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CHAPTER III - Our Karmic Liabilities - Part 2

6. The healer or the healing group must remember that it is not mental energy only with which he works.  He, for himself,

a. Creates a thought of healing power.

b. That created focal point of concentrated attention becomes the directing agent for the healing force or prana.

c. This prana is neither mental nor astral in nature.  It is pure planetary substance or living essence, and is that substance of which the vital body of the planet is made.

d. The healer or the healing group appropriates as much of this substance as is possible, and by the power of their united thought they direct it to and through the centre involved.  Healing work is circulatory, and this must not be forgotten.  The pranic energy (thought-directed) is not sent to the centre and there permitted to accumulate.  It is passed through the centre, first of all to the organ involved or the area where difficulty is to be found, and then is sent out to the body as a totality.  It might be regarded as a system of flushing, with a purificatory and stimulating effect.

It is only possible in these early days of experiment and work along these lines to give certain simple rules.  Out of the results achieved experience will come, and the healing group will learn gradually how to work, when to change its methods, and what to notice.

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From the start of work along these lines, records should be kept.  In this aspect of the work the patient will frequently cooperate.  Dates, incidental phenomena, changes for the better or the worse should be noted, along with information as is possible anent the patient's general condition.  For this reason, I recommend that in the early stages of this work healing be attempted only in connection with those who are well known to the members or who are put in the hands of the healing group by physicians or by those willing to give full information.

People who are so ill that they are not expected to live, or who are suffering from diseases which preclude ultimate recovery, should not be taken into the healing group for treatment, except with ameliorative results in mind.  No neophyte knows enough of karma to work with confidence either at the task of health or of release by death.  If, however, a patient gets worse whilst the group is working upon his case, he should not be dropped, but a definite and different technique can then be used to ease the path of death.  In the next section I intend to touch upon the karma of death.

If you will bear in mind that work in connection with the etheric body (as an instrument of vitality) is today as little known as the science of modern medicine was known in the year 1200 A.D., you will be enabled to work without discouragement and without that undue expectation which today handicaps the neophyte.  Assume consciously the position that nothing is as yet really known anent the centres, the areas of energy in the body, and thought direction; realise also that you are engaging upon a great research project.  Nothing, literally nothing, has been done in relation to medicine and the science of the centres in any practical way, though certain books upon the relation of the centres to psychological research and equipment and the glandular [289] or endocrine system have played tentatively with the subject.  The field of research which I propose to you is an entirely new one.  Those among you who enter it may not see the results of what you are attempting to do.  Your impatience and your eagerness to help may handicap you; your ignorance may cause you to make mistakes.  But, go on; persevere; keep careful records and preserve all correspondence.  Then the results will be sure.

1. KARMIC LIABILITIES OF THE INDIVIDUAL

We have already studied (perhaps without realising its implications) our first point under this heading.  This concerns the karmic liabilities of the individual, emerging from the subjective vehicles and from the personality as a whole.

As we discussed the psychological causes of disease as they arise in the subtle vehicles in the three worlds or from the disciple's tension as he endeavours to tread the Path, we were in reality concerned entirely with karma or the effect of the inner causes of events, equipment and circumstances upon the physical plane.  We saw how the inner bodies, via the etheric body, conditioned the man's outer manifestation, and that disease or health was largely dependent upon them.  They are the immediate karmic cause of physical plane existence.  If the idea is then extended to include previous incarnations—as must inevitably be the case—then we arrive at the conclusion that the condition of these inner bodies, their limitations and their richness, their defects and their assets, and their general psychic and psychological tendencies are inherited from previous lives, and are therefore responsible for the present earthly situation.  We have, consequently, simply pushed the causes of present day conditions still further back, and we could—if we so desired—enter a field of such intricacy and detail that nothing profitable would eventuate.  The whole problem of the recovery [290] of past incarnations is one of infinite possibility, and when I use this word "infinite" I immediately put the whole subject out of the control of the finite mind.  We are then dealing with something which it is not possible to handle rationally.

