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Subheadings:   A Preliminary Survey    Your Work    Advancement in The Next Life    Developing Harmony Within    Birth Into the Spiritual World    The Soul Mate System    Durability of The Fusion    People Who Think They Are Soul Mates    A New Form and New Powers    Immortality    Into the Celestial

Birth Charts:  James H. Doolittle Chart    New Church of Light Home Chart

Chapter 10

Through Astral and Spiritual to Celestial

ANY description of the next life, to be even moderately adequate, should not be confined to the conditions that obtain merely on the various astral levels. It should contain also some details of the still higher velocity spiritual world, and those ranges of velocity above the spiritual called the celestial world. Because the velocities in these worlds are so high as to impart additional properties to all objects and persons of such realms, they are more intense, more conscious, and more real worlds than either the astral or the physical.

But even in a description of the higher astral levels we might exhaust all the pleasant adjectives of the English language and yet fail to convey any idea of the majesty, glory, beauty, and exquisite joys. How, then, is it possible to impart even a meagerly correct impression of the still higher realms that await the human soul?

Realizing that such an undertaking is beyond my power, I shall not attempt it. Instead, I shall mention the chief functions of these worlds in human progress, point out, in broad outline, the steps that lead up to acquiring these new functions, and signify that the various activities of the astral world modified in form to suit the conditions there found are continued in still higher worlds.

It seems to be the chief function of the animal kingdom to confer Simple Consciousness, and the chief function of life in the physical human form to confer Self-Consciousness. Man may also, while on earth in the physical body, through cultivating extrasensory perception, acquire Cosmic Consciousness and Divine Consciousness. But more commonly he gains Cosmic Consciousness only after he passes to the next life, and acquires Divine Consciousness as a permanent asset only after he moves above the astral levels and discards all remnants of the astral form to function solely in a spiritual body in the still higher velocity spiritual world.

Let us suppose, therefore, that you are an ordinary citizen of the physical world, that you have not lived a life devoid of unselfish acts, but at the same time have made no very great effort to build up your spirituality, and that you have made enough study of occultism that you can readily adapt yourself to the conditions on the astral plane. Perhaps as a result of extrasensory perception you have had at least flashes of Cosmic Consciousness. And it is to be assumed that at least in rare intervals, you have had extrasensory experiences that have brought to you convincing proof of inner-plane forces, that conscious life persists beyond the tomb, that the universe is an organic whole dependent upon the cooperation of its parts for progress, and that in other rare instances you have made convincing personal contacts with the all-pervading intelligence of Deity. In other words, suppose you are in enlightenment and spirituality about the average of the present twenty thousand students who read The Brotherhood of Light courses. What can you expect when you pass to the next life?

Due to the fact that you have a fairly clear conception of what the next life is like, the sleep transition between the physical plane and the astral world will probably be of very short duration. You will awaken after possibly only a few moments loss of consciousness. You will find yourself amid very pleasant surroundings and will be greeted by welcoming friends. Not unlikely someone you have loved on earth who has passed before will be apprised of your coming and condition himself temporarily to the region close to earth where you have your astral birth so that he can explain to you your new surroundings and help you to become thoroughly adjusted.

This period of adjustment for you, because you already know about what to expect, will not take long. Very shortly, feeling vigorous and fully recovered from the strain of transition, you will go, probably guided by a companion, to an astral level above the one into which you were born. Because your own dominant vibratory frequencies are the same as those of this level, you will feel quite comfortable in its atmosphere. Should you later descend toward earth, the atmosphere there will feel thick and foggy and the light dim. But should you attempt to move into a higher level, the light appears dazzling and the atmosphere too rarefied to sustain your existence.

A Preliminary Survey

In this land where you now find yourself you will wish to take an active part. Before going here you already knew that what you get out of this new life, and the advancement you make toward the more desirable life of the higher levels, depends entirely upon yourself. You will have arrived with a certain equipment, and you will wish to know how these qualities you possess may be used to the greatest advantage. This equipment, in terms of natural aptitudes and luck attracting ability amid each type of environment, will be quite accurately mapped in the chart of your birth into this new life. Perhaps, through a study of your aptitudes and luck attracting ability while on earth, as mapped in the chart of your physical birth, you already while on earth had come to realize the nature of your cosmic work. Or you may as yet be in some doubt as to just in what your function in cosmic affairs consists. If you do not know, you at once will seek the advice of those who specialize in such matters. And in either case, so soon as you have traveled around the level on which you now find yourself enough to have some general idea of the conditions there, you will enter upon this particular line of work.

