I will remain in hearts as the unknown friend,

Ever rousing all in their flaming feelings,

And silently urging them

Through their own noble thoughts

To forsake their slumber of earthliness.

In the light of wisdom

I will dance with all their joys

In the unseen bower of Silence.

I will wipe the dream fears

Of disease, sadness, and ignorance

From the Soul’s Face of Silence,

With the veil of Divine Mother’s Peace.

I will put the pole star of perpetual friendship

In the mental firmament of my seeking brothers

And bring them

To their lost home of Peace within.

I will be the billows of feelings

Dancing in the heart-sea of souls.

The door of my friendliness will ever be open

Equally for those brothers who hate me

As well as for those who love me.

I am the child of the Supreme Spirit.

My Father possesses everything.

"I and My Father are One."

Having the Father, I have everything

And I own everything that He owns.

Wilt Thou not open Thy lips of Silence

And whisper constant guiding thoughts

To my soul?

May all demoniac noisy thoughts

Take flight in order that silent

Song whispers of guidance

May be audible to my forgetful soul.

Thy lost love I had been seeking

In the desert dryness

Of human short-lived likes and dislikes.

Wandering through

Undependable human sympathy

At last I found the oasis of Thy sweetness

Laid in the desert of my seeking despair.

In the cheer of all hearts

I heard the echo of Thy Bliss.

In the friendship of all true souls

I found Thy friendship.

I found my own health

In the forms of others.

I rejoice in the prosperity of all

As my own prosperity.

In making others wise

I found my wisdom.

In the happiness of all

I found my own happiness.

I will use all the broken flutes of sorrow

And play through them

The song of my constant Divine Bliss.

I will establish

The consciousness of my health

In all.

I will establish my God devotion

In all those I meet.

I will establish a Temple of Wisdom

In every friend I love.

I will establish a Temple of Understanding

In hatred-stricken souls.

I will build a universal Temple of Love

Within myself, without bars

Of color, caste, or creed, where all my brothers

May offer the flowers of their understanding

Unto the one Altar of Wisdom.

Father, Thou art mine forever and forever.

In everything which is good

I worship Thy presence.

Through the windows of all good thoughts,

I behold Thy goodness.

Today I will worship God in deep silence,

And will wait to hear His answer

Through my increasing peace of meditation.

I will mingle my inner devotional whispers

With the prayers of saints

And continuously offer them

In the temple of silence and activity

Until I can hear His whispers loudly, everywhere.

I will behold His temple in the hearts

Of Hindus, Christians, Mohammedans, Jews,

And all races.

I will always behold the perfect, healthy, all-wise,

All-blissful image of God in my life.

I will pluck the star-blossoms

From the garden of night

And offer them before

His Smiling Face of the moon.

While I look at His mooned face,

I will wash my sorrows in His iridescent smiles.

I will break the limitations of restlessness

And limitlessly expand

The power of my meditation

Until the universal Christ-Consciousness

May be able to manifest through me.

I shall seek God first, last, and all the time.

Since God has given me my needs,

I will know Him first and then use His counsel

To desire and to do what He wills me

To desire and to do.

Knowing God, I will be satisfied

And will desire only that kind of prosperity

Which He wants me to have.

Father, I have been Thy prodigal son.

I have wandered away

From Thy home of all power, but now I am back

In Thy home of Self-Realization.

I want all good things which Thou hast,

For they all belong to me, as I am Thy child.

*Heavenly Father, Jesus Christ,

Saints of all religions,

Master minds of India,

Supreme Master Babaji,

Great Master Lahiri Mahasaya,

Master Swami Sri Yukteswarji Giriji,

And the Spirit in our body, mind,

And soul temples, I bow to you.

May Thy love, Oh Spirit,

Shine forever on the sanctuary of my devotion,

And may I be able to awaken Thy love

In all hearts.

Oh Spirit, make my soul Thy temple,

But make my heart Thy beloved home,

Where Thou wouldst dwell with me

In ease and everlasting understanding.

Father, make me feel that I am Thy son.

Save me from beggary, and let all things,

Including health, prosperity, and wisdom,

Seek me instead of my pursuing them.

I will use the starry openings,

The telescopes of sun and moon,

The windows of open flowers,

And luminous human minds

In which to behold

Thy omnipresent hiding place.

Preserve Thou, Oh Lord,

The Lotus of Divine Love,

In the Vase of my Heart,

Filled with the constant fresh waters

Of my devotion,

And may its etherial fresh fragrance

Pervade the surrounding lotuses,

And entice them into Thy Abode of Bliss.

Four things a man must learn to do

If he would make his record true:

To think without confusion clearly;

To love his fellow-men sincerely;

To act from honest motives purely;

To trust in God and heaven securely.

____________________________________________________________________________________

DO YOU sometimes allow the usurper, Imagination, to "play you for a fool?" If so, it will do you no harm to meditate upon the statements we are going to make. Furthermore, if you can persuade yourself to believe these statements and act upon the assumption that they are true, the practical effect upon your life will be the establishment, in your conscience, of their essential truth. You are the supreme ruler of yourself. You are not the slave of anything unless you grant to a thing or condition an apparent power over you.

A great book says: "Shall the thing created say to Him that made it, ‘Why hast Thou made me thus?’" Now, who or what is the Creator? Is it your body, your senses, your mind, your personal will, or the things your personality touches? Surely not. Then, why do you fear to declare that this Creator is yourself—your highest, best, truest Self, who stands back of all phenomena?

You are not governed by your imagination, and the very fact that you speak of it as "your" imagination, proves it. You are not ruled by the thing you image to yourself nor by the function called imagining, for you are the one who imagines. You are not ruled by even the will to imagine, for you are the governor of your will. You are not governed by your attitude toward anything or any condition in your universe, and the fact that you can change your attitude proves it.

You are the creator, the preserver, the transformer, and your will is the director, but never forget that YOU are the director of your will. When, in the course of creation or of imagining, you discover that you have imparted to any image so much of the essence of yourself that it is capable of believing in its own power, and threatens to rebel against your sovereignty, then know that it is no longer worthy of preservation, but that the time has come for you to transform that image into another and less potent form and to compel it to do you obeisance. Be not frightened by your shadow, be not overcome by the ghost that you have made.

All things, all conditions, all time, all mental qualities, all emotions belong to you. You alone are the enduring one. You are not in the world; all worlds are in you. The universe is under your feet. Forever and ever you govern as you please. If, for a time, you sportively place your crown upon the head of a favored idea, remember that this is but temporary and that you can retake your kingdom whenever you please.

DEAR Reader, do not wander aimlessly, lost in the jungle of life, constantly bleeding your happiness with the thorns of new desires. You must find the goal of your life and the shortest road which leads you there. Do not travel unknown roads, picking up new troubles. I am not telling you to be desireless, speechless, ambitionless, and useless in the world. All I am telling you is to culture the right desires and drop the useless ones.

Too much wrong ambition is just as bad as too much passive contentment. As human beings, we have been endowed with needs and we must meet their demands. As man is a physical, mental, spiritual being, he must look after his all-round welfare, avoiding one-sided, over-development. To possess wonderful health and a good appetite, with no money to maintain that health and to satisfy that hunger, is agonizing. To have lots of money and lots of indigestion is heart-rending. To have lots of health, and lots of wealth, and lots of trouble with self and others, is pitiable. To have lots of health, wealth, and mental efficiency, but no knowledge of the ultimate Truth, and with a lack of peace, is very useless, disturbing, and dissatisfying.

