BOOK 3  45-55

The Book of the Spiritual Man  1-11   12-22   22-33   34- 44   45-55

45. Thereupon will come the manifestation of the atomic and other
powers, which are the endowment of the body, together with its
unassailable force.

The body in question is, of course, the etheric body of the spiritual
man. He is said to possess eight powers: the atomic, the power of
assimilating himself with the nature of the atom, which will, perhaps,
involve the power to disintegrate material forms; the power of
levitation; the power of limitless extension; the power of boundless
reach, so that, as the commentator says, "he can touch the moon with
the tip of his finger"; the power to accomplish his will; the power of
gravitation, the correlative of levitation; the power of command; the
power of creative will. These are the endowments of the spiritual man.
Further, the spiritual body is unassailable. Fire burns it not, water wets
it not, the sword cleaves it not, dry winds parch it not. And, it is said,
the spiritual man can impart something of this quality and temper to
his bodily vesture.

46. Shapeliness, beauty, force, the temper of the diamond: these are
the endowments of that body.

The spiritual man is shapely, beautiful strong, firm as the diamond.
Therefore it is written: "These things saith the Son of God, who hath
his eyes like unto a flame of fire, and his feet are like fine brass: He
that overcometh and keepeth my works unto the end, to him will I
give power over the nations: and he shall rule them with a rod of iron;
and I will give him the morning star."

47. Mastery over the powers of perception and action comes through
perfectly concentrated Meditation on their fivefold forms; namely,
their power to grasp their distinctive nature, the element of
self-consciousness in them, their inherence, and their purposiveness.

Take, for example, sight. This possesses, first, the power to grasp,
apprehend, perceive; second, it has its distinctive form of perception;
that is, visual perception; third, it always carries with its operations
self-consciousness, the thought: "I perceive"; fourth sight has the
power of extension through the whole field of vision, even to the
utmost star; fifth, it is used for the purposes of the Seer. So with the
other senses. Perfectly concentrated Meditation on each sense, a
viewing it from behind and within, as is possible for the spiritual man,
brings a mastery of the scope and true character of each sense, and of
the world on which they report collectively.

48. Thence comes the power swift as thought, independent of
instruments, and the mastery over matter.

We are further enumerating the endowments of the spiritual man.
Among these is the power to traverse space with the swiftness of
thought, so that whatever place the spiritual man thinks of, to that he
goes, in that place he already is. Thought has now become his means
of locomotion. He is, therefore, independent of instruments, and can
bring his force to bear directly, wherever he wills.

49. When the spiritual man is perfectly disentangled from the psychic
body, he attains to mastery over all things and to a knowledge of all.

The spiritual man is enmeshed in the web of the emotions; desire, fear,
ambition, passion; and impeded by the mental forms of separateness
and materialism. When these meshes are sundered, these obstacles
completely overcome, then the spiritual man stands forth in his own
wide world, strong, mighty, wise. He uses divine powers, with a
divine scope and energy, working together with divine Companions.
To such a one it is said: "Thou art now a disciple, able to stand, able
to hear, able to see, able to speak, thou hast conquered desire and
attained to self- knowledge, thou hast seen thy soul in its bloom and
recognized it, and heard the voice of the silence."

50. By absence of all self-indulgence at this point, when the seeds of
bondage to sorrow are destroyed, pure spiritual being is attained.

The seeking of indulgence for the personal self, whether through
passion or ambition, sows the seed of future sorrow. For this self
indulgence of the personality is a double sin against the real; a sin
against the cleanness of life, and a sin against the universal being,
which permits no exclusive particular good, since, in the real, all
spiritual possessions are held in common. This twofold sin brings its
reacting punishment, its confining bondage to sorrow. But ceasing
from self-indulgence brings purity, liberation, spiritual life.

51. There should be complete overcoming of allurement or pride in
the invitations of the different realms of life, lest attachment to things
evil arise once more.

The commentator tells us that disciples, seekers for union, are of four
degrees: first, those who are entering the path; second, those who are
in the realm of allurements; third, those who have won the victory
over matter and the senses; fourth, those who stand firm in pure
spiritual life. To the second, especially, the caution in the text is
addressed. More modern teachers would express the same truth by a
warning against the delusions and fascinations of the psychic realm,
which open around the disciple, as he breaks through into the unseen
worlds. These are the dangers of the anteroom. Safety lies in passing
on swiftly into the inner chamber. '`Him that overcometh will I make
a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out."

52. From perfectly concentrated Meditatetion on the divisions of time
and their succession comes that wisdom which is born of discernment.

The Upanishads say of the liberated that "he has passed beyond the
triad of time"; he no longer sees life as projected into past, present and
future, since these are forms of the mind; but beholds all things spread
out in the quiet light of the Eternal. This would seem to be the same
thought, and to point to that clear-eyed spiritual perception which is
above time; that wisdom born of the unveiling of Time's delusion.
Then shall the disciple live neither in the present nor the future, but in
the Eternal.

53. Hence comes discernment between things which are of like nature,
not distinguished by difference of kind, character or position. Here, as
also in the preceding Sutra, we are close to the doctrine that
distinctions of order, time and space are creations of the mind; the
threefold prism through which the real object appears to us distorted
and refracted. When the prism is withdrawn, the object returns to its
primal unity, no longer distinguishable by the mind, yet clearly
knowable by that high power of spiritual discernment, of illumination,
which is above the mind.

54. The wisdom which is born of discerns ment is starlike; it discerns
all things, and all conditions of things, it discerns without succession:
simultaneously.

That wisdom, that intuitive, divining power is starlike, says the
commentator, because it shines with its own light, because it rises on
high, and illumines all things. Nought is hid from it, whether things
past, things present, or things to come; for it is beyond the threefold
form of time, so that all things are spread before it together, in the
single light of the divine. This power has been beautifully described by
Columba: "Some there are, though very few, to whom Divine grace
has granted this: that they can clearly and most distinctly see, at one
and the same moment, as though under one ray of the sun, even the
entire circuit of the whole world with its surroundings of ocean and
sky, the inmost part of their mind being marvellously enlarged."

55. When the vessture and the spiritual man are alike pure, then
perfect spiritual life is attained.

The vesture, says the commentator, must first be washed pure of all
stains of passion and darkness, and the seeds of future sorrow must be
burned up utterly. Then, both the vesture and the wearer of the
vesture being alike pure, the spiritual man enters into perfect spiritual
life.

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