While making your preliminary survey of conditions, you probably will be accompanied by a friend or at least by some guide who will see to it that you have proper accommodations for the periods of rest. But so soon as you have decided upon your work, and where it will be conducted, you will probably wish to establish yourself in a home. You can, of course, find quarters for yourself in some large building where others also have suites who at present do not care for a separate home and a more complex form of domestic life. But if you desire it, you can either build or secure a home of beauty and convenience that will give you domestic privacy.

You may have on this plane a loved one awaiting your coming, to share with you the bliss of domestic partnership. You may have someone on earth, or on some level above or below, to whom your heart belongs; and thus decide to have no intimate domestic partnership until such a time as you both can reside on the same vibratory level. You may decide that your best work for the present, and your greatest happiness, does not require the forming of marriage ties. Or, in this new realm, you may meet someone of the opposite sex and complementary affinity, the mutual attraction resulting in a happy marriage. But at least so soon as you have decided how to proceed with your work you will wish to make some arrangement, even though of a temporary nature, for periods of rest, and perhaps also for the establishment of a separate residence, suitable as a home for yourself and your domestic partner.

Your Work

If you have not already, while on earth, learned this, you will soon be shown that this work, which you are being fitted to perform, and which, because of your aptitude in it, you find most Joy in doing, is not confined to anyone plane or to anyone level. To be sure, it is not performed in just the same way, nor under the same conditions, on different levels; but even above the astral, in spiritual and celestial realms, it has the same general functions. Your training in lower life forms before birth into a human body, your experiences in human form while on earth, and your work on the level of the astral where you now reside, all contribute to your ability to perform this special function in cosmic society.

Vocational astrology is highly important; for make no mistake about this, the most important thing about your existence is your ability to contribute your own work to cosmic welfare. This is true on every level of your life. But the amount you can contribute to cosmic welfare depends, not merely upon the ability you have developed on some particular level, but more particularly upon the level where you function. The higher the level on which a function is performed, the more it contributes to universal good.

Furthermore, each succeeding higher level of the after life possesses certain definite advantages over the next lower. The higher life progresses the more free does it become, the more power does it exercise, the broader the range of its consciousness, the more ecstatic its joys, and the more exhilarating does it find existence.

On earth it is common to refer to standards of living. The slums represent one standard, and the surroundings and conveniences of those who are refined in tastes, have more than the average education, and some wealth, represent another standard. It is generally believed that a higher living standard for people everywhere is to be desired. And while much that is artificial may enter into the standards of earth, each higher level of the next life represents a very real, and very desirable, higher standard of living.

Therefore, when you become adjusted to your work and domestic existence in the next life, you will not desire to remain forever on the level where you find yourself. Instead, you will wish to move forward, to perfect your knowledge and abilities, and to qualify yourself as soon as possible to move up into the next inhabitable range of vibratory frequencies.

Advancement in The Next Life

Mere knowledge will not permit you to advance to a new level, although additional knowledge will enable you to increase the range of your usefulness. Not only will it assist you to do your work better where you are, but also, through lending a wider and more accurate comprehension of the meaning of life and the requirements for adequate living, it will enable you the more readily to develop those characteristics which alone will enable you to function on the next higher level. As a consequence, you will probably decide to spend a certain amount of time and energy gaining mental education.

On this level where you start your life work you will find that within yourself are the same old discords. Your finer form now embraces the thought cells and thought structures with which you were born into physical existence as these have been added to and reorganized by the experiences you had on the physical plane. Those with whom you associate on this new plane also have discords yet within their astral forms. You are essentially no different than you were while on earth. And your discords still attract to you certain experiences that seem disagreeable.

