another one works. Without this exchange, people wouldn’t have been able to help each other.
So, be attentive to the sufferings of all living beings and know that all those around you also suffer. Suffering is a beautiful thing! Suffering is just the language of God – nothing else. It is the Great Mother. Whoever wants to hear from God should be ready to bear the greatest sufferings in the world and he should be ready to be neglected by all people. And if in such a situation everything around him abates, then he will hear God’s voice – then he will connect with the reality in Life. Until man is healthy, until he is wealthy, until he has friends, God will not start talking to him – everybody might talk to him, but not God. Whoever has suffered has attained greater softness, greater tenderness, more knowledge and experience than the one, who has not suffered. Nevertheless, all people want to pass their lives without suffering.
When someone mentions suffering, you say, “Let suffering stay away from me.” When someone mentions Joy, you immediately smile. But Joy and grief always go one after the other. If you call grief, Joy will immediately come after her. When grief talks with some man for a long time it in fact says to him, “Up till now I tilled and hoed –I know how to do this. After I break the ground of the field I will call my sister – Joy – to plant it – she is very good at planting.” If some man calls Joy before the field has been hoed and broken, she will tell him, “I have a sister who knows how to plough and how to hoe; she has to come prior to me and to do this job – then I will come to plant the field. We work together – she commences some job and I finish it; then I commence and she finishes.” Consequently, without Joy and Grief the life of man would be unhappy. As they work together they cultivate the human, they bring tenderness and softness within him. If only the grief worked on him, it would make him rough; if only the Joy worked on him, it would make him hard. Both of them though, bring soft, tender, noble feelings and noble aspirations into the human character. The same can be noticed among the learned people; while a man is preoccupied only with a single subject, as a result he gets rough. If a learned man devotes twenty or thirty years of his life only to the study of the butterflies, he will get rough. What will be the use, if during his life he has caught thousands of butterflies and stuffed them? What kind of art, what kind of science is the occupation of a man who stuffs various animals? A day will come when this man, who has stuffed thousands of the animals with a status lower than his, will be stuffed, too. The real art, the real science is when he studies animals without stuffing them. While occupied with stuffing animals, science takes a wrong direction. While it brings in the Good in Life, it also brings in the evil in Life, the rough and the cruel things. Except for stuffing animals, Nature can also be studied by another method, which differs from the former methods.
So, beware of the roughening of the feelings. Upon studying natural sciences and mathematics, man can roughen. If he is not cautious, each man might roughen, no matter if he is a minister, a teacher, a priest, etc. If the Master beats his disciples, in less than ten years he will start to roughen. If the priest acts rudely with his congregation, he roughens. If the minister is rude to his dependent, he also roughens. Each thing might roughen man, so he should be careful and he should protect himself. There doesn’t exist a natural scientist who has not paid a high price for the stuffing which he has done; there isn’t a fisherman who hasn’t paid a high price for the fish caught; there isn’t a butcher who hasn’t paid a high price for the sheep and cattle he has killed. In general, there doesn’t exist a man in the world, who after he has violated the Divine law, has not paid for that.
So, whoever studies Nature, should observe some sacred rules that the contemporary scientists do not know and do not apply. If, for instance, someone wants to study butterflies, he has to go to that Exalted Being which patronizes them and to he has to ask from this Being permission to study them. If this Being gives him such permission, it will also give him a way to treat them and a way to study them without causing them any harm. If this man decides to enter the kingdom of butterflies without permission, their protector will teach him a lesson, which he will remember forever. If someone wants to enter the kingdom of the elements as a chemist and to study them, he will nevertheless have to ask permission from the keeper of the elements – to ask if he is permitted to study them, to ask how many elements he is allowed to study, etc. To ask permission when you study some science, no matter what this science is – this is the first sacred rule, which you should observe. Otherwise, each of you will pay high price for the violation of this rule. This is the reason why many scientists pay dearly for their experiments; many of them have paid with their lives. Each area of science is sacred and whoever wants to study it, should obtain permission from those, who rule this area. If you would like to be a good medical man and to treat people successfully, first get permission from the Beings that rule this field and then practice.
One thing is required from man - faith! He should have faith in what he studies. While he is under treatment, man should also have faith. The medicines, which the doctor prescribes to him, are effective to the degree of his faith. Things being as they are, man can be treated without medicines. Imagine that there are thirty paralyzed persons in some hospital: one has a paralyzed leg, another has a paralyzed arm, etc. If these sick persons have strong faith, all of them can get well with only one formula. The human faith is a mighty thing!
So, as faith is a precondition for the curing of the sick person, so the school provides conditions for the development of the gifts and abilities put into the human being. Whoever might use these conditions, he can become a learned man. This means, that the school does not make man learned, neither does it gives him knowledge, but it does provide for him the conditions that are necessary for him to acquire knowledge and to become a learned man. The church does not make man religious, but it provides the conditions, necessary for the development of his religious sense. As you know this, you should have in mind, that the class in which you are will not make occult disciples of you at once, but it will provide for you the necessary conditions, so that you can become such disciples. If you use the conditions rationally, you will become successful disciples; if you do not make proper use of these conditions, you will not attain anything. The ideas, which are given in the School, should be so clear to you that they should not awake within your mind any ambiguity. In order to succeed in the adoption of the ideas, which are being presented to you, you should be like children. There doesn’t exist a funnier thing for man, than to think that he is old, that he is an adult and because of this he knows everything. This man has prematurely grown old – he is like a child who thinks that he is an adult man.
A Frenchman is walking in the streets of a French town and meets a little boy with a cigarette in his mouth, he stops him and says, “Little boy, it is not good that you smoke – you are such a small child!” _ “Mister, don’t you know that there aren’t any children in France?” The misfortune of France is in this, that there are no children there. At the same time, everyone who you meet in Bulgaria will tell you, “How do you think – am I a simple man? You think I know nothing, don't you?” The misfortune of Bulgaria is in this, that all Bulgarians consider themselves learned people. When a man thinks of himself as a learned man, it is like when we have a bottle that has been full for years. No, as soon as your bottle is full, you should use its contents, you should empty it and you should fill it with fresh and clean water. Each of you should like to be filled up and to be emptied. When one gets empty, he should not regret that, when one is filled - he should be glad that he has acquired something new. For this reason all of you should have positive views of things – only in this way will you gain success and you will be able to develop properly.
Now keep within your mind the following fundamental ideas from this lecture: when you suffer, sympathize with each other. Secondly: no matter what you do, no matter what you are occupied with, use it for the development of tender and noble feelings within you. Consequently, beware of roughening of your feelings and develop within your own self, delicacy and compassion.
- Only the bright way of Wisdom leads to the Truth.
- It constantly cheers us.
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