AMORC Degree 11 (1-50)

MASTER MONOGRAPH TEMPLE SECTION

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ROSICRUCIAN ORDER

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Thi* monograph always remains the property of ffie Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. !t is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph One

Eleventh Degree Monograph One

THE CONCURRENCE This Week’s Consideration of a Famous Opinión V

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<1 The allegory of Christian Rosenkreutz again is brought to the attention of the members in this first outer chamber of the Eleventh Degree. The following excerpt taken from the Confessio Fraternitatis, a Latín work which appeared in 1615, specifying the purpose and in* tent of the Rosicrucian Organisation, refers to Christian Rosenkreutz. The adept is forewamed of the patient progress, step by step, toward the Greater Light:

. . . we hold that the meditations of our Christian father (C .R 'C .) on all subjects which from the creation of the world have been invented, brought forth, and propagated by human ingenuity, through G od’s revelation, or through the Service of Angels or spirits, or through the sagacity o f under' standing, or through the experience of long observation, are so great, that if all boo\s should perish, and by G od’s almighty sufferance all writings and all leaming should be lost, yet posterity will be able thereby to lay a new foundation of sciences, and to erect a new citadel o f truth; the which per' haps would not be so hard to do if one should begin to pulí doum and de' stroy the oíd, ruinous building, then enlarge the fore'court, afterwards bring light into the private chambers, and then change the doors, staples, and other things according to our intention. Therefore, it must not be expected that new comers shall attain at once all our weighty secrets. They must proceed step by step from the smaller to the greater, and must not be retarded by difficulties. — CONFESSIO FR A TER N ITA TIS, 1615

TEMPLE MONOGRAPH ELEVENTH DEGREE

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! This lesson constitutes the first preliminary instructions regarding the Eleventh Degree of the Rosicrucian Order. You have not entered the Eleventh Degree, for your processes of entering that De gree will be gradual, but you have completed the Tenth and stand upon the Threshold of the Eleventh, and I now greet you at the first portal of the chambers of the Eleventh Degree. Certain things will have to be explained to you before you may enter the various outer chambers of the Temple of the Eleventh Degree, and you will have to prepare yourself for the initiation which will take place when you are finally ready to enter the Great Temple. A great deal has been said in recent years by those who would attempt to criticize the Rosicrucian Order by saying that the true Rosi crucian body of members is a spiritual rather than a material body, and that the real initiations are psychic or spiritual rather than material ones. Most of those who have made these remarks either in magazine articles, books, or otherwise, are not members of the Rosi crucian Order and therefore are not well informed on the subject about which they are speaking. They have gathered this little information about the spirituality of the organization from something they have read in ancient books or records. They have been attempting to say that the real Rosicrucian Order does not have lodges and Temples of a material nature such as ours, and does not have material initiations in these Temples, ñor is it any real physical organization at all. Their emphasis upon the spiritual side of the organization is meant by them to imply that the physical side has never really existed. In this they are in error. The physical side of the Rosicrucian Order has always been the largest and most perceptible part of its membership and activities, but the spiritual side has been its strongest in the accomplishment of the great work. What the ancient manuscripts or books referred to was the fact that the real power of Rosicrucianism lies in its spiritual organiza tion and in the accomplishments of its members who represent that spiritual organization. The records of history show the continuous and unbroken existence of the physical organization of Rosicrucianism throughout the world. These same records, however, could say nothing more about the spiritual side of the organization except that it was the greatest, the strongest, and the most powerful part. Many an eminent Rosicrucian writing in an enthusiastic way about Rosicrucian ism has wholly ignored the physical organization and spoken highly of the spiritual and invisible body of Rosicrucians. This has led casual readers of such manuscripts or records to think that the physical or ganization did not exist at all. I think that every one of us will agree that the most vital and important part of a church congregation lies in its spiritual power and, therefore, in its spiritual organization, but this does not deny the fact


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that even a church must have a physical organization also, and a mate rial temple as the foundation for the greater and higher work. It is absolutely true that the most potent and important part of the Rosi crucian activities is centered in the invisible membership of the spiritual organization. You members of the Tenth Degree have been preparing yourselves to become a part of that invisible spiritual organization. The word invisible, here, does not mean that each one of you is invisible, or that any of the members of this spiritual organization is invisible, or that all of you are living only in psychic bodies or spiritual bodies. It simply means that those who are in this spiritual branch of the work do not come together to form a physical, material, visible lodge or class of students. You shall see before the Eleventh Degree is com pleted that each one of you is a member in an invisible organization. This organization is invisible only because the members of it do not come together, do not meet with one another in classes, or do not have a separate temple or lodge of a physical nature for their use. It does not mean that because they are a part of the spiritual organization they have nothing to do with the physical things of life, for after all, the true purpose of any spiritual movement, or any spiritual development or attainment, is to function through and perfect the physical. If we eliminate the physical body of the individual entirely and eliminate all physical and material things of life, there is no purpose left for the existence of spiritual power and knowledge. We might just as well say, with the same truthfulness, that if a man's body is completely annihilated and reduced to dust of the earth and scattered broadcast so that there is no longer any physical body in any form or shape, there would no longer be any need for the mind of that body or the intellect to exist. The purpose of the mind in the physical body is to govern, direct, control, and perfect the existence of the physical body. The soul in man is there for the purpose of directing, controlling, and perfecting the evolution of the physical body and the personality and not to live an independent and separate life. If all physi cal bodies of men and women throughout the universe were to cease ex istence completely forever and ever, there would no longer be any need for individual soul expressions or spiritual bodies of any kind. In other words, a spiritual body, like the mind or the intellect, has no purpose or function separate and independent. It must carry on some duties, some activities, in order to have any purpose for its existence. The spiritual part of the Rosicrucian organization is its very soul, but we have already learned in the lower Degrees that the highest manifestation of the soul and the greatest revelations of its unfoldment and achievement are made manifest through the physical body, and the physical world. The spiritual or soul body of the Rosicrucian organization is the governing, controlling body, which carries on the greater work and highest work of the physical organization.


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In the last monograph of the Tenth Degree a little light was thrown on the subject of the "body" of C.R-C. Now, you will come to understand that the spiritual body of Christian Rosenkreutz, which was allegorically found in a Tomb in Germany early in the 17th century, and found at other times in tombs in other lands, is the soul body or spiritual body of the Rosicrucian organization. I explained to you that this body of C.R-C. was the body of men and women living in secrecy and in preparation for the revival of the great work at various periods. Each of you who passes into the Eleventh Degree will be a part of that spiritual body for the revival of the great work in this country at some future time. When that time comes, the body of C.R-C. will be larger than the body has been in any of the previous periods when it has come out of the tomb of silence to revive the work. It is only natural that the spirit ual body of an individual or of an organization should evolve and grow larger from century to century. When the body of C.R-C. was discovered in Germany in the 17th century, it actually consisted of twelve members. At an earlier time it consisted of only nine, and in a later period it consisted of thirty-one, and in more recent times it consisted of over a hundred members. By the time the spiritual body is found again in America in the 21st century, it will probably consist of about one thousand carefully selected, well-trained and prepared individuáis. They will be so attuned to each other, so well-prepared to work in harmony, and so well-trained in mutual understanding and cooperative thinking, that they will act and function like one perfect body, and this will be the spiritual body of C.R-C. Today you stand on the threshold of the first portal of the Great Temple. There are many chambers surrounding this Temple through which each one of you will pass before you approach the threshold of the inner Temple itself. According to our records, as well as ancient traditions, some of you who are reading this monograph possibly will advance part way through the Eleventh Degree, then before completing it, pass through transition into a higher Temple for further preparation. I have no way of knowing who they will be, ñor how, ñor when it will occur; neither is it given for you to know. We do know, however, that according to the law of probability, two or three will thus advance. This advancement will not be sudden, ñor will it be extended by suffering and misery; but rather it will be a peaceful experience. I am sure that none of you will have any fear of suchpassing, for you will become acquainted with its possibility sufficiently in advance to be prepared for it, and welcome the great initiation. Of course, this transition may occur for some, not just because they are in the Eleventh Degree, but simply because the time of the great transition in their life cycle corresponds to the period when they would have attained that degree of advancement. Each of you now reading this first monograph of the Eleventh Degree


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eventually will attain the great initiation which will take you into the higher Temple and prepare you for a still greater work. Before this occurs, it is very positive that each one of you shall pass through the smaller chambers surrounding the Temple of the Eleventh Degree and enter the inner Temple, receiving there such instructions as will make you at peace with the world, and powerful in your ability to manifest spirituality and complete Cosmic Illumination at the same time. Those members who are now on the threshold of the Eleventh Degree are going to become the most spiritually illuminated of all of the mem bers in the Rosicrucian Order under my jurisdiction. This means that they will be among the most advanced members in the organization throughout the world and will be attuned with the spiritual bodies in other lands and locations. These spiritual bodies of members in various countries are those in preparation for the future revival of the great work that constitutes the Great White Brotherhood. In other words, the Great White Brotherhood today consists of the spiritual bodies of members in each land, united in one universal, spiritual, invisible organization. The Great White Lodge of this Brotherhood exists on the spiritual or psychic plañe. As each member of the Great White Brotherhood, or the spiritual bodies in various lands, passes through transition and receives the higher initiation, he enters the Great White Lodge of the Cosmic plañe. The members in the Great White Lodge are constantly in attunement and in communication with their f ellow members of the Great White Brotherhood on this earth plañe. This exchange of communication and contact is what brings to the Great White Brotherhood here on earth the wonderful illuminating messages, the manifestations of the Cosmic contact, and the guidance and inspiration in the preparation of our teachings. The Guardian of the threshold of the Eleventh Degree now gives you this ancient traditional lecture. You are to visualize yourself seated upon a stone bench in a cool, gray room of a magnif icent Temple. There is absolute stillness and quiet. You are unaware of what is going on in the world around you— of business, city noises, or any earthly activities. Your teacher, who is the guardian, stands upon a raised platform at one end of this room. A beam of sunlight shining through one of the small latticed windows in the upper part of the wall illuminates him. His aura shines in great brilliancy. He speaks to you, who are seated in the shadows, as he has spoken in centuries pasts "Where you are now seated represents the first chamber of the series of rooms of preparation. This great Temple building in which we are located is a square structure. In the very center of it is a Temple in the shape of a six-pointed star, which is formed by the interlacing of two triangles. This inner Temple is precisely in the center of the great square building. It is a magnificent, silent, peaceful Temple. Around all of the sides of this sixpointed star are twelve small antechambers or preparation rooms, each like this one, which is the first of the twelve.


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"It has been my pleasure to receive you at the outer portal of this great building and to direct your footsteps across the threshold into this chamber where you are receiving your first instructions. It will be my continuous pleasure to guard the threshold and from time to time admit another or others to this chamber. It will be my duty to refuse to allow anyone to leave this Temple, or to cross the threshold into the world again, unless he has violated his obligations or has reversed the blessings that have come upon him, thereby deserving to have the door closed forever to his future advancement. In other words, I shall be as careful in my guardianship regarding the worthiness of those who seek to retire from the progress now before them, as I shall be regarding those who approach this threshold and seek for further advancement. The tests and triáis to determine your worthiness to continué are as frequent as have been the tests and triáis to determine your worthiness to enter this holy chamber. Therefore, it will be my duty to protect you from selfdeception and the temptations of the outer world which may tempt you to retrace your steps, to leave this great Temple and resign your place in the line of progress. "For many years, you have had every opportunity to determine whether you desire to continué the progress you have been making ; whether you desire to remain a brother or sister of the Rosy Cross and follow the Path to its ultimate goal. Of your own volition and by your own expressed desires, you have continued to this Chamber without undue influence, without any coercion, and without any promise of reward other than that which would be beneficial to your soul and the joy and happiness which comes into the life of every advance adept on the Path. Since we assume that you are sincere in your determination to pro gress, we have the right to interpret any sudden change in this attitude of yours as the result of the voice of the Tempter from without trying to discourage you from your sincere determination and lead you into darkness. This is why it will be my duty to guard your exit as I have guarded your entries, and why I shall inquire into your motives for wishing to retrace your steps just as I have inquired into your desires to advance. From this day on, you will be under the protection of the Great Masters who will look upon each one of you as their chosen child. You shall be known as Children of the Light. Like a good father and a good parent, the Masters will look with concern upon any desire to depart from this Holy home and this Holy family." This is the ancient lecture of the Guardian of the first chamber. It is not the last time that we shall hear his voice or hear his words. Each time we progress to another chamber of the Great Temple he will remind us of our progress and our obligations. While we are in each chamber for a while, the Masters will prepare us with instructions of profound wisdom. In this way a series of discourses, modernized only in their language, will be given to each one of you through the médium of these Eleventh Degree lessons. I need not remind you at this time that they will contain the highest


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knowledge and information revealed by the Great White Brotherhood, inspired by the Great White Lodge, and held secret and sacred by the spiritual organization of the Rosicrucians. Therefore, each of you shall guard well these lessons and hold secret for the time being the fact that you have advanced to the first portal of the Eleventh De gree. Also you shall await definite instruction in regard to each new point and each new lesson. May Peace, Happiness, and Spiritual Joy be with each one of you. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER Note: The enneadic star in the center of the triangle, appearing on your present monograph pages, represents three interlaced triangles and denotes mystical, infinite, and finite perfection. It likewise is the symbol that designates the Eleventh Temple Degree of the Rosicrucian Order.

Summary of This Monograph V

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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have careíully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory. You are now at the first portal awaiting the entrance into the various outer cham bers of the Eleventh Degree. Here you are prepared for entrance into the inner Tem ple which leads to the manifestation of Cosmic Illumination. The members on the threshold of the Eleventh Degree are going to become the most spiritually illumined of all members of the Rosicrucian organization, Members of the Great White Brotherhood who have passed through transition and have received higher initiation on the Cosmic plañe become members of the Great White Lodge. Through exchange of communication with the Great White Lodge, the Great White Brotherhood receives messages of guidance for its instruction. ÍJ Some members may pass through transition and receive initiation on the Cosmic plañe before completing the Eleventh Degree, but they will be prepared in advance i

for a peaceful transition. The physical, material activity always has been the largest part of the membership of the Rosicrucian organization. The spiritual part always has been the truly strongest power, accomplishing the greatest work. í¡ The seventeenth century allegory of Christian Rosenkreutz refers to the spiritual body of the Rosicrucian organization in preparation for the revival of its active work.

T H E IN S T IT U T IO N B E H IN D T H E R O S I C R U C I A N

O R G A N IZ A T IO N

Rosicrucian Park, San José, California, U. S. A .

'C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedicated to every Rosicrucian'

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R O S I C R U C I A N OR D E R

Thl* monograph always remaíns the property of tha Supremo Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. If is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Two

Eleventh Degree Monograph Two


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í Some students of mysticism choose the path of renun^ ciation to attain their goal; others choose action. Since man must leam to conquer the vicissitudes of life, and overcome temptations by mingling with mankind, the path of action is of utmost importance. This very controversy is the subject of a dialogue from the Brahmanical Scripture, the Bhagavad'Gita, which Krishna, the incamation of the Deity, had with A r juna, son of the King of India, some three thousand years before Christ:

Renunciation and pursuit of action are both means of bliss. But o f these twain, better is its pursuit than its renunciation. The simple, not the wise, thinl{ right performance and renunciation diverse; but whoso pursueth either well gaineth the fruit of both. Hard to obtain is true renunciation without right performance. Whoso is fixed in holiness, puré in heart, victorious over his senses and his self, seeing all beings in himself, is not defiled by action. The man of devotion, Knower o f Truth, when he doth see, hear, touch, eat, move, sleep, breathe, will hold that he doth nothing o f himself, but that the senses move amidst their objects. —Attributed to Vyasa


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! We will continué our preliminary discussions regarding the work of the Eleventh Degree. There are several important subjects to be discussed. We have some ancient instructions which outline the method of procedure in several of the older jurisdictions. Each varies slightly according to the personal plans of the teacher. In one case, the pre liminary instructions begin by telling the members of this new Degree how they should proceed to prepare their minds for the incoming of new knowledge. In another case, the teacher began his preliminary in structions by outlining the important elements of the first steps so that the students would be ready for them. In still another case, the procedure seemed to be metaphysical rather than mental. The class of students and their needs must be taken into consideration when preparing the lessons. Our knowledge of the individuality of each member informs us that he is now prepared intellectually and spiritually for the material which follows. In this work of the Eleventh Degree there are some new rituals, many new principies, and many discussions. We are now reaching a point in our work where many principies that will be touched upon in our studies have not yet been tested thoroughly by all the members in America or in other lands, for they are new and surprising as well as very interesting. Some of them we may discuss without coming to any conclusión as to whether we should use them or not. Some of the prin cipies that we will have in this Eleventh Degree, while being accepted with enthusiasm, will also be received with some degree of skepticism. In other words, the true Rosicrucian spirit will come to the front and you will say to yourself: nI cannot believe that this principie is true but I want to believe that it is ; therefore, I am going to test it for myself." You will remember that in the early Degrees, we reminded our students that a true Rosicrucian should always be a walking question mark. We do not want any of our principies accepted merely on faith without personal experience. Of course, I know that in these modern days many of the laws which were unproved a few years ago are now accepted facts. Perhaps you would not feel inclined to test and demónstrate these principies to yourself because they are evident truths to your present-day understanding. Some of the principies in our lessons were undoubtedly tested for days, weeks, and months, by students many years ago, but today we would not think of testing them except by putting them into application, for we know very well that they are true. Our experiences with radio and similar modern scientific achievements have demonstrated some of the higher laws to us in a better way than we could have tested them in our own laboratorios. Such will not be the case with many other principies contained in the Elev enth Degree. Only a few years ago, it would have been almost impossible to have selected a number of members and trusted to their intelligence and ability the testing of the principies


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contained in this Eleventh Degree. The last few years have brought so much understanding and psychic development to our highest members that they are now ready to experiment and understand principies which they would not have been able to understand ten years ago. In the next few years the progress of our own work and the progress of scientific achievement outside our organization will prepare more and more mem bers to understand and utilize the highest mystical principies in our monographs. Our next discussion concerns individual preparation. Advancement in this Degree will depend solely upon the wholehearted devotion of the student. It is not necessary for him to accept things on faith without experiencing them, but it certainly requires devotion, trust, and confidence in the organization to study carefully new lessons, keeping the knowledge secret, and cooperate in every way with the spirit of this Eleventh Degree. However, according to tradition, one member of the Eleventh Degree will eventually become doubtful and distrustful, and will have to be removed or allowed to withdraw. Somewhere in the present Eleventh Degree about midway in the work there will also be one who is not as sincere and honest in his devotion to the work as he should be. He, too, will have to be withheld from any further progress. Aside from this, I realize that these Eleventh De gree lessons are going to a class of very devoted and trusting stu dents. We are reaching a point in the work where each of you is about to become as familiar with all the high principies of the work as I am. In other words, you are reaching a point where your own intellectual mastership of the teachings and your own development becomes equal to that of the teacher. This is inevitable in every school and system. Instead of bringing any sadness, or any unpleasant situation, it brings joy to the heart of the teacher. In every true teacher there is always the hope that he will have in his class some students who will become greater than he is in the understanding and mastership of the lessons. It is the desire of great teachers of voice, piano, violin, art, law, or science, that someday their pupils will become greater masters than themselves. It is this unselfish desire on the part of teachers that has produced the world*s greatest performers and masters in every line of effort. I know that those who go on, inevitably attaining greater heights than I have attained, will help others to reach similar heights and thus aid in carrying on the great work. After all, our real ambition is to see the great work progressing and , to make sure that it will continué in the future. ties.

This brings us back again to the purpose of our present activi It is to prepare for the future cycle many years from now when the new period of the Rosicrucian Order is to be reborn. In order that each of you in this Eleventh Degree may become a real master and a real worker in the future, you must begin now to purge yourself of every element that might deter you from


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attaining puré and undefiled mastership. Although it may be questionable whether in this earthly incarnation we can attain perfect master ship, it is certainly possible to rise so high in this incarnation that the finishing touches of perfection will be attained after our transition while we are dwelling in the Cosmic waiting for our next reincarnation. The degree of perfection that we attain in that period of Cosmic waiting and Cosmic instruction will depend upon how nearly perfect we make ourselves here before transition comes. First, we must eliminate from ourselves all of those traits of character which interfere with our broad and universal comprehension and Cosmic attunement. This does not refer to the petty things of life, but to the larger and more universal things. It does not refer to our temporary and passing anxieties, or even to our passing hatreds, distastes, and angers. These things do not leave any definite or indelible impression upon our psychic selves. They are purely of the flesh and with the passing of the flesh at transition they pass av/ay also. We cannot rise above the human element and cease being human with any hope that this will in any way perfect the psychic self within. The psychic self within is helped mostly by allowing the human self to learn its lessons and become acquainted with life through experiences. Again we are reminded of the Rosicrucian principie that taking one's self away into a retreat to live an isolated life of meditation and spiritual contemplation does not bring real attainment and mas tership to the psychic self. The one who daily battles with the vicissitudes of life and suffers all of its anguish and yields to its many temptations, then overcomes them one by one while still being hu man and constantly in human touch until the last moment of conscious breath, is the one who is attaining the greater mastership in life. Each experience and each lesson of life should teach us two lessons: first, the weaknesses of our own judgment and will power; second, the universal nature of all experiences and all things. For instance, consider the man who throughout his lifetime has indulged freely in the use of liquor until it finally has brought him down to the very depths of sorrow, despondency, and poverty, but who then saves himself by rising above the temptations of liquor. He not only attains a higher degree of mastership in this respect. than one who was never tempted or never yielded to the temptation, but through the suffering he had and _ the problems he had to face, if he is a mystic he will understand r more fully one of the universal weaknesses of humanity and one of the universal problems of civilization. This universal understanding, this sympathetic knowledge that all human beings are thus tempted and yield in order to learn the lessons of life, will save him from looking with disdain and cynicism upon those who yield to the temp tations of life. It is this broadening of the universal un derstanding, this sympathetic sensing of what others have in their hearts and what others have to face in their daily


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lives, that establishes an attunement with the universal mind and brings illumination. By this, you will see that the true mystic, who is seeking the highest attainment, is not one who becomes pious or allows the attitude of superiority to affect his consciousness. Even though he may rise from his low plañe of sin and thereby attain self-mastership, he must always be conscious of the fact that the others who have not yet risen above these low planes are human, good, and probably are learning important lessons in life. The mystic must understand that sin is only that which one knows to be wrong and wilfully refuses to oblitér ate from one *s life. The women of the street and the men of the gutters are not to be looked upon as irredeemable or unworthy of our consideration. They are not be to condemned as sinners but to be pitied as those who have not yet learned self-mastership. They are neither beneath our dignity ñor equal to us in attainment; nevertheless they are still our kin. As one philosopher said: "But for the grace of God, there go I." We should be able to look upon the lowest of human specimens and realize that it is by the grace of God's illumination and by the saving grace of our own mastership that we are not that one. This broad viewpoint of all of life brings the God consciousness into our beings and makes us see things as God sees them. This will bring with it a consciousness of conditions and an understanding of laws and principies which no teacher can convey, ñor prophet reveal, unless the recipient is attuned through sympathetic understanding. You will learn in this Eleventh Degree what the teachers and workers of the Rosicrucian Order have had to suffer and sacrifice in order to maintain the work of the organization and fulfill their promises. You will be able to realize what it is to be the leader or the head of an organization such as ours, and to have made enthusiastic promises early in life which you find difficult and painful to fulfill as your days pass by. You will know how you must understand human nature and deal with it diplomatically and understandingly in order to help conquer its weaknesses and attain mastership. You will understand why error must be met with error, and sin brought face to face with. sin, in order that there may be not only the least conflict but also the most dramatic realization. You will see why it is that in order to overcome delusion, another form of delusion must be substituted until one neutralizes the other and the eyes and the mind are open to receive the truth. You will realize also why it is that those who dwell in darkness cannot be taken out instantly into the brilliant effulgence of the Greater Light. They must emerge gently and gradually from one degree of darkness to a lesser degree of darkness, dwelling in a false, soft light before coming face to face with the true Greater Light. You will know why the truth must be presented in simple forms and formulae for the understanding of those who are youthful in its reception, rather than in all of its astonishing magnif icence. You will see that the adult is


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but the child grown older, and that the child*s methods of comprehension still exist in the adult when it comes to facing new knowledge, All of these things help us to understand why man often prefers to dwell in darkness rather than face the Greater Light, and why misconceptions have a stronger appeal to the minds of many than truth. You will see that often the adult is like the child in preferring to believe in his fairies rather than to step into the world of realities and learn that they no longer exist. You will come to know also that no matter how man may seek to know the truth, or what symbols he may use to represent the truth to his consciousness, he is, after all, adoring the truth and paying homage to it in his own humble way. You will learn that it is wrong to judge a man by the mistake he has made in his symbols, but rather he should be judged by the motive in his heart. It would be unjust to judge the pagan as a heathen because he symbolized his god in stone ; for he conquered more than we when he learned the valué of creating any symbol at all. The motive in his heart was to pay adoration to that which was superior to him self, and in his adoration he professed and expressed sincere loyalty, reverence, and obedience. Perhaps we lack this in our modern times of greater comprehension. The man who worships gold in his heart is worshipping that which he concedes has greater power than he himself possesses. He is deluded by the thought that he does possess this greater power by possessing the gold. But the very acknowledgment in his heart that there is something greater than the strength of his muscles or the in tellect of his mind is a hopeful sign; such a man is far from being irredeemable. It is better that he die in the vain adoration of his gold than that he should die with no faith in anything superior to himself. But to take from this man his gold and rob him of that which represented to him a superior power, and attempt to tell him that he was deluded, would bring to him not salvation but absolute loss of all hope and a loss of all sense of salvation. It must be our purpose to sympathize with his adoration for gold and gradually to substituto for that gold something that is far superior. This substitution cannot be made suddenly, for revolution will not leave a permanent effect. We must not destroy the faith in his heart or the conviction in his mind that there is something superior to himself, but rather foster it and let it mature into a grander and nobler symbol, until the gold will become to him merely a useless possession which he will cast aside willingly for the shimmering glitter of a new symbol far in advance of the one he has adored. After all, our sins and all of the temptations of the flesh are representativo of false adoration; the condemnation of these symbols will bring no change in the heart. All of these ideas and many others must be understood if you are to be attuned sympathetically for the work of the Eleventh Degree. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which vou should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read tliis summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

Much material may be presented now which formerly was necessary to be withheld. Many principies previously necessary to be proved have become accepted facts due to modern scientific achievements. í| Advancement in this Degree will depend upon the wholehearted devotion of the student. Those students who continué in this great work will assure the continuance of this work by helping others to reach greater heights. It is necessary to purge yourself to attain mastership. Mastership, unattained in this incarnation, may be perfected in the Cosmic plañe, while awaiting reincamation. The degree of perfection depends upon progress made prior to transition. n

Mastership cannot be attained by isolated meditation, but rather by experiences among mankind. Each experience should teach the weakness of our own judgment and will power, and the universal nature of all things. Sin is only that which one knows to be wrong and wilfully refuses to oblitérate fron. oóne’s life.