Karma was, for infant humanity and for the undeveloped individual, a group matter.  The man was a member of a group but without any thought as to the implications and the responsibilities entailed.  Later, as the process of individualisation became more effective in character and purpose and more pronounced in temperament, karma became also more personal and definite, and the man in a position to make or work off more causes and effects.  The personality not being thoroughly unfolded and integrated, the man was still involved in group life and the interrelations became more extensive.  Later on, the personality became the conscious creator of its own causes and the conscious participator in the effects.  Upon the Path, the karma of the chosen group, of the individual, and of those with whom the man chooses association through unity of spiritual purpose involves him, and another factor is added to the previous categories of karmic responsibility.  Later still, karma in the three worlds is met, overcome and negated; at the same time karma connected with the initiating of causes through world service is added to that which the individual has already experienced, and he shares in the karmic responsibility of the Hierarchy itself.  All these stages:

1. Elementary group karma—of the primitive man,

2. Individual karma of the self-conscious developing man,

3. Karma, related to the life of the disciple,

4. Hierarchical karma,

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must be added to the well known Karma of Retribution with which the disciple is already familiar; to it must also be added national and racial karma, plus the educational karma which all disciples bring upon themselves when they are desirous of entering an Ashram to prepare for initiation.

There is also the Karma of Reward in contradistinction to that of Retribution; this is a type of karma oft forgotten, but one which will become better known in the coming world cycle.  Humanity has worked off much evil karma, and the karma based on causes later to be initiated will not generate such dire effects as that of the past.  Not all karma is bad, in spite of what man thinks.  Much of it is necessarily punitive and distressing, owing to humanity's ignorance and low stage of development.  When karmic retribution becomes acute and terrible, as it is in today's appalling world experience, it indicates that humanity has reached a point where consequences can be meted out on a large scale and with justice.  Very little suffering is attached to karma where there is ignorance, leading to irresponsibility and complete lack of thought and there is attached to affairs but little true sense of guilt.  There may be unhappy conditions and distressing circumstances, but the ability to respond to such conditions with commensurate pain is lacking; there is little mental reaction to the processes of karmic retribution.  This should be borne in mind.  The Aryan race is now, however, so developed mentally and on a large scale that karma is truly horrible and agonising and can express itself through world conditions.  At the same time, the present widespread distress indicates the extent and success of human unfoldment and is a most hopeful and promising sign.  In this idea, you have the clue as to why the good, the holy and the saintly servers of the race carry—in this world cycle—such a heavy load of karmic ill.

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It is consequently quite impossible in the scope of this treatise to deal more fully with this subject of karma as it produces the many types of human ills, including disease—only one of its manifestations.  The theme is too vast, too complicated and too widely diffusing in its effect.  All that one can do is to posit the fact that past actions and reactions have established in previous lives such a karmic rhythm that today all the aspects of the lower nature are involved; and among the commonest and most ordinary effects, and one in which the great Law of Retribution takes effect, is that of disease.  This is a point which healers and metaphysicians, so-called, should most carefully consider.

2. THE SEVEN RAY CAUSES OF KARMA

These carry the cause of all human difficulties, including ill health and disease—individual, national and racial—still further back to the very origin of creation itself.  Karma demonstrates in those streams of energy and of primordial substance which pour into and through the created world, including the lower three worlds where work the lunar pitris and the elemental essences of all forms.  This primordial karma (if I may so call it) is contributory to the existence of disease.  We are told in the ancient books, to which the Masters have access, that the world is constructed of substance which is already tainted with the karma of a previous solar system.

It will be apparent to you that these streams of force, emanating from the Lords of the Seven Rays, are coloured, therefore, and "tainted"—if I may use such a word—by the limitations of these same great Beings; They are Gods, from our point of view, but in reality, Gods in the making, even though much nearer solar divinity than the most advanced human being is near to planetary divinity.  They are the "imperfect Gods" spoken of in The Secret Doctrine [293] and are the planetary Logoi of the sacred and non-sacred planets.  If the great informing Lives of the planets within our solar system are imperfect, the effect of this imperfection must inevitably affect Their planetary creations, Their bodies of manifestation, and thus introduce a karmic condition over which the individual human being has absolutely no control, but within which he moves and which he shares.  It is obviously impossible for me to elucidate this theme.  All I can do or am permitted to do is to give you seven stanzas from one of the most ancient volumes in the world; it deals with the seven ray causes of imperfections in our planetary manifestations.  To these should be added (if it were only possible) the stanzas which convey the significance of the defects emerging from astrological conditions and producing effects of a planetary nature and involving, therefore, the horoscope of our particular planetary Logos.  But these are far too abstruse, elaborate and far-reaching in their theme, and can be studied and considered only when humanity has reached such a stage of intuitive development that men can "appreciate causes and effects as whole processes and can see both the beginning and the end in one flash of time in space."  In these words the Master Serapis once summed up the matter when endeavouring to train a group of initiated disciples in this mode of approaching vast subjects.