Developing Harmony Within

But on the higher astral levels, to which later you hope to move, these internal discords are considered to indicate emotional immaturity. If they are quite pronounced they may even inhibit the raising of the dominant vibratory rate to any higher level. But at least their continued existence, through attracting obstacles, hindrances and misfortune, detracts from what otherwise might be accomplished for the common good. And as the amount of accomplishment for the common good is the only measure of value in the next life, those who have the spirituality to move to higher levels undergo whatever of training and experience is necessary harmoniously to reorganize the thought cells of their finer forms.

In order to acquire the knowledge of how this is done you may, or may not, need some instruction. But the actual work of reorganizing your astral form will be done through various experiences in connection with your work, through the social contacts you make in recreation periods, and through your domestic relationship.

When your emotional progress is sufficiently advanced, your response to all the various contacts of life will be pleasurable. You will have outgrown at any time the feeling of irritation, anger, disgust, anxiety, fear, sorrow, or any other disagreeable emotion. Or if, for a few fleeting moments, sorrow or anxiety in connection with some loved one is felt, it will be recognized as a weakness and some other interest substituted which will serve as an antidote to annul the discord thus registered. To be of great value to the society where you now find yourself you must feel only harmonies and refrain from experiencing discords. And among other things, your effort thus to benefit others is a determining factor in establishing a dominant vibratory rate that will permit you to pass to a still higher level.

Harmonies and discords, of course, obtain on every level and in every world. But the residents of higher levels, as a result of their training to work in these realms of high frequency, persistently cultivate and practice the ability to maintain complete inward harmony in the face of any and every impact from their environment. By virtue of this ability they produce results of amazing magnitude. Instead of being buffeted about by the tremendous forces of these high-frequency regions, they are able to direct them into constructive channels of their own choosing.

But in spite of reorganizing your astral body into a more harmonious whole, and thus increasing your usefulness to others and greatly increasing your own happiness, you will not move to a higher plane except through acquiring a higher dominant vibratory rate; that is, through a definite gain in spirituality. Various factors may contribute to this gain.

The desire and the effort to contribute to the welfare of others in the greatest degree is perhaps the most important and efficacious means of gaining spirituality. You will find opportunity for this in your work.

Yet by a proper attitude toward any event of life it may be purified. Then by combining it with another experience which provides a natural flux, and using it constructively for universal progression, its vibratory rate may be raised, even to the frequency where it imparts its energy to the still higher-velocity substance of the spiritual world. Your social contacts, your domestic experiences, and all your other activities of the next life, through such character cultivation, can be made to assist in raising your dominant vibratory rate.

Still another means that you will probably employ is the refinement of your emotional responses through cultivation of a keener appreciation of that which is beautiful and elevating. The need for this is recognized on all levels above the sordid, and the splendid pageants, light symphonies, musical productions, public exhibitions of dramatic art, dancing and suitable literature, all afford opportunity in this direction.

Thus it is that when you pass to the next life you may expect to take up some definite work that will be of value to others. You will establish yourself in a home very much to your liking. You will resume, or form, domestic ties according to inclination and the circumstances of your previous and your present life. Social contacts will probably be rather numerous. And, quite likely, you will find that amusements are so significant as not to be neglected. Your activities, no doubt, will be quite varied, but the whole pattern of your life will tend to merge into a combination that will rather quickly prepare you to move to the next higher astral level.

It may be, when you have reached this stage of development, that you will have a domestic partner who, hand in hand, will make the transition with you. One or the other may even linger somewhat, to help the other reach a point where the transition is feasible. But whether alone, or with someone, whether you go with a whole group or only as an individual, the time will arrive for you to move to a higher sphere.

Then you will bid old friends goodbye. Some, perhaps, will meet to see you off. By learning how temporarily to lower your dominant vibratory rate you will be able, occasionally, to visit them in the future. And, by means of across the planes thought transference and other means you will still be able to keep somewhat in touch with them. But your chief activities from now on will be in a new land and amid other acquaintances.

If you make the transition to the new level with a group led by a guide, it may be that those of the land where you now go will make it a gala occasion, and welcome you with a joyous ceremony. Or, you may prefer not to await such an occasion, and without a guide, by means of aerial travel, make the journey alone without publicity.

