Esoteric Psychology I

	Some of the points which I may seek to make clear will not be capable of substantiation and cannot be proved by you. These it would be wise to accept as working hypotheses, in order to understand that whereof I seek to speak. Some of the points I may make you may find yourself capable of checking up in your own life experience, and they will call forth from you a recognition coming from your concrete mind; or they may produce in you a reaction of the intensest conviction, emanating from your intuitively aware Self. In any case, read slowly; apply the laws of analogy and of correspondence; study yourself and your brethren; seek to link what I say to any knowledge you may possess of the modern theories, and remember that the more truly you live as a soul the more surely you will comprehend that which may be imparted.

	I should like to point out here that when I speak in terms of personality and perforce employ the personal pronoun, I must not be accused of personalizing these great forces. I speak in terms of entity, of pure Being, and not in terms of human personality. But the handicap of language persists; and in teaching those who think in terms of the lower concrete mind, and whose intuition is dormant or only manifesting in flashes, I am compelled to speak in parables and use the language of word symbols. Let me point out also that all statements which I may make are in relation to our particular planet and couched in terms that can be understood by the humanity which our planet has produced.

	The soul, in relation to the human being, is the mind principle in two capacities, or the mind expressing itself in two ways. These two ways are registered and become part of the organized equipment of the human body when it is adequately refined and sufficiently developed: The lower concrete mind, the mental body, the "chitta" or mind stuff. The higher spiritual or abstract mind.

	These two aspects of the soul, its two basic qualities, bring into being the human kingdom and enable man to contact both the lower kingdoms in nature and the higher spiritual realities. The first, the quality of mind in its lower manifestation, is owned potentially by every atom in every form in every kingdom in nature. It is a part of the body nature, inherent and potential, and is the basis of brotherhood, of absolute unity, of universal synthesis and divine coherence in manifestation. The other, the higher aspect, is the principle of self-awareness, and when combined with the lower aspect produces the self-consciousness of the human being. When the lower aspect has informed and pervaded the forms in the subhuman kingdoms, and when it has worked upon those forms and their latent sentiency so as to produce adequate refinement and sentiency, the vibration becomes so potent that the higher is attracted and there is a fusion or at-one-ing. This is like a higher recapitulation of the initial union of spirit and matter which brought the world into being. A human soul is thus brought into existence and begins its long career. It is now a differentiated entity.

	The complexity of the subject is very great, and only the broad general outline of the system, and the basic principles governing the law of evolution, can be dimly sensed and grasped. The sweep of the subject is so vast that the concrete mind and the rationalizing nature lose themselves in the realized complexities and problems. But the illumined intuition, with its power to synthesize (which is the emerging characteristic of the disciples and initiates under training), can and does lead them into a measured sequence of expansions of consciousness.