V
THE DISSOCIATION OF HUMAN
PERSONALITY DURING INITIATION
DURING deep
sleep the human soul does not register impressions through
the medium of the physical senses. In that state the
perceptions of the external world do not touch it. It is, in
truth, outside the coarser part of human nature, the physical
body, and is only connected with the finer bodies — known
as the astral and etheric — which escape the observation
of the physical senses. The activity of these finer bodies
does not cease in sleep. Even as the physical body stands in
a certain relation to the things and beings of its own world,
even as it is affected by these and affects them, so is it
also with the soul in a higher world, but in this latter
case, experience continues during sleep. The soul is then
veritably in full activity, but we cannot know of these
personal activities as long as we have no higher senses, by
means of which we may observe, during sleep, what happens
around us and what we do ourselves, just as well as we can
use our ordinary senses in daily life for the observation of
our physical environment. Occult training consists (as has
been shown in the foregoing chapters) in the upbuilding of
just such higher senses.
By means of
examples like that which follows one can readily conceive how
the soul with its finer vehicles may continue its activity
during the intervals when the physical body is at rest. It is
no mere nursery tale which will here be told, but a real case
from life, which was observed with all the means possessed by
the clairvoyant investigator and with all the care which it
is incumbent upon him to exercise; nor is it related as a
“proof,” but merely as an illustration. [
Note 1 ]
A young man
stood confronted by an examination which would probably
decide his entire future life. For a long time previously, he
had worked for it assiduously, and consequently, on the
evening before the examination, was exceedingly tired. He was
to appear before the examiners punctually at eight in the
morning of the following day. He wanted to have a night's
restful sleep before the trial, but he feared lest, on
account of his exhaustion, he might not be able to wake
himself at the right hour. He therefore took the precaution
to arrange that a Person living in the next room should wake
him at six o'clock by knocking at his door. Thus he was able
to abandon himself to sleep with an easy mind. On the
following day he awoke, not at the call of his neighbor, but
out of a dream. He heard six sharp rifle-reports, and with
the sixth he was awake. His watch — equipped with no
alarm — stood at six o'clock. He dressed himself, and
after half an hour his neighbor awoke him. In reality, it was
only just then six o'clock, for his watch, by some accident,
had gained half an hour in the night. The dream which
awakened him had timed itself to the erroneous watch. What
was it, then, which happened here? The soul of the young man
had remained active even during his sleep. Because he had
previously formed a connection between this activity of soul
and the watch at his side, there had remained a connection
between the two for the whole of the night, so that on the
next day the soul came, as it were, to the hour of six
simultaneously with the watch. This activity had impressed
itself on the young man's consciousness through the pictorial
dream already described, which had awakened him One cannot
explain it away by reference to the increasing light of day
or anything similar, for the soul acted not in accordance
with the real time of day, but with the erroneous watch. The
soul was active like a veritable watchman while the physical
person slept. It is not the activity of the soul which is
lacking in sleep, but rather a consciousness of that
activity.
If, by occult
training, the sleep-life of a person is cultivated, in the
way already set forth in the previous chapter, he can then
follow consciously everything which passes before him while
in this particular state; he can voluntarily put himself en
rapport with his environment, just as with his experiences,
known through the physical senses, during the continuance of
the waking consciousness. Had the young man in the above
example been a clairvoyant, he would have been able to watch
the time for himself during sleep, and in consequence to have
awakened himself. It is necessary to state here that the
perception of the ordinary phenomenal environment presupposes
one of the higher stages of clairvoyance. At the beginning of
his development at this stage, the student only perceives
things which pertain to another world, without being able to
discern their relation to the objects of his workaday
surroundings.
That which is
illustrated in such typical examples of dream — or
sleep — life is repeatedly experienced by people. The
soul lives an unintermittently in the higher worlds and is
active within them. Out of those higher worlds it continually
draws the suggestions upon which it works when again in the
physical body, while the ordinary man remains unconscious of
this higher life. It is the work of the occult student to
make it conscious, and by so doing his life becomes
transformed. So long as the soul has not the higher sight, it
is guided by foreign agencies, and just as the life of a
blind man to whom sight is given by an operation becomes
quite different from what it was before, so that he can
henceforth dispense with a guide, thus also does the life of
a person change im-der the influence of occult training. He,
too, is now abandoned by his guide and must henceforward
guide himself. As soon as this occurs he is, of course,
liable to errors of which his waking consciousness had no
conception. He now deals with a world in which, hitherto and
unknown to himself, he had been influenced by higher powers.
