Page:A Collection of Esoteric Writings.djvu/79

65 the author regarding the same may be gathered from his treatise on the philosophy of spirit. They may be summarized as follows:—

(1.) The four discreeted degrees in the human being "called animal, human, angelic, and deific," show that every human being (however wicked and depraved) will ultimately reach immortality.*

(2.) There is no re-birth in the material human form, there is no retrogression at any time.

And there is this interesting passage in the author's book:—

(3.) "The thread of life is broken up at the point where it appeared to be broken off by physical dissolution, and every one will come into the use and enjoyment of his or her own specific life, i. e., whatever each one has loved the most, he or she will enter into the spirit of it, not using earthly material or organisms for the same but spiritual substances, as distinct from matter as earth is from at atmospheric air; thus the artist, musician, mechanic inventor, scientist, and philosopher will still continue their occupations but in a spiritual manner."

Now as regards the first proposition, it is not easy to understand how the existence of four discreeted degrees in human being or any number of such degrees necessarily leads to unconditional immortality. Such a result may follow if deific or angelic existence were quite consistetconsistent [sic] with, or could reconcile itself to, a depraved and wicked personality or individuality or the recollection of such personality. The mere existence of an immortality principle in man can never secure to him unconditional immortality unless he is in a position to purify his nature, either through the regular course of initiations or successive re-births in the ordinary course of nature according to the great cyclic Law, and transfer the purest essence of his individuality and the recollection of his past births and lives