Arriving in this new land, where the light seems brighter and all activities more intense, you may require a little time to adjust yourself to its conditions. The people you meet will be courteous, and even though you are a stranger, will be desirous of helping you in every way. And very shortly you will find where your services are needed in your particular kind of work. Thus will you take up your work on this higher level, establish yourself in a home here, enter into the social life, perhaps, of this level, and accustom yourself to its enjoyments.

Here, as on the lower level from which you came, you will endeavor, through increasing your mental and emotional education, to make of yourself a more effective person. You will continue to cultivate more refined emotions and in general build up your spirituality. And in due time, as a result of your effort, you will be ready to move to a still more advanced level.

But, because the general process of advancement hinges on effort to promote the general welfare, on proper mental attitudes toward all events, and on the refinement of the emotions, you must not think that it is just a monotonous repetition of the same thing, over and over, on different levels.

Instead, the conditions, problems, and adjustments of different levels give all the variety that could be desired. Entertainments are entertainments, of course. But the methods and the quality of the effect are subject to infinite variation. The people contacted from time to time are tremendously interesting. Some of them do such amazing things, and others have been to such strange places. And even domestic life fails to pall, because expression of pure affection, and the interchange of thought, are given so much wider range than when hampered and restricted by the dense material form.

Interest in one’s work is never lacking; for there are always new difficulties to overcome and new obstacles to be removed. These are not such as are attracted by internal discords; but are simply the natural resistance one encounters when endeavoring progressively to accomplish greater and more important tasks. One never reaches the point where there are no still larger jobs to tackle. One thing successfully accomplished prepares and trains the individual for better and more complex work.

And while those on the upper astral levels carefully cultivate the ability to resist any disagreeable thought or feeling that would tend to create an inward discord, they are not free from the impact of environmental forces and conditions that test the power of their resistance. Even as on earth, they sometimes undertake tasks that are beyond their ability, and consequently, at least for the time, fail. Separations from those dearly loved are sometimes necessary. The sorrowing thoughts of dear ones left on earth rise to them with disturbing insistence. A loved one may await them on a higher level, and the long spiritual development necessary to rise to this level may engender irritation.

People must realize in the next life what they should recognize on earth that never, in the whole span of eternity, will the soul reach a point where there is nothing left to struggle for. At any stage of its journey, when it has done the best its intelligence and energy permit, however unsatisfactory the temporary condition may be, it has no cause for anxiety or perturbation. Those on the higher astral levels do not maintain harmony within themselves because there is nothing left for them intensely to desire, but because they have learned what people on earth should learn, that feeling disagreeable detracts from such ability as they have.

The astrological forces, even as those that reach the earth, are at times harmonious and at other times discordant. But on the higher astral levels the inharmonious astrological forces are neutralized or harmoniously transformed by the person as they reach his astral form. They are not permitted to engender discords within his body.

Yet because of their influence upon the whole environment, they nevertheless aid or hinder the progress of the work in hand. The discords make it imperative that certain things be done. Carrying forward the plan of universal progression meets then with the opposition of the tremendous untamed forces of Nature. When one frontier has been reached and conquered, always there is another beyond. Always something yet to be accomplished in the work of cosmic construction that requires still higher intelligence and ability.

Thus it is that while your work will always perform the same general function, with every new level that you reach in your progress you will find the demands of that work more exacting. As your powers expand, more will be expected of you. And as you advance from level to level the joys derived from the other departments of your life also will correspondingly increase.

As your body becomes more refined, you thus progress from one astral level to another. Gradually you are building a spiritual body. But while you are still on earth, or after you pass to the next life until you leave the astral world, you do not function in this spiritual body. It is, nevertheless, being built by your high aspirations, by your mental attitudes, and by your desire to benefit others. You gradually eliminate the coarser astral particles of your body. And with every higher level you reach in the astral world you increase your dominant vibratory rate.

Because of this higher rate of vibration, a person from a higher level usually appears very bright. This brightness may be so great as to dazzle, even when the person has modified his dominant vibration enough to visit and be seen on some lower level.