The "Book of Karma" has in it the following stanzas, and these can serve as an introduction to those dealing with the Seven Ray causes of inharmony and disease.  To the intuitive aspirant some meaning will emerge, but he must ever bear in mind that all that I am attempting to do is to put into words—unsatisfactory and quite inadequate—stanzas concerning the conditioning factors in the equipment of those great Beings Whose life force (which we call energy) creates all that is, colours and shapes all [294] manifestations within the worlds, and adds its quota of force to the equipment of every single human being.  Every man appropriates this energy to the measure of his need, and his need is the sign of his development.  The stanzas I have selected are from The Book of Imperfections.  Part Fourteen:

"The seven imperfections issued forth and tainted substance from the highest sphere unto the lowest.  The seven perfections followed next, and the two—that which is whole and sound and that which is known as detail and unwholesome in an awful sense—met upon the plane of physical life.  (The etheric plane.—A.A.B.)

And there they fought, swinging into the conflict all that they were and had, all that was seen and all that was unseen within the triple ring.  (The three lower worlds.—A.A.B.)

The seven imperfections entered the seven races of men, each in their own place; they coloured the seven points within each race.  (The seven planetary centres, transmitting imperfect energy.—A.A.B.)

The seven perfections hovered o'er each race, over each man within each race and over each point within each man.

And thus the conflict grew from the outermost to the innermost, from the greatest One to the littlest ones.  Seven the imperfections.  Seven the perfect wholes; seven the ways to oust the dark of imperfection and demonstrate the clear cold light, the white electric light of perfect wholeness."

All that you can gain from the above, my brother, is a concept of agelong conflict, of seven great energies which manifest as dualities and which produce when anchored within one body (whether that of a planet, a man or an [295] atom) an area or cycle of distress, as it is called; this distress produces the evolutionary urge and is itself the cause of manifestation, whilst its effect (which is karma) is the liberation ultimately of the perfect and the good.  These things are not easy to comprehend.  It must be remembered that the seven imperfections are related to the sevenfold nature of the One in Whom we live and move and have our being, and that these seven imperfect energies hold within themselves the perfect will-to-good, more potent in the long run than the will-to-harm.

These energies pour through the seven centres of the planetary body and are—as far as we are concerned—the seven ray energies.  In relation to the will-to-harm which can and does demonstrate as disease in all the four kingdoms in nature, you have the reason why I instituted, among the esoteric students for whom I have made myself responsible, the development of harmlessness.  It is the major agent for the offsetting of karma.  I will here give you Law IX, and thus complete a group of laws which, when followed, will be found essential to the curing of disease and the maintenance of health.

LAW IX

Perfection calls imperfection to the surface.  Good drives evil always from the form of man in time and space.  The method used by the Perfect One and that employed by Good is harmlessness.  This is not negativity but perfect poise, a completed point of view and divine understanding.

You will have noticed that what I have said in this connection removes the whole subject of disease into a distant world of origins—a world into which man is as yet unable to penetrate.  It is for this reason that I have devoted so much time to the consideration of the causes of disease; more than half of what I have to say is to be [296] found in this first part of our discussion.  We have nearly concluded this, and face what many will regard as the more useful and practical part of the teaching anent this subject.  It has never been my intention to deal with the pathology of disease or the symptoms of the many forms of ill health which ravage mankind.  I seek mainly to lay the stress upon the subjective reasons for the majority of ills which attack the human frame.  My purpose is, however, sound.  The overemphasis which people put upon disease is bewildering to the soul, for it places the transient, constantly changing form-nature in a position of undue prominence, whereas—from the angle of the soul—the vicissitudes of the body are only of importance just in so far as they contribute to the enrichment of soul experience.

