Part 5

But I was speaking of the larger leisure out here. I wish you could arrange your life so as to have a little more leisure. I do not want you to be lazy, but the passive conditions of the mind are quite as valuable as the active conditions. It is when you are passive that we can reach you. When your mind and body are always occupied, it is difficult to impress you with any message of the soul. Find a little more time each day for doing nothing at all. It is good to do nothing sometimes; then the semi-conscious parts of your mind can work. They can remind you that there is an inner life; for the inner life that is “capable” to you on earth is really the point of contact with the world in which we live.

I have said that the two worlds touch, and they touch through the inner. You go in to come out. It is a paradox, and paradoxes conceal great truths. Contradictions are not truths, but a paradox is not a contradiction.

There is a great difference in the length of time that people stay out here. You talk of being homesick. There are souls here who are homesick for the earth. They sometimes go back almost at once, which is generally a mistake. Unless one is young and still has a store of unused energy saved over from the last life, in going back to the earth too soon one lacks the force of a strong rebound.

It is strange to see a man here as homesick for the earth as certain poets and dreamers on earth are homesick for the inner life.

This use of the terms “outer” and “inner” may seem confusing; but you must remember that while you go _in_ to come to us, we go _out_ to come to you. In our normal state here we are living almost a subjective life. We become more and more objective as we touch your world. You become more and more subjective as you touch our world. If you only knew it, you could come to us at almost any time for a brief visit--I mean, by going deep enough into yourself.

If you want to try the experiment and will not be afraid, I can take you out here without your quite losing consciousness in your body--I mean without your being in deep sleep. You can call me when you want to make a trial. If I do not come at once, do not be discouraged. Of course at the moment I might be doing something else; but in that case I will come at another time.

There is no hurry. That is what I want to impress upon you. What you do not do this year you can perhaps do next year; but if you are always rushing after things, you can accomplish little in this particular work. Eternity is long enough for the full development of the ego of man. Eternity seems to have been designed for that end. That was a sound statement which was given at one time: “The object of life is life.” I have realised that more fully since I had an opportunity to study eternity from a new angle. This is a very good angle from which to view both time and eternity. I see now what I did not see before, that I myself have never wasted any time. Even my failures were a valuable part of my experience. We lose to gain again. We go in and out of power sometimes as we go in and out of life, to learn what is there and outside. In this, as in all things, the object of life is life.

Do not hurry. A man may grow gradually into power and knowledge, or he may take them by force. Will is free. But the gradual growth has a less powerful reaction.

LETTER XXII

THE SERPENT OF ETERNITY

I WANT to talk to you to-night about eternity. Until I came out, I never had a grasp on that problem. I thought only in terms of months and years and centuries; now I see the full sweep of the circle. The comings out and the goings into matter are no more than the systole and the diastole of the ego-heart; and, speaking from the standpoint of eternity, they are relatively as brief. To you a lifetime is a long time. It used to seem so to me, but it does not seem so now.

People are always saying, “If I had my life to live over, I would do so and so.” Now, no man has any particular life to live over, any more than the heart can go back and beat over again the beat of the second previous; but every man has his next life to prepare for. Suppose you have made a botch of your existence. Most men have, viewed from the standpoint of their highest ideal; but every man who can think must have assimilated some experience which he can carry over with him. He may not, on coming out into the sunlight of another life on earth, be able to remember the details of his former experience, though some men can recall them by a sufficient training and a fixed will; but the tendencies of any given life, the unexplained impulses and desires, are in nearly all cases brought over.

You should get away from the mental habit of regarding your present life as the only one, get rid of the idea that the life you expect to lead on this side, after your death, is to be an endless existence in one state. You could no more endure such an endless existence in the subtle matter of the inner world than you could endure to live forever in the gross matter in which you are now encased. You would weary of it. You could not support it.

Do get this idea of rhythm into your brain. All beings are subject to the law of rhythm, even the gods,--though in a greater way than ourselves, with longer periods of flux and reflux.