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False adoration should be replaced with more worth-while symbols.

{][ Those dwelling in darkness must emerge gradually into the Greater Light.

MASTER MONOGRAPH *

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R O S I C R U C I A N OR D E R a m r> r r.

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This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C . It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hree

Eleventh Degree Monograph Three

The matter contained herein it officially issued through the Suprema Council of the A . M . O . R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Oftice for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, enaraved. typewritten. and photographic copies of officially prescn be d and copyrighted monograpns, dissertations, scientific postulatrons, philosophical discourses academic studies diagram s, illustrations, and charts" os authorized by the Imperator o í A . M . O . R. C. (The above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving, and are ¡mparted only as on incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M. O. R. C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A n y other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of thjs O rder. A . M . O . R. C . Is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ríame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizatíons or movement».

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Amidst the cares of state and the coarse clangor of arms of the second century A.D., the Emperor Marcus Aurelius leamed to retire into the sanctuary of his own soul. This meditation, a form of diary written solely for his own use, is as great a source of inspiration today as it was during his day:

M en see\ for themselves prívate retiring places such as country viUages, the seashore, mountains; yea thou thyself art wont to long much after such places. But this thou must \now proceeds from simplicity in the highest degree. At what time soever thou wilt, it is in thy power to retire into thyself and to be at rest and free from all businesses. A man cannot any whither retire better than to his own soul; he especially who is beforehand provided o f such things within, which whensoever he doth withdraw himself to loo\ in, may presently afford unto him perfect ease and tranquility. —M ARCUS AURELIUS ANTONIUS, 121480 A.D.


NUM BER THREE

— D— PAGE ONE

Beloved Members, GreetingsI For several months each of you will remain in the antechamber of the Great Temple for the receiving of preliminary instructions. These instructions will be intensely interesting and undoubtedly will help kyou to make some of the most interesting Cosmic contacts you have ever experienced. In order that you may be always conscious that you are in this antechamber, I want you to think of it not only during the daytime, but also each night when you retire. As you prepare to go to sleep, let your last thoughts be that you and the others in this class of initiates of the Eleventh Degree are living in a great temple or monastery, and that each of you has been given a little cell-like room, adjoining the temple and cióse to the antechamber, for your per sonal study and sleeping room. As you get ready to go to sleep, visualizo yourself in this small stone room with stone walls, stone ceiling, and a stone floor with only a small rug on it, a small washstand, a single iron bed, a table with a light on it, two chairs, and a small wardrobe. In one córner are several small bookshelves with a number of reference books. At one end of the room is a small window rather high up from the floor but yet low enough for you to be able to look over the window sill and see the great open spaces outside. Opposite the window is a small curved-top doorway with a heavy wooden door bearing a great lock and big iron hinges. Everything is plain but clean and neat. There is absoluto quiet. A wonderful feelng of safety and peaceful vibrations pervades this room. If you visualize this each night as you go to sleep you will be attuning yourself with the very conditions that existed years ago and still exist in many places where temples of this kind are in use. Those members who joined our first tour to Egypt and the Holy Land had the fortune to see similar cells in oíd monasteries. Since there was difficulty in obtaining hotel accommodations for a party of eighty, on occasions we were obliged to find lodgings and food in a convent or monastery. In such a monastery just outside the city of Jerusalem several members of the party found lodgings for three days in small stone rooms similar to those described above. It was here that many interesting Cosmic experiences were had.

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Every advanced student of the higher principies of life sooner or later desires a secluded place where he or she may enjoy the same strict privacy that the oíd monks and mystics enjoyed in the Oriental lands. There is something very beneficial as well as fascinating about being absolutely alone with your aura and with the Cosmic vibra tions, where you can be safe from intrusión or interruption and con témplate, meditate, concéntrate, and attune with the Cosmic. Even one hour a day of such separation is highly beneficial. Of course, it is not possible for everyone to spend the entire night in such complete separation, but it is possible for


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everyone to have an occasional hour in the evening in some room where outside interference is absolutely prevented. The ancient mystics claimed that when they entered into this little room of their own and closed the door they shut out the ma terial world and separated themselves from it. The only way anyone could enter that room was through Cosmic vibrations, and only by the solicitation or invitation of the person inside. They meant by this that even other highly advanced mystics could not project into that room, and that no psychic body could enter unless invited to do so by the person living within. This fact has been found to be true. That is why the little private room becomes not only a sanctum for worship and study but a place of peace and protection against any of the intrusions of the world. While we are at our daily affairs, and going about the streets or in the open spaces, others may reach us by psychic contact whether we are thinking of them or inviting them or not. But there are two fun damental Cosmic rules which have proved to be true through thousands upon thousands of experiments. These rules are as follows: First, that no person can project himself into the presence of another when that other person is attending to some intimate, personal, private matter that should not be open to the gaze or contact of another. Thus we have found that no one can make such a contact while one is bathing, writing a confidential letter, or performing or taking part in any of the intimate, personal, private matters of our individual lives. Anyone attempting to project or reach us at such times finds that his intrusión is halted by a great bright light that blinds him to seeing anything or making any contact in any form. Thus the Cosmic guarantees to each one of us complete and perfect privacy and intimate periods of separation. The second law is that when the mystic is in his sanctum with the doors closed no one may enter except by invita tion. The only contact that can be made at such times by an uninvited person is merely that of getting cióse enough to discover that you are in your sanctum and are to be left alone, but no person making a projection at such a time will be able to tell either what you are doing in your sanctum or what you are thinking. They simply learn that you are in your sanctum and closed against any uninvited intrusión. With such conditions existing, the little private sanctum becomes a marvelous place for meditation, study, and experimentation. It means that you can concéntrate upon some individual, or upon one of the Great Masters and invite him to come to your room, feeling absolutely certain that no one else can come but the one you invited. It means that all outside disturbing noises, even of a psychic nature, cannot interfere with the experiment or your thoughts. It means that the room will become highly charged with your own vibrations and that through these you can carry on better experiments than when the room is charged with your own vibrations plus those


NUMBER THREE

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of others who may be thinking about you or reaching into your room. Therefore, the Guardian of the chamber informs all of the Neophytes at the beginning of the Eleventh Degree of the necessity and valué of separating oneself from the world for short periods of time. We hope also that every one of the members in the Eleventh Degree will strive to maintain a sanctum or study room at home that is as little used by |^ther members of the family as possible. If, while you are lying in bed at night preparatory to going to sleep, you visualizo yourself as being in your little room, you may have solitude, even though actually you may not be alone. If you will think of yourself while going to sleep as being separated from the rest of the world, it will help you to maintain, while you are asleep, a separate attunement with the Cosmic. This will bring you many inter esting experiences or contacts through the night. Many of these you will probably remember in the morning. I suppose you know that in many countries the central room of the home, or a small room built in the center of the house, is the holy room for the household. The occupants of the home only enter this room early in the morning to make their prayers and salutations, or to wash their hands before meal time and pray again, or for meditation and religious thought. The early history of the Jews shows that they had such a sacred place in their homes. It is unfortunate that as the Jews reached the Western world and parts of Europe they abandoned this wonderful sacred principie until it is almost an unknown custom in the Western world today. We have accepted the idea that a church should be built in each community where we can go once or twice a week for prayer and meditation instead of having such a sa cred place in our own homes. It is easy to notice that as the idea of community churches began to be established the real religious sanctity of the home was abandoned and religious thought in the family diminished, until today the average home has little or no religious thought in it; only the Sunday church service provides for our re ligious needs. In proportion as man abandoned the home sanctum and its accompanying daily religious practices, he became less and less attuned with the Cosmic. This is the real cause of the lack of true un derstanding of Cosmic principies and religious thought in the Western world today. The building of more churches and the preaching of more critical sermons will not help the situation whatever. Our own rec ords show that among our members of the Rosicrucian Order, with their |;,tudy sanctums at home, there is more religious thought and spiritual practice than in the homes of those who depend solely upon the church for the place of worship and religious thought. In the ancient days when the Guardian of the outer cham bers spoke to the Eleventh Degree members of the valué of their little cells, he did not have to explain all that I have here, ñor criticize the absence of sanctums in their homes,


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for most of them, since early childhood, were familiar with the use of sanctums and the method of religious study associated with them. The Guardian impressed upon the Neophytes of the first chamber the continued necessity of periodic separation from the world and of solitary contemplation. The average member of our Order already has learned the valué of having a sacred place in his home as a retreat for meditation and attunement with God, but, as previously pointed out, this is not true in the average modern home. We notice in the early history of the first Rosicrucians that carne to America in 1694 that two ancient mystical principies were immediately put into practice. Instead of building a number of small homes for each family, or building a great central temple for all of them to come into for worship and study, they built two large houses in which to live. One of them was for all of the unmarried men and the other was for all the unmarried women. In each of these houses the bedrooms were small and like the cells of ancient times. Here the members could sleep and study separately in accordance with the ancient principies. The women*s house still stands in Pennsylvania and is one of the interesting shrines of the oíd Rosicrucian activi ties. The second principie that they put into practice was the digging out of a number of small caves in the mountainside where the principal officers or leaders of the movement could go for further study and contemplation, each in his own cave and in imitation of the ancient authorities who used to live exclusively in such caves in the rocks or mountains. In these caves in Pennsylvania these officers used to sit for hours at a time in study and contemplation with absolute quiet and peace. The largest of these caves used by the Master Kelpius still remains and is another one of the interesting sights pointed out by the Historical Society of Pennsylvania as one of the earliest landmarks in Pennsylvania. Many of our members in the eastern part of the United States have visited that cave. It is cióse to Mystical Lañe at Fairmount Park and is known as The Mystic Cave. Thus we see that the mystics always had a love for privacy and separateness from the world. It was this ancient Oriental mystical practice that was responsible for the first monasterios and convents built by the Román Catholic Church. The Rosicrucians, however, did not believe that a person should start early in life and live a whole life of solitary confinement in such an institution and do nothing but meditate and pray without helping in the great work of the world. They claimed that each one of us had an earthly mission to perform and that this mission must not be neglected ñor should our duty to religious principies be neglected; therefore, part of our time should be spent in earthly prácticos that would help the world and mankind and part of the time be spent in religious thought and personal devel opment Each one of you should contémplate these suggestions. Arrange to have some privacy for an hour of such meditation

TEMPLE MONOGRAPH ELEVEN TH DEGREE

NUMBER THREE

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whenever possible. You are going to be given thoughts to contémplate, principies to meditate upon, and ideáis to visualize and to take into the Cosmic, and you will want privacy, peace, and quietness when you do so. Certainly each of you can arrange with the family or with your home life to have an hour to yourselves two or three nights a week, either early or late in the evening or early in the morning, and you should do your utmost to have this arranged in your home. Remember also that the morning periods before you have eaten breakfast are excellent for such meditation and contemplation. If you can arrange occasionally to have an hour to yourself sometime before breakfast, or when the rest of the family is asleep, you will find that your mind is clear, and Cosmic contact is keener and you are more receptivo. Therefore, an occasional hour or even a half-hour spent in thought or study early in the morning will be very beneficial and helpful to you in the experiments and studies that are to follow in this Degree. It will be well for you to think over these points during the coming week. Try two or three periods of nighttime concentration all alone, and try one in the morning, so that you will be familiar with the points that will be explained in the next lesson. I thank each one of you who has written to me of your appreciation of the Tenth Degree and of your entrance into the Eleventh De gree. I assure you that we will all become more closely bound together by vibrations of harmony and peace. Each of you should begin to realize what a closely united bond of the spirit of brotherhood exists in this organization, especially among those in the highest Degrees. I want this to increase and grow until it becomes a great power of happiness and joy in the life of each of you. May Peace Profound abide within each of you. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have caremlly read the complete mono graph, try to recaü as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

With the disappearance of home sanctums man today gives less thought to Cosmic attunement. Several of the historical landmarks of the early Rosicrucians still remain in Pennsyl vania. Students profít greatly from an hour daily spent in uninterrupted and secluded con templation and meditation. No person can project himself psychic ally into the presence of another when that person is attending to intímate personal matters. i

A balance should be maintained between earthly practices to benefit mankind and concentration of psychic development. ÍJ Attunement with the Cosmic while asleep can be made by separating oneself from the world prior to sleep. Many interesting Cosmic experiences may be remembered in the morning. ¡®j The visualizaron of the stone cell before retiring, will help in the attunement of the conditions of many years ago. Q Cosmic contact is sometimes keener during the quiet hours of the morning before breakfast.

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MASTER MONOGRAPH R O S I C R U C I A N OR DE R

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TTiTs monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A- M. O. R. C. It ¡s not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Four

Eleventh Degree Monograph Four

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One of the allegories of greatest import to be found in all mystical literature from ancient mythology to the pres" ent'day writings is that of the Bride and Bridegroom, often ,referred to as the Chymical Marriage in transcendental and physical alchemy. Many of the truths of transcendental alchemy were presented by the simple, untutored cobbler of the sixteenth century, Jacob Boehme. Through illumination he leamed many truths which had been denied persons of great academic leaming. The reader will be able to recognise readily a comparison of the following allegory written by Boehme and the allegory presented in the Parabola in this weeks monograph:

The fiery soul, puré as clear gold, and tested in the Fire of God, is the husband of the noble Sophia, for she is the tincture o f the light. If the tinc' ture of the fire is perfectly puré, then will Sophia be united with it, and thus A dam receives again the most noble bride that was ta\en away from him during his sleep, and will ta\e her into his arms. This is neither a man ñor a woman, but a branch on the pearl'tree standing in God's paradise. But how the bride receives her groom in his clear and bright fre'qudity, and how she gives him the \iss o f love, this will be understood only by him who has been at the marriage of the Lamb. T o all others it will be a mystery. — JACOB BOEHME, 15754624

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TEMPLE M O N O G R A P H ELEVENTH DEGREE

N U M B E R FOUR

— D— PAGE O N E

Beloved Members, Greetings! Once again you are assembled in the antechamber for your special instructions and preparation. This time the Guardian who is giving you such instructions opens a large and ancient-looking book bound in hand-tooled leather bearing many symbols, and fastened with a peculiar ^lock. He stands before you and opens the lock of the book and then opens the book itself. We see the yellowed pages with partly faded brown writing and large, colored, fancily printed initials at the beginning of each paragraph. He proceeds to tell us that the first lesson of the special in structions will be read from the ancient records. He tells us that the book he holds in his hands was first published in the sixteenth century, and that the Rosicrucian monks in Germany in one of the oíd monasterios— in the form of a castle up on the hills overlooking the Rhine— prepared this book by Consulting the oldest manuscripts and recorded traditions and teachings of the Order so that they might be saved for posterity. This ancient book is still in the archives of the Order and is one of the many that will be used in the work of the Eleventh Degree. The Guardian turns to the first part of the book and to the section that is entitled, "A Simple Spelling Book for the Daily Practice of Disciples." This section of the book is signed by "A Brother of the Fraternity of the Rosy Cross, P.F. with annotations by P.S." The Guardian now prepares to read from the first lesson in that book and the title of it is "Parabola." This ñame you will come to remember often in the future and it will become highly significant in connection with many other ancient Rosicrucian papers and lessons, and you will probably sense it often in some of your experiments, for it is a symbolical ñame, which some of you may discern from a realization of its original meaning. Before the Guardian reads to you, or before we quote here what the Guardian reads to you, I would like to cali your attention to the fact that here and there in the paragraphs of this lesson, you will find numbers in brackets. These numbers refer to important points of the story, which we want you to keep in mind. After this story is completely presented to you in these lessons, I will add comments and ex^ planations to the statements which are identified by these bracketed ^ numbers. You are to try to discover in this story some very important and veiled messages and lessons. You are to meditate this week upon the paragraphs of this story and see if you can determine the wonderful secret message that is contained in it. The Guardian tells all of those in his class before him that they are to take his story with them into their cells and individually meditate upon it and derive from it such personal points as their inner mind interprets.


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Now let us proceed with listening to this very oíd and intensely interesting story which has never been given to our students in this form at any time in the past: "Once when I was walking in a young, green, and beautiful wood, reflecting upon the trouble of this life, also beweeping the misery caused us through the lamentable fall of our first parents, my thoughts made me to err from the usual path, and I found myself, I know not how, upon a narrow foot-path, quite wild, untended and impassable, which was so overgrown with many bushes and plants, that it was easy to see how little it was used. Therefore, I started and had gladly turned back; but such was no longer in my power, especially as so mighty a wind blew behind me that I had rather been able to take ten steps forward than one back. (1) "Therefore, I was constrained to wander on and not heed the rough going. "After walking a good time I came at last to a charming meadow, like a round circle, surrounded by beautiful fruitful trees, named by the inhabitants Pratum Felicitatis. There I found a band of oíd men, all with ice-gray beards, except one rather young man with pointed black beard, as also another whose ñame I indeed knew, whose countenance, however, I could not for the time being see, and who was still younger. They disputed upon all sorts of things, particularly upon a high and large secret nut, hidden in nature, which God kept hidden from the great world, and only revealed to those alone who loved him. "I listened long to them, and their discourses pleased me well; but some of them wanted to break lo ose from the bridle, not indeed in respect of the 'materiae1 or work, but of the 'Parabolas, similtudines,1 and other 'Parerga1: therein they followed the figments of Aristotle, Pliny, and others, which one had copied from the other. Thereat I could not contain myself any longer, but mixed in some of my mustard, refuting such empty things from experience, until the greater part of them agreed with me, examined me in their Faculty and made it pretty uneasy for me, but my grounding was so good that I passed with honours, so that they all wondered among themselves, deciding unanimously to receive me into their College, whereat my heart rejoiced. (2) "But, said they, I could not become a real colleague until I had learnt to know their Lion right well and knew completely what he, inwardly as well as outwardly, knew and could do. Therefore I should put forth diligence that he become subject to me. I had enough trust in myself this to do, and promised them to do my best. For their society pleased me so well that it would now have taken much for me to separate from them. (3) "They led me to the Lion, describing him to me at great length: But how I was to proceed with him in the beginning,


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nobody would tell me: some of them hinted, but very confusedly, that the ordinary multitude could not understand him, but gave me to under stand that when I had bound him fast and secured myself from his sharp claws and pointed teeth, they could not hide anything further from me. Now, the Lion was very oíd, grim and monstrous, his yellow mane hung over his neck, he seemed quite unconquerable, so that I was half horrified at my own temerity, and gladly would have turned back, had not my promise, and the circumstance that those ancients surrounding me were all-expectant as to what I should do, deterred me. I stepped up to the Lion in his trench with show of confidence and began to coax him, but he, with his brightly shining eyes, looked at me so fixedly that from very fear I nearly fled abjectly, although I remembered that I had heard from one of the ancients, whilst on the way to the Lion's trench, that very many people had undertaken to compel themselves to approach the Lion, of whom few had succeeded, yet would I not bring shame upon myself, and bethought me of certain grips learnt with great diligence in this 'Athletica,1 besides which I was well experienced in natural 'Magia' and so forgot all flattery, and attacked the Lion with such nimble artifice and subtlety, that before he was well aware I drew the blood out of his body, yea from out his heart, which was beautifully red but very cholerío. Then I anatomized further and found, to my no small wonder, that strangely enough his bones, of which there were many more than his blood, were white as snow. (4) "As all this became clear to my dear ancients, standing there above around the pit and watching, they began hotly disputing together as far as I could see, but what they said I could not make out, as I was still deep down below in the pit: Still, as they closed upon each other with words, I heard how one said, he must bring him to life again, otherwise he cannot be our Colleague. (5) I would not go a long way round and betook myself out of the pit over a great place, and carne, I don't know how, upon a very high wall whose height climbed over 100 ells towards the clouds, but above it was not as broad as a shoe, and there went, as I went up, to the end an iron railing right in the middle of the wall with many cast-iron supports. On to this same wall I carne, I say, and it seemed to me there went somebody a few steps ahead of me on the right side of the rail. "After following this person a while I saw behind me on the other side also somebody following, whether a man or a woman I am still in doubt, who called to me and said it were better to wander on his side than where I was walking, which I easily believed, for because of the rail, which so stood in the middle and made the way too narrow, walk ing was very bad at such a height. Then I saw several who wanted to go such a way fall over behind me. Therefore, I swung myself under the rail, holding fast with the hands and continuing my way on the other side,(6) till I came at last to a part of the wall which was very precipitous and dangerous to climb down. Then I was sorry that I had not remained on the other side (7),


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and I could not get through beneath to the same, so it was impossible for me to turn about and so get myself on to the other way. Therefore I dared, trusting to my good feet, held fast, and so arrived down below without hurt, and after I had wandered a little further, so I saw and knew of no more danger, and knew not where the wall and rail had gone to. "Arrived down below, there I found a beautiful Rosebush, with beautiful red roses growing upon it, of which I broke several off and stuck in my hat. (8) But I noticed there a wall which went round a large garden. In the garden there were youths. Maidens were standing outside the wall. These would gladly have joined the youths but fought shy of the trouble of going all the way round to the gate of the garden. Then I took pity on them, went again the way I had come, but on a level, and so quickly that I soon came to several houses, think ing to find the gardener's house. But I found there very many people, each having his own chamber. Working alone they were slow; together they worked diligently; yet each had his own work. But what they were doing, it occurred to me, I had done and worked before this, and all their work was known to me. Strange, thought I, see, if so many other people do such dirty and slovenly work, a mere appearance, ac cording to their own fancy, but having no 'Fundament* in nature, so are you to be pardoned. Therefore, knowing that such arts disappear like smoke, I would not delay to no purpose, and went the way I had determined. "As I now went toward the garden gate, several to one side regarded me sourly, so that I feared they would hinder me in my 'Propo sito' (Purpose): But others said: see, he wants to get into the gar den, and we have so long done garden-service here, and have never got in how we will laugh at him if he doesn't succeed. But I took no notice of all this, because I understood this matter of the garden better than they, though I was never inside, but I went straight to a door, which was locked fast, so that also from outside one could neither see ñor find a keyhole. But I observed that a small round hole, not to be perceived by the common eye, was in the door, and thought at once that there one would have to open the door: I got ready, there fore, with my specially prepared skeleton-key, unlocked the door, and went in. Once inside I found some other barred doors, which I however opened without trouble. But this was a passage, just as though it were in a well-built house, about six shoes wide and twenty long, with a ceiling above. And although the other doors were yet closed, still, since the first door was opened, I could see well enough into the garden. "I wandered on into the garden in the ñame of God. There I found in the middle a tiny garden, about square in shape, each side six measure-yards long, which was fenced with wild roses blooming very beautifully. But because it rained a


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little, and shone the sun thereby, there was a very charming rainbow. After I had gone by the tiny garden and wanted to go to the place where I should help the maidens, soon I became aware that in place of the wall stood a low trellissed fence, and there went the most beauti ful maiden ciad in puré white silk, with the most majestic of youths robed in scarlet, past the Rose-Garden with their arms about each Oother, and carrying many sweet-smelling roses in their hands. I spoke to them, inquiring how they had got over the fence. This my best-beloved Bridegroom said she, helped me over, and we are now going out of this lovely garden to our chamber to cultivate friendship. I am glad, said I, that without further trouble on my part, satisfaction is done to your will; nevertheless look you how I have hurried and have come round such a long way in so short a time in order to serve you. "After that I carne to a great mili, built inside of stone, therein were no flour bins or other things such as belong to grinding, but one saw through the wall some water-wheels going in water. I asked why this was. An oíd miller answered me that the mill-stones were shut off on the other side. When I then saw from the weir-bridge a mili-boy go in, him I followed. When I had now come over the bridge, which had to its left the water-wheels, I stood still and marvelled at that which I saw. For the wheels were now above the bridge, the water coal-black, yet its drops were white, and though the bridge was not over three fingers broad, yet I dared to go back again, and held on to the wooden rails which were over the weir-bridge, and so passed over the water in security and without getting wet. Then I asked the oíd miller how many water-wheels he had: Ten, he answered. The adventure would not go out of my thoughts, and I would gladly have known what the meaning was. But when I noticed that the miller didn't want to let out, I went away, and there was before the mili a lofty paved hill, on it were some of the aforesaid ancients. They walked in the sun, which was then shining very warmly, and had a letter written to them by the Faculty, about which they consulted. I soon perceived what the contents might be, and that they concerned me, therefore went to them and said: Gentlemen, is it about me? Yes, said they, the woman whom you took not long ago you must keep as your wedded wife, or we must report it to our Prince. I said, that will cause no difficulty, for I was born with her in the same moment and brought up with her from childhood, and having taken her once I will always keep her, and death itself shall not separate us: For I love her with all my á ardent heart. What complaint have we then, answered they, the Bride V is also content, and we have her will; you must let yourselves be married. Well contented, said I. Very well, said the one, so will the Lion receive back his life again, and become much mightier and stronger than before. (9) "Then I remembered my foregoing trouble and work, and thought within myself, strangely enough, it must concern not myself, but another well known to me: In him I see our Bride


NUMBER FOUR

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groom with his Bride, clothed as before walking along, ready and pre pared to be wedded, of which I was very glad: For I was in great anxiety lest the things should concern me. (10) "Now then, as expected our Bridegroom in his gorgeous scarlet clothes with his sweetest Bride, whose white silk gown gave out such bright rays, carne to the ancients; they wedded the twain soon, and I IJ was not a little astonished that this Maiden, who should be her Bride-" groom*s Mother, was still so young that she even now seemed newly born. (11) "Now, I know not what sins these two must have committed, that they, although they were brother and sister, bound themselves together with love to such a degree, that they were also not to be separated, and so then were willing at the same time to be charged with incest. These two were brought, instead of a bridal-bed, after a splendid wedding, into a perpetual prison. So that their doings could be watched the prison was transparent, a bright, crystal-clear apartment, like a celestial globe, fitting their high birth and prominent standing. To this prison they were condemned and therein locked up, there in constant tears and true repentance to do penance for their misdeeds com mitted. But beforehand all outward clothing and finery, used as ornament was taken from them, so that they were obliged to live quite naked together. Nobody was allowed to go into the apartment to wait upon them, but after they had been supplied with necessary food and drink, taken from the water before-mentioned, the door of the room was securely bolted and locked, also the seal of the Faculty was impressed upon it, and I received the order that I should guard them, and during the winter, before the door, sufficiently warm the room, that they neither freeze ñor burn, and that they in no wise get out and escape. Should, however, contrary to expectations, this mandate be abused, I should be grievously punished for this. The thing didn't please me, my fear and care damped my courage: for, thought I to myself, it is no small thing which I have been commanded to do. I knew also that the 1Collegium sapientiae* was not in the habit of lying but of putting in to practice what it said. However, as I could not change matters, and further as this locked chamber was in the middle of a strong tower, which was yet again surrounded by strong bastions and high walls, where in one could, with a fair but continual fire, warm the chamber, so I undertook the office, and began in God's ñame to warm the chamber and protect the imprisoned married couple from the coid.

i

"But what happens? As soon as they feel the least warmth, they embrace each other so tenderly that such a thing will not soon be seen again, and they remain also in such ardour that the heart of the young Bridegroom melts for very fervour of love in his body, also his whole body melts at the same moment in the arms of his beloved and falls apart. As she, who loved him not less than he her, saw this, so she wept from her heart for him and at the


NUMBER FOUR

— D— PAGE SEVEN

same time buried him, so that one could not see, for the tears she had shed, which flooded everything, where he had gone to. She gave herself to her weeping and mourning for a short time, and such the pain at her heart that she did not want to live longer but gave herself up voluntarily to death. Alas for me, in what anxiety, distress and trouble was I, that I should see both of those entrusted to me in the same ijioment perish in water and lie dead before my eyes. My certain ruin stood before me, yes, and what was worse for me, I feared more the scorn and derision, which I saw in my mind's eyes, I should be exposed to, than any harm which could happen to me." (12) (To be continued in next lesson.) Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

The student should meditate upon the meanings of the veiled messages contained in the Parabola, the story of which follows: The author, after meditation upon the vanities of life, enters upon the seemingly impassable mystical path. The wind causes many difficulties and he is tempted to leave the path. He meets members of the mystical college who grill him in many ways, but he passes their tests with honors. Through grips and magia the diíficuit task of conquering the Lion is made easy. This Lion must be revived in order to become a Colleague. The High Wall surrounding the Lion pit, he scales and follows. Someone precedes him; many who follow fall, but he is successful in reaching the ground safely. In the garden he plucks a rose for his hat. With a key he manages, where others have failed, to enter the garden, which is filled with wild roses and enhanced by a rainbow. Reference is made to the Bride and Bridegroom, ciad in white and red respectively. In order to revive the Lion, the author is requested to wed the Bride. The Bride and Bridegroom, charged with incest, are imprisoned, and all their raiment and finery removed. They are given food and water from the mystical mili stream. Their cell is guarded by the author, who sees that they are protected. With warmth and ardor, the Bridegroom melts; through weeping, the Bride also dies; both perishing in water. The Parabola is concluded in the next monograph.