This astral world, through the various levels of which you will gradually ascend, is not permanent and immutable. Life on its levels can continue over vast stretches of time, but at last must end. There is no immortality in the astral world. Immortality requires adjustments to still higher conditions. And thus it is, in due course of time, you will leave the astral entirely to live in the realm of the still higher-velocity spiritual world.

Birth Into the Spiritual World

At the present time the realization of Cosmic Consciousness, which enables the individual to realize his specific function in the whole and his proper relation to other entities in the universe, is not a common thing while people yet occupy physical bodies on earth. And still more uncommon is the attainment while yet on earth of Divine Consciousness, which is similar to Cosmic Consciousness, except that instead of functioning on the astral plane, its scope and properties are vastly increased through the consciousness gaining its realization on the still higher-velocity spiritual plane.

There is nothing about occupying a physical form which compels the soul to confine its activities, and therefore its consciousness, to any plane, or to any level of a plane. If it can refine its feelings sufficiently and give these high velocity rates sufficient intensity, it can function on and be conscious of, not merely the astral plane, where Cosmic Consciousness more commonly is attained, but the spiritual plane, where Divine Consciousness must be acquired before transition to the realm of the celestial.

These higher states of consciousness, however, cannot be attained merely through reason or other cerebral processes. They can be acquired only through those faculties which science now recognizes under the name of extrasensory perception. It is only through extrasensory perception that man can gain for himself firsthand proof of the survival of the personality on inner planes of existence, or that he can attain Cosmic Consciousness in which he realizes, through his oneness with it, that the universe is an organic whole dependent for its progress upon the intelligent cooperation of its parts, and just what his work is in this cooperative endeavor. If you fail to gain such realization while on earth, you will develop it in your ascent through the astral levels. But if you intelligently work for it, you can gain this state of progress while still on earth in a physical body. One of the reasons it is not common for people to gain this advancement while on earth is because the use of extrasensory perception has been discouraged, and so few have any idea that such consciousness is even a possibility.

Nor is their any impassable barrier to your attaining Divine Consciousness while still occupying a physical body. But to do so, your extrasensory faculties must function not merely on the astral plane, but be able to function on the still higher-velocity spiritual plane. And you will not be able thus to use your spiritual extrasensory powers until, through correct living, feeling and thinking, you have built up for yourself more than a fragmentary spiritual body. Because it operates from this interior plane where the powers of the soul are so vastly superior, Divine Consciousness goes beyond Cosmic Consciousness and brings a more perfect conception of God’ s Great Plan, and what the individual can do at any given time most to further its realization. And it brings other knowledge of significance which is obtainable only by those, whether they still occupy a physical body or have passed to the inner plane, whose extrasensory perceptions function on the high-velocity spiritual plane.

The all-pervading intelligence of Deity can be contacted and realized on any plane or any level, but it cannot be thus realized by rational consciousness. It can only be apprehended by the extrasensory faculties.

Thus to enable people to contact Deity, to prove for themselves the continuation of self-conscious life on inner planes, and to make it possible for them to gain cosmic consciousness and perhaps even Divine Consciousness while still occupying their physical bodies, lone of the chief objectives of The Church of Light is to get people familiar with the facts of extrasensory perception, and to find the most effective way by which people can develop and use it.

Of course, the attainment of a state of consciousness, even if it is a high state which commonly develops on upper levels of the inner plane, of itself does not advance the individual much. It only gives him the knowledge of the functions of his soul and what he should strive for. The other chief objective of The Church of Light, therefore, is to furnish people with the information that will enable them thus to progress and contribute their utmost to universal welfare. But whether or not you attain the higher states of development while on earth, you will have Cosmic Consciousness before you leave the astral plane. And on that plane at last there will come the so-called second death. But to you, because you have built for yourself a spiritual body, it will not be a death, or even a sleep, but a conscious transition to a new order of being.

You will slough off the remnants of your astral form. Never again will you possess an astral body; for it is left behind, even though eliminated more gradually, as completely as was your physical form. Henceforth you are a bright and radiant being whom those of the astral world and earth may well regard as an angel.