I did not want to leave the earth, I fought against it until the last; but now I see that my coming out was inevitable because of the conditions. Had I begun earlier I might have provisioned my craft for a longer cruise; but when the coal and water had run out I had to make port.

It is possible to provision even a small life-craft for a longer voyage than the allotted threescore years and ten; but one must economise the coal and not waste the water. There are some who will understand that water is the fluid of life.

Many persons resent the idea that the life after death is not eternal, a never-ending progression in spiritual realms; though few who so object have much of an idea what they mean when they talk of spiritual realms.

Life everlasting is possible to all souls--yes; but it is not possible to go on forever in one direction. Evolution is a curve. Eternity is a circle, a serpent that swallows its own tail. Until you are willing to go in and out of dense matter, you will never learn to transcend matter. There are those who can stay in or out at will, and, relatively speaking, as long as they choose; but they are never those who shrink from either form of life.

I used to shrink from what I called death. There are those on this side who shrink from what _they_ call death. Do you know what they call death? It is rebirth into the world. Yes, even so.

There are many here who are as ignorant of rhythm as most people are on your side. I have met men and women who did not even know that they would go back to the earth again, who talked of the “great change” as the men of earth talk of dying, and of all that lay beyond as “unproved and unprovable.” It would be tragic if it were not so absurd.

When I knew that I had to die I determined to carry with me memory, philosophy, and reason.

Now I want to say something which will perhaps surprise you. There is a man who wrote a book called _The Law of Psychic Phenomena_ and in that book he said certain things of those two parts of the mind which he called the subjective and the objective. He said that the subjective mind was incapable of inductive reasoning, that the subjective mind would accept any premise given it by the objective mind, and would reason from that premise with matchless logic; but that it could not go behind the premise, that it could not reason backwards.

Now, remember that in this form of matter where I am men are living principally a subjective life, as men on earth live principally an objective life. These people here, being in the subjective, reason from the premises already given them during their objective or earth existence. That is why most of those who last lived in the so-called Western lands, where the idea of rhythm or rebirth is unpopular, came out here with the fixed idea that they would not go back into earth life. Hence most of them still reason from that premise.

Do you not understand that what you believe you are going to be out here is largely determinative of what you will be. Those who do not believe in rebirth cannot forever escape the rhythm of rebirth; but they hold to their belief until the tide of rhythm sweeps them along with it and forces them into gross matter again, into which they go quite unprepared, carrying with them almost no memory of their life out here. They carried out here the memory of the earth life because they expected so to carry it.

Many Orientals who have always believed in rebirth remember their former lives, because they expected to remember them.

Yes, when I realised that I had to leave the earth I laid a spell upon myself. I determined to remember through both the going out and the subsequent coming in. Of course I cannot swear now to remember everything when I come into heavy matter again; but I am determined to do so if possible; and I shall succeed to some extent if I do not get the wrong mother. I intend to take great care on that point, and to choose a mother who is familiar with the idea of rebirth. If possible, I want to choose a mother who actually knew me in my last life as ----, and who, if I shall announce in childhood that I am that same ---- whom she knew when a young girl, will not chide me and drive me back into myself with her doubts.

I believe that many children carry over into earth life memories of their lives out here, but that those memories are afterwards lost by reason of the suggestion constantly given to children that they are newly created, “fresh from the hand of God,” etc., etc.

Eternity is indeed long, and there are more things on earth and heaven than are dreamed of in the philosophy of the average teacher of children.

If you could only get hold of the idea of immortal life and _cling to it_! If you could realise yourself as being without beginning and without end, then you might commence to do things worth while. It is a wonderful consciousness that consciousness of eternity. Small troubles seem indeed small to him who thinks of himself in the terms of a million years. You may make the figure a billion, or whatever you like, but the idea is the same. No man can grasp the idea of a million years, or a million dollars, or a million of anything; the figure is merely a symbol for a great quantity, whether it be years or gold pieces. The idea cannot be fixed; there will always be something that escapes. No millionaire knows exactly what he is worth at any given time; for there is always interest to be counted, and the value is a shifting one. It is so with immortality. Do not think of yourself as having lived a million years, or a trillion years, but as truly immortal, without beginning or end. The man who knows himself to be rich is richer than the man who says that he has a certain amount of money, be the amount large or small. So rest in the consciousness of eternity and work in the consciousness of eternity.