These higher powers are regulated by the great universal
harmony. It is from this harmony that the student emerges. He
has now to accomplish for himself things which were hitherto
done for him without his co-operation.
Because this is
the case there will be much said in the treatises which deal
with such things concerning the dangers which are connected
with an ascent into the higher worlds. The descriptions of
these dangers which have sometimes been given are very apt to
make timid souls regard this higher life only with horror. It
should here be said that these experiences only occur if the
necessary rules of prudence are neglected. On the other hand,
if everything which a genuine occult education imparts as
counsel were here given as a warning, it would be manifest
that the ascent is through experiences which in magnitude, as
in form, surpass everything that has been painted by the
boldest fancy of an ordinary person; yet it is not reasonable
to talk of possible injury to health or life. The student
learns to recognize horrible threatening forms that haunt
every corner and cranny of life. It is even possible for him
to make use of such powers and beings who are withdrawn from
the perceptions of sense, and the temptation to use these
powers in the service of some forbidden interest of his own
is very great. There is also the possibility of employing
these forces in erroneous ways, owing to an inadequate
knowledge concerning the higher worlds. Some of these
especially important events (as, for example, the meeting
with “the Guardian of the Threshold”) will be
described further on in this treatise. Yet one must realize
that these hostile powers are around us even when we do not
know anything about them. It is true that in this case their
relation to man is determined by higher powers, and that this
relationship only changes when he consciously enters the
world which was hitherto unknown to him. At the same time,
this will enhance his existence and enlarge the circle of his
life to an enormous extent. There is danger only if the
student, whether from impatience or arrogance, assumes too
early an independence in his attitude toward the experiences
of the higher world — if he cannot wait until he acquires
a really mature insight into superphysical laws. In this
sphere the words “humility” and
“modesty” are still less empty than in ordinary
life. If these, in the very best sense, are the attributes of
the student, he may be sure that his ascent into the higher
life may be achieved without any danger to what one usually
means by health and life. Above all things it is needful that
there should be no disharmony between these higher
experiences and the events and demands of every-day life. The
student's task throughout is to search on earth, and he who
tries to withdraw from the sacred tasks of this earth and to
escape into another world may be sure that he never reaches
his goal. Yet what the senses behold is only a part of the
world, and in spiritual regions lie the causes of what are
facts in the phenomenal world. One should participate in the
thins of the spirit in order to carry one's revelations into
the world of the senses. Man transforms the earth, by
implanting in it that which he has discovered in the
spiritual world, and that is his task. Yet, because the earth
is dependent upon the spiritual world — because we can
only be truly effective on earth if we have part in those
worlds wherein lie concealed the creative forces — we
ought to be willing to ascend into those regions. If a person
enters on a course of occult training with this sentiment,
and if he never deviates for a moment from the directions
already given, he has not even the most insignificant of
dangers to fear. No one ought to hold back from occult
education on account of the dangers that confront him; rather
should the very prospect form a powerful inducement toward
the acquisition of those qualities which must be possessed by
the genuine occult student.
After these
preliminaries, which ought certainly to dispel all
forebodings, let us now describe one of these
“dangers.” It is true that very considerable
changes are undergone by the finer bodies of the occult
student. These changes are connected with certain
evolutionary events which happen within the three fundamental
forces of the soul — the will, the feelings, and the
thoughts. As regards the occult training of a person these
three forces stand in a definite relation, regulated by the
laws of the higher world. He does not will, nor think, nor
feel, in an arbitrary manner. If, for example, a particular
idea arises in his mind, then, in accordance with natural
laws, a certain feeling is attached to it, or else it is
followed by a resolution of the will that is likewise
connected with it according to law. You enter a room, find it
to be stuffy, and open the window. You hear your name called,
and follow the call. You are questioned and you answer. You
perceive an ill-smelling object and you experience a feeling
of disgust. These are simple connections between thought,
feeling, and will. If, however, the student surveys human
life, he will observe that everything in it is built up on
such connections. Indeed, we only call the life of a person
“normal” if we detect in it just that
interrelation of thought, feeling, and will which is founded
on the laws of human nature. We deem it contrary to these
laws if a person, for instance, takes pleasure in an
ill-smelling object, or if, on being questioned, he does not
answer. The success which we expect from a right education or
a fitting instruction consists in our presupposition that we
can thereby impart to our pupil an interrelation of thought,
feeling, and will that corresponds to human nature. When we
present to a pupil any particular ideas, we do so on the
supposition that they will assimilate, in an orderly
association, with his feelings and volitions. All this arises
from the fact that in the finer soul-vehicles of man the
central points of the three powers, feeling, thinking, and
willing, are connected with each other in a definite way.