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This monograph always remaíns fhe properfy of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O . R. C . It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Five

Eleventh Degree Monograph Five

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THE CONCURRENCE This Week’s Gonsideration of a Famous Opinión V

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The Virgin Sophia is referred to in mystical literature under various ñames. In the Parabola she is called the Bride, the Virgin, and the Queen; however, her qualities remain the same and are recognised by those who have made her acquaintance. The following quotation from the Scottish poet, William Sharp, al' though not using any of the aforementioned ñames, clearly shows that he has known the Virgin Sophia:

So Í7iexpressible, she seemed to say: ‘Thou art mine own, mine equal and my spouse, My complement, without whom I were nought; So in mine eyes thou are more fair than I, For in thee only is my life fulfilled.’ Then added, in harmonious voice, aloud: lThou long hast thought upon life's mystery, Its vast, eternally recurring rounds Of rest and rebirth and activity, And sought therein the passage of the soul From light to dar\, from dar\ to light again. Come then with me, and we will see in part The latter in its human phase unveiled.' So saying, with her presence she endowed Him with new senses, faculties and powers. That far surpassed the limits of the oíd. — W ILLIAM SHARP, 18554905


NUMBER FIVE

— D— PAGE ONE

Beloved Members, Greetings ! We will continué the symbolical story and enjoy the strange mysticism and secret message that is contained in it. Here follows the remainder of the Parabola: ^ "Whilst spending some days in such troubled thoughts, taking wcounsel with myself and turning the matter over and over again in my thoughts as to what was best to be done, it occurred to me how Medea brought the dead body of Aesonis to life again, and I thought to my self: If Medea could do such a thing, why should you not also succeed? I began to consider how I would do such a thing, but found no better way than to continué with warmth until the water had disappeared and I should see again the dead bodies of our loving couple, hoping then to escape all danger for my usefulness and earn praise. I proceeded, therefore, with my warmth begun, and continued with it for forty whole days, then I became aware that the longer the time the more the water decreased, and the dead bodies, though as black as coal, began to show themselves again: and indeed this would have happened sooner had not the apartment been so firmly locked and sealed. Which I might, however, under no circumstances open. Then I noticed how the water rose up and hurried towards the clouds, collected itself together above in the apartment and fell down like rain: so that it could not get away then, until our Bridegroom with his dearest Bride lay dead and putrified, and therefore stinking in the highest degree, before my eyes. "Meanwhile a very beautiful rainbow was seen in the apartment, produced by the sunshine in the wet weather, with extraordinarily fine colours, which gladdened me not a little in the affliction I had passed through, but much more was I glad at seeing my two lovers lying before me. But there is no joy so great but what it is mixed with much sorrow: I also then experienced grief in my joy, for meanwhile those who had been commended to my care lay dead before me without a sign of life. But as I knew that their chamber was made of such puré and dense Materia, and also so firmly locked that their soul and spirit could not get out but were kept cióse within, so I went on with my continual warmth, day and night, in the carrying out of my office, quite imagining that the twain would not return to the bodies as long as the damp remained. For such are well preserved in damp nature. As this I then also found in very truth. For I became aware, through ^careful observation, that towards evening many vapours rose up from êarth through the sun's forcé, and drew themselves up into the above, just as though the sun would draw water. They became condensed during the night into a lovely and very fertile dew, which in the morning fell and wetted the earth, also washing the bodies of our dead ones, so that the more the bathing and washing took place the longer, more beautiful and whiter they became from day to day. But the whiter and more beautiful they became, the more the moistures disappeared, till at last, when the air was clear


NUMBER FIVE

— D— PAGE TW O

and fair, and all misty and damp weather had passed, the spirit and soul of the Bride could no longer contain themselves in the clear air, but went into the clarified and now transfigured body of the Queen, which soon received them and immediately carne to life: which gladdened me as you may easily understand with a strange joy, as I saw her arise in the costliest garments such as have rarely been seen, and adorned with a precious crown set all over with diamonds, and heard her say: ® Hear ye children of men, perceive all ye born of women, that the Almighty has the power to set up and depose kings: He makes rich and poor according to his will: He kills and brings to life again. (13) Behold in me a true and living example of this. I was great and became small: but now, after being humbled, am I a Queen supreme over many kingdoms: I was killed and brought to life again; to me, poor one, have the great treasures of the wise ones and the mighty ones been entrusted and given over. "Therefore, unto me has also poor rich, and to bestow mercy on the sick. But I am not yet equal powerful King, who is still to be comes he will prove that my words

been given the power to make the the humble, and to bring health to to my best beloved brother, the allawakened from the dead. When he were his. (14)

"After she had said this, the sun shone very brightly, and the day became warmer than before, and the dog-days were at the door. But because, long before, for the great and splendid wedding of our new Queen, all sorts of costly garments, as of black velvet, grey damask, grey silk, silver taffeta, snow-white silk, and one especially beauti ful robe of silver, threaded with costly pearls and splendid diamonds, had been prepared, so also at the same time were prepared for the young King different clothes of costly stuffs of Incarnat, of yellowgold colours, and lastly a red velvet garment sewn with costly rubies and carbuncles in great number. But the tailors who made the clothes were invisible, so that I wondered, when I saw one coat after another and one dress after another ready before my eyes, how could it happen, especially as I knew that nobody but the Bridegroom and his Bride had entered the chamber; but what made me marvel most of all was that, as soon as another coat or dress was ready, the former disappeared in the same moment before my eyes, so that I did not know where they went to, or who had locked them away. (15) "When this costly apparel was ready, there appeared the great and0 mighty King in glittering splendour, to which nothing can be compared: and when he found himself locked in, he begged me in friendly and very gracious words to open the door for him, and that I would grant that he come out, and it would be of great use to me. Although I had received the strict order not to open the door, yet I was so impressed by the great authority and gracious speech of the King, that I opened for him with good will. And as he went


NUMBER FIVE

— D— PAGE THREE

out he was so friendly, so gracious, even so humble, that he indeed bore witness thereto that nothing sits so well on high personages as these virtues. But because he had passed through the dog-days in great heat, he was very thirsty, run-down and tired, and ordered me to bring some of I the swiftly-running water from under the mill-wheels, from which, when ^ I had brought it, he quaffed a large draught with great avidity, then went again into his chamber, and ordered me to lock the door securely after him, so that nobody could disturb him or awaken him from sleep. "Herein he rested some days, and called to me to open the door. But I noticed that he had become much handsomer, richer in blood, and more splendid, which observing also himself, and attributing this to such a splendid and wholesome water, he soon demanded more water, and also drank much of it, more than before, so that I at last began to consider building the chamber much wider. When then this King had drunk of this fine drink, despised by the ignorant, to his heart1s content he became so handsome and splendid, that I have never in all my life seen either such a magnificent person or such deeds and conduct. Then he led me into his kingdom and showed me all the treasures and riches of the world, so that I must confess that not only the Queen proclaimed the Truth, but left the greatest part of those who know him to describe: for gold and noble carbuncle-stones were there in endless quantities, rejuvenation and restitution of natural forces, as also restoration of lost health and taking away of all illness were common things there. But most excellent of all was that the people of that same land know their creator, fear and honour him; and obtain from him wisdom and understanding and at last, after this temporary glory, attain to eternal beatitude. There unto may God the Father, Son and Holy Ghost help us. Amen." (16) Thus ends the mystical story. You will note that there are sixteen places in this story where there are numbers in brackets. These sixteen places will be referred to in our next contact when the significance of certain passages and phrases will be explained. In the meantime, you are to reread the entire story again, including the installment that was sent to you last week, and see if you can work out in your own mind, and especially, in your intuitive consciousness, the real mystery and significance of this message. You should medi tate upon it, dwell upon it, and read some of the passages over a ^ number of times. It is this sort of study and analysis that is going w t o bring you a certain form of mystical attunement and help you in the work that is to follow. I will not tell you any more at this time but leave you to have this one very important message, or strange Parabola, to study during the coming week. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

The symbolical story of the Parabola continúes: The author, wishing to revive the Bride and Bridegroom, remembers how Aesonis was brought to life by Medea. For forty days he continúes with warmth until the water has disappeared showing the dead bodies black as coal. His task is delayed because of the firmly locked apartment. The water rose and fell as rain, causing a rainbow in the apartment. The rain washes the bodies white as snow. The spirit and soul of the Bride and Bridegroom, unable to contain themselves in the clarified air, immediately come to life in the bodies of the Queen and King, who are vested in splendid raiment made by invisible tailors. As more elabórate finery is made the former clothing disappears. The Queen informs the author that unto her has been given the power to make the poor rich and to bring health to the sick, and bestow mercy on the humble. Even greater than the Queen is the King, who after drinking the mystical water becomes more magnificent. He leads the author to his Kingdom wherein natural forces are restored, and the people know and honor their creator.


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This monograph always remains the properfy of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Six

Eleventh Degree Monograph Six

The matter contained herein i* officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O . R. C. under the emblem above.. which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, engraved, typewritten^ and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertationj, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses academic studies diagram s, illustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Im perator of A . M. O. R. C. (The above emblem and ñame of the O rde r are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving, and are im parted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal titl*, and the right of possession to this monograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M . O . R. C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A n y other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M. O . R. C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movements.


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fl The following stanzas are selected from the mystical poem called the “Cherubic Wanderer," written by the mediaeval Germán physician, philosopher, and mystic, Johannes Scheffler, also known as Angelus Silesius. In these stanzas veiled truths are to be found conceming the mystic way and the means of obtaining it. Note particularly the references to the Rose, the mystical marriage, and the mystical rebirth:

IN SILENCE YOU W ORSHIP GOD Who desires to worship God's Majesty In truth, he must plunge himself into the sacred silence. Who in heaven will crown his head with roses He must be pric\ed on earth with thorns. THE SPIRITUA L M A TER DEI Towards Mary, all mee^ness, God so flamed up in love That He considered it a bliss to become Her Child. If you be mee\ li\e the Virgi?T Immaculate Yourself shall become your mother,— and God your Child. BLESSED VIRG IN Say, lofty Lady, was it mee\ness Thine Which won Thee the right of a Mother of G od? For I myself am longing to become The Virgin, the Bride and God's Mother On this earth. ST. ALEX How could St. Alex be so valiant as to dismiss his bride on the nuptial day? W hy could he be a bridegroom, who was the bride himself and had betrothed himself for ever to the Divine Bridegroom? A STRANGE M ARRIAGE Oh, what a marriage! The God of glory, the \ing o f \ings too\ a slave's daughter, my soul, for His spouse. . . . BY SILENCE W E LEARN Be silent, my darling, for: whose soul has groum silent altogether, he shall receive more of God than he ever wished. —JOHANNES SCHEFFLER, 16244677


NUMBER SIX

—D— PAGE ONE

B eloved Members, G r e e t i n g s !

I hope that during the past two weeks, each of you has been dwelling in your little cell room of meditation and has received from the inner self the interpretation of the Parabola that was given to you by your guardian instructor. Some of you may look lightly upon the presentation of this incident in your early work of the Eleventh Degree and think that this whole story and all that is connected with it does not deserve the time and space of two weekly lessons. You are to be the judges, and if this is your conviction and you act accordingly by giving the subject little or no attention, then the results will be as you would have them, and the responsibility is solely your own. I can only say that the time will come when you will regret taking that attitude; you will discover that you have missed something of great importance. In order to help you discern the secret points of this allegorical story and give you the key whereby you can unlock the mysteries contained in it, I am going to give you my personal and modern under standing of it as well as its ancient interpretation. I will combine these two interpretations into one. Even so, there will be veiled meanings and messages in my interpretation which will be for each one of you, personally, to decipher and extract. In other words, the real meaning of this Parabola will be different for each one of you in some slight degree, and I think that you will discover these slight differences very easily after meditating this week upon the interpretation that I am now going to give you. The special meaning to be found in this story will be the key to your future work in this Degree. This key probably will dawn upon you after you have heard my interpreta tion, or after some weeks of further instruction and meditation have been enjoyed by each of you. You will recall that in the presentation of the Parabola, as con tained in the preceding fourth and f ifth monographs, there were numbers with brackets around them at the end of certain paragraphs. Will you please take Monograph Number Four now and hold it in your hands for reference while you read the following interpretation: At the end of the first paragraph of the Parabola, given in Mono graph Four, you will see Figure 1 in brackets. The author of the story begins by telling how he entered upon the mystical Path after meditations on the vanities and sufferings of life. He describes how he found the mystical Path to be narrow, uneven, and seemingly impassable, and not a popular or well-known Path to the goal. He tells how he was tempted to leave it. The wind with its blowing is used as a symbol to represent the mighty Cosmic forces that reside within us and urge us to go on even when other worldly conditions and the arguments of friends and others tempt us to go backward. Perhaps you will discern, in the symbol of the wind, the Holy Ghost that descended upon Jesús and which left Him at His


NUMBER SIX

— D— PAGE TW O

Crucifixión, and which is always pictured as a strong breeze. It is the Holy Ghost that must come upon each of you and dwell within you while you are preparing yourselves at the beginning of this Eleventh Degree for the greater work that is to follow. Therefore, make a notation in your consciousnss that the symbol of the wind represents the Holy Ghost, Now, skip to the third paragraph, beginning with the words I listened long to them. Here, we see that the student has been accepted into a mystical school. In other words, he has contacted the mystical Collegium or the secret brotherhood, and you will note that the student was again tested, tried, and grilled in many ways, yet he passed all of these tests with honors just as you have passed many tests in re cent months and years, especially throughout the work of the Tenth Degree. Now, read the fourth paragraph, beginning with the word But. Here we see the symbolism of the Lion introduced. This is another symbol for you to register in your mystical memory. The Lion here represents the outer physical man or the outer physical body with its worldly or mass consciousness containing the thoughts that the masses have adopted, or the ideas that the newspapers, magazines, and public utterances have created in the physical consciousness of the average human being. Becoming acquainted with the Lion means becoming acquainted with the real outer man as separate and apart from the inner man. After we once discover the weakness of our outer self as a sepa rate entity, we can appreciate better the strength of the inner man. The symbolism in this paragraph is very deep and it must be analyzed carefully in order that its hidden message may be discovered. Now, let us take the next paragraph, beginning with the phrase They led me to the Lion. At the end of this paragraph we have Figure 4. You will notice that the beginning of this paragraph states that the mystics and students of the school led this new member to the Lion. In other words, their teachings and their instructions enabled the student not only to discover the Lion but helped establish between them a very cióse acquaintance. You realize, of course, that all of our monographs in the previous Degrees have been doing this very thing. Throughout this paragraph we find references to natural magic or, as we cali it nowadays, white magic. And, you will notice also that reference is made to a grip. The grip here is not a grip with the hands upon the Lion, but the secret grip or handclasp whereby one member of a secret society makes himself known to another and thereby brings to his side the support of those who are in sympathy with him. The pit in which the Lion was located refers to man's worldly con sciousness; the blood and snow refer to the allegorical and mystical principies of the red and white tinctures, and also to the male and female biological differences. This paragraph is certainly a beautiful story, which I hope each of you will study very carefully.


NUMBER SIX

— D— PAGE THREE

Let us now continué to the next paragraph, beginning with the word As. In the center of this paragraph, we find Figure 5. We note that the whole paragraph refers to the killing, or destruction in a mystical sense, of the outer man; in other words, the Lion. The reference to reviving the Lion refers to the rebirth or regeneration of |¿he outer self in order that it may live hereafter in proper attune ment with the inner self and as though both were one harmonious unit. In the next paragraph, beginning with the words After following, we find Figures 6 and 7. Number six indicates the left side which, as you probably have learned in earlier lessons, is the mystical side of the physical brain, and is important in many mystical experiments. Number seven, on the other hand, refers to the right side. This should be significant to you. In the next paragraph, beginning with the word Arrived. we find Figure 8. The author speaks of red roses that were broken off and stuck in his hat. Here I can make a little explanation that could not have been made years ago. In many of the Shakespearean folios in their original form containing the hidden ciphers, which reveal the identity of Sir Francis Bacon, there are symbolical drawings or illustrations and decorations in various places. In a number of these draw ings, a character representing Sir Francis Bacon, or Shakespeare, is found wearing a peculiar hat with roses stuck in it. Some of these illustrations show a rose on the front of each of his fancy shoes. In Bacon*s day, the Rosicrucians had adopted the symbolism found in this paragraph of the Parabola. In their general assemblies where they wore a hat, they wore a rose for secret identification. The rose has always been the symbol of the secret mysteries and of the mystical unfoldment of the soul, and is representativo of the Mystic Path. In the time that this Parabola was written, the explanation of the rose given to the initiates was that the rose in full bloom is the attribute, quality, and adornment of the Virgin Sophia, or the soul in its female principie of the godhead. For the first time this introduces into our studies of the higher Degrees the oíd thought and principie that the godhead is both male and female, as explained in previous lessons of the lower Degrees. The Egyptians symbolized this dual principie of God by the words rah representing the male; and mah representing the female, and the com®>pounded word Rama representing God, as both male and female powers. Jesús was claimed by the ancient mystics to represent the rose of life. The return of Jesús to the consciousness of God at the time of the Ascensión was called the Chymical Marriage by the ancient Rosicrucians. This will open up to you a great volume of mystical understanding, and you should delve into it more deeply by recalling all that you have read about the ascensión of Jesús to the heavens and further studying its significance. The rose was also considered equivalent to the white lotus of the


NUMBER SIX

— D— PAGE FOUR

Orient, which grew in purity in the midst of stagnant pools of filthy water and symbolized the pureness of the soul rising from the earthly sordidness. More in regard to the rose will be discovered in this paragraph by a careful analysis. Since it is difficult to analyze more of this story than the first nine paragraphs in one week, I shall conclude the interpretation of the Parabola in the following monograph. Remember, I do not mean that you make purely an intellectual study of these paragraphs, but rather meditate upon one or two phrases at a time, and as great a length of time as will permit the inner self gradually to unfold a special meaning. Personally, I have noticed that sometimes two days are required for a certain mystical phrase to unlock something within my consciousness, or within the soul, and to bring it gradually to my outer consciousness. Therefore, give as much time and thought to these paragraphs as possible, as though they were a secret formula containing the cipher code that would solve the personal problems of your life in a mystical way. Do not be in a hurry to reach any common conclusión that the outer self artificially may create. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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ffl In the interpretation of the Parabola, we find the wind referred to as the Cosmic forces within urging us ever upward. It also symbolizes the Holy Ghost. ÍJ Along the Mystic Path, the author meets the members of the collegium, or secret brotherhood, whose tests he passes. ÍJ The Lion, signifying the outer, objective man, is overcome by secret formulas such as leamed in the Rosicrucian studies. The reviving of the Lion is the rebirth of the outer self and its attunement with the Inner Self. The pit is the materiality which man must surmount in order to advance. The left side of the wall refers to the symbolic mystical side of the physical brain. *1 The rose is highly significant. It symbolizes the unfoldment of the soul, the spiritual Christ rising to join with His Father, the Virgin Sophia, and the Chymical Marriage.



Rosicrucian Parle, San José, California, U. S. A .

"C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedicated to every Rosicrucian"

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ROSICRUC I AN ORDER a m r> n n

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This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C . It is not purchased by, but loanad to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Seven

Eleventh Degree Monograph Seven

R E G I S T E R E D IN U. 9

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PA T EN T O F F IC E

PMtNTED I N U * . « .

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M. O . R. C . under the emblem above. which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed. engraved, typewritten. and photographic copies of official, prescribed, and copyrighted monographs, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses, and academic studies. diagrams, illustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A . M. O . R. C . All matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving, and are imparted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to this monograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M .O . R .C . and it shall be returned to it upon ¡ts request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé end exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A n y other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member, and is a violetion of the Stetutes of this Order. A . M. O. R .C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame end symbols, end the Imperetor has tole right to grent the use of them to other allied organization* or movements.


