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CHAPTER III - The Next Step in the Mental Development of Humanity - Part 2

THE AQUARIAN AGE

As a result of the bridging work which will be done in the immediate one hundred and fifty years ahead of us, the technique of bridging the various cleavages found in the human family, and of weaving into one strong cable the various threads of energy which tenuously, as yet, connect the various aspects of the inner man with the outer form, will have made [95] so much progress that the bulk of the intelligent people in the world and of all classes and nations will be integrated personalities.  When this is the case, the science of the antahkarana will be a planned part of their training.  Today, as we study this science and its related sciences of meditation and service, the appeal will be only to the world aspirants and disciples.  Its usefulness will only be found at present to be for those special incarnating souls who are today coming into incarnation with such rapidity as a response to the world's need for help.  But later the appeal will be general and its usefulness more nearly universal.

It is needless for me to outline for you the nature of the educational systems of the Aquarian Age because they would prove most unsuitable at this time.  I mention them as it is necessary to remember that the work done during the next two centuries in the field of education is definitely temporary and balancing, and that out of the fulfillment of the task assigned to education will grow those more permanent systems which, in the new age, will be found flourishing everywhere.

Three major sciences will eventually dominate the field of education in the new age.  They will not negate the activities of modern science but will integrate them into a wider subjective whole.  These three sciences are:

1. The Science of the Antahkarana. This is the new and true science of the mind, which will utilise mental substance for the building of the bridge between personality and soul, and then between the soul and the spiritual triad.  This constitutes active work in substance subtler than the substance of the three worlds of ordinary human evolution.  It concerns the substance of the three higher levels of the mental plane.  These symbolic bridges, when constructed, will facilitate the stream or flow of consciousness and will produce that continuity of consciousness, or that sense of unimpeded awareness, which will finally end the fear of death, [96] negate all sense of separateness, and make a man responsive in his brain consciousness to impressions coming to him from the higher spiritual realms or from the Mind of God.  Thus he will more easily be initiated into the purposes and plans of the Creator.

2. The Science of Meditation.  At present meditation is associated in the minds of men with religious matters.  But that relates only to theme.  The science can be applied to every possible life process.  In reality, this science is a subsidiary branch, preparatory to the Science of the Antahkarana.  It is really the true science of occult bridge building or bridging in consciousness.  By its means, particularly in the early stages, the building process is facilitated.  It is one of the major ways of spiritual functioning; it is one of the many ways to God; it relates the individual mind eventually to the higher mind and later to the Universal Mind.  It is one of the major building techniques and will eventually dominate the new educational methods in schools and colleges.  It is intended primarily to:

a. Produce sensitivity to the higher impressions.

b. Build the first half of the antahkarana, that between the personality and the soul.

c. Produce an eventual continuity of consciousness.  Meditation is essentially the science of light, because it works in the substance of light.  One branch of it is concerned with the science of visualisation because, as the light continues to bring revelation, the power to visualise can grow with the aid of the illumined mind, and the later work of training the disciple to create is then made possible.  It might be added here that the building of the second half of the antahkarana (that which bridges the gap in consciousness between the soul and the spiritual triad) is called the science of vision, because [97] just as the first half of the bridge is built through the use of mental substance, so the second half is built through the use of light substance.

3. The Science of Service grows normally and naturally out of the successful application of the other two sciences.  As the linking up of soul and personality proceeds, and as the knowledge of the plan and the light of the soul pour into the brain consciousness, the normal result is the subordination of the lower to the higher.  Identification with group purposes and plans is the natural attribute of the soul.  As this identification is carried forward on mental and soul levels, it produces a corresponding activity in the personal life and this activity we call service.  Service is the true science of creation and is a scientific method of establishing continuity.

These three sciences will be regarded eventually as the three major concerns of the educational process and upon them will the emphasis increasingly be placed.

We have now laid the ground for a consideration of the three sciences which will dominate the thought of educators in the coming age.  The building and the development of the antahkarana, the development of the power to control life and to work white magic through the science of meditation, and also the science of service whereby group control and group relationship are fostered and developed—these are the three fundamental sciences which will guide the psychologist and the educator of the future.  These will also cause a radical change in the attitude of parents towards their children and in the methods which they employ to train and teach them when they are very young and in the formative years of their consciousness.

It should here be remembered that these parents themselves will have been brought up under this new and different regime and will themselves have been developed [98] under this changed mode of approaching the educational process.  What may therefore seem to you mystical and vague (because of its newness, or its idealism and its emphasis upon a seeming abstract group consciousness), will seem to them normal and natural.  What I am here outlining to you is a possibility which lies ahead for the next two or three generations; I am also referring to a recognition which a new educational ideology will normally permit to govern the mode of instruction.