This connection in the finer soul-vehicles has also its
analogy in the coarse physical body. There, too, the organs
of volition stand in a certain orderly relation to those of
thinking and feeling. A definite thought regularly evokes a
feeling or a volition. In the course of a person's higher
development the threads which connect these three principles
with each other are severed. At first this rupture occurs
only in regard to the finer organism of the soul; but at a
still higher stage the separation extends also to the
physical body. In the higher spiritual evolution of a person
his brain actually divides into three separated parts. The
separation, indeed, is of such a nature that it is not
perceptible to ordinary sense-observation, nor could it be
detected by the keenest physical instruments. Yet it occurs,
and the clairvoyant has means of observing it. The brain of
the higher clairvoyant divides into three independent active
entities: the thought-brain, the feeling-brain, and the
willing-brain.
The organs of
thinking, feeling, and willing remain, then, quite free in
themselves, and their connection is no longer maintained by a
law innate in them, but must now be tended by the growing
higher consciousness of the individual. This, then, is the
change which the occult student observes coming over
himself — that there is no longer a connection between a
thought and a feeling, or a feeling and a volition, except
when he creates the connection himself. No impulse drives him
from thought to action if he does not voluntarily harbor it.
He can now stand completely without feeling before an object
which, before his training, would have filled him with
glowing love or violent hatred; he can likewise remain
actionless before a thought which heretofore would have
spurred him an to action as if by itself. He can execute
deeds by an effort of will where not the remotest cause would
be visible to a person who had not been through the occult
school. The greatest acquisition which the occult student
inherits is the attainment of complete lordship over the
connecting threads of the three powers of the soul; yet
simultaneously these connections are placed entirely at his
own responsibility.
Only through
such alterations in his nature can a person come into
conscious touch with certain superphysical powers and
entities. For between his own soul and certain fundamental
forces of the world there are correspondences or links. The
power, for instance, which lies in the will can act upon, and
perceive, particular things and entities of the higher world,
but it can only do so when dissociated from the threads that
link it with the feelings and thoughts of the soul. As soon
as this separation is effected the activities of the will can
be manifested, and so is it likewise with the forces of
thought and feeling. If a person sends out a feeling of
hatred, it is visible to the clairvoyant as a thin cloud of
light of a special hue, and the clairvoyant can ward off such
a feeling, just as an ordinary person wards off a physical
blow that is aimed at him. Hate is a perceptible phenomenon
in the superphysical world, but the clairvoyant is only able
to perceive it in so far as he can send out the force which
resides in his feelings, just as an ordinary person can
direct outwards the receptive faculty of his eyes. What is
here applied to hatred applies also to far more important
facts in the phenomenal world. The individual can come into
conscious communion with them by this very liberation of the
elemental forces in the soul.
On account of
this division of the thinking, feeling, and willing forces it
is now possible that a threefold error may overtake the
development of a person who has been disregardful of his
occult instructions. Such an error might occur if the
connecting threads were severed before the student had
acquired so much knowledge of the higher consciousness as
would enable him to hold the reins by which to guide well,
such as a free, harmonious co-operation of the separate
forces would supply. For, as a rule, the three human
principles at any given period of life are not symmetrically
developed. In one the power of thought is advanced beyond
those of feeling and will; in a second, another power has the
upper hand over its companions. So long as the connection
between these forces — a connection produced by the laws
of the higher world — remains intact, no injurious
irregularity, in the higher sense, can result from the
predominance of one force or another. In a person of
will-power, for instance, thought and feeling work by those
laws to equalize all and to prevent the over-weighty will
from falling into a kind of degeneration. If such a person,
however, should take up an occult training, the law-given
influence of thought and feeling upon the monstrous,
unchecked, oppressive will would entirely cease. If, then,
the individual has not carried his control of the higher
consciousness so far that he can call up the desirable
harmony for himself, the will continues an its own unbridled
way and repeatedly overpowers its possessor. Thought and
feeling lapse into complete debility; and the individual is
whipped like a slave by his own overmastering will. A violent
nature which rushes from one uncurbed action to another is
the result.