Most people live almost mechanically, unconscious of any ideal or plan of life. Most people come on earth, struggle for a living, and leave the shores of mortality without knowing why then came here, and what their duties were.

No matter what the goal of life is, it is obvious that man is so undermined with needs that he must struggle to satisfy them. The believer and the disbeliever in God must both struggle to meet their needs. Therefore, it is very important to know that man should concentrate on his needs and not create a lot of useless extra desires. He must differentiate between real needs and unnecessary necessities.

Man, often being wrapped up with his unnecessary necessities and physical luxuries, forgets to concentrate on his little physical needs and on his great need of developing mental efficiency in everything, and of acquiring Divine contentment. Man is so busy multiplying his conditions of physical comfort that he considers very many unnecessary thing as a necessary part of his existence.

though in poor circumstances, he often buys new models of automobiles and new clothes on the installment plan, so that he is always overhead and ears in debt and spends his entire time in unsuccessful attempts at making money. He has no time to develop his mental efficiency or to cultivate peace within because his time is entirely taken up in slavishly meeting the demands of Tyrant Physical Luxury habits. Every man must remember that the real needs of life are mental and spiritual efficiency.

Maximum peace, all-round mental efficiency, and sufficient material security, constitute the goal of man.

Great wealth does not necessarily bring health, peace, or efficiency, but acquirement of efficiency and peace are bound to bring a properly balanced material success. Most people develop mental efficiency as the by-product of their efforts for material success, but very few people know that money is made for happiness, but happiness cannot be found just by developing an insatiable soul-corroding desire for money.

After establishing that the goal of life is maximum efficiency, peace, health, and success, let us consider the surest way to prosperity. Prosperity does not consist just in the making of money; it also consists in acquiring the mental efficiency by which man can uniformly acquire health, wealth, wisdom, and peace at will.

Mental efficiency depends upon the art of concentration. Man must know the scientific method of concentration, by which he can disengage his attention from objects of distraction and focus it on one thing at a time. By the power of concentration, man can use the untold power of mind to accomplish that which he desires, and he can guard all doors through which failure may enter. All men of success have been men of great concentration, men who could dive deeply into their problems and come out with the pearls of right solution. Most people are suffocated by distraction and are unable to fish out the pearls of success.

However, one may be a man of concentration and power and may dive deep into the sea of problems but still may not find the pearl of success at all. There are many men who have powerful concentration but they do not know where to strike success. This is where another factor in acquiring prosperity comes into consideration. Brilliant people with efficient minds also have starved or have had only meager success.

All prosperity is measured out to man according to the law of cause and effect, which governs not only this life, but all past lives. That is why intelligent people are often born poor or unhealthy, whereas, an idiot may b born healthy and wealthy. Men were originally sons of God made in His image, having free choice and equal power of accomplishment, but, by the misuse of his God-given reason and will power man became controlled by the natural law of cause and effect and law of action (Karma) and thus limited his life. A man’s success depends not only upon his intelligence and efficiency but upon the nature of his past actions. However, there is a way to overcome the unfavorable results of past actions. They must be destroyed and a new cause set in motion.

Some psychologists erroneously teach that by visualizing a Rolls Royce with eternal gas, or by mentally picturing Henry Ford, one can get a Rolls Royce or can become like Henry Ford. No matter how strongly all the people in the world visualized Henry Ford, all of them could not be like him. This is an impossibility according to the law of cause and effect which governs this earth and the destinies of men.

Though it is impossible to conceive of fifteen hundred billion people of the earth becoming millionaires, still it is easy to think that all people by real effort can regain their lost divinity and become sons of God.

To become a son of God is not an acquirement, but a regaining of that which was lost. To become a son of God is to be able to claim all prosperity and everything that God has. It is possible for all to be millionaires after reclaiming their lost Divine Sonhood if they then still desire to step down into the field of material prosperity.

The surest way to prosperity lies, not in begging through wrong prayer, but in establishing first your Oneness with God and afterward demanding the Divine Son’s share. That is why Jesus said that men of the world wrongly and unsuccessfully seek bread first, but that they should seek the Kingdom of God first, then all things, all prosperity, unasked, would be added unto them.

This is easier said than done. You have heard this before, but you must learn to demonstrate this truth in your life. You must remember that Jesus actually knew and felt it when he said: "I and my Father are One." That is why He could command the storms to stop, turn water into wine, wake Lazarus from sleep, and heal the physically and mentally suffering, and could feed the multitude. He was spiritually efficient, and hence He knew the art of mental and physical efficiency.

God is the secret of all mental power, peace, and prosperity. Then why use the limited impossible human method of prosperity? By visualizing prosperity, or by affirmation, you may strengthen your subconscious mind, which may in turn encourage your conscious mind, but that is all that visualization alone can do. The conscious mind still has to achieve the success just the same and is hindered by the law of cause and effect. The conscious mind cannot initiate a new cause which will bring positive success in any direction, but when the human mind can contact God, then the superconscious mind can be sure of success, due to the unlimited power of God and due to creating a new cause of success.

The man of powerful concentration must ask God to direct his focused mind on the right place for right success. Passive people want God to do all the work and egotists ascribe all their success to themselves. Passive people do not use the power of God in intelligence and egotists, though using God-given intelligence, forget to receive God’s direction as to where the intelligence should be used. I can blame inertia as the cause of failure, but it hurts me to see intelligent egotists fail after making real intelligent effort.

That is why it is necessary to avoid both passivity and egotism. In the early morning and before going to bed, every man, woman, and child interested in prosperity must make the positive contact with God in order to succeed.

Since your soul’s message cannot reach God through your mental microphone if it is broken by hammers of restlessness, so you must repair it by practicing deep silence both in the morning and before sleep, until all restless thoughts disappear. Then, when the mental microphone is repaired by calmness, affirm deeply: "My Father and I are One" until you feel the response of God through a deep ever-increasing peace, which cannot be felt except through practice of the Preceptor-given right method of meditation. This increasing peace, or Bliss, is the surest proof of God’s contact and response.

Remember, you must broadcast your message: "My Father and I are One" until you feel this overpowering, all-solacing Bliss of God. When this happens, you have made the contact. Then demand your celestial right by affirming: "Father, I am Thy child, guide me to my right prosperity," or "Father, I will reason, I will will, I will act, but lead Thou my reason, will, and activity to the right thing which I should do in order to acquire health, wealth, peace, and wisdom."

Do not will and act first, but contact God first and thus harness your will and activity to the right goal. As you cannot broadcast through a broken microphone, so must you remember that you cannot broadcast your prayer through the mental microphone which is disordered by restlessness. By deep calmness, repair your mind microphone. Then again, as you cannot get an answer by just calling someone through a microphone and then running away, so, also, you must not first pray once and run away, but you must continuously broadcast your prayer to God through you calm mental microphone until you hear His voice. Most people pray in restlessness and do not pray with the determination to receive a response.

Remember that the surest way to all-round prosperity, or to the attainment of health, wealth, peace, and wisdom, lies in first reclaiming your lost Divine Sonhood by continuously broadcasting your message to God through your calm mental microphone until you receive His answer through the increased Bliss of meditation.

"And Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost returned from Jordan, and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness, being forty days tempted of the devil. And in those days he did eat nothing: and when they were ended, he afterward hungered. And the devil said unto him, If thou be the Son of God, command this stone that it be made bread. And Jesus answered him, saying, It is written, That man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word of God."—Luke 4.