The factor that is of importance is the causes, initiated by man from life to life; these work out in the appearance of disease, in the emergence of some disastrous consequence in circumstance and in event, and in the general conditioning of some particular incarnation.  It is with these causes that man must learn to deal, to recognise them, and to trace the conditioning energy to the appropriate effect, dealing primarily then with the task of negating the cause by the opposition of a trained will.  Karma is not an inevitable, inescapable and dire happening.  It can be offset; but this offsetting, particularly where disease is concerned, will include four lines of activity:

1. Determining the nature of the cause and the area in consciousness where it originated.

2. Developing those qualities which are the polar opposite of the effective cause.

3. Practising harmlessness so as to arrest the expression of the cause and to prevent any further implementing of the unfortunate condition.

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4. Taking the necessary physical steps which will produce the conditions which the soul desires.  These steps will include:

a. A mental acquiescence and an acceptance of the fact of the effect—in the case which we are considering in relation to karma—disease.

b. Wise action along the lines of orthodox medical procedure.

c. The assistance of a healing group or a healer for aid in inner spiritual healing.

d. Clear vision as to the outcome.  This may lead to preparation for a more useful physical plane life or preparation for the great transition called death.

But behind all wise thinking and wise activity must be the acceptance of the existence of certain general conditions which work out as physical ill health during this world cycle, and not only for the human kingdom but also for the three sub-human kingdoms.  The Law of Imperfection exists because the Great Realities (to be found in all the phenomenal world) are likewise in process of development and of evolutionary unfoldment.  Therefore, until They, as spiritual Beings, have developed "sublime control"—as it is called—over the substance of Their phenomenal forms, those forms will fall short of divine perfection.  Disease is only a form of transient imperfection, and death is just a method for refocussing energy, prior to a forward moving activity, leading steadily and always towards betterment.

The comprehension of the seven stanzas which I now propose to give you will lead eventually to the isolation of the seven psychological causes of disease, inherent in the substance of all forms in this world cycle, because all forms are infused with the life energy of the "imperfect Gods." [298] The seven Spirits, we are told in the Scriptures of the world, are "before the Throne of God"; this signifies that They are not yet in a position to mount the Throne, symbolically speaking, owing to the fact that They have not yet achieved complete divine expression.  These Lords of the Seven Rays are greater and more advanced in the spiritual scale than are those great Lives who form the Council of the Lord of the World in Shamballa.  They are the Representatives of the seven ray Energies Who inform the seven sacred planets but are not yet as divinely developed as They are.  The problem of humanity in respect to imperfection is complicated, not only by the fact that the seven informing vitalising Energies are "tainted with imperfection," but also by the fact that the Lord of the World is Himself, from the angle of a Solar Logos for instance, far from perfect; this is the reason why our planet, the Earth, is not a sacred planet.  We are told that Sanat Kumara is the divine prisoner of this planet, held here until the "last weary pilgrim has found his way home."  This is His heavy karma even whilst it is an expression of His desire and of His joy; the "weary pilgrims" are the atoms (human or otherwise) in His body, and they are tainted with imperfection because of His imperfections; their complete "healing" will set the term for His release.

Bear in mind, therefore, that the stanzas—seven in number—now to be given, indicate the quality of the descending energies and the taints which these energies carry and convey to all forms which are vitalised by the life of our planetary Logos.

The Seven Ray Causes of Inharmony and Disease

I. "The Great One set Himself to follow by Himself alone His chosen path.  He brooked no interference.  He hardened in His courses.  From plane [299] to plane, this hardening proceeded; it grew and stiffened.  His will was set, and crystal-like, brilliant, brittle and hard.  The power to crystallise was His.  He brought not will-to-live but will-to-die.  Death was His gift to life.  Infusion and diffusion pleased Him not.  He loved and sought abstraction."

As far as we can understand the significance of this stanza in relation to our theme of disease, the imperfection of this divine energy produces a peculiar attitude which expresses itself in the power to crystallise, to harden, to bring about attrition and cause the great abstracting process which we call death.  Other results are the many crystallising processes going on in the physical form, all atrophying processes, and old age.

II. "The Great One poured His life throughout all parts and every aspect of manifestation.  From the centre to the periphery and from the periphery to the centre He rushed, carrying abundance of life, energising all forms of Himself, producing excess of movement, endless extension, abundant growth and undue haste.  He knew not what He wanted because He wanted all, desired all, attracted all and gave to all too much."