A second
deviation ensues if feeling shakes off its appropriate bridle
in the same extreme manner. A person who bows in adoration
before another may easily give himself over to an unlimited
dependence, until his own thought and will are ruined. In
place of the higher knowledge a pitiful vacuity and
feebleness would become the lot of such a person. Again, in a
case where feeling largely preponderates, a nature too much
given over to piety and religious aspiration may lapse into
religious extravagance that carries him away.
The third evil
is found where thought is too prominent, for then there may
result a contemplative nature inimical to life and shut
within itself. To such persons the world only appears to have
any significance so far as it offers them objects for the
satisfaction of their limitless thirst for wisdom. They are
never impelled by a thought either to a feeling or to a deed.
They are seen at once to be cold, unfeeling folk. They fly
away from every contact with the things of ordinary life as
from something that stings them to aversion, or that at least
has lost all meaning for them.
These are the
three ways of error against which the occult student should
be counselled: over-action, excess of feeling, and a cold,
unloving struggle after wisdom. Viewed from without — as
also from the materialistic medical standpoint — the
picture of an occult student upon one of these byways does
not greatly differ (especially in degree) from that of a
madman, or at least of a person suffering from severe nervous
illness. From all this it will be clear how important it is
to occult education that the three principles of the soul
should throughout be symmetrically developed, before their
innate connection is severed and the awakened higher
consciousness enthroned in its place; for if a mistake once
occurs, if one of these principles falls into lawlessness,
the higher soul appears as a thing misborn. The unbridled
force then pervades the individual's entire personality; and
one cannot expect the balance to be restored for a long time.
That which seems but a harmless characteristic so long as its
possessor is without occult training,— especially if he
belongs to the willing, thinking, or feeling type,— is
so increased in the occult student that the more homely
virtues, so necessary for everyday life, are apt to be
obscured.
A really
serious danger is at hand when the student has acquired the
faculty of calling up before him in waking consciousness
those things that he can experience in the state of sleep. As
long as it is only a matter of illuminating the intervals of
sleep, the sense-life, regulated according to common
universal laws, always works during the waking hours towards
restoring the disturbed equilibrium of the soul. That is why
it is so essential that the waking life of an occult student
should in every respect be healthy and systematic. The more
he fulfils the demand which is made by the external world
upon a sound and powerful type of body, soul, and spirit, the
better it is for him. On the other hand, it may be very bad
for him if his ordinary waking life acts so as to excite or
irritate him; if any disturbing or hindering influence from
the external life occurs during the great changes that are
undergone by his inner nature. He should seek for everything
which corresponds to his powers and faculties, everything
that puts him in an undisturbed harmonious connection with
his environment. He should avoid everything which upsets this
harmony, everything that brings unrest and fever into his
life. Regarding this, it is not so much a matter of removing
this unrest or fever in an external sense, as of taking care
that the moods, purposes, thoughts, and bodily health do not
thereby undergo a continual fluctuation. During his occult
training all this is not so easy for a person to accomplish
as it was before, since the higher experiences, which are now
interwoven with his life, react uninterruptedly upon his
entire existence. If something in these higher experiences is
not in its place, the irregularity lurks perpetually and is
liable to throw him off the right path at every turn. For
this reason the student should omit nothing which will secure
for him a lasting control over his entire nature, nor should
presence of mind, and a peaceful survey of all possible
situations in life ever be allowed to desert him. A genuine
occult training, indeed, itself engenders all these
attributes, and in the course of such training one only
learns to know these dangers at the precise moment when one
acquires the full power to rout them from the field.
Notes:
1. It
has been necessary to make this preamble, since the
superstitious followers of materialism, as soon as they
hear of any such story, immediately respond by declaring
that these cases prove nothing They whittle away
everything of the kind as the result of delusion and
inaccurate observation. To them it should be remarked, by
way of reply, that the clairvoyant investigator does not
require such indirect proofs; he attains to a direct
knowledge by means of the higher sight. Nevertheless,
facts of the kind related above serve to illustrate what
is meant. To establish their truth other means exist than
those which materialistic learning will use in the
unimpeachable exposition of a matter of ordinary fact.
|