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Esoteric Psychology II - Chapter I - The Egoic Ray - The Growth of Soul Influence
We have seen in our studies that the soul is a dual blend of energies - the energy of life and the energy of mind - as far as its relation to the mechanism is temporarily concerned. The merging of these two energies in the human mechanism produces what we call consciousness - at first self-consciousness and finally group-consciousness. The mechanism is, in its own nature, also a blend or fusion of energies - the energy of substance itself which takes the form of the atomic structure [68] of the physical body, plus the vitality which animates that body, and, secondly, the energy of that body which we call the astral body, distinguished by sensitivity, emotional activity, and that magnetic force which we call desire. There is, finally, the energy of mind itself. These four types of energy form what we call the lower personal self, but it is the higher mental aspect of the mind which links, subjectively, this personality and the soul. It is the lower consciousness which (when developed) enables a man eventually to make conscious contact with the higher. It is the lower concretizing mind which must be awakened, understood and used with definiteness before the higher mind can become the medium through which knowledge can be gained of those realities which constitute the kingdom of God. Intellect must be unfolded before the intuition can be correctly evoked. We have, therefore, in the case of man, two groups of major energies dominating, as a result of a long experience of incarnation in form, the energy of the astral or desire nature and the energy of mind. When these are fused and blended, thoroughly organized and utilized, then we see a functioning and powerful Personality. Seeking to impose itself upon these energies and to subordinate them to higher and different aims is to be found that blended energy-unit which we call the soul. Its two energies (mind and love, the latter being also a dual form of energy) are anchored, if one may use this word in a symbolic and esoteric sense, in the human brain, whilst the life principle, as we have seen, is anchored in the human heart. The four energies of the lower self - atomic energy, vital energy, feeling energy and mental energy - plus the two energies of the soul, make the six energies used by man in his life experience; but the energy of the atom is usually not counted as a human energy, as it is uniform in its usage in all [69] forms of life in all kingdoms, and therefore man is regarded as a sum total of five energies, and not of six energies. The human soul (in contradistinction to the soul as it functions in its own kingdom, free from the limitations of human life) is imprisoned by and subject to the control of the lower energies for the major part of its experience. Then, upon the Path of Probation, the dual energy of the soul begins to be increasingly active, and the man seeks consciously to use his mind, and to express love-wisdom on the physical plane. This is a simple statement of the objective of all aspirants. When the five energies are beginning to be used consciously and wisely in service, a rhythm is then set up between the personality and the soul. It is as if a magnetic field were then established, and these two vibrating and magnetic units, or grouped energies, begin to swing into each other's field of influence. In the early stages, this happens only occasionally and rarely. Later it occurs more constantly, and thus a path of contact is established which eventually becomes the line of least resistance, "the way of familiar approach", as it is sometimes esoterically called. Thus the first half of the "bridge", the antahkarana, is constructed. By the time the third initiation is undergone, this way is completed, and the initiate can "pass to higher worlds at will, leaving the lower worlds far behind; or he can come again and pass upon the way that leads from dark to light, from light to dark, and from the under, lower worlds into the realms of light". Thus the two are one, and the first great unison upon the path of return is complete. A second stage of the way has then to be trodden, leading to a second union of still greater importance in that it leads to complete liberation from the three worlds. It must be remembered that the soul, in its turn, is a union of two energies, plus the energy of spirit, of which the lower three are the reflection. It is a synthesis of the [70] energy of Life itself (which demonstrates as the life-principle within the world of forms), of the energy of the intuition, or spiritual love-wisdom or understanding (which demonstrates as sensitivity and feeling in the astral body), and of spiritual mind, whose reflection in the lower nature is the mind or the principle of intelligence in the form world. In these three energies we have the atma-buddhi-manas of the theosophical literature. They are that higher triplicity which is reflected in the lower three, and which focuses through the soul body on the higher levels of the mental plane before being "precipitated into incarnation", as it is esoterically called. Modernizing the concept, we might say that the energies which animate the physical body and the intelligent life of the atom, the sensitive emotional states, and the intelligent mind have eventually to be blended with, and transmuted into, the energies which animate the soul. These are the spiritual mind, conveying illumination; the intuitive nature, conferring spiritual perception and divine livingness.
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