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9 After studyíng the mystical symbolism of the Parabola and its interpretation, as given in the lessons and induced from serious meditation, the reader should be able to gather further insight into the Chymical Marriage, as mentioned by the philosopher Jacob Boehme:

The virgin says: I have something against you. I have raised you up from among the thorns. W hen you were a wild animal, I have configured in you my own image. But the wild animal is among the thorns: this I will not ta\e unto my bosom. Tou are still living within your wild animal. W hen the world ta\es that animal, because it belongs to it, then will I ta\e you. Thus each one will ta\e its own belongings. W hy do you therefore love so much that wild animal which causes to you nothing but sorrow? Tou cannot ta\e it with you. It does not belong to you, but to the world. Let the world use it as it may, but remain you with me. It will be only a little while; then will your animal brea\, and you will be rid of it, and remain with me. How will you then rejoice, if you thin\ of that animal, which afflicted you day and night, and of which you are then free. As a flower grows up out o f the earth, so do you rise up out of your wild animal. Tou say, T am your animal; you are born in me.' Listen, my animal! I am greater than you. W hen you was to become, I was your conductor. My essences are out of the root of etemity; but you are of this world. Tou will brea\; but I remain etemally in my power. Therefore I am far nobler than you. My wor\s are in power, while yours remain as shadows. W hen I am once rid o f you, I will then never accept you again as my animal; but (I ta\e) my new body which I am regenerating within the deepest root of the holy element. — JACOB BOEHME, 15754624


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Beloved Members, GreetingsI Before beginning this week's instruction, I want to thank each of you for the very fine letters expressing your great joy in the work of the Tenth Degree, and your keen interest in the work of the Elevnth Degree. In nearly every instance, each has reported some strange sensation of Cosmic peace or attunement that has come since the first week of Eleventh Degree study. From your letters, it appears that the members of this Degree already have discovered the secret of seclusion by nightly visualizing their rooms as personal sanctums in the great monastery. I have never gotten over the fascination of being alone by inclosing myself in my cell. Very often on my trips, when I must reside for a day or two in a hotel, I find it extremely pleasant to turn the room into a cell and live the life of a Rosicrucian in this sense. Often I have heard from others how disturbing it is for them to sleep in a different room each night, especially in a hotel room with all its dis turbing vibrations from previous occupants and the distracting noises from surrounding rooms. All of these subtle influences are easily eliminated by turning the room into a cell. As you will learn later, this transformed room is reached easily by those desirable psychic projections which you would receive. Your room may be entirely empty except for yourself, or may be peopled with those friends that you would cali into psychic manifestation, just as you wish it to be. But the fact remains that there is a great spiritual peace and influx of the Christ Consciousness that comes to each who retires at night with the mental and spiritual assumption of transcendental isolation and physical separateness. This will develop more strongly and more significantly as you progress with the work of this Degree. Gradually your cell room will become not only your spiritual sanctum but your metaphysical laboratory and your alchemical workshop. Here, the highest principies of our teachings will be easily applied and directed by you. Here the Cosmic will make many manifestations to you. You will find yourself engulfed in the aura of Cosmic radiations, which will bring regeneration and rebirth to your entire being. We now will continué to analyze the second part of the Parabola 4. and dwell on the significance of the various paragraphs. We will begin with the eleventh paragraph appearing on page four of Monoraph Four beginning with the words I wandered on. At the end of this paragraph is Figure 9. The paragraph refers to a garden into which the mystic wandered. This garden with its small opening repre sents certain experiences of a mystical nature which can be understood only after actual practice with the experiences. The key represents an experience which will open wide the door into the lotuses. This is symbolical for the roses in


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the garden. The next interesting point about the paragraph is the first reference to the Bridegroom and the Bride, represented as the youth and the maiden. In all mystical literature of a symbolical nature, reference is made to the Bride and Bridegroom. In this story, the Bridegroom is the author of the visión, or the one who is telling the story. The mili to which he carne is Nature's own laboratory viewed from a transcendental viewpoint. \ The mystics speak with the youth about the f orthcoming wedding with his Bride, and it is to be noted that the youth and the maiden were born at nearly the same time and brought up together. It should be noted that the Bride is his soul. Therefore, through this marriage the Lion, which is the mystically unawakened or lifeless man, is brought to life again to become stronger and mightier, and to become an adept and an initiate. This will make him master of all things through mystical rebirth. The secret of the Bride and Bridegroom is a secret of the proper unity of soul and body, of the reawakened and regenerated physical man in perfect harmony with the eternal, immortal soul. Many hours of con templation and meditation upon this sublime principie, so beautifully symbolized in all literature as the wedding of the Bridegroom and Bride, will reveal a great lesson that will never leave your consciousness. Now we will go on to the next paragraph beginning with the words Then I remember. At the end of this, we have Figure 10. Here, we are reminded of certain psychic struggles through which every mystic must pass. For instance, there is the problem of transposing con sciousness from the lower self to the higher self. This always brings struggles and anguish, and along with it the temptation to turn backward on the Path or to give up the task as a difficult one to accomplish. We are shown in this paragraph that the first great temptation that comes to the mystic at this point of his development is the voice of pride, vanity, or self-consciousness, which whispers to him and tries to convince him that by transposing the consciousness to his higher self, he will lose his earthly individuality or personality. That seems to be the one point where so many yield to the voice of the tempter and turn backward in their progress. They look upon the phys ical I am as more important than the inner self. The very idea that the outer self may be lost in a sublime transfer of its consciousness to the inner self, is horrifying to personal vanity and pride. Yet, pride and vanity are the two great stones which hold millions of persons earthbound and prevent them from ever entering the spiritual kingdom. Personally, I think that if there are any two outstanding points in the whole preparatory instructions of the Parabola, they are in connection with the symbolism of the marriage of the Lion with the maiden, as referred to above, and the resulting test of our pride and vanity. Many ancient manuscripts of a very high spiritual nature state that there is no greater sin of the flesh than that of vanity or pride. In one ancient manuscript it is distinctly


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stated that even the sin of lust or adultery, which is looked upon as the greatest temptation of the flesh, or greatest personal indulgence of the flesh, is not as reactive upon the progress of one who is trying to better himself, as is the indulgence in pride and vanity. The one is purely of the physical emotions of the flesh, while the other has its gratification and satisfaction in the emotional part of man which is so ^strongly connected with the psychic or spiritual part of man. Jesús ®referred to this weakness of the flesh in many ways ; for instance, when he said that those who had great wealth or worldly possessions must dis pose of them before they could enter the kingdom of heaven. He did not refer to the possession of absolute necessities, ñor even to the enjoyment of many of life's luxuries, but he did refer to the vain-glorious indulgence in wealth, which satisfied the pride and vanity of the lower self. Likewise, all of the ancient injunctions against having any other gods before the one great God referred to man's glorifying the physical pleasures and things of life through his vanity and pride. They did not refer to the worshipping of lesser gods, as the heathens did through a lack of understanding of the nature and existence of the true God, for God would rather have the uninformed and uninstructed person worship anything that he considered higher and more spiritual than himself, than to worship either something lesser than himself or to worship nothing at all. It is in this point that the mystics disagree with the orthodox Christians. While the latter condemn the primitivo forms of worship, the mystic says that man's primitivo forms of worship were the very foundation of his spiritual awakening. The minute man begins to worship something that will bring him spiritual or inner contentment, and concentrates his faith in something other than him self, he is walking bravely and boldly on the Path toward spiritual development. After all, man does not lose his personality through rebirth and the spiritual marriage of his outer self with the inner self ; rather, he is reborn and his consciousness is united with the universal consciousness of God. It is only in this way that his real personality is immortalized and preserved for eternity. The mystery of all this paragraph is worthy of many weeks of contemplation. Let us proceed to the next paragraph, Figure 11, beginning with the words Now then. Brief as is this paragraph of the Parabola, it is highly significant and important. It touches upon the evolutionary system of the mystic, which is the fundamental of all the mysteries of the world. The ancient myths, the sagas of the ancient heroes, | the spiritual legends, and the veiled allegories of the oldest of the mystical writings, all refer to the same fundamental principie; namely, the death of the oíd man. This, of course, refers to the mystical death and the resulting resurrection or rebirth. Here the author of the Parabola says that he was surprised to find the Bride who had to be the mother of her Bridegroom still so young. The rebirth of the self always brings with it a realization of the youth of the self and how young it really is in the scheme of universal things.


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In the next paragraph beginning with the word Now, we find Figure 12 at the end of this long paragraph. Undoubtedly, you have discerned that the secret chamber of the bridal scene represents the hu man inner being, wherein the mystical Bridegroom becomes united with the Bride. The warming of the chamber refers to the raising of the vibrations of the spiritual self through mystical concentration. One of the most beautifully allegorical stories of mystical development was that written by Jane Leade, the famous and greatly beloved leader of the Rosicrucian lodge in London, known as the Philadelphic Lodge. This was, incidentally, where the Rosicrucians from Germany and other countries visited for a few weeks before setting sail from Europe to come to America in 1693-1694 to establish the first Rosicrucian or ganization in the New World. Among the few preserved stories and writings of this wonderful, spiritual woman, we find the human in terior referred to as a stove which is necessary continually to be heated. Therefore, we see that even in modern times the ancient symbolism was still used. The origin of this allegory is based upon the oíd symbol of spirituality being the mystical fíame burning within. You will recognize how true to form the AMORC has held its ritualistic principies when you analyze our Temple ceremonies as established in this jurisdiction. In every First Degree initiation in all of our Temples, the Vestal Virgin, or Colombe, extinguishes her vestal fíame during the ceremony. Then the master explains that the fíame now burns in our hearts instead of burning at the Vestal Altar. No other Rosi crucian organization but the legitimate one makes even the slightest ref erence to this very essential principie. It is significant to note here also that the author states that the warmth of the fire thus started in his being continued for forty days. I will pass over the significance of the number forty. for you can discover easily by reading mystical literature that forty is a mystical number. Even in the Christian Bible the number forty is used many times in connection with the flood and various other occurrences. When the student has started the great mystical fire burning within him, and the fíame has reached any degree of brilliancy, the warmth and the fire will continué for some time, even after the student has discontinued his practices, but then gradually it begins to weaken until sooner or later it must be revived. This is why we say that a student who is once upon the Path may stop his studies and practices for a while and still have the development continué, but then he must once again revive the fíame if he wants to have the utmost benefit from it. We must keep in mind, however, that the signif icant story of the Pa rabola was not written for those who are just starting upon the Path, and those who have just kindled a small, new fíame for the first time. Throughout this paragraph the author paints many allegorical, mystical pictures. This is done in order to prevent any profanation of the sacred mysteries. Reference is


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made in this paragraph to the Collegium Sapientiae. This is one of the oldest and purest of Rosicrucian terms and is not found in any other system of mysticism. It means a college of knowledge or a temple of wisdom. In ancient days all of the Rosicrucian Temples were called Collegii. At the cióse of the next paragraph, beginning with the word Whilst, we find Figure 13. This long paragraph further describes the mystical stages taking place within the student who is practicing and developing. All of you will find in the experiences of your own life, since you joined the Rosicrucians, some point that agrees with the veiled allegories of this paragraph. We will skip to the paragraph beginning with the words Therefore unto me. At the end of this paragraph is Figure 14. Here we find the awakened soul, or the so-called Virgin Sophia, speaking within the student before his mystical marriage. Here is surely a promise of what each of you will be able to do after you have reached a certain point in your progress. You can see plainly that you have been in preparation for this work ever since you joined our organization. In the next paragraph beginning with the words After she had said this, we find Figure 15 at the end of the paragraph. This is to cali our attention to the fact that the paragraph contains the peculiar phrase that seems very modern; namely, the reference to dog days. Here in America these dog days occur during the hottest period of the summer. In this Parabola, however, something different is meant. The Dog Star, called Sirius, in Egypt was consecrated to Anubis, who was the god of the dead, and who was symbolized as having a dog's head. Among the Greeks, this god was known as Cerberus. This god was the guard of the underworld and his presence will be announced in an infallible way to each mystic who in his evolution descends to hell. In other words, this guard of the underworld will be made known to us whenever we permit ourselves to degrade our development or proceed in the wrong direction. It is the mystic1s guard against entering too deeply into the underworld through temptation and sin. Notice throughout this paragraph how worldly things are offered as temptations, and how rapidly one adored material thing fades into insignificance when a more tempting earthly thing is offered, thus luring us continuously on a downward scale until nothing less than the greatest of earthly temptations will please us. The Parabola ends with the word Amen, after which we have Figure 16. This is to cali our attention to the fact that this word, which is used in the Bible and in Christian religión, does not have the sig nif icance that usually is given to it. In the book of Revelation, Jesús himself is called the AMEN and the word is an Egyptian one and was originally one of the ñames of the great god of Egypt. Its real meaning lies wholly in the vowel


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sounds when properly pronounced, and these vowel sounds mean or create perfect manifestation. Jesús was such a manifestation. When the word Amen is used at the end of a prayer or a petition, it means that after having expressed one's wishes, the vowel sounds of ah-men are uttered to start the laws working to bring about a perfect manifestation of the plea. Thus we find that the entire Parabola is a description of the inner evolution of the mystic after having started upon the Path. ' It is a perfect allegory of the Hermetic art. Much has been left unexplained by me in order that it will be revealed in the only perfect way possible, and that is from your own inner consciousness. A few points have not been explained because we are not yet ready to reveal the real meaning. I hope, therefore, that every one of you will meditate on this Parabola, and especially on the significance of the interpretations I have given, and thus be ready next week for some interesting revelations. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER


V

V

Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recaU as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

The symbolical interpretation of the Parabola continúes: The garden represents mystical experiences, entered by the key of personal experience as actually practiced. The author recognizes himself as the Bridegroom. Through the perfect unión with the Bride, the Lion, or unawakened man, is mystically reborn. The mili is Nature’s transcendental laboratory. Cf Man does not lose his personality through rebirth; his consciousness is imited with the universal consciousness of God; his real personality is immortalized. The chamber of the Bridal scene is the human inner being. The warming refers to the raising of spiritual vibrations through concentration. In ancient days all Rosicru cian Temples were called Collegii. í| Many of the struggles related in this allegory can be compared to the mystical ex periences of the Rosicrucian student. t]J The Virgin Sophia foretells many things able to be accomplished by the student. The Robes and unseen tailors represent temptations, each fading when a more elab órate article of temptation appears. fll The word Amen is of Egyptian origin, meaning or creating perfect manifestation. The whole Parabola is a description of the inner evolution of the mystic after starting upon the Path.

WinmÜ';

MASTER MONOGRAPH

Thís monograph aiways remaíns the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the roceiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Eight

Eleventh Degree Monograph Eight

The matfer contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A. M . O . R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, engraved, typewritten^ and photoaraphic copies of o f f ic ia ílv prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses, academ ic studies. diagram *, illustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A. M. O . R. C. (The above emblem and ñame of the O fd e r are also registered in countries throuqhout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member reteiving. and ere im parted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to thi» m onograph is and shafl remain in the Supreme S ra n d Lodge of A . M . O. R. C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does. ipso facto, terminate all right» of the member, and is a víolation of the Stetutes of thjs Order. A. M . O . R. C. is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other sllied organizations or movements.

This Week’s Gonsideration of a Famous Opinión V

V

V

One of the greatest sources of profound lectures given briefly and tersely in parables is to be found in the Bible. These parables contain many deep and hidden mysteríes, to be understood only by those enlightened ones of the inner circle. One such parable refers to the Bride and Bridegroom, the wedding feast, and the invited guests: And Jesús answered and spa\e again in parables unto them, saying: the \ingdom of heaven is li\ened unto a certain \ing which made a marriage feast for his son, and sent forth his servant to cali them that were bidden to the marriage feast: and they would not come. Again he sent forth other servants, saying: Tell them that are bidden: Behold, I have made ready my dinner; my oxen and my fatlings are \illed, and all things are ready: Come to the marriage feast. But they made light of it, and went their ways, one to his own farm, another to his merchandise; and the rest laid hold on his servants and entreated them shamefully, and \iiled them. But the \ing was wroth; and he sent his armies and destroyed those murderers, and burned their city. Then saith he to his servants: The wedding is ready, but they that were bidden were not worthy. Go ye therefore into the partings of the highways, and as many as ye shail find bid to the marriage feast. And those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all as many as they found both bad and good: And the wedding was filled with guests. But when the \ing carne in to behold the guests he saw there a man who had not on a wedding garment, and he said unto him: Friend, how camest thou in thither not having a wedding garment? And he was speech' less. Then the \ing said to the servants: Bind him hand and foot and cast him out into the outer dar\ness; there shall be the weeping and gnashing of teeth. For many are called but few are chosen. (Matthew X X II: 144) JESUS THE CHRIST


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Beloved Members, Greetings! Again I come before you— speaking as though I were the Guardian of the Antechamber in whose presence you members assemble— to continué your preparation for the work of this Degree. Again I speak to you, s if standing before you in the small antechamber and using the ords, thoughts, or ideas that were given to the most exclusive and preferred members of the advanced Degrees of the organization.

é

You may think that these talks in this antechamber are brief, for sometimes they may appear constricted and terse. But I trust that our members have reached beyond that point where they judge the importance of a lecture by its length in minutes or its number of words. I am reminded, in this regard, of a great lesson which Henry Khunrath, the famous Rosicrucian mystic of the Middle Ages, delivered at a special conclave of advanced adepts. This man was not only an advanced mystic and a high officer in the organization, but he was famous for the fact that he could reduce his ideas and thoughts to a few simple words. It is said that often he would spend days in preparing a special talk to these advanced members, and on the day of their meeting he would spend hours arranging for the meeting, and some of the members would spend many hours traveling to reach the little college in which these sessions were held. The other members of lower grades and the officers of the organization would watch the students hurrying into the college building. They would see Khunrath, attired in his long, flowing gray robes and peculiar square cap, rush into this building with an armful of manuscripts and books. Everything indicated that there was going to be a very long and important session of special instruction for these highly advanced brothers and sisters. Then someone would cióse the door to the lecture hall, and there would be silence throughout the hallway of the building. The crowd outside, having a recess in their work and sitting under trees in review of earlier lessons, would wait for this man's special class to end. It is said that often only two or three minutes would pass when the door would open again and out would come the students with grave expressions on their faces, and Khunrath would hurry off toward one of the outer buildings that he used as his home. If any of the students were stopped and asked what kind of lecture was received in so short a time, he would shake his head and say, "Marvelous, wonderful, beautiful, and profound." To all others it seemed that the class scarcely had been called to order, certainly the learned teacher had not even time in which to make his introductory remarks, when the class would be dismissed and the great lesson ended. All the younger students marvelled at such instruction in so brief a time, and at the fact that what each student received often required weeks to contémplate and analyze.


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It is recorded further that on one occasion when Khunrath was called before a great conclave of members of all grades and Degrees of Rosicrucian study, he was asked to give to his mixed group of students one of his remarkably short and inspiring lessons for which he was famed. Realizing that the mystery of his brief instructions was uppermost in their minds, and that all of those who had not attended his special class were anxious to know what could be said in a few words %■ that would constitute a truly great lesson, he rose before the audience and said that at last he had been able to accomplish the great dream of his life and that after years of labor, analysis, test, and trial, he had been able to reduce one of his greatest lessons to the briefest possible time of delivery. "In fact," he said, "I have now the honor and the pleasure to deliver to you what is not only the ultimate of my ambitions in this direction, but what is probably the shortest and brief est lecture ever given in a Rosicrucian or other college. I find it possible now to reduce one of my greatest discourses to but a single word. That word I will give to you as the summum bonum of my carefully evolved lecture. I give you this word and ask you to see the truth in it, to discover its great principies, to analyze its profound meaning, and absorb from it the greatest lesson of your life. Therefore, I pronounce my lecture in one word." He gave one word to his audience. It was a Germán word which, translated as closely as possible into English, is equivalent to The Over-soul. It is said that the effect of this one dynamic word upon his audi ence was like an electric shock or bolt of lightning striking every student within hearing of his voice. There was nothing in the vowel sounds of the word, nothing in his oratory to produce this effect, because Khunrath spoke softly and without any theatrical effects whatsoever. Yet, that lecture will remain in Rosicrucian history as the most wonderful lesson ever taught. I have noticed, in many writings of the Middle Ages, that wherever the term Over-soul is used, there is almost a reverential and sacred reference to the fact that it was first used by Khunrath in his profound and memorable lecture. We, too, are soon to know the significance of the Over-soul. We will realize that this one Germán word, or the two words in English, constitute a thought; and that thought expresses a great law, or many great laws and principies, and identifies or distinguishes one grand and magnificent phenomenon of Cosmic manifestation. You will see that his students and every Rosicrucian in any part of the world can take a this one thought, expressed in a hyphenated word, and meditate for weeks upon it, and from such meditation derive more than one great lec ture or lesson of instruction. Therefore, we should hesitate to gauge the valué of any instruction by its length or its number of words. Each of you is now in a stage of development and understanding in your progress where one word, or at least one thought, may seize


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hold of your consciousness and electrify it into a seeking of understanding and comprehension that will result in the addition of knowledge equivalent to a whole series of lessons and lectures. Throughout this Degree many of the monographs will be brief, as far as words are concerned, but profound and beyond human appreciation at the first reading.

i

Two very great problems confront us in presenting these lectures to you. First, we cannot be too clear and too revealing in everything we want to say, because it is forbidden by the organization to put into black and white some of the thoughts contained in the Eleventh Degree. They are supposed to be revealed only by whispered words from the lips of one to the ears of another, out of sight and hearing of any other person. Secondly, it is impossible to transíate into the English language some of the thoughts and teachings originally prepared and written in Latin or Sanskrit. The thought does not seem to be the same when translated. Since some thoughts cannot be expressed in words of any kind, the reader must meditate and contémplate upon the translated words in order to derive the real meaning. Remember that we do not teach truth; we do not publish truth; we cannot speak truth. Truth must grow from within and be felt or sensed in a spiritual way without the limitations of words or phrases. If you de rive any truths from our teachings, they will not be truths which we have given to you, but truths which have grown within you from the little seeds which we have sown in your consciousness. Keep in mind, therefore, that the Rosicrucian teachings are only seeds and not truths, and that our whole process is merely the selection of the proper seeds and the proper method of planting them in fertile soil where they will grow into truths ; for truth is the fruit of the tree of knowledge and is not the tree itself.

Even in the foregoing paragraphs, you will find concealed some important lessons. There are certain phrases and certain great truths which should be analyzed and developed into a significant principie for you. Take the statement, "Truth is the fruit of the tree of knowl edge and not the tree itself." If you will succeed in turning that phrase into a lecture, you will be doing what the students of Khunrath did. Just see the significance of certain words and ideas in that phrase. First of all, truth is likened to fruit or flowers, or something that starts with an almost imperceptible bud on the tree. It * evolves slowly into full manifestation and then becomes a nourishment ^ which must be taken into the body where its individual identity is lost through being absorbed into the body or consciousness. The next important point is that knowledge is likened to a tree. That is an actual symbol, but it now has new signifi cance. Knowledge, like a tree, has its main trunk and many branches of expression. Knowledge, like a tree, also is vis ible only after it has been co-ordinated and united into one


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"trunk" preparatory to reaching out to cover the various branches of science and art. But we never see the sources of the "trunk," or in other words, the primitive and original sources of the main body of knowledge. Like a tree, knowledge has its primitive roots or original sources from which it has gathered and accumulated facts or the elements necessary to constitute a great trunk of truth. Like a tree, % also, knowledge does not show any bias or prejudice in regard to the channels through which it secures its nourishment. The roots of a tree will enter into any kind of soil or condition in order to get what they want, and also the roots of a tree will penetrate the thickest and most stubborn soil, and will push rocks out of the way or go over them, or go through crevices of any kind, in order to get what they need. Likewise, the roots of the tree are unselfish servants to supply the great knowledge that constitutes the tree itself. I could go on for a long period of time showing you the great lesson that can be taken out of this one paragraph. I hope that you will do the same thing with all of the paragraphs which follow in this and succeeding lessons. We now are going to proceed with the first great lesson growing out of the symbolism in the Parabola. We are going to touch upon that which has been considered the greatest mystery or mystical element in all of the sacred mystical teachings. It is known as the alchemical marriage or Chymical Marriage. It is known also in the early Christian teachings as the spiritual marriage. We find the first injunction, or law, relating to this matter expressed in these words: "Be hold the Bridegroom cometh, go ye out to meet him." Just to let you see how differently the idea is expressed in Latin and how briefly the thought can be stated, I will give you the Latin versión in its veiled form: Ecce sponsus venit, exite obviam ei. It is said that the origin of this phrase was in the writings of St. Matthew, who credited it to Christ Jesús. Undoubtedly, Jesús did teach this law to his disciples, but he was not the first to give that great law to disciples. When Je sús used these words, he used them as a teacher and as a human teaoher, and not as the Christ principie, because the Bridegroom is the Christ and Jesús would not have used the law to intimate that he was referring to himself. Christ, or the Christ consciousness, is the Bridegroom; and the human nature in its outer worldly manifestation, including its human consciousness, is the Bride. Here are the two who are to be united in the holiest of marriages. We are to notice in this law several commands and several promises of reaction. We are first commanded to behold. The real meaning of that word is more than simply look, or watch out; it means to concéntrate carefully and devote one's attention to a certain thing. It means to be held or bound by that one idea so that we will not fail to observe and be ready for its manifestation. So we are to behold. and therefore be ready for the coming of the Bridegroom.


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We are to understand that the promise is made that the Bridegroom will come to us, near us, or cióse enough for us to be able to make the contact. The Bridegroom is not off at a distance place where we must journey in order to make the contact, but we are to understand that the Bridegroom will rise up or develop, or gradually make His apAêarance in our presence through some spiritual processes, whereby the bridegroom comes into our environment. In the next place, the command says that we are to go out in order to make the contact. Here is an excellent example of the difficulty in translating certain thoughts into words and especially into the English language. Notice that the Latin uses the word exite. We are to send out the outer nature so that it may make the contact with the Bridegroom. In other words, we are to come out of the prison, out of the shell, or out of the false attitude in which we have been living, in order that this outer self may contact the Bridegroom. The second promise is implied in the words to meet. There will be a meeting, a blending, a uniting of the Bride and Bridegroom as the ultimate result of the rest of the command. These are all significant words upon which you should speculate and find the law or the princi pie which applies to you, especially. For instance, do you realize what sort of prison you must come out of in order to meet the Bride groom? Your prison, my prison, and the prison of all our members are distinctly different. My prison may be very great and strong; it may be alluring and tempting for me to stay in it, for I may have become thoroughly accustomed to it and think that it is as fine a place to re side as any that I have ever seen. Our prisons are not just our bodies, but our mental attitudes, our habits, our standards of thought and beliefs, our faiths, and all the hundred other things that tie us fast to certain conditions in life. You may have to give up certain pleasures or indulgences, or you may have to abandon certain beliefs that have been very dear to you and most consoling. These are the things that constitute the prison out of which we must come. The physical body, itself, is not a sinful thing in which we are imprisoned, for it is one of God's creations. The thing that binds us and holds us fast more than any physical body is the mind of that body and the thoughts and principies it has established as its rule and guide in life. So to come out of your prison will mean a different problem for There is no living person who can tell you what you have to do in this regard better than you can tell yourself. You must discover what it is and what it means to you, through meditation and contemplation. In order to behold the situation, each one of us has a different problem; to meet the Bridegroom presents other problems. How far is it necessary to go to meet the Bridegroom? The promise is made that the Bridegroom is coming to us if we behold the law, but how far will the Bride groom come toward us? Surely, we cannot expect the Bridegroom

A each of those in this Eleventh Degree.


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to come all the way, for we are enjoined to go out to meet him. That means that we, too, must journey part of the way. Undoubtedly, the Bridegroom will come nearer to some of us than to others, because of the distance we have advanced previously in our journey along the Path. There may be some of you who are already very cióse to the Bridegroom, and there may be others who are far away. You have the consolation, however, that as you approach and struggle in your efforts to get closer to the Bridegroom, the Bridegroom is coming toward you. In other words, he is going to meet you halfway; at least, if you do your part. Meeting the Bridegroom may mean to some of you a very definite struggle. It will mean subduing many of your passions ; subduing and eliminating desires and ambitions, and placing this ambition ahead of all the rest. It will mean also purging yourself of undesirable qualities, for you will not want to meet the Bridegroom in poor clothing, unclean, unkempt, and unworthy. The bride always arrays herself to look the loveliest, sweetest, and the most attractive on her wedding day. This is for no other purpose than to make herself truly worthy of the bridegroom. Thus, it must be with each one of you in this marriage. This is all we shall say at this time regarding the Chymical Mar riage, for you will find, in your weekly contemplation of the many rules and laws, much food for thought. The law is a seed; if you plant it in your consciousness it will continué to grow throughout the rest of your life. Remember, the meeting with the Bridegroom may take place any week, any month, in the near future. Next week we will have more regarding this marriage and the processes. Now, let me touch upon another law for your further consideration and study. There are certain mysteries in life which are held as sacred mysteries in life, or in the spiritual world, which man ultimately cannot solve and understand. The greatest of all mysteries is that of God's consciousness in man. The first step toward the understanding of this mystery is to cease thinking of God as external. God is not only in the universe but also in man. The consciousness of God is everywhere, as well as in man. It is man who is in the universe and not on it or merely of it. The consciousness of God is life, but it is more than this; it is love and it is power. Of all the attributes of this mysterious consciousness, the greatest is that of love. For love is Creative as well as protective, and it is inspiring and illuminating. Therefore, it is life and light. If man will consider himself as the light of the life in the love of God within him, he will come to understand his own relationship to God so much better. In ^ these few words lies a key to volumes of knowledge, and it is necessary for me to withhold any further words of instruction and allow the self to develop from the seeds thus given on these few pages so that great truths may be born in your consciousness. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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C Many profound lectures have been simple, brief and terse. The great Rosicrucian, Khunrath, reduced one lecture to one word, meaning “Over-soul.” Cj[ One thought, meditated upon, might be equivalent to a complete sermón. Truth must grow from within. Truth is the fruit of the tree of knowledge and not the tree itself. Rosicrucian teachings are the seeds of truth. ÍJ In the Chymical Marriage, the Christ consciousness is the Bridegroom, and human nature is the Bride. Cf This marriage must take place within man. The Bridegroom cometh; the Bride not only must behold him, but must be prepared to meet him; must go out to meet him. íff The consciousness of God is within man, as well as surrounding him. T he consciousness of God is life, love, and power. The greatest of these, love, is Creative, protective, inspiring, and illuminating. 1t

Man is the light of life in the light of the love of God within him.