The imperfection of this great energy with its building, vitalising and cohering potency, was and is the power to overstimulate, to produce accretion, to pile together, to build too many forms, to attract too many atoms and to bring about those conditions which lead to what has been called (esoterically) "the suffocation of the life"—another form of dying, but dying this time as a result of excessive vitality, affecting the blood stream, producing building within the forms already built, and frequently creating an [300] etheric vehicle which is too potent for the outer exoteric physical form.  Other results are, for instance, the appearance of tumors, of cancers, of growths, and the overdevelopment of bodily aspects, overlarge organs and supernumerary bodily parts.

III. "The Great One gathered here and there.  He chose and He rejected.  This power He refused and this power He accepted.  He had no purpose linked to the six purposes of His six Brothers.  He acquired a form and liked it not; threw it away and chose another.  He had no settled point or plan but lived in glamour and liked it well.  He smothered both the good and the bad, though using both.  Excess in one direction could be seen and starvation in another.  Both these extremes governed His choice of living substance, He threw together those that suited not each other, then saw the end was sorrow and deceit.  Patterns He made, but purpose suited not.  He gave up in despair."

The main effect of this imperfect "maneuvering" and manipulation, as it has been called, is largely astral in nature, producing consequent physical ill health and the undesirable effects which we have already studied in this treatise.  It is because this third ray energy is the energy of substance itself that its imperfections demonstrate profusely in the human tendency to disease.  Glamour results from the excessive use of this third ray energy for selfish and personal ends and manifests primarily upon the sixth or astral plane.  As a result of this manipulation of desire, and the wild maneuvering for its satisfaction along material lines, you have such diseases as the gastric and intestinal disorders and the various stomach troubles which devastate [301] civilised humanity—far more than the savage races.  Certain brain disorders also are effects, and low vitality.

IV. "The Great One fought and entered into combat.  All that He met appeared to Him a subject for display of power.  Within the fourth He found a field of battle and settled down to fight.  He saw the right and knew the wrong and vibrated between the two, fighting first one and then the other, but missing all the time that midway point where battle is not known.  There harmony, ease, rest and peaceful silence will be found.  He weakened all the forms which used His strength and power.  Yet all the time He sought for beauty; searched for loveliness; and yearned for peace.  Despair overtook Him in His courses, and with despair the will-to-live could not survive.  Yet all the time the loveliness was there."

Here we have a strong indication as to the reason why humanity (the fourth kingdom in nature) succumbs with such rapidity and such ease to disease.  The conflicts to which humanity is so constantly summoned, both in group form and as individuals, lead—until understood and used as a means to triumph and progress—to a condition of constant devitalisation.  Where this is present, resistance to disease fades out and practically all forms of ill health and bodily ills become possible.  Diffusion of energy leads to a constant lessening of this resistance.  As a result you have debility, quick and bad reaction to the disease indigenous in the planet itself, and a rapid taking on of infections and of contagious diseases.  It is this energy which lies behind what we call epidemics, and influenza is one of its main expressions.

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V. "The Great One arose in His wrath and separated Himself.  He swept aside the great dualities and saw primarily the field of multiplicity.  He produced cleavage on every hand.  He wrought with potent thought for separative action.  He established barriers with joy.  He brooked no understanding; He knew no unity, for He was cold, austere, ascetic and forever cruel.  He stood between the tender, loving centre of all lives and the outer court of writhing, living men.  Yet He stood not at the midway point, and naught He did sufficed to heal the breach.  He widened all cleavages, erected barriers, and sought to make still wider gaps."

It has been most difficult to describe the nature of the imperfection of the energy of the Lord of the fifth ray.  In the activity of this energy which demonstrates primarily upon the fifth or mental plane will be found eventually the source of many psychological disorders and mental trouble.  Cleavage is the outstanding characteristic—cleavage within the individual or between the individual and his group, rendering him anti-social.  I have dealt with this in an earlier part of this treatise and need not further enlarge upon the difficulties here (In Esoteric Psychology, Vol. II of A Treatise on the Seven Rays).  Other results are certain forms of insanities, brain lesions and those gaps in the relation of the physical body to the subtle bodies which show as imbecilities and psychological troubles.  Another form of disease, emerging as a result of this fifth ray force is migraine, which is caused by a lack of relationship between the energy around the pineal gland and that around the pituitary body.