The consciousness of Jesus, the man, felt the limitation of the body and began to vibrate with the ghost-like, holy, intelligent, Cosmic vibration as heard in meditation. This was the first attempt of the soul of Jesus to rise above His bodily attachment of incarnations. Jesus had been successful in transferring His consciousness from the circumference of the body to the boundary of all finite creation in the vibrating region. (See figure X.)

The whole Cosmos can be divided in halves. One portion is pervaded by the transcendental God, the Father, who is ever-existing, ever-conscious, ever-new Bliss, and beyond all the categories of time, space, and vibration. The other portion is the vibratory region of space and time which contains in its sphere all the planetary universes, milky way, stars, and our little family of solar systems. The earth is a part of the solar system, and the body of Jesus was a small speck of the earth. Jesus, the man, had His consciousness caged in the little body, a speck of earth space.

Jesus, the Christ Consciousness, by the expanding power of love and the spreading power of meditation, had been able to extend His consciousness to the region of all vibratory space. This is what is meant by Jesus being full of the Holy Ghost. Jesus was not possessed by a Ghost, or a disembodied soul, as popularly understood, but His consciousness was expanded fully from the region of the body vibration to the region of all vibration, as shown in the Figure X. Jesus, the man, a speck of the earth, became Jesus, the Christ, with His consciousness pervading all finite vibration.

Omnipresent Spirit becomes buried in matter and vibration, just as the oil remains hidden in the olive, and can be released again only through love and meditation.

When the olive is squeezed, tiny drops of oil appear on its surface, so Spirit tries to squeeze its way out of matter as the souls of gems, beautiful minerals, plants, men, and supermen. Spirit expressed itself as beauty, magnetic and chemical power in gems, as beauty and life in plants, as beauty, power, life, motion, and consciousness in animals, as comprehension and expanding power in man, and again returns to omnipresence in the superman.

The gem expresses a part of Spirit, the plant expresses a little more. The animal expresses Spirit more than the plant, for the animal can cover a greater portion of space by bodily movements. Man, by his self-consciousness, can comprehend the thoughts of other men and can project his mind into space and to the stars, at least by the power of imagination.

The superman, by withdrawing life and energy from his body, can expand them and project them into all space, thus actually feeling the presence of all universes and every atom of the earth in his own consciousness. In the superman the lost omnipresence of Spirit is bound in the soul by individualized Spirit. To understand exactly what Jesus meant by being filled with the Holy Ghost, one must scientifically and metaphysically explode superstition and understand the true significance of His statements. That is why Jesus said: "Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. Fear ye not, therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows." Matt. 10:29-31.

Jesus, like the great Yogis of India, not only could foretell the actions of people and the course of events from a distance through telepathic vibrations of thought, but He also knew about all the happenings on the earth surface or within it, or in any portion of space, in any planet or vibratory Creation, through His omnipresent feeling. That is why Jesus foretold or felt the death of Lazarus in His own omnipresent Christ Consciousness of omnipresence.

A little ant’s consciousness is limited by its little body. An elephant’s consciousness is extended all over his big body. His consciousness is aware in all parts of his own body so that ten people touching ten different parts of his body would awaken simultaneous awareness in him. Likewise, Christ Consciousness is extended to the boundaries of all vibratory regions, as represented in Figure X. Jesus, the man’s consciousness, was at first extended only to the boundaries of His body.

The body of man may not be as large as that of an elephant, but his consciousness, unlike the elephant’s, can cover the territories of stars in imagination. Christ, a Superman-God, by constantly meditating upon the finitely omnipresent vibrating ocean sound, (as taught in Yogoda, 5th Lesson) or Holy Ghost vibration, felt His consciousness filled in every particle of space.

First: Jesus, the man’s consciousness, was bound by His body occupying a little speck of vibratory region on the earth. Second: By meditation and feeling Cosmic vibration in every particle of vibratory space, Jesus, the man, became Jesus, the Christ. (Simply listening to the Cosmic souls will not do. By Guru-Preceptor-given higher and higher meditation one must learn to actually feel the sound in plants and stars or in any portion of space at will.) In the Holy Ghost state the consciousness of Jesus had expanded from the body to all vibratory regions.

This Holy Ghost state is the second state of high metaphysical development. This Holy Ghost state can be attained externally by extending the feeling of love to one’s family, society, nation, all nations, all creatures, and internally by expanding consciousness through semi-subconsciousness, soul consciousness, semi-superconsciousness, semi-Christ Consciousness to Christ Consciousness present in all vibratory regions.

A Christ-like person must love all living creatures and actually feel His presence in every portion of earth or vibratory space semi-universally at the same time. He does not need to concentrate in order to know anything. He already knows all things because he feels all finite creation, stars, and all specks of space, as the living cells of his own body.

Once Lahiri Mahasaya, my Preceptor’s Guru. was teaching the Hindu Bible, or Bhagavad Gita, to a group of his students in Benares, India, and was talking of Kulastha Chaitanya, or his Christ Consciousness in all finite vibratory creation, when suddenly he gasped and cried out: "I am drowning in the bodies of many souls off the coast of Japan." Later the disciples read in the newspapers that a shipload of people were drowning near the coast of Japan at exactly the time when Lahiri Mahasaya felt and saw the shipwreck in his omnipresence.

So it was with Jesus. By extending His consciousness through the different states of consciousness, He had arrived at this second Holy Ghost state.

At this time, after Jesus, the man, became Jesus, the Christ, he had to go through a metaphysical and psychological test before He could reach the third and last state of extending His consciousness to the Spirit of God, the Father’s, vibrationless region, as shown in Figure X.

The devil, or conscious Cosmic metaphysical Satan, through Cosmic delusion and psychological temptations, began to tempt the Christ Consciousness of Jesus by reminding Him of the limited needs of the body, so that instead of living by His newly-found Cosmic energy He might become mortal again by misusing His Divine powers in changing atoms of stone to atoms of bread.

Before Jesus attained the third and final state, in which He could behold Himself as the transcendental, vibrationless God, the Father, and the Christ Consciousness in vibratory space, He was led by the ultimate Spirit in the silence of the wilderness to be tested, to see if Christ Consciousness had risen above all mortal memories of food and other small material temptations of the powers of miracles.

Miracles are held in esteem by earth-bound mortals, but they should not be loved or used by a superman to test the attention and love of God to the devotee. To test the love of God by invoking His miracles is to disturb the faith in Him and His all-protecting power. That is why Jesus refused to convert the stones into bread, even though His body was hungry from the delusive human standpoint. Also, that is why He refused to be tempted by Cosmic Satan into jumping from the mountain top to show whether the angels would hold Him or not.

The Christ Consciousness of Jesus found an adequate test in the temptations born of the memories of past mortal habits, and in the test of "living by bread alone," and so forth, which was instigated through the Cosmic delusion of the metaphysical Satan.

Whether one believes in Cosmic Satan or not, it can be easily understood that the Spirit, before giving the final transcendental, Cosmic Consciousness of God, the Father, to Jesus, wanted to see if His newly-acquired Christ Consciousness could rise above the temptations born of the memory of mortal habits.

Jesus, in lifting Himself from the Holy Ghost state of feeling all Cosmic vibration and its universal Christ Consciousness, found a matter-ward pull of Cosmic delusion which began to remind Him of confining, limiting, human habits of incarnations.