In this new world you will find that existence has properties that are quite amazing. Things that seem impossible to one familiar only with the astral levels are here taken as a matter of course. The speed of movement here is such that a new series of relations, a new set of natural laws, obtain. And because you have tuned in—not merely your consciousness, and not merely as a visitor, but your whole form permanently—to the frequencies of this world, your first task is to become familiar with all these new conditions.

Many strange things might be related of this bright and beautiful world. You have a home here. It already has been built by you, perhaps unconsciously, while you were yet on lower planes. And in this home are treasures and precious jewels, real treasures and real jewels, not the baubles for which men of earth strive with one another. They are the result and tokens of your spiritual achievements. They are yours, and await to be shared by you and your soul’s companion.

But all this, and anything else I might say of the conditions you will meet in this high-velocity world, sounds at best like poetic fancy and at worst like irresponsible ravings. How can I, or anyone, describe that which is so different and immeasurably more blessed than anything experienced by man on earth. I shall not try.

Responsibilities are increased in this spiritual world. The guidance, supervision, and government of lower regions is managed. Your work is there, too, but in a form superior to what you now can imagine. Loved ones, social contacts, amusements, education, variety to life, and ecstatic enjoyment, along with serious but intensely interesting work, will occupy your time.

And as in the astral world, due to your own effort, you will rise from one level to another, continuing to refine yourself and to gain in ability to serve the universal cause. And finally you will arrive at the boundary of the sixth and seventh state of the spiritual world. I do not mean that there are only seven distinct levels, because each state contains a number of distinct frequency levels, each of which is a complete habitat of life. But the spiritual world, like the astral world, has seven broad divisions. And the boundary of the sixth and seventh state of the spiritual world is peculiarly significant, for it is here the permanent and indissoluble union of soul mates takes place.

It is customary to speak of this permanent union of soul mates as the fusion of their forms into a single body occupied by both souls. But it should not be thought that this implies the loss of identity, or restricts the freedom of movement of either. Each still possesses a distinctive form; but the two, vitalized by the same ego, are never separate in the sense that the exchange of energy between them ceases. The permanent lines of force over which energy is exchanged unite the two separate bodies and the central ego into a definite system which has a form, moves as a whole, and possesses definite potencies that were impossible to either separate soul.

The Soul Mate System

An atom of matter now is known to be a central positive electrical nucleus, about which resolves one or more electrons. Each of these electrons has its own form and individuality.

The atom of matter with two electrons revolving around the central nucleus possesses definite properties. Neither of the two electrons possesses these properties. What this atom can do easily, could not be done by any number of separate electrons, nor by any number of separate central nuclei, or protons. Because the two electrons have united in a definite, and, under ordinary circumstances, quite permanent, union about a common center, a miniature two-planet solar system is formed. And the properties of the atom, and what it can do, are determined not merely by the electrons and protons, but by their union in this definite system.

Each electron still maintains its own individuality and its own form. But no one would be so foolish as to say that while each electron has a form, the atom which contains them has not also a form. Furthermore, because each planet in our solar system has its own individuality and form, we should not be inclined to say that the solar system, as such, has no form. As a matter of fact, the solar system has a form, and produces results quite impossible to planets not thus permanently joined into a system.

The planets in our solar system are sometimes farther from the sun than at other times. Yet the solar system maintains its identity and its peculiar potencies.

Man and wife, upon the earth, blend in loving affection. Each can distinctly feel the exchange of magnetism. And even while separated and each going about his daily duties, so long as the minds of both remain on the vibratory level wherein this blend of energies took place, each continues to feel the nearness of the other, and the continuation of the energy exchange. Between those who are ardently in love, this feeling of nearness and exchange may continue for days and weeks, even though they are far distant in space, until some call upon the attention polarizes the forces of one or the other to a different vibratory frequency and breaks the magnetic connection.

The rapport between them thus broken, to establish the magnetic response again may require that they meet and exchange caresses, it may require an exchange of letters, or even only that each think of the other intently. Yet when man and wife are truly lovers, the periodic establishment of such energy exchange, which usually is not maintained permanently due to the intrusion of conditions which break the rapport, is common experience. And at such times as this rapport is thus complete, they together form a definite system.