VI. "The Great One loved Himself in others and in all forms.  On every hand, He saw objects of His [303] devotion and ever they proved to be Himself.  Into these others He ever poured Himself, asking response and never getting it.  Surely and with certainty the outlines of the forms so loved were lost, grew dim and disappeared.  The objects of His love slowly faded out.  Only a world of shadows, of mist and fog remain.  And as He looked upon Himself, He said:  Lord of Glamour, that am I, and the Angel of Bewilderment.  Naught is clear to me.  I love yet all seems wrong!  I know that love is right and the spirit of the universe.  What then is wrong?"

Curiously enough, it is the potency of this sixth ray force (as it feeds desire) which is responsible for much of the ills and diseases of humanity which are based upon the misuse of the mission and function of sex.  Desire, bewilderment, weakness, perversions and the one-pointed development of sexual and other satisfactions grow out of the misuse of this energy.  The bewilderment growing out of desire leads to a violently demanded satisfaction and the taking of those steps—some right and some wrong—which lead to satisfaction.  The results cover a wide field, all the way from sadistic cruelty and lust to those marriages which are based on physical desire and to those conditions which lead to the many forms of sexual disease.  A clue to this whole world-wide problem lies in the words of an ancient writing which says that "the imperfection of the Lord of the Sixth Ray opened the door to an erroneous marriage between the poles."

VII. "The Great One gathered to Himself His forces and affirmed His intention to create.  He created that which is outer and can be seen.  He saw His creations and liked them not and so withdrew His attention; then the creations He had made died [304] and disappeared.  He had no lasting success and saw naught but failure as He travelled on the outer path of life.  He comprehended not the need of forms.  To some He gave an over-plus of life, to some too little; and so both kinds died and failed to show the beauty of the Lord Who gave them life but failed to give them understanding.  He knew not then that love sustains."

The effects of this ray force are most peculiar and will be a great deal more prevalent than heretofore, as this ray is now coming into power.  It is this energy which is largely responsible for infections and contagious diseases.  The keynote of the work of the seventh ray is to bring together life and matter upon the physical plane.  This, however, when viewed from the angle of imperfection, is a bringing together (if you can understand the implications) of Life, the lives and the general livingness of the creative process.  This is symbolised by the promiscuity and the endless moving interplay of all life within all lives.  The result is therefore the activity of all germs and bacteria within the medium which will best nurture them.

These are abstruse and difficult concepts, but they should be pondered upon, and deep reflection will lead to understanding.  All disease and ill health are the result of the activity or the inactivity of one or other of the seven types of energy as they play upon the human body.  All physical ills emerge out of the impact of these imperfect energies as they make their impact upon, enter into and pass through the centres in the body.  All depends upon the condition of the seven centres in the human body; through these the impersonal energies play, carrying life, disease or death, stimulating the imperfections in the body or bringing healing to the body.  All depends, as far as the human being is [305] concerned, upon the condition of the physical body, the age of the soul and the karmic possibilities.

I would ask you not to misinterpret the significance of the word "imperfection" which I have used so constantly in relation to the great Beings Who express a divinity unattainable by humanity at any time upon this particular planet.  You must bear in mind that this solar system is the second, and that in the first solar system the emphasis was laid upon intelligent materiality; the goal of the highest initiate was to attain complete control over matter, to unfold the mind principle and to evidence a definite materialism.  In these so distant aeons that marked attainment, whereas in this solar system it marks defeat for humanity.  This system, including all the planets along with our Earth, has a different goal, and the second divine aspect, that of love, has to be manifested, and manifested through the medium of matter impregnated with the qualities developed in system one.  What was perfection at that time is not so now.  Therefore, the Great Beings which are the sumtotal of all that is, are working through and in substance, which is already tinged or tainted with that which must be left behind and subjected to no further unfoldment.

These are the imperfections which we are considering—the seven aspects of intelligent materiality; it is here that disease has its seat and expression.  We are told that the physical body is not a principle; in the last solar system it was.  In this, the principles are different and it is in the clash between what is and what will be (what wills-to-be) that we have, upon the physical plane, the causes of disease and death.  Ponder on these matters and bear in mind that you must see the picture upon a large scale, as large a scale as possible, if there is to be a true understanding of some of the causes of physical ills and disease.

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