Jesus successfully stood the test by saying: "I have found the new source of living by God, the Father, as the fountain of all life, and not by physical bread." In doing this, Jesus teaches mankind one of the greatest methods of actually knowing that the body lives principally by God and secondarily by bread. Jesus said that the body does not live by the little condensed solidified energy of bread alone, but by the word of the unlimited vibrating Cosmic Energy of God.

In the next issue will be given a unique exposition of why Jesus fasted, an explanation of metaphysical fasting and spiritual development, and also the mystic laws of living more by the word of God and not alone by bread.

IS IT not remarkable that, in the face of so much clear and convincing testimony from philosophy, science, and human experience, the race has not yet learned the high value of silence, of calmness, of peace?

"Be still, and know that I am God!"

The old Hebrew prophet heard the earthquake and the wind, and saw the fire. But God was not in these. He was in the "still small voice."

We are so busy today, so noisy, so restless, that it seems as though we could not possibly hear the "still small voice." But, unless we do hear it, we cannot get in tune with Reality, with the Cosmic truth.

All world religions inculcate the value of peace, of meditation. Buddhism and Christianity preach it constantly. While the Koran, of Mohammed, does not specifically prescribe silence, it does insist on meditation and prayer, at least five times every day. The Jewish scriptures instruct all good Jews in the virtues of quietude and peace. In the Babylonian Talmud we find: "Peace is the vessel in which all God’s blessings are presented to us and preserved by us."

The distilled wisdom of the race, even apart from religious thought, bears insistent testimony to the power of quiet and calmness. Still waters run deep. Only the empty vessel sounds loudly. All the worthwhile things of life are evolved in the stillness. Be calm. Don’t get excited. These are the very essence of human wisdom of all ages and climes.

No man can understand God intellectually. It has been tried through endless ages by many learned pundits of all keen-minded races. "The existence of God," said the Mahatma Gandhi, recently, is "like a geometrical axiom." Intellectual attempts to understand Him are bound to fail, because "a rational explanation cannot give you the faith in a living God, for it is a thing beyond the grasp of reason. It transcends reason."

In their attempts to rationalize about God, the intellectuals have coined terms and phrases which mean nothing to those simple folk who begin and end everything with a child-like faith in God. On the Pyramids of ancient Egypt there is this inscription:

"I am that which exists. I am all that is, that was, that shall be. No mortal man has lifted my veil. He is One only, self-created, and to that Only One do all things owe their being."

This is the counterpart of the Christian: "I am that I am." "Before Abraham was, I am." It is the Brahma of the Hindu, the "I am He" of the Vedantist.

But this does not satisfy the humble mind which cannot grasp it. There is another Hindu school, that which holds love to be the universal solvent. The vishnovists, who follow Chaitannya, brush aside all complications and apply the test of love. By love we can understand, or accept, all things.

Then, after all, the Hindus do not mean the same thing as we do by the word God. To them it does not mean an anthropomorphic deity. It is a kind of all-pervading universal Spirit, of which we form an integral part, and with which we aim to become one, to merge into it and absorb it.

God is not, as our forefathers so childishly believed, an old man with a beard, seated on a golden throne to judge men for their misdeeds in this life on earth. "The conception of God to which the analysis of our experience has led is not that of a perfect being existing apart from the ignorance, sin, and suffering of our own world, but present within and around us, sharing in our struggle."

This is the opinion of one of the most eminent living British scientists, Prof. J. S. Haldane. In a recent book on "The Philosophical Basis of Biology," he says: "Our evidence for the existence of God is derived from the recognition in ourselves of the striving after truth, beauty, and goodness, and it is only in presence of what appears to us as error, evil, and ugliness that this Divine striving manifests itself.

There is no other evidence of any real value, but this evidence is sufficient that throughout all the appearances of chaos, our universe is the progressive manifestation of God. This conclusion, or faith, is the faith of religion."

Restlessness and noise—these are the two most troublesome factors in our modern life which we must overcome before we can even begin to acquire that peace which is necessary to "know God."

We cannot, perhaps, entirely eradicate our tendency to restlessness. We are too much the creatures of our self-made environment. But there is one thing we can do. By training, we can modify, to a certain extent, these faulty mental habits, and take the edge off our fret and worry; in short, cultivate emotional poise.

For the cure of "nervousness" (which is often only another name for faulty habit of mind) change of scene is often advised. It is, indeed, often necessary by way of breaking up the associations under which the faulty mental habits have developed, and by which they are constantly fostered. One can, as we say in our modern idiom, "sit tight" wherever he is and himself materially modify his character, if he is only ready to sacrifice his pride to his cure, and if he be sufficiently broad-minded to recognize in this description his own shortcomings as well as those of his neighbor.

To such an one, the unfavorable environment becomes merely an obstacle, something to be overcome instead of avoided. If he succeeds in viewing with placidity, not only the brusque affront, but the sly criticism, the covert glance, and the daily reminder of his stupidity, he will be repaid by an increase in self-respect which may even carry with it the respect of his own family. Is it not worth while to try and approximate, if we cannot hope to attain fully, the ideal of fretless, fussless, and unworrying poise?

A friend of the writer says that nervous prostration cannot be so easily disposed of. He says he frets because he is tired. As a matter of fact, the principal reason that he gets so tired is probably because he frets.

Even suppose a person is tired. Much of the consequent fret is a mere obsession, a fixed idea. The association of the words "tired and cross" has become so fixed in our minds that to separate them would do violence to our ideas of the proprieties, but try this experiment once. Going home after a hard day’s work, say to yourself: "Why tired and cross? Why not tired and good-natured?"

Try another experiment: Start out with the determination that you will do each piece of work in its turn without unnecessary fret, without burdening your mind with such questions for the thousandth time as whether So-and-So will keep his appointment, whether So-and-So will pay his bill, whether So-and-So will understand your motives, and whether your business is all gone and will never come back again. The writer has tried and can testify to the wonderfully helpful results.

Try to limit your thoughts to the task in hand. Dismiss the one just finished and leave the next one to take its turn. To quote from a recent book: "When you have entrusted someone else with a part of your work, dismiss that part from your mind. Most important of all, hold yourself in readiness to react comfortably, instead of irritably, to the ordinary incidents of life. If you succeed in doing this, you will be surprised to find yourself comparatively fresh at the end of a hard day’s work. Meanwhile, your affairs will not suffer."

If you do not follow some such policy, there are dangers ahead in this machine age of rush and racket. Man is falling behind the material civilization he has created, and the fruit of his lagging ability to adapt himself to the pace is an enormous amount of insanity. Dr. Charles H. Mayo, of the Mayo Clinic at Rochester, Minn., said recently:

"We pass through more of the wonders of life in forty years than was possible for old people in the past. The world has moved ahead so fast as regards material civilization that man has for the moment almost got behind in his power of adaptation. Every other hospital bed in the United States is for mentally afflicted, insane, idiotic, feeble-minded, or senile persons. There is an enormous number of people who are almost fit for the asylum. Many people live to an age when they are dependent and senile. Only 5 per cent of our people, at the age of 65 years, have independent means. Why? Because we have not as yet, psychologically, morally, nervously, and spiritually, caught up with the machine age which we have brought upon ourselves."

The noisiness of our modern, particularly our modern American, life is appalling. It would seem as though we hated to be still.

A lady acquaintance of the writer recently complained of the "awful silences" required by service in one of the churches.

"Why," she said, "Think of it! The rector made us sit absolutely quiet for several minutes at a time."

I recall also the rather naive, perhaps, but quite characteristic comment, of a young American girl, who, by force of circumstances, had been compelled to pass several hours in the Black Forest in Germany with those splendid trees all about and no automobile, radio set, fire company, riveting machine, or whoopee party within miles.