That is all for to-night.

LETTER XXIII

A BRIEF FOR THE DEFENDANT

TELL the friend who is so anxious lest I do you harm by writing with your hand that that matter was thoroughly threshed out on this side between the Teacher and me before it began to take form on your side.

Ordinary mediumship, where the organism of a more or less unhealthy person on earth is opened indiscriminately for the entrance and obsession of any passing spirit, good or evil, is a very different proposition from this. Here I, who was your friend in the world, having passed beyond, reach back to instruct you from my greater knowledge on this side.

I am not making any opening in your nervous system through which irresponsible and evil forces can enter and take possession of you. In fact, if any spirit, good or bad, should make such an attempt, he would have to reckon with me, and I am not powerless. I know now, have both remembered and been taught, secrets by which I can protect you from what is generally known as mediumship. Furthermore, I advise you never, even at the urgent prayer of those whose loved ones have gone out--_never_ to lend yourself to them. The wanderers in the so-called invisible world have no right to come and demand entrance through your organism, merely because it is so constituted that they could enter, any more than a street crowd would have the right to force its way into your home, merely because its members were curious, hungry, or cold. Do not allow it. Permission was once given, yes; but the case was exceptional and was not based on the personal desire or curiosity of anybody--not even yourself. I doubt if permission will ever be granted again.

Many things have changed since I began to write with you. At first I used your hand and arm from the outside--sometimes, as you remember, with such force as to make them lame the next day. Then, grown more familiar with the means at my disposal, I tried another method, and you noticed a change in the character of the writing. It began clumsily, with large and badly formed characters, gradually becoming clearer as my control of the instrument I was using was better established.

Now, for the last few times I have used still another and a third method. I enter your mind, putting myself in absolute telepathic rapport with your mind, impressing upon your mind itself the things I wish to say. In order to write in this way, you have to make yourself utterly passive, stilling all individual thought and yielding yourself to my thought; but that is no more than you do every day in reading a fascinating book. You give your mind to the author who leads you along, rapt and passive, by means of the printed page.

These experiments in perfecting a way of communication have been very interesting to me.

Tell your friend that I am not a child, nor a reckless experimentalist. Not only in my last life on earth but in many former lives I have been a student of the higher science, giving myself absolutely to truth and to the quest of truth. I have never wantonly used any human being to his or her detriment, and I certainly shall not begin with you, my true friend and student.

Nor shall I interfere in any way with your life, or with your studies and work. The idea is nonsensical. While I walked the world on two feet I was never considered a dangerous man. I have not changed my character merely by changing my clothes and putting on a lighter suit.

I have certain things to say to the world. At present you are the only person who can act as amanuensis for me. This is neither my fault nor yours. The question before us is not whether I want the letters written, or even whether you want to write them, but whether they will be beneficial to the world. I think they will. You think they may be. B---- thinks that they are not only immensely valuable, but unique. So-and-so and So-and-so have doubts and fears. I cannot help that, nor can you.

Bless their hearts! Why should they be so anxious to bolt the doors behind me? I shall certainly not try to run their affairs for them from this side. They are equal to their job, or they would not be able to hold it. But this is quite a different job which I have given myself, and you have kindly consented to help me.

You may not get much reward for your labour, save the shake of the wiseacres’ heads and their superior smiles, and the suggestion of the more scientifically inclined that I am your own “subconscious mind.” I shall not be offended by that hypothesis, nor need you.

Of course you are not worried, for if you were I could not write. Your mind has to be placid as a lake on a windless night in order for me to write at all.

Give my love to them.

LETTER XXIV

FORBIDDEN KNOWLEDGE

I HAVE been doing many things of late. You could never imagine where I went the other day--to the great funeral of the Emperor of Japan. You could not go from Paris to Japan and return in so short a time, could you? But I did.

