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THE NATURE OF THE SOUL

Modern psychology, speaking generally, regards the Soul in one or another of the following ways:

1. Either non-existent, the only obvious and provable thing being the intelligent mechanism.

2. As being the sum total of the conscious reactions of the cells of the body—the sentiency of the organism, in other words.

3. As a gradually evolving self, conveying life and, as time elapses, awareness; it is regarded as being conditioned by the body and as a product of the evolution of that body during the ages.

4. As a definite Self, an entity, informing a body, functioning at various levels of human consciousness, and having continuity, immortality and potentiality.

The occult teaching accepts all these hypotheses as correct, but as relative in time and space, and as having reference to different forms of divine life and to differing aspects of those forms. It is with the occult teaching, right or wrong, that we are at present engaged, and our premises and conclusions can be stated in the following propositions:

1.  Every human being, in or out of incarnation, is a "fragment of divinity," and an outpost of the divine consciousness, functioning in time and space for purposes of expression.

2.  All these Souls, selves, or human beings are found, as we have seen, on one or other of the seven emanations of Spiritual energy, issuing forth from God at the beginning of an era of creative activity. They return to their emanating Source when that particular cycle is brought to a close.

3.  In the interim between emanation and reabsorption, these Souls pass through various experiences until such time as they can "shine forth in all their exactitude of truth."

4. They are called, as has been stated, in A Treatise on Cosmic Fire:

1. Lotuses of revelation.

2. Lotuses with perfume.

3. Radiant lotuses.

4. Lotuses wherein the flower is on the point of opening.

5. Lotuses of closed and sealed condition.

6. The colourless lotuses.

7. Lotuses in bud.

5.  These Souls, cycling through various forms of life in the long evolutionary process arrive eventually at

        full, self-conscious existence. By this we mean that they are self-determined, self-conditioned, and self-

        aware. They are also conscious of and responsive to their environment.

6.   Once this conscious awareness is achieved, then progress becomes more rapid. It should be borne in

        mind that many human beings are not thus aware. The groupings which arise out of this awareness

        (limiting our ideas entirely to those within the radius of the human family) can be expressed as

        follows:

7.  The Souls who live but whose consciousness sleeps. These are the dormant human beings whose intelligence is of such a low order, and their awareness of themselves and of life is so dim and nebulous, that only the lowest forms of human existence come into this category. Racially, nationally, and tribally they do not exist as pure types, but occasionally such a person emerges in the slums of our great cities. They are like a "throw back" and never appear among what are called the natural savages, or the peasantry.

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