One with clairvoyance enough to see finer energies can discern the lines of force extending between them, binding them for the time being into a single magnetic field. This fusion is maintained regardless of the distance from each other that they may travel. And because it is not dependent upon the close proximity of physical bodies, it is called regenerate union.

Durability of The Fusion

The completeness of such magnetic fusions between husband and wife, and the permanence of the periods during which their affections bind them together into a single unit, depends upon many things. But in proportion as they approach true complementary affinities it is easier to establish and maintain this complete fusion. Which is just another way of saying that some people are more suited to each other in marriage than they might be suited to certain others. But however suited for each other they may be, if they encourage brutality or sensuality it shatters the magnetic field so constructed. The higher the level on which the rapport is formed, the more enduring it is apt to prove.

Thus it is that on the higher astral levels affectional relations more and more bind husband and wife into a cooperative unit with powers quite impossible for either or both to exercise without such cooperation.

On the levels of the spiritual world this complementary unity becomes even more perfect the higher they move.

People Who Think They Are Soul Mates

While true soul mates may meet on earth, because this relation can only be perceived from the spiritual plane, only those who have advanced far enough to perceive things as they exist on this spiritual plane can be sure that such a relation exists. Most of those on earth who think they are soul mates merely experience a strong magnetic attraction. They have not advanced far enough to have any clear conception of what a spiritual attraction would be like.

But when you reach the spiritual world, as the natural result of your upward progress you will possess Divine Consciousness. Or, if you build up a sound and vigorous spiritual body, you can acquire this state of consciousness while you are still on earth.

Among other things, this brings the awareness of the existence and whereabouts of the soul mate. And when you pass from the sixth to the seventh state of the spiritual world, as a natural result of having reached this advanced spiritual region, there will be a complete and permanent blending of your energies.

From thence onward you will progress together as a complete system. This system is composed of a male soul, a female soul, and a single ego. The ego corresponds to the nucleus of an atom, and each soul to one of two electrons. Each soul retains both its own form and its own identity. Nor is each limited in its action by the other, except as domestic partners customarily and voluntarily are when striving for accomplishment of some common work. Even here on earth, husband and wife may travel a thousand miles apart without breaking the fusion of their finer forces. In fact, distance in space seems to have no power to dissolve such a system.

A New Form and New Powers

Nevertheless, even though each retains liberty of action, a distinct form, and its own identity, both have merged into another and more complex permanent body, or form. Instead of being more or less separate factors, the ego and the two souls now make up a definitely organized group. And just as an atom has a distinct form, or a solar system has a distinct form, this system that has now come into existence also has a definite form.

Furthermore, just as a solar system can accomplish that which would be impossible to its members if these were not thus united, and just as an atom can exhibit qualities impossible to ununited electrons and protons, no matter how numerous, so the Angel thus formed by the permanent union of soul mates has abilities infinitely superior to those of souls before they were thus permanently united.

Immortality

Most souls inherit immortality by virtue of being human. But, because the astral body in the course of time, even though that time be long, must dissolve, immortality cannot be completely assured until the spiritual world has been reached.

I do not mean that when the spiritual world is reached that you will remain eternally on some of its levels. On the contrary, there is no place in the universe of which it can be said, you reach this height and no higher. Progression continues, and without end.

But when, while in the flesh or after you reach the astral world, you have built for yourself a spiritual body in which you can function in the spiritual world, your immortality becomes assured. Passing then, from the physical or astral levels to the spiritual world, it is a function of that world to confer Divine Consciousness. The result of this state of consciousness insures that your life and activities at all times are directed by Divine Guidance.

You will not, therefore, remain eternally in the spiritual body with which you now find yourself. But because you have reached the stage where you have such a spiritual form is assurance that you will not be overtaken by any force of Nature that can dissolve this body before you have increased its vibrations sufficiently to function on a still higher level. In this sense, and in this sense alone, can the spiritual body be considered imperishable and immortal.

Into the Celestial

The possession of such a spiritual form, and the Divine Consciousness conferred by it, will in reality lead to your progress up to the seventh state of the spiritual world. Here the permanent union with your soul mate will take place, and as a result of this, after a period of adjustment to the new condition thus engendered, you will pass as an Angel quite beyond the spiritual world into the celestial. With this transition you will also pass beyond what it is possible for embodied man clearly to comprehend.