An hour before starting I did not even know that the Emperor of Japan was dead. The Teacher sought me out and invited me to go with him. He said that something would occur there which I ought to see.

His prophecy was verified. I saw a soul, a great soul, go out as a suicide. It was sad and terrible.

But as I write this the Teacher comes and stands beside me; he advises me to say no more on that subject.

One sees horrible things out here, as well as beautiful things. I can only say with regard to suicide, that if men knew what awaits those who go out by their own hand, they would remain with the evil that they know. I am sorry I cannot tell you more about this, for it would interest you. The testimony of an eye-witness is always more convincing than the mere repetition of theories.

The appearance of the Teacher with his advice has put out of my mind for the moment the desire to write. But I will come again.

_Later._

I have been able to do what you so much desired--to find the boy who came out accidentally by drowning.

As you looked at his photograph, I saw it through your eyes, and carried away the memory of the face. I found him wandering about, quite bewildered. When I spoke to him of you and said that you had asked me to help him, he seemed surprised.

I was able to give him a little aid, though he has a friend here--an old man who is nearer to him than I could ever be. He will gradually adjust himself to the new conditions.

You had better not try to speak with him. He is on a different path, and is being looked after, for he has friends. The little help I was able to give was in the nature of information. He needed diversion from a too-pressing thought, and I suggested one or two ways of passing time which are both agreeable and instructive.

You wonder at the expression “passing time”? But time exists out here. Wherever there is sequence, there is time. There may come a “time” when all things will exist simultaneously, past, present and--shall we say future? But so long as past, present and future are more or less distinct, so long time is. It is nothing but the principle of sequence. Did you fancy it was anything else?

Interiorly, that is, deep within the self, one may find a silent place where all things _seem_ to exist in unison; but as soon as the soul even there attempts to examine things separately, then sequence begins.

The union with the All is another matter. That is, or seems to be, timeless; but as soon as one attempts to unite with or to be conscious of things, time is manifest.

LETTER XXV

A SHADOWLESS WORLD

I HAD been here some time before I noticed one of the most marked peculiarities of this world.

One night as I was passing slowly along, I saw a group of persons approaching me. It was very light where they were, because there were so many of them. Suddenly, as I saw this light, a thought came to my mind, a saying from one of the Hermetic books: “Where the light is strongest, there are the shadows deepest.” But on looking at these men and women, I saw that _they cast no shadows_.

I hailed the nearest man--you must remember that this was soon after I came out, and when I was still more ignorant than I am now--and I called his attention to this peculiar phenomenon of a shadowless yet brilliantly lighted world. He smiled at my surprise, and said:

“You have not been here long, have you?”

“No.”

“Then you are not aware that we light our own place? The substance of which our bodies are composed is radiant. How could our forms cast shadows, when light radiates from them in all directions?”

“And in the sunlight?” I asked.

“Oh,” he answered, “you know that in the sunlight we cannot be seen at all! The light of the sun is coarse and crude, and it puts out the light of the spirits.”

Does it seem strange to you that at this moment I can feel the warmth of that wood fire by which you sit? There is a magic in burning wood. The combustion of coal has quite a different effect upon the psychic atmosphere. If one who had always been blind to visions and insensible to the finer feelings and premonitions of the invisible world would try meditating before a blazing wood fire for an hour or two every day or night, his eyes and other subtler senses might be opened to things of which he had theretofore never even dreamed.

Those Orientals who worship their God with fire are wise and full of visions. The light of burning wax has also a magical effect, though different from that of a wood fire. Sit sometimes in the evening with no light but that of a solitary candle, and see what visions will come from the “Void.”

I have not told you anything for a long time about the boy Lionel. He is now much interested in the idea of choosing a family of engineers in which to be born again. The thought is one to which he is always returning.

“Why are you in such a hurry to leave me?” I asked him, the first time he mentioned the subject.

“But I do not feel as if I should be leaving you altogether,” he replied. “I could come out to you in dreams.”