T H E IN S T IT U T IO N B E H IN D T H E R O S I C R U C I A N O R G A N I Z A T I O N Rosicrucian Park, San José, California, U. S. A .

'C o n se cra te d to truth and dedicated to every R osicrucian"


4* R O S I C R U C I A N OR D E R

TWs monograph afways remaíns the properfy of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O . R. C . It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receivíng member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Nine

Eleventh Degree Monograph Nine

THE CONCURRENCE This Week’s Consideration of a Famous Opinión

Found among the compilation of the teachings of the Rosicrucians of the 16th and 17th centuries, is the follow' ing excerpt of alchemical writings. Reference is made to the dar\ night, which is mentioned in this lesson. It may be interpreted in a physical or transcendental sense:

. . . then it happened that the dar\ness was covered with clouds, and the sun began to shine through, yet at the same time three parts of it were still heavily dar\ened; and lo, an arm bro\e through the clouds, and my body trembled because of it, and it held in its hand a letter with four seáis hanging i down from it, on which stood written: I am blac\ but comely, O ye daughters of Jerusalem, as the tents of Kedar, as the curtaim o f Solomon: Loo\ not upon me, because I am blac\, because the sun haih loo\ed upon me, etc. But as soon as the fixum acted in the humidum, a rainbow spanned itself and I thought o f the covenant of the Most High, and lo, with the planet and the fixed stars, the sun overcame the dar\ness, and over every mountain and valley there carne a lovely and bright day; then all fear and terror had an end, and everything beheld this day and rejoiced, praised the Lord, and said: The winter is past, the rain is over and gone; the flowers appear on the earth; the time o f the singing of the birds is come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land; the fig tree putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell. Aureum Seculum Redivium (The Golden Age Restored) 1621 (Taken from the Secret Symbols of the Rosicrucians)


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Beloved Members, Greetings! Again we are assembled in the anteroom for further preliminary instruction. We anticipate with keen interest further instruction re garding the Chymical Marriage and the uniting of the Bride and the Bridegroom. Therefore, we sit in silence and our interest is tense ^while we wait for the first words of our guardian and instructor, ^ i n ally he rises before us and breaks the silence with the following words: My Fratres and Sorores, this is to be the Obscure Night. It is an occasion in your instruction and guidance which you will remember always as the Obscure Night. That you may understand what is meant by this, let me explain it so that it may register in your conscious ness for all time. In fact, it should so register itself in your consciousness that throughout this incarnation and into the next, and the following ones, you will always recall the occasion of the Obscure Night. You have not yet attained the Marriage and you have not yet attained the full realization of the interior life, but you have taken the first steps and are entering into the first stages of the processes which lead to these things. Your studies and your work at the present time do not constitute the gratification of your desire to attain the spiritual marriage and the quickening of the interior life, but merely a quickening of the transcendental activities that lead to these wonderful things. But between that quicken ing, and those first steps that you have just taken and the realiza tion of your desires, there is a period of spiritual darkness which comes to all who have reached the great Path. This period of darkness was called the Obscure Night by the Essenes and by the early Christians. They derived the understanding of it and the ñame of it from the works and experiences of the early mystics of the Orient. It is equivalent to the Mystical Mystery of Aridity, which is mentioned so frequently in the spiritual writings of Latin theology. It also is referred to as the Black State of the Matter of the Alchemist. It is really the significant darkness before the dawn of initiation. It is the passage of the soul through Hades. It also is symbolized in the higher mystical teachings as the Death of Tartarus, which precedes the evolution of the inner light and the education of the withdrawn glory. Even in many other fraternities or brotherhoods which have copied their ritualistic initiations from the ^.spiritual initiation of the Rosicrucians, this darkness of the Obscure Night is symbolized by the blindfold which is placed over the eyes of the candidates. Thus, throughout the mystical writings and symbolism of all ages, and even in the classical writings of the Greeks and Romans, as well as their mythology and theology, the Obscure Night is referred to in veiled words or terms so that the unworthy will have no understanding of what is meant. In some writings of a mystical nature, it has been referred to as the sudden discovery of a fearful mystery, or as a period of time


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that is "dark, delusivo and dangerous." This Obscure Night is a state or condition in which the eye of the mind is turned inward upon itself and has not yet perceived the greater light within, It is the entrance for the first time into an unknown world when all is necessarily in doubt, darkness, danger, and vague vastness. In the quotation of one of the oldest mystical writings regard ing this intensely interesting period of development, it is described as a condition where "are heard the noises and the voices of many strange and devouring creatures, some of which are escaped with difficulty, and almost each has a different sound." This description is symbolical, of course. The world into which you enter at this time is unquestionably vast, for it is inimitable in space and immor tal in time, It is absolutely dark; darker than any darkness known to man; for the worldly light does not reach it, and the spiritual light has not yet been discerned. The noises and the voices of many strange creatures are the vibrations of consciousness of every living thing in the universe, The devouring nature of some of these creatures symbolizes the temptation and absorption of some of the worldly characters who attempt to lead us from the Path and hold us spellbound in their grasp. In order to enter into this darkness and dwell in it for a time, fortitude and strength of character, as well as determination, is required. Those who, because of timidity or fear, hesitate at the entrance of this Obscure Night or after the first hour's experience therein, are sometimes called dwellers in the alchemical garden. This peculiar phrase means that these persons are waiting until they learn the alchemist's secret of transmuting fear into fearlessness, and hesitancy into action. Therefore, if you ever read or hear of those who are dwelling in the alchemical garden, you will know that they have not passed through the Obscure Night and have not found the rising sun or the Great Light of the New Dawn. Those who enter fearlessly and enthusiastically into the first hour of the Obscure Night, and seek to go all through the remaining hours, will find that the first hour represents the greatest effort and struggle necessary to pass the night. In other words, it is the initial hour, and the first step in that hour, that represents more than half of the labor required to pass through the whole night, and assures success to each who manifests this fearlessness and enthusiasm. It is evident, therefore, that the Obscure Night is a period just before the New Dawn, or the New Birth into the Greater Light. Some mystical writings refer to this New Dawn as the Golden Dawn, and those who dwell in the Golden Light of the new day are called Brothers and Sisters of the Golden Dawn.


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In some mystical writings, it would appear as though there was an entirely separate organization known as the Order of the Golden Dawn, sometimes referred to as the G.D. This is supposed to refer to the highest development in the Rosicrucian fraternity. But in order that those unfamiliar with the processes may not understand from the writ ings to what the symbolism refers, it is often said that only those in 0the Order or Brotherhood of the Golden Dawn know the real work of the Rosicrucians. Likewise, some mystical writings of the past have said that the true fraternity of the Rosicrucians would be found only.in the Order of the Golden Dawn; in other words, in the G. D., but that this real fraternity has no temples made by hand, ñor any visible or ganization. This has been the puzzling statement that has led so many persons to believe that the real Rosicrucian Order had no con crete organization, no visible brotherhood, no temples, ñor lodges on earth. Many eminent writers on mysticism of the present time have been misled by these veiled references and, therefore, their readers have been misled, much to our regret. On the other hand, many mystical writers purposely have veiled their statements by intimating that there was no visible organization, in order to discourage the curiosity seeker. One such great Rosicru cian writer was Karel Weinfurter, who wrote a very outstanding manuscript on "The Lost Word Regained." In recent years, some of his writings were translated into English and published in English. The book is very difficult to secure, since it had a limited edition and was not for public distribution. However, in this translated versión we read the following words: "A great many are marching the same way as did and do the members of the sublimest brotherhood upon earth, known as Rosicrucians, or the Brotherhood of the Rosy Cross . . . . the actual Rosicrucians have no visible brotherhood, no lodge where they meet each other, whereas they do exist and there is a possibility to get into personal touch with them. But this is only reserved to those mystics who have attained the actual inner baptism." It will be seen by this statement that the author is paradoxical. If there really was no visible organization or brotherhood of Rosicru cians, then his second statement that it is possible to get in personal touch with them would be absolutely false. He has worded his state ment very carefully by the use of a few adjectives. He says that the actual Rosicrucians have no visible brotherhood, meaning there| b y that the real or highest, or most advanced Rosicrucians, consti^tuting the inner, secret group, do not have temples or lodges, in which to pursue their studies. This, you will realize, is absolutely true, inasmuch as you, who are now in the Eleventh Degree and preparing to enter this inner circle or sanctuary, will have no visible lodge or temple where you come together to study, but will meet in the invisible psychic sanctuary. Yet it is possible for you to meet others in the same sanctuary, and come in per sonal touch with them. You will notice also that he says that


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in order to meet these unknown, actual Rosicrucians, it is necessary to have attained the actual or real inner baptism. The significant word here is the word inner. This, you will understand in a few moments. Those persons constituting the general public who read such t statements as the above-mentioned, and then hear of our organization * and its worldly activities, often come to the conclusión that the mate rial organization of Rosicrucians is false and unreal. That explains why so many persons who have only casually read mystical literature are ready to claim that there is no real, visible organization of Rosicrucians, and that any claim in this regard is false and misleading. It is difficult to argüe with such persons, for you cannot explain the truth to them; therefore, all that you can do is to say that they may believe as they please, but the time may come when they will know better. As you approach the hour of the Golden Dawn, or the moment of new birth, when you come face to face with the Greater Light from within, you will be then face to face with the Portal of the Sanctuary. Here is another symbolical term with which you should become familiar. The Portal of the Sanctuary is the entrance way to the great temple where the Holy Assembly dwells in peace, power, and proficiency. Passing from the Obscure Night, with its many hours of meditation and preparation, to the place and condition of facing the new light of the new day at the great Portal of the Sanctuary, constitutes the baptism of regeneration. Here, then, will occur the Chymical Marriage and the uniting of the Bride and the Bridegroom. Let us now contémplate in sacred reverence and sublime appreciation that which occurs during the hours of the Obscure Night. This night is a period of trial and of temptation where the soul will pass through all of the bitterness of Calvary and where the Christ within us seems to be foresaken by the Father of All. It is a night of contradiction and of that special conflict which comes out of the worldly spirit of perversity. Here, both the mind and the senses are drawn strongly toward earthly things. Even though the spirit may be strong and the desire may be burning with enthusiasm, nevertheless the weakness of the flesh will tend to yield, and mind and senses will desire to go backward toward the worldly form and nature of things. We can com pare ourselves in this dark night as being like the children of Israel in the desert, with the human side yearning for the flesh pots of Egypt and turning away from the lighter food of the spiritual manna, which had not yet been tasted, and of which the power and influence had not yet been realized. Thus we see that this great night of obscurity is a turning point in our attainment of spiritual illumination. It is a time when there is every opportunity for the closest unión between the heart of man and the heart of God, and many really spiritual natures have never passed beyond this night,


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for they were weak in their determination and too easily won by the voice of the Tempter. Such great mystics, even as Cornelius Agrippa, failed to pass it because of their deep interest in the material side of their knowledge. On the other hand, such eminent mystics as William Postel and Thomas Vaughan, and thousands of others, passed through the Night easily and safely and with great joy in their hearts. In the early rituals of the Román Catholic Church reference was made to this mystical pe riod, and the applicant for admission to the higher and inner circles of the church was instructed to desire the healing agony of the purgatorial fire. "Without a sob or a resistance" was he to contémplate his passage through the night. Those who, like the children of Israel, remain wandering in the desert of the Obscure Night and enter not into the promised land of the Golden Dawn, always face, throughout their lives a bitter struggle to accomplish their ultimate desires and hopes. Yet, God does not leave them forsaken, for their attainment and accomplishment in the past, which brought them to the hour of the Ob scure Night, saves them in the end and allows them to enjoy health, happiness, and the necessities of life, even though they do not attain the greater mastership and control of universal principies. In this period of darkness, preceding the dawn, when we must face the triáis and temptations that will test our determination and our worthiness, it is only right that we should contémplate the act of prayer and its valué. In such a time, our prayers should be expressions of aspiration and pleas for strength, that we may remain steadfast in our desires and yield not to temptation. Our prayers should also be invocations wherein the soul, collecting all of the forces from the Cosmic, summons these to her assistance that she may in turn strengthen our natures and aid us to face the situations that arise. So, we find that the Obscure Night is one of transcendental experiences. It is the time when the ángel who is to follow will follow, and the ángel who is to rise will rise. It is the time when those principalities and powers surrounded by strong hosts and mighty angels of both the Cosmic and mundane world beckon unto us to unite with them and enjoy what they have to offer. Therefore, you are to dwell in the Obscure Night for the next few months, giving as much of your time to prayer and meditation as is possible. Each week, through these weekly lessons, you will receive guidance and instruction as to how to strengthen yourselves, remain steadfast, and reject the temptations, in order to reach the hour of the Golden Dawn and the birth of a new day with a new life for you. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefuUy read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

The Obscure Night is a period of transcendental experiences preliminary to the entrance into the Temple of Ulumination; a turning point of spiritual illumination. *31 The first hour of the Obscure Night is that of greatest struggle. fj During the Obscure Night, our prayers should be expressions of aspiration and pleas for strength against temptation. The Obscure Night is known also by such terms as Mystical Mystery of Aridity, Black State of Matter, and the Death of Tartarus. It is symbolized in the passage of the soul through Hades; by the blindfold used in initiation ceremonies. The Obscure Night is referred to in mystical litera ture of all ages, t

Cf Although many mystics pass easily through the dark night, many find it extremely difficult, and some fail completely.

¡immv

— .•••


ROSICRUCIAN ORDER

*

This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Ten

Eleventh Degree Monograph Ten

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O . R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, engraved, typewritten^ and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses academic studies diagram s, illustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A . M . O. R. C. (Trie above amblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving and are ¡mparted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M . O. R. C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contente herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive Information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attampted use does, ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A. M . O. R. C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movements.

This Week’s Consideration of a Famous Opinión V j i /

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^ Throughout the more advanced teachings of the Rosi' crucian studies, the adept has been informed gradually of the importance of the Word. In this lesson, a different in' terpretation is given to this subject. Along this same line of thought are the following excerpts from the profound and mystical writings of the uneducated Jacob Boehme, which were gained through illumination:

In the spirit of the word is to be understood the whole of Divinity, with all its powers and effects, and with its whole essence; its uprising, penetrat' ing, and changing; the whole action and the whole generation.

Thus every creature has its own center for its outspea\ing, or the sound of the formed word within itself, both the etemal and temporal beings; the unreasoning ones as well as man; for the first Ens has been spo\en out of the sound o f God, by wisdom, out of her center into the fire and light, and has been formed into the fiat, and entered into ‘com paction. The Ens is out of the etemal, but the compaction is out of the temporal; and therefore in every thing there is something etemal hidden in time. In that quality in which each word in the human voice in the act o f out' spea\ing forms and manifests itself, either in the love o f God, as in the Holy Ens, or in the wrath of God; in the same quality will it be ta\en up again therein after it has been spoên out. The false word becomes infected by the devil.

The word is near to thee, even within thy heart and lips, and God him' self is the word which is in thy heart and lips. — JACOB BOEHME, 15754624


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! While you are dwelling in the Obscure Night, waiting the development of certain conditions and manifestations, and determining just what is your individual effort for the future, there are certain little helps that I can give you in a veiled way, which were given to the mystics in ancient times while they dwelt in the period of the Obscure Night. They came together each morning at sunrise for their usual salutations and prayers. Before retiring to the privacy of their cells to spend their time in meditation and contemplation, the Guardian stood before them and read certain texts or proverbs. These were brief paragraphs or sentences ; each one a great fundamental truth or law, veiled in the briefest words so that they could take these thoughts with them to their cells to be used as keys to meditate upon during the day. One of the manif estations that will come to you sooner or later, perhaps during the Obscure Night, will be the keen realization of sev eral words, or one word of several syllables, that will seem to impress themselves upon you in a strange way. First, let me tell you that this word or group of words will constitute what the ancient mys tics called the inner word. In the Christian doctrines it is referred to as The Word. Emphasis is given to the fact that all spiritual per sons eventually come to believe that in the beginning of all creation there was one great word called The Word. This is the so-called lost word. It is not the lost word, however, that will come to you during your development, but a word that will be important to you throughout your lifetime and probably of little valué to anyone else. If I were to speak from my own experience and judgment, I would cali this the thought rather than the word, or the inner thought instead of the in ner word, because this inner word may be just one word, as I have said, or several words; but in every case, the word or words will con stitute a single thought. Of course, it is possible for one word to convey a thought to the mind of another which would take a number of words to explain. Take the one word love for instance. It is easy enough to express the idea with one word, so far as conveying the thought to another is concerned, but the moment one attempts to analyze the thought, a great many more words than one are necessary even to outline the nature and effect of love. Each highly-evolved being on the Path, who has participated in the Chymical Marriage, will have this word or thought as the secret key to his inner consciousness. I cannot tell you much about it at the present time, because even what I have said in the few lines above is apt to create suggestions or ideas in your mind that may influence the coming of the word, or cause you to create one artificially. I hope, therefore, that none of you will allow your minds to concéntrate upon the word love, or any other word arbitrarily selected by you, and unconsciously foster or forcé


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a selected word upon yourself and thereby blot out the real word or group of words that should come from the Cosmic. Since it is too easy to deceive ourselves in this regard, I hesitate to explain very much about it. It is as though you were being led into a great garden of many flowers and told that you were to select one of them, which was to be the key to your life. Then suppose that you were told that the right selection of this flower would come as a Cosmic urge and that you were to sit in the midst of the flowers until you had an inspiration and a conviction as to which flower was to be selected. If nothing more were told to you about it, you probably would depend solely upon a Cosmic impulse. But if I went on to explain to you that the flower was of a certain color and grew to a certain height on a bush, merely to illustrate to you what I meant by selecting a flower, the chances are that my words might cause you to look for a bush or a flower nearly like the one I had described, and unconsciously to-select that one instead of listening to the Cosmic impulse, However, I may tell you the following facts, taken from the oldest of the Rosicrucian manuscripts, without unduly influencing you. The inner word or thought is an expression of the divine self in each one of us. In fact, the early mystics of the Christian era claim that it is the voice of the prophet spoken on our own beings. The outstanding fact about this is that the word or thought becomes an infallible guide, incapable of error. Please read that sentence again. The thought or word is for you, and you alone. You might meet, sometime in your lifetime, one or two persons who have received the same or a similar word or thought, but it is more than likely that you will go through life without ever having found another with the same thought or word. Of course, you will not give this word to anyone else except a person whom you know to have gone into the Eleventh Degree, who has passed through the same stages of development as yourself, and who also has received a word. The exchange of words with such persons can do no harm, inasmuch as once the true word has been given to a person, or the true word has been realized, nothing said by anyone else can ever change it for you. In other words, if you have listened carefully and heard the proper word or thought, the fact that someone else has a different one, or a word that has meant more to him than your word seems to mean to you, will never cause you to look for a new word in exchange for the one you have, because once properly realized you will know that your word is yours and that there could never be an other one to take its place. I have said that it would become a guide for you. I mean by this that this word will be much like a magic power of some kind, not because it really deais with magic, but because you will realize its power and its significance ; you will obey it, and listen to it as though it were some magic power that influenced you. You will know that this word or group of words, spoken softly when you are alone or in the silence, immediately will attune you


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with the Cosmic and bring you into intimate contact with one of the great Masters of the Cosmic. You will discover that the word will protect you from harm, relieve illness, change conditions, and vibrations. It will do many other startling things for you, not merely through the vibrations of its sound but because it will immediately bring you under the protection and guidance of one of the great Masters. It is of valué to know, however, that the guardian always warned his pupils that others in the past occasionally had disobeyed the word or ignored it; in such circumstances, they had quickly learned that such an act brought them grief and sorrow. Of course, we are all human and the human element in us is very apt to cause us to feel at times that our own reasoning is superior to any other thoughts that may come from the outside or the inside. In other words, the voice of the Tempter often tries to make us ignore the inner word and listen to our own reasoning. In such cases, inevitably we fail, thereby learning a lesson. You will judge from what I have said here in this veiled way that this inner word or thought will come to you at times when you are in doubt or when you need the still small voice to guide you. I am not going to tell you, however, how, when, or where the word suddenly will manifest itself to you when you most need it. This, you must learn from experience. We have an excellent example, in the very oíd mystical stories of Moses in the Christian Bible, of a person who at times disobeyed the Divine Voice and paid no attention to the inner word. Perhaps you have never realized that the story of Moses is more allegorical and symbolical than a truthful presentation of facts. It is one of the most veiled stories that the Bible contains. At times it would seem that Moses was not one person but several persons. If we keep in mind the fact that Moses simply symbolized the one who had been initiated, but who swayed back and forth between earthly temptation and Divine urge, we will realize that we are not reading the story of one man, but of a character that represented many men or many personalities. The one outstanding lesson that we get from the story of Moses is the beautiful mystical fact that while a man is both spiritual and physical, and can have in him the Divine Voice, ready and willing to urge him and advise him, God has ordained that man shall have free will and shall A ’hear the temptation of the world as well as the advice of the inner consciousness. He has the privilege of choosing as he pleases. This leads me to a point where I may safely and confidentially comment on one of the ancient Rosicrucian laws which we have refrained from using in any of the lower Degrees because it is so apt to be misunderstood. That law is this: "Do what thou wilt, is the whole of the law; love is the law; love under


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will." The first part of that law is the most significant. "Do what thou wilt, is the whole of the law." Now that does not mean that you can do as you please, and that there is no other law except the law permitting you to go through life and do anything and everything that you desire to do. You would see at once that such a principie would not be any law at all. The key to the whole law lies in the word will. This command to do the things you will to do means to do the things that you have reasoned upon, examined, analyzed, and finally agreed upon, with the understanding that you will assume all the responsibility for your act, and bear all of the Karma that results therefrom. You see, therefore, that the law is very much like the other one expressed in our teachings, "If you daré to do, you will have the power to do." After you have had the inner word given to you and have become acquainted with the signal alarm or impulse from the self within which tells you when you are right or wrong in your planning, then, if you will to do anything, that shall be the law unto you. Of course, I am again veiling my words. You must analyze every word and thought in the foregoing sentences and meditate upon them in order to arrive at the sublime, transcendental truths contained in them. There are two sources of will in the universe. One is the will of God; the other is the will of man. Let all of your actions be according to will. That is the whole of the law. You must do either the will of God or your own will, for there is no other law but this. I now will quote one very beautiful passage that is the outstanding gem of thought in the oldest of Rosicrucian writings, dealing exclusively with this subject of the inner word and attempting to make you feel and realize the sound and nature of the word. Just listen to this beautiful expression: "The lingual powers of nature are to the inner self what the scale of tones in music is for the musician. The letters or vowel sounds of the alphabet are the school for the inner self. Man must let the very spirit of these sounds work upon him until his life's emotions become awakened to the point of infallibility, as the ear of the musician becomes trained in hearing musical sounds with infallibility; in other words, the inner self must become so familiar with the intimate powers of the soul of the inner word that God ceases to be something far and strange, and the inner self is able to speak with God as though speaking with the outer self." There is another beautiful extract which I think I may safely use at the present time. It is from the same manuscript. "God is of the essence of the word, and the essence of the word is expressed in the vowel sounds or letters of the human language. In the beginning, when there were not yet worlds or beings, or creatures, there was naught but seeming space. Space was filled


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with powers and with the forces of God. These powers had to be organized that they might become constructivo, creativo, and beneficent. God organized these powers by the sending forth of the word which by the vowels and the essences of their powers controlled the powers of the universe." Still another passage may guide you in your contemplation: "God has given himself unto or into man, and the spirit of man or his con sciousness is a part of God. But more than this, through the vowel sounds of his language God has permitted man the privilege and capacity of calling the spirit powers of the universe and of thus becoming identified with them and bringing his ego into contact and attunement with God." There is much more that I can tell you after you have found your word, but I daré not say more at present. It is inevitable that at various points on the Path your teacher must leave you alone to meditate and contémplate. It may be that at such times your heart and soul will cry aloud for one word of instruction, or one answer to a great problem; but the Master must remain silent; the answer must come from within. Thus it is with each one of you. You must dwell in si lence, meditation, and contemplation, during your period of the Ob scure Night, and wait for the Dawn when the marriage will take place; in the meantime, listen for the inner word. That word may be a famil iar one that you have often heard. It may be a sentence composed of two, three, or four short words like a proverb, or a prophetic saying, or a law or a command. I cannot tell you what it will be like, and God forbid that I should give you one that would not be the true one. It must come to you. Through your prayers and through your medita tion, you will bring it to you. Arise, if you can, early in the morning at sunrise, and before eating or breaking fast, bathe, then sit or stand in a position facing the sunrise, and search for the word. Sean the horizon of the sky where the sun is rising as though you were seeking the rising of the Son of Man, and the Son of God to come forth with the word written on a scroll. Then search yourself inwardly. Listen to every sound that may come to your mind, every word that may come to your thoughts from within. Write down those that seem strongly impressed upon your con sciousness, but do not adopt them or accept them unless, after many days of seeking, the same word continúes to come or the same thought is expressed. Pray for the light to come to you and pray for the word to reveal itself. Go into contemplation after breakfast again, if you can, or at midday, or at sunset, and again before retiring. The most important period of your life is at hand, and every moment that you can give to such contemplation or medi tation during the Obscure Night will be worth all of the trouble, time, and denial of pleasures that you can possibly


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give to this period. Do not ask others what success they are having until you are ready to answer that you have been successful, and then do not discuss this matter with any except those whom you may discover to be in the same position and same point of development as yourself. It may be many weeks before you receive the word; or it may be cióse at hand. I can only pray for you that it may be soon. In the meantime, I will send you again next week some further thoughts upon which to contémplate. This lesson should be read many times during the coming week, taking a paragraph of it at a time for contemplation and meditation. Analyze carefully each sentence and make it a part of your very being. May the Cosmic Masters be with you and guide you. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, tiy to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

Each is to look for the inner word, the expression of the divine self within, which is a guide incapable of error. It will protect you, relieve illness, and change vibrations. 9

The inner word varíes with each individual, but retnains infallible once obtained.

fJÍ This word will attune the user with one of the great masters of the Cosmic. Disobedience of the word brings grief and sorrow. 9

The voice of the Tempter tries to make one ignore the inner word and listen to one’s own reasoning. Moses exemplifies an initiate who vacillated between the inner word and the voice of the Tempter.