"Isn’t there anything doing around here?" she asked.

"No, Fraulein," replied a German officer present. "No, Nothing doing, nothing except Nature."

The noises in our cities today are legion. The writer can add nothing new to the long list of indictments that have been brought against them. Even the medical authorities and the efficiency experts are now telling us that this Bedlam is not only unpleasant and wearing on the nerves, but positively injurious to our health and impairing to our economic efficiency.

How can we know Reality, the Eternal order of the universe, unless we calm ourselves and "hear the angels sing." Our nights are scarcely any better than our days. A young student some time ago observed to the writer that he could not understand what Longfellow meant when he wrote those penetratingly lovely lines:

"The day is done, and the darkness

Falls from the wings of night

As a feather is wafted downward

From an eagle in his flight.

And the night shall be full of music,

And the cares that infest the day

Shall fold their tents like the Arabs

And as silently steal away."

How Nature does provide compensations! Here is Edison, whose name (when he died recently) had become almost literally a household word all over the globe, whose contribution to our race was the most wonderful gift the human eye, and ear, ever received.

Edison was deaf for many years and we commiserated with him for having been deprived of the sense of hearing, but he did not repine, not he. Often he told friends how much he had been spared by not being compelled to hear the stupid distracting noises and the futile chatter of life around about him. In the blessed silence of his deafness he worked out into practice some of his wonderful ideas.

One of the world’s greatest souls, certainly one of its greatest men of art, also found God in his deafness. Beethoven, preeminent in the history of music, had a spiritual instinct which was sharpened by his loss of hearing. Shut in from the meaningless rumble and rattle of our idle, restless outside world, he realized the meaning of God. In a really impressive tribute to this musical genius, recently published, Emil Ludwig says of Beethoven:

"Continually, in a kind of pianissimo of emotion, did he breathe the only bliss he knew into his notebooks, and it was always God to whom he first addressed himself: "Almighty, in the forest, I am filled with bliss. What glory in such a forest region, on the heights, is peace, peace, serving Him—serving."

All of us might have this peace that passeth all understanding, that means a perception of the ultimate Reality. That will put us in rapport with God—if we only would.

To help us get rid of restlessness, at least in a measure, we Occidentals are beginning to understand the wonderful value of mediation in the sense that the Orientals, the Hindus, know it.

Meditation, in the definition of the yogi, is concentration to know God. This is not the place to give a full description of the methods by which we can acquire a command of ourselves and attain peace, but we can be helped very much by a certain practical technique which the system of Yogoda teaches. This technique (as developed by Swami Yogananda) includes diet, posture, and the acquiring of efficient mental discipline and character habits. By patiently cultivating this technique, as the writer knows from several years of experience, a large measure of self control can be attained, and much peace gained, as well as a realization of the eternal realities of the universe, all of which help mightily in an approach to a knowledge of God.

"To lift the aspirant from the lower levels of renunciation, where objects are renounced, to the loftier heights where desires are dead, and where the yogi dwells in calm and ceaseless contemplation, while his body and mind are actively employed in discharging the duties that fall to his lot in life."

This is the aim of Hindu spiritual philosophy. The central lesson of the Bhagavad Gita, the quintessence of the "Mahabharata," the Hindu scriptural poem, is just that.

In the introduction to her translation of the Bhagavad Gita, under the English title of "The Lord’s Song," Mrs. Annie Besant points out that, scattered through the text are verses of beauty, packed with meaning, for us moderns as well as for the ancients who first read them in the original Sanskrit. "Life may be achieved and maintained in the midst of worldly affairs," says the ancient sage, "that the obstacles to that union lie not outside us but within us."

"Yoga" means, literally, "union," harmony with the Divine law, becoming one with the Divine Life, by the subjection of all outward going energies. To reach this state, balance and equilibrium must be gained so that the individual personal self, joined to the great Cosmic Self, shall not be affected by pleasure or pain, desire or aversion.

This is the aim that the disciple Arjuna (who represents all people) has set before him by the Lord Krishna.

"He must learn not to be attracted by the attractive, nor repelled by the repellent, but must see both as manifestations of the one Lord, so that they may be lessons for his guidance, not fetters for his bondage. In the midst of turmoil, he must rest in the Lord of Peace, discharging every duty to the fullest, not because he seeks the results of his actions, but because it is his duty to perform them. His heart is an altar, love to his Lord the flame burning upon it; all his acts, physical and mental, are sacrifices offered on the altar; and once offered, he has with them no further concern."

Majestically, the text moves:

"The disciplined Self,

Moving among sense-objects with senses free From attraction and repulsion,

Mastered by the SELF, goeth to Peace."

"In that Peace the extinction of all pains

Ariseth for him, for of him

Whose heart is peaceful

The Reason soon attaineth equilibrium."

"When his subdued thought is fixed on the SELF, Free from longing after all desirable things,

Then it is said: ‘He is harmonized’."

"As a lamp in a windless place flickereth not,

To such is likened the yogi of subdued thought, Absorbed in the Yoga of the SELF."

"By devotion, he knoweth Me in essence,

Who and what I am;

Having thus known Me in essence

He forthwith entered into the Supreme."

"Though ever performing all actions,

Taking refuge in Me, by My grace he obtaineth The eternal indestructible abode."

The more metrical translation, made by Sir Edwin Arnold, is given the title ‘The Song Celestial."

The Lord Krishna tells Arjuna that:

"—Out of tranquility shall rise

The end and healing of his earthly pains,

Since the will governed sets the soul at peace."

Also:

"—When the soul masters itself,

And cleaves to Truth

And comes possessing knowledge—

To the higher peace. The uttermost repose."

To those "blessed ones who worship Me,"

Said the Lord Krishna,

"I bring assurance of full bliss beyond."

To worship the Lord, Arjuna is told, humanity must love solitude and "shun noise of foolish crowds."

During recent years a number of books on concentration and its benefits in getting in touch with the reality of situations have appeared from the pens of western writers.

Psychologists of the Occident are agreed that there is a mental law which, under favorable conditions, carries out the will of the subconscious. There are indeed tides of the mind—"the ebb and flow of feelings, the elevations and depressions of experience."

It is true that the American temperament, as developed by what we may call "the American scene," is not conducive to acquiring the art of concentration or quiet meditation. Our love of sensation and thrill, our dependence upon variety, and our passion as a people for movement, are so many hindrances which have to be overcome. Even while automobiling through the beautiful countryside, so many of us today feel it necessary to use the traveling radio attached to the car.

The one noticeable striving of multitudes of human beings today in our country is for entertainment—music, dancing, parties, public gatherings, games, sports, and what not. "Yet in spite of this almost fierce endeavor to be happy, hundreds of men and women feel the oppression of a dull life. The ‘kick’ they seek they do not find. What was an excitement last month is a damp squib today, and the search is on for something new. Anything to escape oneself."

One explanation of this condition, says a recent writer, is that many persons have no inward resources. "All their lives are external. Of an inner life of mind and soul they have but a symptom. How, then, can they be expected to concentrate on ideas, on fact, even on tangible objects? A process so slow, so unexciting, so apparently unremunerative, is not for them. At least, so they imagine, and whenever circumstances conspire to impose such tasks their incompetence is obvious."

Even the non-spiritual psychologists (witness T. S. Knowlson in his recent: "The Secret of Concentration") maintain "concentrate on evil and you make evil actions easy; concentrate on the good and the good comes your way."