The universe as we know it moves largely through mechanical principles. But behind these principles, and behind the arrangement of the various external and interior worlds, is intelligent direction and guidance.

I have no desire to bolster up the popular superstition that beings higher than man continually meddle with the operation of natural law. But the directive power of mind, even when exercised from the spiritual plane of being, conforms to natural law. And those of the higher spiritual levels exercise a governing function in the progress and development of life within our universe that can only be hinted here.

But what we call natural law, after all, is merely a description of how, under various circumstances, substance and intelligence act. Because, in the universe to which we are accustomed, substance and intelligence act according to a certain sequence, does not prove that in some other universe they may not act in a very different way. It is quite possible that other types of universes, with which we as yet are unfamiliar, and which develop life for entirely different functions in the cosmic economy, may have very different natural laws.

You will readily understand that an Angel, as a definite system generating a field of force that embraces two souls and their ego, has potentialities beyond anything that can be conceived of as merely human. The function of such a unit is not merely guarding and directing that which has already been created, but also of creating.

I am not attempting to tell you how new universes are brought into existence; but I believe they are brought forth by groups of Angels. To such a group you will ultimately belong. Each soul mate system, by virtue of the function it has been created to perform, takes charge of its own department in this creation, under the leadership of an intelligence still higher than such Angels.

And the existence of such an intelligence indicates that eventually you will move to a world even above the celestial. But even as an Angel you will assist in determining the laws that govern some future universe, and will contribute toward bringing it into existence.

Farther than this I cannot see. And even this is beyond what embodied man can clearly comprehend. But all that which can be seen and comprehended shows the next life to be a progressive series of steps, ever ascending in intelligence, in glory, in ability, and in capacity for enjoyment. It is unutterably stupendous and blessed to be a human soul.

But thus in the contemplation of the glories and joys of future states of existence let us not minimize the importance or the opportunities of present existence. All effort expended on earth for spiritual advancement yields many fold the degree of progress that a similar effort would if delayed until physical life is past. Nor are the opportunities presented to us today different in kind than they will be in the future. Refinement of organism and thought and emotion, and working for the welfare of all, are as available to us now as they will be in any time to come.

Let us recognize also that the roadmap of life which will guide our efforts on inner planes, astrology, is now available. And for following the best path of life to which it guides us we have the same tools we must use to advance ourselves in the after life. Those tools by which the destiny can be changed in the direction extrasensory perception and astrology show to be most advantageous, are the facts of induced emotion and the facts of directed thinking. Therefore, let us be on our way, rapidly, while still occupying the physical form, toward those glorious angelic and celestial levels of whose rapturous qualities as yet we have had but a fleeting glimpse.

Birth Charts

James H. Doolittle Chart December 14, 1896, 4:25 p.m.; 123W. 37:36N. Data furnished by San Francisco astrologer in 1924. 1918, combat aviation instructor: Mercury sesquisquare Neptune r. 1924, June 23, Dawn to Dark record across the U. S.: Mercury in 9th inconjunct Jupiter p. 1925, October, broke two world flying records: Mercury inconjunct Jupiter p, Sun semisextile Sun r. 1929, September 1, wing of plane off, bailed out of plane at 2,000 feet: Sun sesquisquare Mars p. 1931, September 6, won Air Derby: Sun sextile Saturn p. 1942, April 18, led first successful bombing of Tokyo in World War II: Mercury sextile Venus p, sextile Saturn r.

Opening of the New Church of Light Home November 17, 1942, 7:00 a.m. PWT; 118:15W. 34N. Timed by an accurate watch. 1915, early May, B. of L. classes organized and taught in Los Angeles, but not opened to general public as World War I was in progress. 1918, November 11, B. of L. classes opened to public, continued since, and there has since been an annual convention each year. 1924, April, B. of L. Astrological Research Department established. 1932, November 2, incorporated as The Church of Light. 1937, December 14, B. of L. ESP Research Department established. 1941, January 5, Crusade for the New Civilization Meetings started.

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