9

“Do what thou wilt, is the whole of the law; love is the law; love under will.” The inner voice forewams if what one wills to do is either right or wrong; if right, what one wills to do is a law unto oneself.





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R O S I C R U C I A N ORDE R ________________________ A M O R C ________________________


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Eleventh D egree Monograph Eleven

Eleventh Degree Monograph Eleven

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O . R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, engraved, typewritten^ and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copyrighted monograph*, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses academic studies, diagrams, ¡llustrations, and charts” as authorized by the Imperator or A . M. O. R. C. (The above emblem and ñame of the O rde r are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving. and are imparted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme S ra n d Lodge of A . M. O. R .C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not ofherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, terminate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A. M . O. R. C. is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Im perator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movements.

This Week’s Consideration of a Famous Opinión V

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9 Each member of the Eleventh Degree is awaiting anx' iously the arrival of the Golden Dawn. Gradually as it approaches, new horisons appear, thus widening our scope of visión and understanding. Plato speaks of this new birth into light as the “revolution of the soul.” In the fol' lowing portion of the Cave Story, taken from the Re public, he voices his Seal for human enlightenment: In the world of \nowledge, the essential Form o f Good appears last of all, and can barely be perceived; but when perceived, we cannot help con' cluding that it is in every case the source of all that is bright and beautiful, in the visible world giving birth to light and its principie the sun, and in the intellectual world dispensing truth and reason; and that whoso would act wisely must set this Form of G ood before his eyes. Our present argument shows us that there is a faculty residing in the soul, and an instrument enabling each of us to learn; and that this faculty or instrument must be wheéled around, in company with the entire soul, from the perishing world, untíl it be enabled to endure the contemplation of the real world and the brightest part thereof, which is the Form of the Good. Am I not right? This is a question involving the revolution of a soul, which is the travers' ing of a road leading from a \ind of night'li\e day up to a true day of real existence; and this road we shall doubtless declare to be true philosophy. — PLATO, 427'347 B.C.


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Beloved Members, G r e e t in g s !

This week we will have just a few more suggestions for you to use in your meditation or contemplation period. From the few letters I have received, it is quite evident that most of you are going to have a keen realization of the fact that while you are dwelling in the Ob scure Night you are in a very critical period of your development. At this time, I shall introduce one of the brief messages that the Guardian used to give his class members at this point: "Be mindful ever of the fact that the Tempter is still dwelling on the Threshold. There are múltiple tempters and múltiple thresholds. When we come into this life at birth we cross the threshold from one world into another, and here we meet the first tempter— which is the spirit of materialism with all of its vanity, ignorance, and gross misunderstanding. That tempter tempts us all through childhood and succeeds well in planting seeds of misunderstanding and miscomprehension in our consciousness. When you crossed the threshold and came into this Order, you met another tempter whose warning should be ever in your mind. He represented the spirit of doubt and insincerity, and spoke his words in the voice of religious and spiritual mockery. At the threshold of your first spiritual awakening, when you entered into the first stages of your psychic development, the tempter again was present to question your inner convictions and to challenge you and to mock at your belief in any power of development and advancement. "Here again you will meet another one of the many tempters that have been at every threshold. This tempter has a very definite and age-old story to tell. I have listened to his voice as he has spoken to many preceding you in this very temple. It is neither my privilege ñor my province to silence him, for while I disagree with what he says and know the evil of his ways, I know also the power that will result from the overcoming of his tempting voice. So I have allowed him to speak in the past as he will be allowed to speak to you again, and I shall watch with concern whether you heed him or prove your mastership by ignoring him. He will tell you that you are foolish to expect any greater power than you now have, and that you need not look for the significance of any coming Dawn, for each dawn is but the beginning of a new day and the days of evil are just as beautiful as the days of goodness. He will laugh at your hope that the new day will bring you greater strength and understanding than you have found in any other day of your life. He will tell you that you are wasting time and precious hours through your studies and meditation, while all the world is offering you gayety, happiness, cheer, and excitement. He will tell you that if you insist upon waiting for the Golden Dawn and find only a little indication of some change, that this will prove that you expected too much and that there is no great thing to come but only the little things that you imagine and which are of no consequence whatsoever. He will try to tell


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you that you have given four years, six years, or ten years to this work and study without any benefit, and that the benefits you think you have received are purely fictitious creations on the part of your mind and are born of hope rather than fact. He will urge you to seek more practical and worldly instructions and to play with material laws .and principies and leave the spiritual and psychic alone because they will not serve you as will the others. He will do his utmost to discourage you in attaining any spiritual development, for he knows that this brings rebirth and the beginning of new life, and that it will unveil and unlock the material world and show it to you in all of its tinsel, false veneer, and impotency. You may listen to him, if you will, though I warn you that this would truly be time wasted, and it is weakening to the moral character to let him occupy your mind and attention. But yielding to him would mean rapidly returning over all the bridges you have crossed and bringing yourself back to the begin ning of your journey. Be strong in your determination, and mastership will be your reward." After you have entered into the new days of the Golden Dawn, you will find that you have awakened a new Creative power within you, which will become one of the most astonishing faculties man has ever possessed. Now, I do not want any of you to discover the usefulness of this power in the shocking way in which I discovered it. Unfortunately, I did not have the valued instruction in the same way that you are receiving it. My instructions were greatly condensed and I had to study alone, for there was no teacher here in America to guide me carefully. Masses of manuscripts were sent to me from abroad, which I had to dig through and transíate and arrange in the proper steps. Night after night, and day after day, I tried new experiments and new prin cipies, often far ahead of my own development, in order that I could anticipate things that were coming and understand better how to trans íate much of the work that I was getting ready to give to new members. In this way, I never received the warning that I am giving to you now, and I suddenly found that I had awakened and developed a certain amount of Creative power that I did not realize I had. I discovered it through seeing that certain things that I wanted to do, or thought about doing, were suddenly brought into manifestation. Even this did not give me a hint as to what was going on or what had happened, and it was not until I began to think of other persons and their problems that I realized that as soon as I thought of a thing or desired a thing properly, it was fulfilled. I found also that I was able to bring this fulfillment of Creative powers into the lives of others. Some of the things that I did unconsciously, without realizing that I was doing, were very shocking or surprising. I had to cali a halt in my thinking until I caught up with my psychic abvancement and understood better what I was doing. Therefore, I want each one of you to be forewarned of the fact that after you pass through the rebirth and regeneration

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of the Golden Dawn, you are going to find yourselves capable of creating results and realizing your plans as never before. It will be necessary, therefore, that you take special care to direct your Crea tive powers along lines that are in sympathy with the Cosmic plan. For this reason, you will have to select certain big projects in life that you want to have accomplished, and center your Creative power on them. I cannot tell you about all of this at the present time, for I must explain it gradually, but I want to say this much of a definite nature: You must begin now, during your thinking and resting periods of the Obscure Night, to decide what branches of the great v/ork carried on by the Cosmic you wish to help the most with your Creative power. Are you interested in politics? If so, you will have to try to discover what it is the Cosmic would want to have done in regard to the political matters in your city, county, or state, and then having discovered what the Cosmic may be desiring to have done, throw your self in harmony with the Cosmic and help to create the conditions the Cosmic wants. If you are interested in humanitarian activities, hospitals, asylums, or homes, you will have to throw your Creative power into that line. If you are interested in the care of poor or unfortunate children, the blind, or the sick, you will have to turn your Creative power in that direction. Is your city planning to buy, secure, and develop a public park or a large public auditorium, or improve a lake, or do some other things that will benefit the public? Is your city or county thinking about getting a new hospital or a new home for the poor? Are some persons connected with your church, or some other church, planning some practical helpfulness to the blind or the needy? There are hundreds of methods by which you can use your Creative power to help the Cosmic. Whatever you do, you must not select any thing that is of a strictly limited, personal nature. It must have some relationship to the lives, the happiness, or the benefit of others, as well as to yourself. Later, when you have gained grace from the Cosmic by having helped it with unselfish problems, you may bring forth one of your own personal ones, but you must not start with personal ones in the beginning. All this week, while you are meditating upon the Obsure Night and following out the suggestions given in the last two or three monographs, keep in mind the great things for others that are being planned by your city or state officials, to which you can give your Cre ative power. May the Joy of Peace and Happiness be your Cosmic Blessing Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recafi as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

9 T he student is advised not to heed the voice of the Tempter. 9 New Creative powers will be awakened after entering the days of the Golden Dawn. 9 Through rebirth, you will be able to utilize your Creative powers as never before. 9 These Creative results must be in harmony with the Cosmic plan. 9

First, center your Creative powers upon altruistic projects.

Then, after unselfish

problems have been served, solution to personal problems may be sought.

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Eleventh Degree Monograph T welve

Eleventh Degree Monograph T welve


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9 During the Obscure Night, while awaiting the ap' proach of the Golden Dawn, it is suggested that many un' necessary, worldly luxuries be sacrificed. This is not a new suggestion for those eamestly seeking regeneration. Many of the sacred scriptures of the past have given sug' gestions. One such source is found in the Mahabharata, the Brahmanical scripture, a collection of the essence of all the Vedas which are the earliest known record of religious truths:

Who truly \noweth My divine hirth and wor\s, casteth off this body and is not bom again. O Arjuna, he cometh unto Me! Many from whom have dropt desire, wrath and fear, full of M y spirit, ma\ing their home in Me, through penance o f wisdom purified, have entered into M e . . . The sacrifice o f wisdom surpasseth far the sacrifice of substance; for all action, son o f Pritha, is wholly in wisdom comprehended. That wisdom thou shouldst leam by discipleship, questionings and serv' ice. Those wise ones who perceive the Truth will teach \nowledge unto thee, which having leamt, O son of Pandu, thou shalt not again fall into folly and shalt see all beings first in thyself and then in Me. Raise thyself by thy self; debase not thyself, for a mans own self is his friend, a mans own self his foe. A devotee should constantly exercise himself in abstraction, abiding in > a secret place, his mind and self restrained, free from expectation or possessions. Planting his seat in a place undefiled, covered with deers\in and Kusa grass, he should practice devotion for the purification o f his heart, and fix his mind on Me, his final Goal. —M AHABHARATA (500 B.C.?)


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! We have come together again for our weekly instructions and guidance in our contemplations and meditations. For a time, we shall continué to dwell in the Obscure Night. According to tradition, forty days and forty nights shall we remain in darkness awaiting the Golden Dawn. This period of forty days and forty nights is not an arbitrary thing, but is associated in some way with a spiritual law or principie which may be revealed to us just after we come out of the night into the day Throughout antiquity, forty days has been the period associated with spiritual regeneration of the individual and the mass. Many of these periods are recorded in the sacred writings of the Orient. Perhaps the oldest reference to this period of forty days is in regard to the proper method of embalming. The Egyptians maintained that unless their unique embalming process was administered carefully for forty days, the soul of the departed one would not be ready for rebirth. They looked upon the duration of forty days as a period wherein the soul was dwelling in the Obscure Night, awaiting rebirth. Many other references to this period of forty days may be found in the compilation of the traditional spiritual laws and principies of the past as recorded in the Oíd Testament of the Christian Bible. Elijah was forty days on Mount Horeb awaiting mystical illumination. For forty days, Moses separated himself from the world, fasting and meditating prior to the great revelation that came from a reawakening in a new world of realities; for forty days, he was on Mount Sinai await ing the spiritual and intellectual rebirth. Egypt, for forty years, passed through one phase of the Obscure Night, awaiting the rebirth of one of its cycles of development. This symbolical period of the Obscure Night may be recognized in the duration of forty years that the children of Israel were in the hands of the Philistines: a period of suffering before they were able to realize the kingdom that had been prepared for them. It required forty days for the Israelite spies, sent out by Moses, to cross the wilderness into the promised land of Canaan, and return bearing wondrous fruits as proof of the great wealth and abundant harvest of the land. In other words, this was a period of suffering, privation, and want, during which they were striving to reach a spiritual place they symbolized as Canaan. This material rather than spiritual interpretation is a typical illustration of the many misinterpretations of the passages in the Christian Bible, caused by the lack of understanding of the translators, as well as by the extreme difficulty in translating the subtle, underlying spiritual significances found in the original source. Another example of such misinterpretation is found in the reference to a diet of manna, which the children of Israel ate


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for forty years while in the wilderness. There have been many discussions in the past one hundred years regarding the physical nature of the physical food which was dropped from the sky to feed the physical bodies of these Israelites. It is amusing to see the extent to which learned men, including theologians, will go, to prove that it was pos sible for God to have sent something from the clouds in the form of a vegetable, or an edible substance such as could have grown in that wilderness, which could have kept the children of Israel alive for that period of time. Many books and lengthy discourses have been written concerning this material question. However, here, as in the case of the interpreters of the original Biblical literature, they have dwelled upon the physical rather than the spiritual sense. They have overlooked entirely the fact that it was not the physical food for the physical bodies, but rather the spiritual food for the spirit ual bodies which sustained the children of Israel for forty years. In the New Testament, we find also this period of forty days symbolically referred to as a period of darkness Just prior to the Gold en Dawn of Illumination. In the wilderness, Jesús was tempted by Satan for forty days. Here again, is symbolized the Obscure Night, during which Jesús withdrew from the world to await the Golden Dawn of supreme spiritual power. If we keep in mind the topography of the country in which Jesús lived, we can understand more readily that the terms such as wilder ness and mountaintop of necessity must have a symbolical significance. There were no great mountains in Palestine, only rolling hills, and these were so frequently traversed that solitude therein would be an improbability. Likewise, there are no great deserts or wildernesses in Palestine, where one would be likely to isolate oneself from humanity for forty days. Henee, it stands to reason that these Biblical references are purely symbolical. The height of the mountain had nothing to do with the incident; instead it signifies the rising of the inner self to greater heights. When it speaks of "ascending the mount," this signifies taking the necessary steps in preparation for initiation. When it speaks of "going into the wilderness," this simply signifies a retreat to a place of quiet seclusion for meditation and concentration to wait Cosmic revelation. Thus, we could cite many such references to this period of forty days, found in the Christian Bible, and other sources of sacred liter ature as well. Each incident has its mystical and spiritual interpretation. In each case, the individual or group of individuáis in ques tion had to dwell in a period of darkness, want, privation, or negation, while awaiting a release of spiritual power, the influx of spiritual wisdom or strength, or a new day of new opportunities: W j j / a new eyele of existence. The interpreters, in their literal translations of the sacred writings, seemed to have lost sight v of the fact that this forty-day period symbolically refers to


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the spiritual and psychic separation from the material things of life. What a world of difference we find in the illuminating understanding of the sacred traditions when once we have the proper key! That is the purpose of our coming together again; that is the purpose of our entering the Obscure Night to be reborn. We want more of these keys that unlock the mysteries of life. We return now to the period of forty days as applied to us. We are told by the Guardian that we must dwell in the Obscure Night for forty days. This period, again, is symbolical. For some, it may mean only three weeks ; while for others, it may require even a greater length of time; eight weeks, maybe longer. The duration is determined by the length of time necessary to partake of all the spiritual food, and the time needed to reach that higher degree of inner development. As the Dawn approaches, each of you will begin to sense that a change has been taking place within you. However, this great change and in ner development will depend upon how much meditation and reflection you give to your spiritual self while dwelling in the Obscure Night. It is necessary to turn your thoughts inwardly, and concéntrate upon the spiritual self, to attain a great awakening at the Golden Dawn. During this period of the Obscure Night, some of you may feel an inner urge to eliminate from your life some of the accustomed physical pleasures ; in such a case, you should obey that urge. Perhaps you feel that you should fast to some degree by eliminating some of the heavier meáis, or some of the more enjoyable foods. You may do so, but it will not be necessary to omit food entirely; for nothing should be done that will weaken the body. Many foods can be eliminated from the diet with out doing bodily harm. Those of you who feel that you should refrain from indulgences of the flesh, or those things which bring mental and physical pleasure, should do so. Most certainly we can eliminate many of the worldly pleasures and still enjoy the real part of life. It is recommended particularly that during the latter part of the Obscure Night, we make as many sacrifices of our physical pleasures as pos sible. Each day, see if you can sacrifice upon the symbolical altar of the Temple something of a purely physical nature that you personally enjoy. However, each should act only in accordance with the thoughts or suggestions that come from within during moments of meditation. In the term sacrifice, as found in sacred literature, we have a further example of the misinterpretation of the symbology. The lamb was used in the sacrificial rites because it symbolized the most precious and necessary animal in life. The lamb not only furnished wool for clothing, but flesh for food. It required constant care and protection against inclement weather and attacks of wild animals; it re quired special pasturage with special attendance. It is easy to understand why the lamb should be selected as a symbol of sacrifice in preference to such an unclean and common ani mal as the hog, whose every characteristic, habit, care, and


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valué are the direct opposite to the precious lamb. The sacrifice of the lamb meant to the ancients the sacrifice of a most valued possession for a spiritual purpose. The lamb, a peaceful, humble follower of the shepherd, also signified the spiritual obedience to the will of the master. It symbolized the spiritual self within each one of us. With this key, we are able to understand more fully the significance of the scriptural references to the sacrifice of the lambs. It is not necessary to sacrifice material things, such as money, upon the altar. For money, as such, is of no use to God; in fact, it would be an insult to Him, to think that by a few coins, one could gain favor in His eyes. But we can sacrifice something which gives us great pleasure ; or we may deny ourselves something which we prize greatly. All of us have some privilege, or possession, which we may sacrifice. We may postpone obtaining some of the things we need until after the Obscure Night; we may lay aside social activities ; we may deny ourselves personal pleasures, such as attending public amusement gatherings, or spending money for personal adornment. During this period of the Obscure Night, anything that we sacrifice, which caters to our physical pleasure, will add to our spiritual development. Thus, with these sacrifices, we enter the symbolical wilderness of life, making the last part of the Obscure Night a rest period of isolation, separation, and quiet meditation. We do not have to deny our selves the actual necessities of life, ñor withdraw from our duties or obligations, but we can bring into these affairs spiritual power and activity. These are thoughts to be meditated upon during the coming week. Next week I shall touch upon one other great thought for your medi tation. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


V

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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recaíl as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

9

The traditional period of dwelling in the Obscure Night is forty days.

9

In many ancient records, forty days refers to the period of regeneration.

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Elijah, Moses, and Jesús are examples of initiates awaiting forty days symbolical of a period of illumination.

9

The period that the children of Israel were in the wilderness, symbolized the fortyday period of sacrifice prior to the Golden Dawn.

9

References to ascending the mount signify the rising of the inner consciousness. Entering the wilderness refers to the entering into secluded meditation within while await ing Cosmic revelation.

9

The scriptural references to the sacrificial lamb symbolize the spiritual self within each of us; an obedient follower of the Master.

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Any inner urge for personal sacrifice during this period of waiting should be adhered to.

T H E IN S T IT U T IO N B E H IN D T H E R O S I C R U C I A N O R G A N I Z A T I O N Rosicrucian Parle, San José, California, U. S. A .

"C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedicated to every R osicrucian"

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TTií* monograph always remaíns th© property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirteen

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirteen


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9 There are many mysteries in life, the answers of which can be revealed only by the God of our Hearts in our in' ner consciousness. Many great mystics and writers have attempted to explain these great mysteries as experienced by them; however, they are meaningful only to the extent of our own advancement of understanding, and ability to seek within for enlightenment. In the following paragraph, we find one such attempt written by the sixth century apostle to the English, St. Augustine. He arranges the ascent of the soul in seven stages. The higher steps are purgation, illumination, and unión. The last stage he calis “the visión and contemplation of truth,—not a step, but the goal of the journey. When it is reached, we shall understand the wholesomeness of the doctrines with which we were fed, as children with milk.” He continúes the description of this state in the follow' ing words:

I entered, and beheld ivith the mysterious eye of my soul the light that never changes, above the eye o f my soul, above my intelligence. It was some' thing altogether different from any earthly illumination. It was higher than my intelligence because it made me, and I was lower because made by it. He who \nows the truth \nows that light, and he who \nows that light \nows eternity. Love \nows that light. W hat is this which flashes in upon me, and thrills my heart without wounding it1 I tremble and I burn; I tremble, feeling that I am unli\e Him; I burn, feeling that I am li\e Him. — ST. AUG USTIN E, ?— 604 A.D.

TEMPLE MONOGRAPH

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ELEVENTH DEGREE B eloved Members, G re e tin g s !

We are reaching the end of our discussion of the Obscure Night, and I hope most of you by this time are halfway through. Of course, this is something that cannot be determined at the present time, for we will not know until the night is ended how long it has been. With some, of course, it will last longer than with others. I hope that some of you have received the word that is to be your holy word. Do not be hasty or impatient about it, for if it has not yet come to you, or you do not yet feel sure of it, do not adopt one arbitrarily. Do not feel that it must be a word with which you are fa miliar, or that seems to mean anything definite, or that you have read in any of our monographs. It may be a totally new word to you; it may be a simple one ; it may not have any definite meaning of and by itself, and it may be in any language and not limited to just the English language. In my last talk, I called your attention to the fact that one of the great lessons, which we are all anxious to learn and to have become a part of our soul-personalities, related to the mysteries of life. How glibly this phrase is used nowadays ! We read in advertisements and announcements, and we hear in sermons, and see on the title pages of books and magazine articles the words The Mysteries of Life. Yet, what do any of these writers or speakers know about the real mysteries of life, and what do you or I know of them? No two persons will give you precisely the same answer when asked, "What are the mysteries of life?" The real mysteries of life cannot appertain merely to the things that puzzle us or mystify us, for these are things that are apt to be revealed at any moment, and the mystery dispelled. There was a time in the life of each of us when we looked upon certain things as the great mysteries of the day. Today, we are so familiar with these things and understand them so well that we wonder how we could have ever considered them as mysteries of life. There was a time when the nature of this earth at the North or the South Pole, and the conditions of climate, water, and land, at such points, were considered one of the great mysteries of this earth. Yet, within a few years, all these mysteries were dispelled by the several exploration parties that went to each one of these poles. There was a time when many persons were puzzled as to what occurred when music was played in one room and transmitted invisibly and inaudibly to a distant point and received there in a large horn. But within a few years, the principies of ra dio became so familiar, even to children, that there is no longer any mystery about radio, and we would hardly walk across the Street to listen to a lecture entitled, "The Mystery of Radio." It has become a commonplace, practical, understandable thing to most of us, from which the real mystery has been

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eliminated. Certainly, any veiled or concealed knowledge, such as has been exemplified, that can be revealed and made commonplace in a few years by the actions of men cannot constitute one of the real mysteries of life. In fact, none of the earthly problems that are veiled by our objective lack of comprehension constitutes one of the mysteries of life. Those things that are concealed from us merely because man's mind has not unravelled the problems, or delved into the material aspects and revealed them, cannot constitute a real mystery. They are simply earthly problems which advancing civilization creates for a time and then makes commonplace. For instance, there was no mystery about ra dio before radio was invented. Man created the mystery and then solved it. Before man began to experiment with certain vibrations and etheric waves, there was no radio or wireless transmission; therefore, there could be no mystery about it. Man, in his peculiar way of doing things, creates many earthly mysteries, then, finding himself tangled in the technicalities of his creation, he proceeds to solve the problems he has created. When he has finally solved them, he feels sure that he has solved a great mys tery. It is like the spider who creates a great web and then finds himself entangled in it. In this situation of entanglement, he comes to realize that he must solve his own perplexity and free himself from the mystery of what he has created. After he frees himself by destroying the mystery of what he has created and making it a simple matter to understand, he should have no reason to feel boastful of his accomplishment. There was no mystery about the North or the South Pole until man began to contémplate those parts of the earth as being dif ferent from other parts. The more he speculated upon the nature of these localities, and listened to the wild speculations concerning conditions there, the more he created an artificial mystery which he had to solve later. Man has never created a mystery that he has not been able to solve. I am speaking truthfully when I say that man never will solve any mysteries except the ones that he himself has created. Therefore, we need never expect that the real mysteries of life will be solved by any acts on our part, for the real mysteries of life are not things that we have created, but are sublime things beyond our objective analysis and beyond our objective explanation. The only manner in which the real mysteries of life can become less mysterious to us is through revelation. We cannot take the least of these real mysteries and sit down at a desk with pencil and paper, and figure it out with our mathematical formulas as we do a problem of geometry or trigonometry. We cannot solve the mysteries of life by means of our objective knowledge as applied in the chemical laboratory with its use of microscopes and other instruments. We cannot take the least of the mysteries of life into the physics laboratory, the electrical laboratory, or any other

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laboratory, and work out a perfect solution. We can only take these mysteries into the sanctum of our hearts, into the consciousness of our inner selves, and there let God reveal to us a little of the mystery. These great mysteries never will be completely solved for any one of us. This is because each revelation that explains any point in any one of the mysteries simply adds more mystery to the entire series. Science has failed to make even the least contribution toward a solu tion of these mysteries. When a scientist attempts to solve the mystery or origin of life by taking the smallest cell of protoplasm and putting it under a microscope for examination, he may discover one point of the mystery only to realize that he has added ten other points more mysterious than the one he thinks he has solved. Under the microscope the simple little cell of protoplasm that is considered the source of all earthly life, becomes not a simple unit or a single thing, but a world of mys teries; for it proves to be a multiplication of mysteries, each one of which would require thousands of years for the human mind to comprehend. When the mystery of the blood cell is studied by Science, the more exhaustivo the research, the more multiplied become the mysteries related to it. Whereas, a few hundred years ago, the blood was a simple mystery that every scientist thought would be solved easily, today a single drop of blood constitutes a world of mysteries which science realizes may never be solved in the least degree. A few years ago, when science discovered that it could evolve a theory of germ life to explain the cause of disease, and reduced all contagion to the simple proposition of germs, it thought it had solved one of the great mysteries of life. Then science suddenly discovered that a single germ cell was a world filled with mysteries, and it al so discovered that there were probably millions of germs of different natures, each containing a world of mysteries if the germ theory was true at all. Therefore, the simple study of the single germ, which seemed to be a simple mystery, became the most profound problem of all mysteries. Even now, science is beginning to realize that this mystery of germs may be another one of its artificial creations and that there may be no germ at all, and that disease may not be due to germs, but to some other cause; thus, the mystery connected with dis ease has become more complex, instead of simplified, by the many years of experimentation in the laboratory. Perhaps the greatest mystery of life is God. God is not a creation of man; therefore, man does not know even how to contémplate the mystery or to express the existence of God. How then, can he take such a mystery into a laboratory, whether it be a labora tory of chemistry, physics, cosmology, or ontology, or even theology? The only way in which any of the mystery of God can

ELEVENTH DEGREE

be revealed is by having and there reveal Himself until we have at least a we daré not hope to ever

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God enter the sanctum of our soul-personality to us little by little, degree by degree, faint appreciation of His existence ; however, understand the mystery completely.