To sum up the whole matter: "Be still and know that I am God."

"Bow to God, your Higher Self," says the yogi. This is only echoing the aspiration of every human heart which knows that God is goodness, that our conception of Him must be made up of our highest ideas of the good, the true, and the beautiful, the Eternal Reality—Bliss.

We can know God only by putting ourselves in the right relationship to His universe, which is His manifestation. If we meditate on our blessings, on what we have to be thankful for, rather than upon the trials, ills, and worries that beset us, or we permit to disturb us, we will begin to know God.

Then will the peace that passeth all understanding come into our hearts. May it abide with us forever!

Happiness comes

Not from the power of possession,

But from the power of appreciation.

Above most other things,

It is wise to cultivate

The powers of appreciation.

The greater the number of stops in an organ,

The greater its possibilities

As an instrument of music.

—H. W. Sylvester.

EVERY spiritual aspirant should ask himself, each day, each week, each month, each year, how the battle between actions initiated by free choice and actions influenced by pre-natal habits has resulted. Each human being acts either by free choice, by the influence of pre-natal karmic* habits, by the suggestions of post-natal karmic habits, or by the vibrations from the effects of environment.

Very few master minds can use exclusively their powers of free choice in making themselves what they want to be in life. The majority of people allow themselves passively and desultorily to grow in any undirected way, according to the good or sinister influences of their pre-natal and post-natal habits, or according to the patterns of their passing moods engendered by specific environments.

Most people don’t know the consequences of acting under the influence of bad habits until they suffer excruciating bodily pain or undergo heart-breaking sorrow. It is pain and sorrow which start the Ego to inquire about the invisible battle between free-will-initiated, wisdom-guided post-natal actions, and pre-natal karmic habits. A wicked man, an artist, a business man, a dogmatist, an intellectual-talkative-do-nothing, and a man of Self-Realization are all the result of the clash between pre-natal seeds of actions and post-natal actions roused by wisdom-guided free choice.

Pre-natal habits establish themselves in the trenches of the subconscious mind and try to influence the discriminative power of the conscious mind. I believe that any man may become what he wants to become if his pre-natal habits do not influence his free choice under the guise of heredity.

Most people start out to adopt a career or professions without considering the influence of pre-natal karmic habit. That is why born artists fail when they attempt to act the role of business men. That is why the born spiritual man does not succeed as a business.

It is good to consult your pre-natal tendencies, and post-natal environment and habits through an intuitive astrologer, or to get yourself analyzed by your Guru (Preceptor) in order to find the specific tendencies you brought with you from the dim distant past. These tendencies were responsible for picking up your specific heredity, and the seeds of post-natal actions lie lurking in your subconscious brain cells ready to germinate under the influence of environment favorable to their growth.

In other words, this spiritual analysis would help you to understand your pre-natally cultivated tendencies and give you the opportunity to choose your path and to adopt or reject the influence of certain good or bad tendencies.

If you were a business man in the past life, it would be easy for you to become a successful one in this life with the least effort, instead of blindly struggling to be an artist or an engineer because of the urge of environment and temptation of erroneous judgment. If you find out that you were a man lacking in self-control, or given to choleric exhibitions in the past life, then you may understand why, against your will, it is easy for you to be tempted or to become wrathful in this life.

The result of the spiritual diagnosis is to give free choice to the Ego, and freedom from the prejudicing influences of pre-natal habits. Every man should be able to act freely, guided by the highest wisdom, and uninfluenced by pre-natal habits unless they are good. It is good to act under the influence of pre-natal good habits, but it is always best to perform good actions through the inspiration of the wisdom-guided, spontaneous free choice of the soul.

The great paradoxes and anomalies seen in life in the form of deep contrasts between rich unhealthy persons and poor healthy persons, some living a long life, some dying at an early age, some being born with an intelligent brain, some starting life with the brain of a moron, are all the result of the battle between pre-natal and post-natal actions.

On the battlefield of life, youth and old age are gathered together. The fierce evil warriors of chronic disease tendencies, habitual failure tendencies, and innate ignorance, are entrenched in brain cells and subconscious mind on one side, and the good warriors of health, success, and wisdom tendencies are entrenched on the other side.

Very seldom have you realized that the health, success, and wisdom outlook of your life entirely depends upon the issue of the battle between your good and bad habits. Henceforth, you must not allow your bodily Kingdom to be occupied by bad habits. You must learn to put your bad habits to flight by training all your diverse good habits in the art of victorious psychological warfare.

The soldiers of bad habits and of ill health and negativeness are invigorated by specific bad actions; whereas, the soldiers of good habits become stimulated by specific good actions. Do not feed bad habits with bad actions. Starve them out by self control. Feed good habits with good actions.

Every man should ask, as the blind king in the Gita asked: "Gathered together in the bodily Kingdom are the warriors of the pre-natal and post-natal good actions arrayed against the pre-natal and post-natal evil actions. What have they done? Which side has won?"

Everyone must ascertain whether the good past and present actions or the bad past and present actions are spreading their victories and influences in the bodily Kingdom.

1 cup cooked kidney beans

1 cup cottage cheese

1/2 cup ground nuts

1 cup whole wheat bread crumbs

1 cup boiled brown rice

1 tablespoon chopped onion

1 tablespoon melted butter.

Mix the ingredients and form a loaf. Brush it over with tomato sauce, and salt and pepper liberally. Bake in a slow over for 35 minutes. Serve with white sauce to which has been added minced sweet red pepper to taste.

2 cups crushed pineapple

2 cups graham cracker crumbs

2 cups cooked brown rice

1 cup brown sugar

butter.

Into a well buttered baking dish place a layer of rice. Sprinkle the rice generously with sugar and dot with bits of butter. Over the rice place a layer of pineapple; sprinkle with sugar and cover with a layer of cracker crumbs. Dot the crumbs with butter. Add another layer of rice as before, then a layer of pineapple, a layer of crumbs, etc., until all the ingredients have been used. Finish with a layer of crumbs on top. Bake in a moderate oven twenty to thirty minutes. Serve with cream.

YOUR individual happiness depends to a large extent upon protecting yourself and your family from the evil results of gossiping. See no evil, talk no evil, hear no evil, think no evil, feel no evil. Most people can talk about other people for hours and thrive under the influence of gossip like the temporary influence of intoxicating poisonous wine. Isn’t it strange that people can smoothly, joyously, and with caustic criticism talk about the faults of others for hours but cannot endure reference to their own faults at all?

The next time you are tempted to talk about the moral and mental wickedness of other people, immediately begin to talk loudly about your own mental and moral wickedness for just five minutes and see how you like it. If you do not like to talk about your own faults, if it hurts you to do so, you certainly should feel more hurt when saying unkind, harmful things about other people. Train yourself and each member of your family to refrain from talking about others. "Judge not, that ye be not judged."

By giving publicity to a man’s weakness, you do not help him. Instead, you either make him wrathful or discouraged and you shame him, perhaps forever, so that he gives up trying to be good. When you take away the sense of dignity from a person by openly maligning him, you make him desperate.

When a man is down, he is too well aware of his own wickedness. By destructive criticism, you push him still farther down into the more of despondency into which he is already sinking. Instead of gossiping about him, you should pull him out with loving, encouraging words. Only when aid is asked should spiritual and moral help be offered. To your own children or loved ones you may offer your friendly, humble suggestions at any time and remove their sense of secrecy or delicacy.

"Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again."—Matt. 7:1-2.

There is plenty of dirt to remove from your own mental home. Do not indulge in evil talk about the mental dirt in the lives of other people, but get busy and free your own life from weaknesses, and also teach this to your loved ones by your example. Silently heal yourself of the desire to criticize, and when free from condemnation and gossip yourself, teach others to be better by your sympathetic heart and good example.

GOD sends His children to the School of Life. All are placed there by Himself. The untaught children mingle with the most learned ones. He placed their names upon the register. He is the Registrar.

Along the corridors of Time He has heard the patter of His children’s feet. He has watched them cross the campus of the universes, through many a life or day in school, and has sent them again and again to the same grade because of unlearned lessons.

There is one book in this School of Life from which all are compelled to study. The sages and saints have all fingered its leaves. Tear stains have added luster, and left no mark upon its pages. Its teachings have never been changed. It was written by the finger of God, and called the Perfect Law Book of Life, out of which the past, the present, and the future generations of children will study.

The teacher is called by the same name. He is the analytical chemist in the laboratory of practical demonstration. Through experiments in right living, he shows his students the infallible workings of certain mental and spiritual laws. Through this method the student will learn to scientifically apply to any problem this universal law without failure.

The old schoolmaster tries in innumerable ways to present these experiments in simple practical tests to the slowly awakening consciousness of his pupils. Patience is added to patience, yet balanced by exactness, for his requirements must be met.

Because he always stands as stern and unalterable as the Medes and Persians, no bribery would induce him to favor one above another.

We take out materials for experiments, and often so indifferently and half-heartedly do we use them that we find only half-learned rules written upon the tablet of the heart.

Our whole being is involved. We learn by these experiments that we need alertness and the use of every well-trained faculty. If we do not recognize this, the experiment is lost. It has proven useless to you, and again the patient teacher lets you repeat the experiment at the sacrifice of time and material, hoping this time to awaken the sleeping faculty. Little children we are, sitting grim and white, frightened by the tests of life, the experiments of the great Law Giver.

But are not all things controlled by law? Law is the expression of God’s will and fills every atom of our being. It would take Eternity to understand the law of all things, but you can come into the knowledge of the natural laws, and by simple and definite formulas solve your most difficult problems. That comes under the category of Law which manifests itself in different ways.

In your notebooks you may classify the different phases of your experiments as you make the tests in your own experimental laboratory, which is your daily life at home, at work, or at play.

In the Revelations of Saint John we see that sleepy students are the most difficult problems a teacher has to face. "I know thy works, that thou art neither hot nor cold; I would thou wert cold or hot and not lukewarm."—Rev. 3:15.

So in these experiments let the meaning penetrate deep. They are given to you to arouse and awaken the sleeping but most needed faculties. Remember your experiments are with yourself.

The very first lesson is order. God’s whole universe is run precisely, rhythmically, and in ordered sequence. The stars do not vary in their course, the sun never forgets to rise, gravity always pulls objects toward the earth. and even the tiny atoms can always be depended upon to act in line with their chemical laws and combine with exactness according to their nature.

Everything in life comes in an orderly manner. There is no such thing as chance, or an unrelated event. Every event has a cause and a result, which in turn becomes a new cause. There is always a reason why it comes. Solomon, who had the gift of wisdom, said: "There is a time for all things. Everything is brought to you at the right time."

Order is the harmonious relation between the parts of any whole. It is then the absence of confusion and disturbance. Thus, order teaches us health. When the bodily organs are in order, you are in good health. This phase of the law may be applied to all conditions which cause combustion in the tube of your experiment, or to all conditions which cause spiritual, mental, or physical inharmony, and which, when order is added in proper ratio, you find to be a perfect solvent. "Good order is the foundation of all good things."—Burke.

The second experiment is made by the use of equilibrium which preserves the equipoise of the body, when the mind is suspended in indecision between different forces of evidence that tend to unbalance reason. Here quick action is often required or the experiment fails. At this point, the faculty is weighed in the balance scales. If it keeps its poise and acts in perfect judgment, the experimenter may now avoid the repetition of the test, but if he fails, the only remedy is to repeat the entire test. This means time and labor lost for the student, although he may profit by the experiment each time he repeats it.

The lessons must be learned not only mentally, but intuitively. You will then no longer have to experiment. It is most difficult when we are taken unawares and forced to make decisions instantly, and to all outward appearances give no evidence of a disturbed condition. Can you pass serenely through conditions of loss, stress, and strain without fear, anger, or worry? Have you attained the poise of self-control?

This shows us that keen perception and quick action are absolutely essential. Are you poised? Or do you lose your head in the moment calling for quick judgment? It would be well to linger here for thoughtful introspection.

The way to higher life meanders through the garden of Self-Realization, lying on the borderland of the human mind.

Life itself is unending in its scope and measureless in its expression. Planes of life correspond to the levels of thoughts. Thought, in its turn, is the indicator of the plane of consciousness. Life unfolds its wealth and beauty according to the unveilment of consciousness. Thus, higher life means higher consciousness.

You may lead your life dwelling on either matter, thought, or consciousness. In the mere material standard of life, the higher joys and sorrows of existence are denied to man. When the standard shifts from matter to consciousness, the higher life begins to evolve with all its attendant happiness and crosses. Life struggles through sorrows to go beyond sorrows, but the sorrows of higher life are the sorrows of God, joyfully accepted by the superior man from the transfiguration of self.

Therefore, the way to higher life passes through the valley of death. To taste the fullness of life, you have to experience death in life. Bury the body of your lower desires and ambitions before you can expect to see the light of your higher mind. Without the blossomings of the higher mind, there is no way to enter through the gate of higher life.

Consequently, live in ideal thoughts, and let these shape your activities instead of being pushed by the impulses of life haphazardly in all directions without any definite and substantial goal.

I want to ply my boat many times

Across the gulfs after death

And come to earth’s shores

From my home in Heaven.

I want to load my boat With those thirsty souls

That are left behind

And carry them by the opal well of iridescent joy, Where my Father distributes

The all-desire-quenching liquid Peace.

I will come again and again,

Crossing a million crags of suffering,

Wounding my feet a million times

As long as I know

One stray brother is left behind.

I want Thee, Oh God, that I may give Thee to all.

I want salvation in order to give it to all.

Free me, Oh God, from the bondage of body,

That I may show others

How they can free themselves.

I want Thy everlasting happiness

That I may make everybody happy

Forever and forever in Thee.

THE question: "What Reincarnates?" naturally arises when considering this subject.

The word "man" is derived from the Sanskrit root "mu" of the verb "to think". Man is therefore a thinker. Man does the thinking, and the vehicle of thinking is the mind through its physical organ, the brain. Physical organs are the needed foci for expression on the physical plane.

We have seen in article number one, entitled "Preexistence," that man is not the body, and not the mind. Man uses the body and the mind. Personality is related to the physical side through body forms and expressions.

This personality is confused with the real; that is, the permanent individuality. Because the "I", or Ego, is so indissolubly connected with life here on the physical plane, it is difficult for some people to understand that it, as personality, as physical Ego, or as metaphysical "I", does not survive, is not immortal, and does not reincarnate.

Buddhism stresses this point very strongly. In some expositions of Buddhism it is not made clear that the "essence," that is, the individuality, is that which lies back of personality, and is the spark of divinity of the Christians, or the Atma of the Vedas. As to immortality, some of Buddha’s teachings are as follows: "You attain to immortality by filling your mind with Truth. Blessed is he who has become an embodiment of Truth and loving-kindness. He is immortal, although he may die. The essence of his being is immortality. Earnestness is the path of immortality; thoughtlessness is the path of death." (Gospel of Buddha.) There is then something in man that is or can be immortal, according to Buddha.

There is a "something or an essence," to use a more Oriental expression, that reincarnates.

The Western world, working by the scientific (analytic) method, has been impressed by the absence of the chaotic behavior which might be expected from the extent of brain lesions. This unity of action of the individuality is considered to be more deeply rooted than even the structural organization. There is "a something" back of the structure or material, and that is the point for study and meditation.

The Western world wants an objective measure for that which is not a mass. Western psychology confuses the ideas of personality and individuality, and as these articles attempt to aid the student to form the deeper and wider concept of Oriental thought, we shall come to the point as to "What Reincarnates?"

Body it cannot be, neither can it be the lower or carnal mind, for these are impermanent. Man’s real essence is Self-Existence (Atma Buddha). Inseparable for this idea is that of innate wisdom and spiritual-mindedness. In other words, the triple essence, or higher triad, is called "Atma-Buddha-Manos," or the reincarnating nomad. Names must be used to convey ideas. The Western mind gains understanding more through the analytic or scientific method and the Oriental mind more through the synthetic or philosophical method. Let us use names to convey ideas and not to dogmatize.

Atma, or the Higher Self, is neither yours nor mine. It is like sunlight, and illuminates all. It is the universal Supreme Spirit. As the sunbeam is inseparable from the sunlight, so it is with respect to Atma. This beam from the Universal Self has its reflecting point in man, the Soul (Buddha). If, by right action, we reflect the ray toward the highest in us, we have less and less to bring us back into reincarnation.

Manos is that activity in man of the Universal Spirit which manifests in what we call intelligence. It is the Christ mind, spoken of by St. Paul, or the Higher mind of the ancient Hindu sages. This is the real individual, or the reincarnating Ego connected to Atma-Buddha. The three constitute the reincarnating nomad.

As "all are but a part of one stupendous whole," we may consider the triad as three aspects of the One Universal Spirit, for in the end we return to the source from whence we came just "as the dewdrop slips into the shining sea."

How may I know that there is a reincarnating essence, triad, or whatever it may be?

All human knowledge is born out of experience. Change is everywhere in Nature. Myriad are the forms of life. Back of all is unity. Modern science has found out that there are no dividing walls. Evolution, or development, has given us that idea. Seeds grow into plants and trees, but grains of sand do not. All the possibilities of a tree are in the seed. All is in the child that later evolves or develops into man. Therefore, these possibilities of seed and of child were invested in the germ of life, from which they came.

Evolution comes out of involution, which is an Oriental concept, the twin of evolution. Involution comes from the One Universal Principle, which is everywhere. The life of the baby, child, and man is the same one universal life. the life of the seed, the tree, and the fruit it this same one universal life. The One Universal Principle manifests as the One Life in living beings, and is the great mystery, as the American Indians say, back of all things. As the Orientals say: "That which ever was, ever is, and ever will be."

By the practice of concentration and meditation one slowly but surely learns that he is the Self, a part of the Universal Self, and then knowledge of the reincarnating essence will come.

Think this: "In this world of many, he who sees that One in this ever-changing world, he who sees Him who never changes as the Soul of his own soul, as his existence—he is free; he is blessed; he has reached the goal." Such a one loses the sense of separateness and lives in the Universal.

On August 14th, Swami Yogananda celebrated the victory of his countrymen by a banquet at the Yogoda Headquarters in honor of the world-famous Indian Olympic Hockey Team. Following a dinner of all Hindu dishes, including sweetmeats and fresh mangoes, addresses were made by Swami Yogananda and many of the distinguished guests, including the Captain of the Hockey Team, Mr. Gupta, John C. Porter, Mayor of Los Angeles, Judge Ben Lindsey, Mr. Sydney Grauman, Professor Waddell, Mr. Cazell and others. The famous pianist, George Liebling, entertained with compositions of his Master, Liszt, while the Samoiloff Trio, Miss Bonita Fitzpatrick and Miss Karla Schramm contributed to the remainder of the musical program, and after the banquet, Swami Yogananda exhibited motion pictures of India and the Taj Mahal.

RECENTLY I was thinking of the discussion among ecclesiastics concerning the truth or fallacy of certain doctrines of transcendentalism in connection with the history of the Man of Nazareth. I reflected that this friendly quarrel is not a new thing under the sun, but that it has been going on for nearly twenty centuries, and I have been wondering why the newspapers make so much of it.

I have concluded that "modernists," in and out of the churches, will continue to think and to examine, and that "fundamentalists" will go on believing, and that the great mass of people will think and believe as they choose, or as they feel that they must, regardless of theologians and scientists.

I have been wondering if the man of faith has not as solid a rock to stand on as has the scientist who pretends to believe nothing excepting that which can be proven to be true, and yet who admits that even a generally accepted scientific fact can be annihilated by a new discovery which can be used to demonstrate that the former fact was only relatively true.

I have been thinking that the reason that there is "no criterion of certainty," and that mind is the eternal doubter, is because the mind cannot possibly know anything, the mind being only the canvas upon which the Spirit paints, at will, pictures which man considers substantial and which go to make up what mortals call "Life."

I have thought how, while the mind is forever in darkness, in spite of its fever and struggle to know, faith lives eternally in the light, assured of the existence of everything it desires, and I have seen how that man, whose life has been touched with a ray of "the light that never was on sea or land," and who has, as it were, become identified with the Spirit of Truth, finds no trouble in believing every glorious, transcendental doctrine that was ever conceived and taught. To such a man all things are possible, and he does not need to wait for science to find "the ultimate of matter" in order to declare, and to realize, in part, the existence of a Supreme Consciousness that includes all space and time and objects, together with all men and their thoughts, words, and actions.

Out of the Darkness

You rise, O Shining One,

And the mists fall away;

The silence sings.

Beauty and joy

Are Your footsteps

On the hills,

And ineffable

The glory of Your face.

Grant I may know Your holy will,

To adore and obey.

WHEN you find that your soul, your heart, every wisp of inspiration, every speck of the vast blue sky, every shining blossom of the sky, the mountains, the earth, the whippoorwill, and the bluebells are all tied with one cord of Rhythm, one cord of Joy, one cord of Unity, and one cord of Spirit, then you know that nothing exists but the waves of His Cosmic Sea.

I feel Him like a gentle breath of Bliss, breathing in my body of Universes. I perceive Him shining through the bright twinkles of all luminosity, and through the waves of Cosmic Consciousness.

I behold Him as the light of Solar inspiration, holding the luminaries of my thoughts in the rhythm of balance.

Like a silent, invisible river flowing beneath the sands, flows the vast dimensionless river of Spirit through the sands of Time, through the sands of Experience, through the sands of all Souls, through the sands of all Living Atoms, and through the sands of all Space.

I feel Him as a bursting voice, leading, guiding, teaching secretly in the Soul Temple of all men and things in Creation.

He is the fountain of wisdom, and radiant inspiration flowing through all souls. He is the fragrance oozing from the incense-vase of all hearts. He is a garden of celestial blossoms and bright thought-flowers. He is the Love which inspired our love dreams.

I feel Him percolating through my heart, as through all hearts, through the pores of the earth, through the sky, and through all created things. He is the eternal motion of Joy. He is the Mirror of Silence, in which all Creation is reflected.