So we are going to contémplate the mysteries of life as we proceed through our higher studies in this Degree, but before we can begin this study, we must have an individual understanding of what constitutes the mysteries of life. Therefore, in expectation of your Golden Dawn, and in anticipation of your passage from the Obscure Night into the brilliancy of day, you must itemize in your mind the great mysteries of life which you would like to have revealed, so that you will be prepared for such revelations and be attuned to each Cos mic, inspirational thought. Remember that such revelations will come gradually, with perhaps one thought at a time like one link of a great chain. Although each link may be golden and beautiful and an inspiration in itself, it will nevertheless be incomplete ; however, unless we valué each link and become so familiar with it that we are prepared to add the next and proper link to it, we may acquire a collection of links that will never form a perfect chain. Our minds, therefore, must be receptive to each thought that is revealed, and we must be prepared to associate it properly with other thoughts and gradually build up the details of a revelation that may be astounding to each of us. Therefore, contémplate upon these things during the coming week in addition to the other thoughts that have been given to you within the last three or four weeks. You will find that the Ob scure Night is being filled with mental activities and spiritual devotion rather than inactivity and loneliness. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


V

V

Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which vou should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

9

If you have not found your word, do not adopt one arbitrarily. V,

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•

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The mysteries of life are beyond objective analysis. They cannot be solved in a lab oratory.

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The mysteries of life can be revealed only partially in the sanctum of our hearts.

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They can never be solved completely. Each revelation causes more mysteries that must be solved.

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Perhaps the greatest mystery is God, which can be understood only gradually within the sanctums of our souls.

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Itemize in your mind the great mysteries you would like to have revealed.

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Revelations will come gradually as a link in a chain.




"C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedicated to every Rosicrucian'

i

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This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. If is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Four teen

Eleventh Degree Monograph Fourteen

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O. R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, engraved, typewritten^ and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses, academic studies diagram s, illustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A. M. O.' R. C. (Trie above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving, and are imparted only es an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal tifie, and the right of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M. O. R. C . and it thall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M . O . R. C. is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and. the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movements.


V

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,9 Through meditation, by going within oneself and blending the consciousness with the Cosmic conscious" ness, there is found to be unity in all things, a discovery that all manifestations stem from one root, the Aether, as termed in the extant fragments of Alchemical wisdom known as the Emerald Tablet, attributed to Hermes Trismegistus:

I spea\ not fiction, hut what is certain and most true. W hat is helow is li\e that which is above, and what is above is li\e that which is below for performing the miracle o f one thing. And as all things were produced from One by the Mediation o f One, so all things are produced from this One thing by adaptation. Its father is the Sun, its mother was the Moon, the wind carried it in its belly, its nurse is the Earth. It is cause of all perfection throughout the whole world. Its power is perfect if it be changed into the earth.

\'

Sepárate the earth from the fire, the subtle from the dross, gently, and with judgment. It ascends from earth to heaven, and descends again to earth, thus you will possess the glory of the whole World, and all obscurity will fly away. This thing is the fortitude o f all fortitude, because it overcomes all subtle things, and penetrates every solid thing. Thus were all things created. Thence proceed wonderful adaptations which are produced in this way. Therefore am I called Hermes Trismegistus, possessing the three parts of the philosophy o f the whole World. W hat I had to say concerning the operation of the Sun is complete. — HERMES TRISM EG ISTU S


NUMBER FOURTEEN

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! Once more, we assemble to receive some instructions for further contemplation and meditation. Only a few who are now dwelling in the Obscure Night have written to me saying that they have received their word, and this plainly indicates that the majority in this class of ours is truly passing through a very complete and thorough preparation for the coming of the Golden Dawn. If the operation were not so exhaustivo or thorough, they probably would have received some little word or token weeks ago. The few who have received the word are those who probably spent con siderable time in contemplation and meditation. Generally, the longer it takes to receive the word and the more time that is spent in con templation and meditation before the word is received, the more com plete will be the preparation and development for the coming experiences. But I hope that as soon as each of you receives your word, you will notify me at once. Just write a brief note, addressed to me, personally, and state in a few words— not more than ten or fifteen— what word you have received, when, and under what circumstances. Certainly, this can be explained in twenty-five or thirty words, and these brief letters will be filed away in the records of this class. We are all approaching the coming of the Dawn, for each week brings us closer to it. But I do hope that the Dawn will not arrive for any of you without your having received the word and having passed through all of the necessary preparation. The principal thing which should occupy your mind is the contem plation of what constitutes the great, or greatest, mystery of life. Of the many mysteries which each one of us might set down in categorical form, there is usually one that is more mysterious than the others, or more important to each of us. That particular one will be different in most cases. To some, the mystery of one's relationship with parents or brothers and sisters, or general family connections, is the most astonishing, surprising, and important. With others, the great mystery is why they were born in certain social or worldly conditions or relationships ; while with others, the mystery pertains to their lack of understanding what their mission in life may be, or what their place in the world at the present time should be. With others, the greatest mystery relates to God's laws or the laws of Na ture. I think a list of perhaps one hundred general principies might be given as constituting the mysteries of life as viewed by the multi tudes. With each person, there is one outstanding mystery that is of supreme importance to that individual, and of little interest to many others. If I may be personal again, I will say that ever since I have contemplated the mysteries of life, there has been one


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that has he Id my interest and contemplation more than the many others. It is in regard to the wonderful working of Cosmic laws which caused me, with my past contacts with the Rosicrucian Order and previous preparation, to be born in a Christian family of a truly orthodox na ture with the physical blood in my veins of ancestors who were connected with the first Rosicrucian foundation in America between 1694 and 1801. Yet nothing of the Rosicrucian teachings or ideas was known to my present parents until I became interested in the organization as a young man. All through my youth, I was placed in contact with eminent religious teachers and writers, with artists, philosophers, and investigators, whose influence on my life very definitely prepared me in this incarnation for the position which I now occupy. Even the mystery of my present position is something worthy of meditation and contemplation. Certainly, all of us can find something in our lives to meditate upon and to use as an illustration of how Cosmic law operates and how divine principies manifest. In thinking of these things for the com ing week, we may bring ourselves closer to the word we require, and at the same time quicken within us something that will help to prepare us for the Dawn. One thing will surely happen in connection with your meditations and your contemplations. You are gradually going to lose your sense of separateness from the rest of the world, and your sense of direct connection with location and immediate interests. In other words, you gradually are going to expand your consciousness until you realize that you are a Citizen of the world rather than of one country, and that you are a resident of the entire earth instead of a resident of one town or locality. Naturally, you will cease to be either an Amer ican or an Englishman, a Germán or a Frenchman, in any sense other than political affiliation or association by birth, for your consciousness and intellect will be nondenominational in a religious sense, and uni versal in a political, racial, and social sense. This will tend to bring into your consciousness much of the Oriental mind instead of allowing it to remain exclusively Occidental. Have you ever given thought to the fact of children in a very large family scattering, after their youth is over, and living in various parts of the world? Let us say, for instance, that a man and a woman of either British nationality or of American birth, living somewhere in the United States, had ten children, five boys and five girls. Let us say that after the children had reached the ages of eighteen and twenty-one, they went to various parts of the world to live and marry, and raise families of their own. Do you think that the father or mother of those ten children could think of the daughter living in France as a Frenchwoman, and the son living in Italy as an Italian, and another daughter living in Russia as being a Russian, and some other son living in Germany as a Germán?


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No, for the parents would look upon their children as being their chil dren and of one nationality, one race, one tongue, regardless of the present location of their physical bodies, You must realize, therefore, that God in looking upon us as His ^children has no thought of any of us as Germán, Italian, Russian, or American, but simply as His children, Whether we are black or white, yellow or red, educated or uneducated, rich or poor, or of any nation ality or tongue, we are equal in His sight as His children. All the other distinguishing elements which material interests elabórate upon and make important are of no importance to Him whatsoever, Thus it must be with each one of us in our development. We must cease to think of ourselves as citizens or residents of any one country, but as members of God's kingdom. We must cease to think of ourselves as speaking different languages, for we are all united in but one lan guage, the language of Love. Once we begin to blend in our consciousness the consciousness of the East and the West, the North and the South, and of the ancient and the modern, we will become universally attuned with the Cosmic. You realize, of course, that the Cosmic has no need for the points of the compass. You will realize gradually that you are not of the world or really in the world, but that the world is within you. This will lead to the first conscious comprehension of what is meant by the macrocosm and microcosm of which we will have more to say later, Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER

Summary of This Monograph

v v, v, Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recaU as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

9

The longer it takes to receive the word, the more thorough will be the preparation for coming experiences.

9

When the word is received, notify class instructor immediately and briefly.

9

Contémplate on the one mystery of life which is outstanding to you.

9

Contemplation of how the Cosmic law operates within us will help prepare us for the Golden Dawn.

9

When universally attuned with the Cosmic, the narrow boundries of countries become meaningless.

9

By feeling that the world is within you, rather than you a part of it, you may sense the comparison of the M acrocosm and the Microcosm.

*


ROSICRUCIAN ORDER

*

This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A .M . O. R.C . It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Fifteen

Eleventh Degree Monograph Fifteen

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A. M . O . R .C . under the emblerr, above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, enqraved, typewritten, and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertation, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses academic studies, diagram s, illustrations. and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A. M. O. R. C. (Trie above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving and are imparted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to this monograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M. 0 . R. C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive Information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A n y other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all right» of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M . O . R .C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movements.


V

V

9 Reference is made in this week’s monograph to the fact that a great many untrained, poorly educated persons have been able to contact that great storehouse of uni' versal information: the Divine source that dwells within each of us and which becomes accessible through illumination. Jacob Boehme is illustrated as such a person. The following ex' cerpt from his works explains this source and how it is obtained. • •

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God is the center o f man, but he resides only within himself, unless the spirit of man becomes one spirit with him; in which case he will become manifest in human nature, in soul, mind and desire, whereby he becomes perceptible to the inner senses of man. T he will sends the senses into God, and God impresses the senses and becomes one being with them. Then the senses carry the power of God to the will, and the will receives them joy' fully but tremblingly; for it recognizes itself as being unworthy \nowing that it comes from an unsteady dwelling. Thus it receives that power by sin\ing down before God, and out of its triumph arises a sweet humility. This is the true essence of God, and this conceived essence within the will is the celestial body, and is called the true and just faith, which the will has received in the power of God. It sin\s within the mind and resides in the fvre of the soul. — JACOB BOEHME, 15754624


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—C— PAGE ONE

Beloved Members, G re e tin g s !

In preparation for the coming work, we will listen to the comments made by the Guardian as in ancient times, and try to visualize his viewpoint. Historically, it is interesting for us to know that the earliest temples, where such preparations for the high Degrees were conducted, were located in Egypt; but this is only interesting to us now from our distant view. In the days when the first mystery temples were established and the first Rosicrucians were going through such prepara tion as you are going through, these early mystics did not look upon the land of Egypt as being anything extraordinary from an Interna tional or universal point of view; they were not even aware of the fact that other countries had no similar temples and mystic brotherhoods. In other words, these first mystics in Egypt did not take geography into consideration at all; the only thought they had in mind was that they were being initiated into universal truths that had no locality or nationality attached to them. It is only our broader perspective at the present time that lends some fascination to the fact that these first mystics were located in Egypt. To the mystics, themselves, they were simply students in their own land in a temple that was a part of the universal truth, and they never gave a moment's thought to their unique position or to the fact that their position was unusual in any sense. As we listen to the words of the Guardian, who spoke to them in their days, we can plainly see that his viewpoint and his conscious ness were universal. He thought of the temple where they were congregated as being in the center of the universe and without thinking of it in connection with any special country or city. This is the viewpoint that we must get and the attitude that we must hold. One of the choicest pieces of mystical philosophy, which the Guardian tried to impress upon each one of the candidates, was the fact that man cannot rise higher in this world than the level of his own consciousness. The beautiful thing about that thought is that it is just as true today as it was thousands of years ago. Man cannot rise higher than the level of his consciousness. You know it is a fact that water cannot rise higher than its source. In modern times, we Apay in the business world that a business cannot become greater than ^ h e consciousness or conscience of the man or group of men back of it. Really, no business, no movement, no activity on the part of men or a group of men, can become any greater than the thinking mind and con sciousness of the people who are back of the movement. If you watch a group of children playing in any neighborhood, you will notice that the games they are playing and the things they are doing are no greater or no higher in thought than


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the consciousness of the children themselves. You therefore expect to find little boys playing with marbles and small toys, and little girls playing with dolls and similar things. You would be astonished to find children of six or eight years of age who would leave their toys and sit down to play a game of chess. On the other hand, you would be surprised to find children of twelve or fourteen who would ^ be playing with toys. You would take it for granted that their minds ^ had not developed beyond the six- or eight-year-old stage. When you go into the business world, you find the same thing. If you go into a small grocery store and find that it is poorly lighted, the goods on the shelves badly arranged, the window display and other conditions untidy, you realize at once that the store represents the degree of mental development of the person who owns it. Should you step into another store and find with great surprise that all of the counters instead of being white are mission green, and the shelves in stead of being stained in ordinary oak are in mission green, that the walls are a harmonious color, that there is an attractive inlaidlinoleum floor covering, and that a few plants have been set about in the store, with everywhere the general impression of a harmonious color scheme, even in the arrangement of the merchandise on the shelves, you would realize at once that this store with its unusual treatment in color and arrangement is merely a reflection of the consciousness of those who own it. If you go into another store and find from experience that there is a general tendency on the part of the employees to cheat in cutting off yardage, to underweigh in measuring merchandise, or to shortchange customers at every opportunity, and if you find that the merchandise itself is of a little cheaper grade than the average store, you may be sure that the person who is at the head of it has a mind and consciousness that reflects these things in his business. The physician, the lawyer, the clergyman, and the teacher are in similar positions. The work that they are doing on behalf of others can be no greater and no better than their individual consciousness and development. When once we understand this, we will not criticize the things that people do or the manner in which they conduct their business affairs or their lives, but will criticize, instead, the de gree of consciousness or development they possess— and certainly, we cannot criticize the insane person for doing foolish things. It is not that the acts of such persons are foolish, but that their stage of development is low, and our criticism should be of their development £ and their understanding. In criticising the development of conscious ness of a person, we should do it kindly and sympathetically, and realize that until we enable these persons to raise their conscious ness, we cannot hope to have them raise their degree of business or personal practice. To attempt to forcé a man to improve his business methods or his social or moral conduct without first improving his consciousness and developing his understanding, is simply a waste of time.


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On the other hand, if we begin by helping such persons to improve the inner self, raise their consciousness and understanding to a higher degree, we will have no difficulty regarding their habits and ways of living, for their course in life will automatically change and adjust itself as the inner consciousness rises. This is the great difference in viewpoint between the mystical viewpoint and that of the intellect. All of our present-day universities, colleges, and schools, are built upon and operate upon the idea that by training a man intellectually to do things the proper way, you will create in him the ability to do these things. This is a great mistake, and I think that it would be well if some facts on this subject could be established in the minds of the masses. The difference between training a man through mental education to do certain things and raising his consciousness to a natural desire to do certain things, is a difference between a surface training and deep inner training. When the consciousness of the in ner self is raised, the person will improve his way of living and acting very easily, and consistently, because even if he does not have the outer, intellectual training, he will always have the Cosmic inspiration and guidance in doing things, and this is more dependable than any outer training and education. We have, therefore, the reason for the Rosicrucian methods of beginning first of all with the training of the inner self and the rais ing of the inner consciousness. The Rosicrucians say that the average man or woman is receiving through school, and through newspapers, magazines, and business training courses, enough education to enable him to be mentally equipped for almost any position in life that he cares to occupy, but that his real handicap lies in not being inwardly developed to a point that will give him the power and the dependable guidance in carrying out his plans. Take, for instance, the notable character of Jacob Boehme, the cobbler. Mentally, he was trained only to be a cobbler, and knew no other trade or profession, but his inner consciousness or Cosmic Mind was developed to a high degree far beyond the necessity of any mere cobbler. The result was that while his hands and body were occupied with a humble form of work, the real self was rising to great heights ; while his good work as shoemaker never attracted attention beyond the little tcwn in which he lived, his spiritual development attracted at tention throughout the world. Today, we read and study his books, and admire and love him for what he was inwardly, and forget that he was merely a cobbler. In the ancient times, the Guardian at the Threshold constantly advised those mystics who were waiting for the coming of the New Day that they were to rise above their intellectual and physical limitations. We must realize that most of those early mystics had far less intellectual training than even our children in the grammar schools have today. It is questionable and


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uncertain whether the average mystic of that time was able to read and write his own Egyptian language perfectly, and certainly he knew nothing about the languages and conditions in other parts of the world. He was being trained to forget that he was a Citizen of Egypt or of the Egyptian race, or that he was living in a country that was separated from others, and was made to feel that inwardly he was a part of the Universal Mind and universal life and, therefore, could expand to the full greatness of the entire universe. As an Egyptian Citizen in a purely physical and mental state, he could not rise above his local environment. He could not become physically a Citizen of the world, and he could not extend his intellectual comprehension be yond the schooling and training that he had in his own counry, but as a mystic, inwardly, he could become a part of every country, and of every race, and have no limit whatever to his Cosmic development. Therefore, while you are dwelling now in the Obscure Night, you are conscious of the limitations which surround you, but with the com ing of the Dawn all limitations break down. We can compare this with light and darkness itself. While we are in darkness our environment is limited. We can see only to a certain distance, and we can sense the conditions around us only within a certain number of feet or yards. Our world is small, indeed, when we are in a darkened place or semi-darkness. If we step out of our homes and look over the landscape, our view is greatly limited and we have no idea as to how far the world really extends. With the coming of the day, however, our vista is enlarged, and we begin to see things many miles away that were invisible in darkness, and we feel that the world is greater and bigger than it was while we were without the light. So it will be with the coming of the new Dawn. The new Dawn is not going to widen our physical world for us, but our spiritual world, and it will be a spiritual Dawn illuminated by a spiritual light. The more we prepare ourselves for this and anticipate it, and keenly real ize what it will all mean, the more thrilling will be the experience. I am glad to say, from the letters I have received, that many of our members in this Degree are now truly excited with anticipation regard ing the coming of the Dawn. Unlike new members who are in the lower Degrees of our study, they are not expecting outward manif estations but only those of an inward nature. When we took our trip to Egypt, I recall that a great many of those who were with us had not yet reached the higher grade of under standing, and they fully expected that during the initiation in the Egyptian Temple there would be manifestations of an outward nature. They looked for miracles to happen around them, or in the shadows of the columns, or in the alcoves and recesses of the corners of the great temple. They were more or less disappointed in this regard, although they did experience many unexpected things. Those members who were in the higher Degrees, however, antici-


NUMBER FIFTEEN

—C — PAGE FIVE

pated nothing like this whatsoever. They sat down quietly with their eyes closed and did not look around them at all with any expectation of seeing any physical manifestations. They turned their thoughts inward while sitting at the foot of these great ancient columns of Amenhotep's temple, and allowed the spiritual vibrations of the place to overwhelm them and create a new life for them in their inner beings. These members had the greatest thrill of their lives, and as long as they live, they will never forget what actually occurred within them at that occasion. An even greater thrill will come to them, and to you, at the com ing of this new spiritual Dawn. Those of you who are in this Degree are so far beyond any of the experienees that are obtained by any of the less advanced members, as just mentioned, that it is like comparing the highest classes of a university with those of a kindergarten. It all depends upon how receptive you make yourself, and if you await with the proper viewpoint for what is to come. If you are anticipating a great physical change in your life, you will receive this in a mild form, indeed, for the new day will not begin with such manifestations first, but with spiritual regeneration. After the spiritual re birth will come the physical in due time and in its proper way. If you are anxious that spiritual power and spiritual illumination shall be your reward, then that is what you will receive. Next week, I shall explain to you the meaning of rebirth and its effect upon the consciousness of the cells and parts of your body that are quickened with the Cosmic spirit. This will help you to un derstand what regeneration in a spiritual sense means, and to be pre pared for the incoming of the Holy Ghost at the high noon of your new day. In the meantime, keep up your meditation and contemplation. Find the word that is to be the key for you, and let me hear from you as soon as you have reached any definite conclusión. Certainly, this is a joyful period in the lives of all of us, and I rejoice with each of you in the cióse companionship that is being created by the experiences of this new Degree, where we all stand together on the Threshold of the greater Temple. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete monograph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

9

The same universal conception of the Cosmic, unbounded by physical limitations, is as true today as it was during the time of the earliest philosopher and mystic, and it is just as important to understand.

^ Man cannot rise higher than the level of his consciousness. 9

The mystic knows no boundaries of material countries, but is a part of every country and every race; he is a part of the Universal Mind.

9

Our understanding of the underlying consciousness of our fellow man enables us to criticize sympathetically.

9

Material habits cannot be corrected until the inner consciousness has been raised to a higher level.

9

Educational systems should strive to stimuíate within the consciousness of the student the natural desire for learning.

9

Rosicrucian methods of teaching begin by training the inner self and raising the inner consciousness.

9

The life and works of Jacob Boehme illustrate the power of the inner consciousness over material limitations.

CJ With the coming of the Dawn, all limitations will break down, and our spiritual horizon will be widened. 9

The more we anticípate and become receptive for the Dawn, the more thrilling will be its experience.

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$

ROSICRUCIAN ORDER

*

This monograph always remain* the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Sixteen

Eleventh D egree Monograph Sixteen


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V

9 Through regeneration, every cell in the body is quick' ened, and complete spiritual and mental peace is obtained. Throughout the ages great men have received this Cosmic consciousness, and many have recorded their experiences. The following excerpt written by the Swiss philosopher, Henri Frederic Amiel, indicates further how we may realize this great experience:

The center o f life is neither in thought ñor in feeling ñor in will, ñor even in consciousness, so far as it things, feels, or wishes. For moral truth may have been penetrated and possessed in all these ways, and escape us still. Deeper even than consciousness, there is our being itself, our very substance, our nature. Only those truths which have entered into this last región, which have become ourselves, become spontaneous and in' voluntary, instinctive and unconscious, are really our life— that is to say, something more than our property. So long as we are able to distinguish any space whatever between the truth and us, we remain outside it. The thought, the feeling, the desire, the consciousness of life are not yet quite life. But peace and repose can nowhere be found except in life and in etemal life, and the etemal life is the Divine life, is God. To become Divine is, then, the aim of life; then only can truth be said to be ours beyond the possibility of loss, because it is no longer outside of us, ñor even in us, but we are it, and it is we; we ourselves are a truth, a will, a wor\ of God. Liberty has become nature; the creature is one with its Creator— one through love. —HENRI FREDERIC AMIEL, 18214881


NUMBER SIXTEEN

— D— PAGE ONE

B e lo v e d Members, G r e e tin g s !

I wonder whether each one of you fully appreciates the importance of rebirth and regeneration, and what it really means in a spiritual and psychic sense. In ancient times, Jesús was asked whether regener ation meant that a man was to enter the womb and be born again. They could only think in material terms and could not conceive of being born again in this life in any other way than a material way. Many who have stopped to contémplate this question today still have this material view. In the ancient initiation ceremonies held in the great Pyramid of Gizeh near Cairo, there was one part of the initiation where the candidate had to enter the "Pit of Death" and remain awhile, and then be reborn. This took place when the candidate had reached almost the last stage of the processes of initiation, after he had been prepared and tested for many years. The initiation began with a ceremony at the Sphinx; the candidates then entered the pyramid through an underground passageway, and finally arrived at the place called the "Pit of Death." From here they were transferred to the Queen's Chamber where they remained in a trance for twenty-four hours. Then they were brought to an adjoining chamber called the "Chamber of Rebirth." They were taken from the Queen's Chamber to this second chamber in a casket or enclosed case, and the high officers knelt around it, and conducted a ceremony until midnight, when the processes of rebirth be gan. At sunrise the candidate carne back into consciousness as a re born person, ready for the last two stages of the highest initiation. In the oldest Egyptian records of the pyramid, we find this phase of the initiation referred to, and the Queen's Chamber is sometimes called "the womb of life." After the candidate*s rebirth, he was quickened in psychic consciousness to perceive and understand the higher truths. It is from the ancient ceremony that all of the other mystic rituals and religious doctrines derive the idea of being reborn or regenerated. It is to this mystical and spiritual process that Jesús re ferred when He spoke of being born again. Now, what is it that actually takes place in such a process? It is not wholly spiritual, for then it might be exclusively of the soul and of the mind. It is not merely the sudden beginning of a new life of thinking and living, for then it might be purely mental, and not of the soul at all. The ancient mystics made a very definite claim about regeneration and rebirth, and the Rosicrucians today are positive that this claim is true. The claim was that every living cell in our bodies has a consciousness all its own, independent of the mass con sciousness and yet always attuned with the Cosmic consciousness. In other words, they said that a grain of wheat might have a mass consciousness or a consciousness for the entire grain, but every cell composing that grain or every microscopical part of cell life in the grain had in it some consciousness of its


NUMBER SIXTEEN

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own, even though that consciousness was in attunement with all other consciousness. I wonder whether I am making this plain to you, or if it is too vague. Here we are, once more confronted with the extreme limitations of the English language and the general limitations of words to convey thoughts. Let me use as an analogy the human body. We say that man has consciousness in him. This is true, but it is a mass consciousness composed of the consciousness of all parts of his body plus the Cosmic consciousness. If a man's arm is amputated the cells in all of the tissue, bone, and blood composing his arm still have consciousness in them, even though this arm is separated from the mass consciousness of the body. If an ear, a foot, or a finger is amputated there is still some consciousness in the mass of matter, and this consciousness is a result of the consciousness that is in each little microscopical cell. The consciousness in all cell life is a Cosmic consciousness. It is not an earthly developed consciousness but a purely spiritual or psychic one derived from God's universal consciousness. These cells after they enter into a mass of matter, whether that mass is a grain of wheat, an ear of corn, a large watermelon, a rose, a piece of moss, or a human body, or an animal body, begin to use their consciousness in harmony with the consciousness of all the other cells to make the har monious condition called mass consciousness. In our own bodies, for instance, we have cells that compose the hair and we have cells which compose bones and tissue and cuticle, and blood and fat, and various other kinds of cells. The consciousness in each one of these different species of cells is different. The consciousness of a hair cell is different from the consciousness in a bone cell; otherwise a hair cell would make bone or tissue and a bone cell might help to form blood or fat, or something else. After these cells are all assembled and correctly related in a human body, they work in harmony to produce a perfect body, and to give it a mass con sciousness without losing their individual consciousness. Now it is this consciousness in man and in every cell of his body that is reborn again through the processes of spiritual regeneration. In other words, through the processes of rebirth these cells become harmonized once more with the Cosmic consciousness and get a new im pulse or a new power of Cosmic life and vitality, and in this way they give the entire body a new form of spiritualized consciousness like that which is found in the body of an infant at birth. It is this new start, bringing consciousness of this spiritual attunement, that makes the person realize and feel in every possible way that he has been reborn. The greatest effect of this is upon the mind and emotions; and, of course, this brings closer attunement between the soul and the outer self, and at once we have a new being. The coming of this new consciousness into the cells, or the quickening of this consciousness at regeneration, was


NUMBER SIXTEEN

D— PAGE THREE

finally called the coming of the Holy Ghost and this became an impor tant principie with the Disciples whom Jesús taught, and He was the first one to reveal it in its true spiritual sense to the persons who were ready for such knowledge. This rebirth did not come to Jesús until the time of his baptism. Entering into the water did not pro duce rebirth; the time had arrived for it, and entering into the water merely helped the process to come to a definite point, and become firmly established. The going out of this Holy Ghost at the time of the Crucifixión and the Ascensión constituted a withdrawal of the high spiritual contact, leaving him just an average man as before the re generation at baptism. Naturally, the coming of regeneration brings more than mere quickening of the mind and perception and development of the spiritual and psychic faculties. The first great change that takes place is that it destroys or removes from the physical system every disease germ, every chronic condition of illness, and every inherited or acquired weakness of the blood system, the nervous system, and of the physical body generally. Second, the vitality of the body will be increased so that not only will the health be better and greater forti tude be given to the body to resist disease and sickness, but there will also be such an abundance of Creative life, vitality, in the body, that healing work will become very easy, even at great distances, and persons who merely come in contact with the aura of such a person will immediately feel the healing vibrations. The person then becomes a living, vibrating dynamo of vitality and health. This condition naturally lengthens the period of life and gives the person greater resistance to conditions which might break down the health, and enables him to fast or live with less food at certain periods when necessity requires. It makes the mind and brain sharp and keen, and brings as well a high degree of intuition and prophetic under standing. We see, therefore, that regeneration really creates a new being in many ways, and gives the person an advantage over a newborn person who has not passed through regeneration. This is the thing that is to be looked forward to as a result of the coming of the New Dawn at the end of the Obscure Night. Of course, regeneration does not occur in an hour or a day like the symbolical regeneration in an initiation ceremony. The beginning of it starts suddenly and usually just at the Dawn of the new life. But the real process of regeneration re quires weeks and months to be completed and usually the completion is symbolized by a baptism, which appears to be the bathing of the entire body with a beautiful light descending from above, much as a dove might descend from the heavens and light upon the head or shoulders of a being I wish that I could tell you more of the little details of the sensations and exper iences that you will have during


NUMBER SIXTEEN

— D— PAGE FOUR

the process of regeneration, but it is impossible to convey these to you now. All that I can do is to prepare you and to advise you just as the ancient guardian used to speak to the candidates before him in their morning or weekly assemblies. Be prepared for the coming of the Dawn of the new day, for at that Dawn will come the first stage of the process of regeneration or rebirth. Your first day of new life will be the period required to complete the process of regeneration, and that may be a week, or a month, or a year, but it will probably be less than six months. It is the Golden Dawn of your life, and it is like the first day of the life of a newborn babe. At the moment of birth, with the first breath, is the beginning of the entrance of life and vitality into the child's body; but it is during the first day of the child's earthly life with continuous breathing, a little nourishment, some exercise, and some use of the lungs that the child's real vital ity is built up in its little body. The first day of a child's life, therefore, determines the health and strength of its future body; and, in the same way, the first Golden Day of your new life will be the im portant one. It may be more than twenty-four hours long, as I have said; it may be as long as six months; but still it will be the first day. This brings me, then, to the understanding of the seven great days or cycles of creation as given in a veiled way in the book of Genesis of the Christian Bible. In my talk to you next week, I will explain these seven periods to you and you will understand why regen eration is the first day, and not the seventh day, and you will also understand why in the scheme of the universe it was a different day, as taught in the Scriptures. I am happy to say that quite a few in this class have found their word and are much surprised at what it has turned out to be for them. In some cases, it is a very simple word, yet the moment it is pronounced, it brings a thrill of power and a realization of something that the member has not had before. I rejoice with each one of you while you still dwell in the Obscure Night, for the longer the preparation, the better and more complete will be the reward when it is finished. Remember, turning your thoughts inwardly means entering the kingdom of heaven, and it is there that you will find the word and come face to face with the day that is to be your Golden Day. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recafi as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

Rebirth was one phase of the mystical initiation ritual of the ancient Egyptians. 9

The rebirth of which Jesús spoke, referred to spiritual regeneration.

9

The consciousness in all cell life is Cosmic consciousness.

9

Mass consciousness is the harmonious combination of the consciousness of cells after they enter matter; each consciousness attracting similar consciousness in the cells.

9

Through rebirth, the consciousness within every cell of man becomes harmonized with Cosmic consciousness, bringing renewed vitality and power.

9

In scriptural references, the regeneration and awareness of Cosmic consciousness, is called the “coming of the Holy Ghost.”

.9

Jesús received the Holy Ghost at baptism because the time was ready, and not because of the baptism itself.

9

Regeneration removes any inharmonious physical condition of the body, increases healing powers, and quickens the mind.

9

Real regeneration requires time to realize.

9

The coming of the Dawn will bring the first stage of regeneration.



v-:' .-.v.vv.y.;;

MASTER MONOGRAPH R O S I C R U C I A N OR D E R

*

TW* monograph always remaínj fhe property of the Suprem o G rand Lodge of A . M . O . R. C .

It is not

purchased by, buf loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Seventeen

Eleventh Degree Monograph Seventeen


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The Alchemical or Spiritual Marriage is the final unión of the soul with the Christ spirit. This unión has been described in the chief work of the Germán mystic, Jan van Ruysbroek. In the following selection from The Order of the Spiritual Marriage he describes the rise of the soul to that final unión : When we rise above ourselves, ( our material selves) and in our ascent to God are made so simple that the love which embraces us is occupied only with itself, above the practice of all the virtues, then we are trans' formed and die in God to ourselves and to all separate individuality. In this embrace and essential unity with God, all devout and inward spirits are one with God by living immersion and meltmg away into Him; they are by grace one and the same thing with Him, because the same essence is in both. For what we are, that we intently contémplate; and what we contémplate, that we are; for our mind, our Ufe, and our essence are simply lifted up and united to the very truth, which is God. W herefore in this simple and intent contemplaron we are one life and one spirit with God. And this I cali the contemplative life. In this highest stage the soul is united to God without means. — JAN VAN RUYSBROEK, 12934381

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ELEVENTH DEGREE

TEMPLE M O N O G R A P H

— C—

N U M B E R SEVENTEEN

PAGE ON E

Beloved Members, Greetings ! We are making very fine progress with our development through the Obscure Night. Comments coming to me from the members of the class plainly indicate that gradually certain changes are taking place. I know that some of the members have had no outer manifestation of any 0kind and really have had no inner manif estation that anything is occurring; neither have they received the word or any symbol. These members interest me the most at the present moment, because the indications are that they will become suddenly aware of certain things and I must be prepared to help them in that case. In other words, those whose progress is apparently slow at the present time are the ones who usually come to the top in the ultimate test. This is because the development suddenly bursts forth with a number of manifestations at one time, and such members are always in a predicament for a few days. Therefore, those of this class who have not yet had any outer or inner manif estations should not feel discouraged in the least. The whole matter is a question of time and of patience ; the rewards are rich enough to warrant any amount of time that may be required. In the meantime, the best that I can do is to keep giving you such points of information as will furnish food for your daily meditation. I cannot urge too strongly upon each of you the valué of going into the silence once each morning, and each evening, but especially, each evening, and there thinking over the points that are contained in these little talks of mine, and any of the other points that may come to your mind, and contemplating upon them in an analytical manner so that your whole consciousness becomes attuned with the Cosmic. The more we dwell upon any thought, the more our whole mind and consciousness becomes attuned with that thought and similar ones. For instance, if I give you the subject of a red rose to contémplate upon and tell you to begin with the rose and think about it from every angle and from every point of view and spend at least half an hour in think ing about it, you will find at the end of the half hour that you have gradually analyzed and meditated upon many wonderful subjects. The first thought of the rose will make you think of its form, its fragrance, and its color. This will make you think of it in its early stages as a bud, and how compact and closely sealed all of its ^.beauty and form is in the early stages. Thinking on this point will ® l e a d you to think of the rosebush, of its general growth and develop ment, and finally of its roots and how it draws nourishment from the soil and from the atmosphere. This will lead you to think of all plants generally, and of the fundamental principies of botany and how all seeds in the ground finally open and send forth roots and branches to become plants. This in turn may lead you to think of all seeds and cell life and how they reproduce their own kind according to Cosmic laws.


NUMBER SEVENTEEN

PAGE TW O

In the same way, every one of the thoughts contained in my little talks with you should be analyzed and meditated upon. Thinking of the rose in the manner in which I have just described could attune your whole consciousness with the wonders of plant life and of the Cosmic principies. This would open your consciousness to any inspiration or revelation from the Cosmic pertaining to nature's laws of reproduction. Thinking of the points contained in my talks will gradually open^í your consciousness to Cosmic inspiration on lines pertaining to your development and your contact with the superconsciousness. I promised you last week to talk further about regeneration and creation, touching upon the Biblical story of creation. I have a few points that I want to give you in this regard, which are really a series of topics on subjects for contemplation throughout the coming week. For instance, have you ever thought of the fact that the real process of creation did not begin as the Bible story states? That story was merely a record of the outer manifestation of creation. In one place in the Bible, we are advised that in the beginning was the Word. This is told by one of the disciples, who had a real concept of the mystical principies of the Cosmic. He intimates that it was the Word going forth from the consciousness of God that constituted the original word mentioned in the account of creation; that is, we must not look upon the Word as merely the logos or law, but as a vibratory essence that went forth to cause creation to be systematized and orderly. The important point for us to think about, however, is the fact that before this word went forth, or before creation started, there was a concept in the consciousness of God, or in other words, creation had to be spiritually and mentally conceived before the Creator undertook to make it manifest in the material world. No wonder that some modern scientists try to make all life appear to be a mechanistic system. They cali their theory the mechanics of life. If we take the Biblical account, it would appear that the Creator sent forth some vibratory power or law, and that this power automatically affected everything in the universe and turned chaos into order, and that everything that occurred was a result of the mechanical action and arbitrary production of the energy that affected it. This would be equivalent to a person throwing a lighted match into the dry leaves of a forest and walking away and leaving the energy of the fire to carry ^ out its processes. What ever resulted would be the arbitrary or mechani-^®* cal result of the first fíame without any mental guidance or direction controlling it. According to our understanding, the whole universe and all that is in it was first conceived in the consciousness of God to the minutest detail, and then God proceeded to set his plan into manifestation. Nothing happened by chance, and


NUMBER SEVENTEEN

PAGE THREE

everything that occurred in each period of the development of the uni verse was in accordance with a preconceived plan. Therefore, the first day of the creation was not the day when the word went forth, but the day when creation was conceived in the mind and consciousness of God. When an artist paints a great picture on a canvas, the first day of his work in producing that picture is not the day that he sets the canvas frame on the easel and mixes his first black color and proceeds to outline the composition of the picture. What he does on that day is merely to transfer from his mind to the blank convas the pic ture that he sees in his mind, although the mental picture has been built up through many preceding days. The first day of the creation of the picture was the day that the artist had his first inspiration and began to meditate and plan, and reconstruct the picture in his mind. The first day of creation was a day of regeneration because it was the day God began to create in his mind a new world and a new pe riod of time. Before that, there was neither time ñor space, for all was in the consciousness of God, and, therefore, all in the present. The moment God began to project His creation into space and bring it into material manifestation, He established continuity of manifestation, relativity of manifestation, and endurance of manifestation. These three elements created two finite conditions in the material world that had never existed in the infinite consciousness. These two elements are Time and Space. Therefore, the first day of creation was the beginning of a new sense of periodicity, or the beginning of a new cycle, and was, therefore, the rebirth into the material world of some thing that had been in existence in God's consciousness. The Bible speaks of creation as having been accomplished in so many days. The word days has been translated to mean, only in an allegorical sense, what we commonly understand as a day. The word might just as well be translated into months or years, or periods. But even these would not have meant anything more to us than the word days means. How long each one of these seven days actually was we do not know. We know that thousands of years must have been spent in the creation of earth and rocks, and it must have been many hundreds of years after that before plant life began to evolve. How many thou sands of years were necessary for the evolution of the various species of animals, we cannot even imagine. Man and woman, however, were created the last of all things, only because it was the highest concept in the mind of God and the ultimate aim of His entire creation. But this was not the last of the periods, but the first of a new period again, for with the coming of man and woman upon the surface of the earth, another period of life and of time began, and this was the second regeneration of the consciousness of God. There are a few little points in connection with this story of creation that may serve as further food for your con-


NUMBER SEVENTEEN

— G PAGE FOUR

templation and meditation. The original place of the creation of man and woman is given the ñame of Edén, The Hebrew word for this signifies a place of pleasure, or in other words, a place of happiness and joy. It was not meant to be the ñame of a locality, but a State of mind. Attempts, therefore, to try to lócate any part of the earth's surface as the Garden of Edén are ridiculous. Furthermore, if it should ever be found that there is life on other planets, then the question will arise as to whether God created the first man and woman on one of the other planets or on the earth. It is strange how we think of the earth as being the only habitable place in the whole uni verse. Think, for a moment, of how we would have to change all of our church doctrines if science discovered that there are human beings living on Mars or some other planet. To the mystic, this would not mean anything, for he would have no fundamental principies to change; but to the narrow, orthodox church person, it would mean a revolution in his thinking. When we come to analyze the real meaning of many of the words used in the original Hebrew texts, we discover that our English translation of the Bible gives us many false impressions, although these false impressions originally were not intended. Take, for instance, how casually we refer to Adam being the first man. We cannot help thinking of it being the ñame of an individual; no wonder children ask why God chose such a ñame for the first man. In the Hebrew text, the word Ad^tn does not mean the ñame of a person, but the quality or condition of a person, for it really means red earth, or red dust— from the earth, or red soil. Therefore, the first man, having no ñame and nothing by which to distinguish him from other creatures, was called red earth because of the nature of the matter that composed his body, and which distinguished it allegorically from other animals. The same thing may be said about the word Eve as the ñame of the woman. The story that Eve was made from a rib of Adam is based upon the fact that the original story in Hebrew says that Eve was made of the matter of Adam's body, or, in other words, made from the same mat ter. The story attempts to say that, after the man was made, the woman was made out of the same matter, and translators tried to personalizo the process by saying that the woman was made out of the rib of Adam. Remember that the book of Genesis in the Bible gives two different versions of the creation of man, and both of them are correct, but explain a different viewpoint. Originally, the human form was of dual sexual nature. Our absorption into the Cosmic ultimately will be the uniting of the sex natures, and then the elimination of sex entirely so that the spiritual being is neither male ñor female, since it has no need for the reproductivo principies and does not reproduce itself ; the soul never divides itself, but is always one universal soul. Now, by contemplating these various principies during the next week, you may open your consciousness to an influx of in-

ELEVEN TH DEGREE

TEMPLE MONOGRAPH

— C—

NUMBER SEVENTEEN

PAGE FIVE

spiration revealing what is taking place within you. The alchemical marriage which joins yourself with the Christ spirit will be the be ginning of regeneration inasmuch as it will eliminate from your inner consciousness all thought of sexual differences, and you will not think of yourself as either a man or woman, but as a spiritual being, sexless and an unseparated part of the universal soul. If this con sciousness develops with you through your contemplation, you will be very cióse to wonderful revelations that we cannot give you in words but which must come from the Cosmic. Therefore, I urge you sincerely to follow in the footsteps of all the Masters of the past, and give deep thought to the points in this brief talk, for I realize that I have given you in this week's message a volume of inspiration if you will work it out, and allow the Cosmic to enlarge upon it for you. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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9

Meditation upon a single point contained in the talks will open one’s consciousness to Cosmic inspiration.

9

One mystic disciple pointed out that the Word going forth from the consciousness of God was the vibratory essence emanated to cause creation to be systematized.

9

Every detail of creation had to be spiritually and mentally conceived before the Creator undertook to make it manifest in the material world.

9

The days of creation, given in the Bible, are allegorical periods of time.

9

On the first day, creation was preconceived in the consciousness of God.

9

Originally, the human form was bi-sexual; a condition to be resumed upon absorption into the Cosmic.

9

The alchemical marriage, which joins your soul with the Christ spirit, will be the beginning of your regeneration.

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MASTER MONOGRAPH $


a m o r c ________________

Thí* monograph afways remam* the property of the Supremo Grand Lodge of A- M. O. R. C . It í» not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Eighteen

Eleventh Degree Monograph Eighteen


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9 This week's lesson recommends a diet for the psychic frHfr preparation of the regeneration attendant to the Gíolden Dawn. The importance of fasting in preparation for en' lightenment has been stressed in many of the scriptures of sacred literature. The following “Teaching Conceming Life,” selected from the Egyptian Boo\ of Wisdom and written over 3400 years ago, gives the advice of Amenênvapt, the Grain Scribe of Upper and Lower Egypt:

A cquire not the habit o f passing the day in the eating'house, ñor of tasting one pot of beer upon another. Those who thus pass their time be' come tomorrow merely victuals. Han\er not greedily after the things of the man whose food is dainty and spiced. Now the food that is dainty and spiced is a storm in the gullet. Better are bread'ca\es of flour and water with a loving heart than rich meats that carry with them bic\ering and quarreling. Better the beggar in the hand of God than the rich at ease in a com' fortable habitation. Accustom thyself to direct to A ton thy sincere prayer, saying: Grant me, I beseech Thee, strength and health! He will give thee the things that are necessary for life. Thou shalt he safe from anxious care. Put thyself for safe\eeping into the hand of the God. Cast thyself into the two arms of the God. T o thy silent meditation add prostratiom on the ground. —AM EN'EM 'APT, 1500 B.C.


NUMBER EIGHTEEN

— D— PAGE ONE

B e lo v e d M embers, G r e e tin g s !

According to the reports coming to me from the members of this class, practically all have received their mystical word, and have noted many indications of an inner change. Other manifestations have not been definite in most cases, and these are not really looked for until the Golden Dawn, or the beginning of the new period that follows the Golden Dawn. Therefore, since all of the members of this class are now so cióse to the ending of the Obscure Night, I must give you the final instructions for your last stage of preparation. I would like to have each one in the class understand that I am talking to him in a personal sense now, for I have no consciousness of a group of members, but am thinking of each one of you individually. While I am preparing this message for you, I am not thinking of a large group of members scattered in all parts of the country reading this lesson at the same time, as though they were all assembled in one congregation listening to a lecture. I think of each one of you as being in your home and in your sanctum, or in some cozy nook where you are alone and reading this message, as though it were a personal letter from me. I know that you do not all go into your sanctums on the same night for the reading of these lectures ; therefore with different days as your study day, and with the differences in time ac cording to geographical location, only a few of you in certain sections will be reading this message at the same moment. This makes it easier for me to make contacts with you and keep in personal touch with you. Therefore, I am speaking now as though I were in your sanctum, telling you just what you should do as the next step in your prepara tion. This step has to do with eating, drinking, and other little points of personal habit. You should now have a period of semifasting. There will be pe riods in the future when you will refrain from food entirely for twenty-four hours, but at the present time you are not to enter into a real fast, but merely to change your diet, and to reduoe the amount of food eaten during the one week beginning with the time you read this message and until you receive the next monograph. First of all, all flesh food must be eliminated during this week. Broths or soups containing the juices of meat may be freely eaten, for in such cases the boiling greatly changes the nature of such flesh fluids. In fact, it is not the fluids of meat that we are dealing with in this particular phase of regulating the diet, but the material substance of the flesh, or, in other words, the fleshy tissue itself. There are two reasons for the elimination of the flesh food: first, to eliminate from the system the vibrations of such food; second, to enable you to eat more of the other foods which I shall now recommend. It is only natural that if your meal at any time is composed partly of flesh food, you will eat that much less of other foods, and there are certain qualities in other foods which I wish to have you take into your body during the coming week.


NUMBER EIGHTEEN

— D— PAGE TW O

Foremost among these other foods, which you should eat as often as possible, or in other words, at as many meáis throughout the week as possible, are the following: Some whole wheat, such as that put up in packages for a breakfast cereal, some shredded wheat or corn flakes prepared as breakfast ce real, fresh fruits of any or all kinds prepared in any way you enjoy them, some stewed apricots, and stewed prunes, or even stewed or baked apples, some celery (if available), plenty of lettuce, some dandelion, and some water cress— if it can be obtained. The dandelion and the wa ter cress should be thoroughly washed and cleaned, and put on ice or allowed to become crisp with coldness, and a little of them eaten once a day. Nuts of various kinds may be eaten, and in the vegetable line, turnips and carrots should be eaten, the latter raw, if you can enjoy them that way or at least enjoy a little of them raw occasionally. Potatoes should be eaten very sparingly in any form. Baked potato is preferable, if the jackets are thoroughly washed before baking, and some of the jacket eaten with the inner part of the potato, The best part of the potato is the jacket, and that which lies cióse to the jack et on the inside. Green peas, lima beans, baked beans— free from pork sauce— rice, sweet potatoes, cauliflower, and practically any other of the ordinary vegetables may be freely eaten. Rice is especially good in any form. Milk may be freely used either hot or coid, but coffee should be avoided, unless it is some form of coffee that has had the poison eliminated— such as Sanka coffee or Kaffee Hag. Both of these latter brands of coffees are puré coffee with the caffeine eliminated. Postum is not a puré coffee, but a substituto made of cereals. It is a good substituto. All fish food and eggs, as well as the flesh of fowls and other animals, should be eliminated. Toasted bread and cheese may be used for lunch or the evening meal. Vegeta bles and fruits may be prepared in any way for lunch or the evening meal. Only three meáis a day should be eaten, and at each meal you should eat just enough to satisfy your hunger, and to keep you from becoming too hungry during the day. The less you eat, however, the better you will be during this week so far as health and psychic preparation are concerned. But you should not attempt to starve yourself or carry on a fast of any kind. If there is any reason why this form of diet would interfere with your health, because of some condition that requires certain foods recommended by a physician, then follow your physician's advice, for your health must be cared for first of all. Salad dressings made from vegetable oils of any kind may be used, but do not use anything which has an acid reaction, such as vinegar. Therefore, in the preparation of any dressings for your salads, avoid vinegar, catsup, mustard, or any preparation containing vinegar or mustard. The acid in citrus fruit, how ever, is of entirely different nature and will be helpful.


NUMBER EIGHTEEN

— D— PAGE THREE

Canned pineapple or grapefruit juice in bottles or cans will be helpful, but the use of too much sugar should be avoided, and therefore, can dios should be avoided during this week, Alcoholic liquors or wines containing a large percentage of alcohol should also be avoided. Grape juice as a drink will be proper. In personal habits, all indulgences of the flesh, especially those of flesh gratification, should be withheld during the week, and it would be better if married persons could sleep separately or avoid the exchange of magnetic forces with persons of the opposite sex during this week. Smoking should be reduced to the minimum. The ears should be thoroughly cleansed, and kept free of wax; the teeth well cleansed, and the throat washed with a gargle, at least once a day. If the diet is followed there will be plenty of roughage and the bowels will act properly, for there should be no constipation. There should be the proper movements of the bowels each day. This is very important. The body should be thoroughly cleansed each day, and deep breathing should be practiced early in the morning and late at night before retiring, by taking into the lungs a number of deep breaths in the fresh air accompanied with a little exercise of the arms and body that will enforce deep breathing. The mind should be filled as much as possible with thoughts of the coming into the body of a spiritual forcé that has not been there be fore. For this reason, the reading of any light fiction books or the going to the theatre, and seeing of any plays, or the reading of newspapers with all of their sordid reports should be avoided. Nothing should be read except that which is inspiring and which will direct the thoughts of the mind toward spiritual things. Listening to beau tiful music of a classical or religious nature, either on radio, phonograph or piano, will be helpful, whereas wild and modern barbarie music should be avoided, if possible, or at least not permitted to impress itself upon your mind. This does not mean that business affairs cannot be attended to or that the usual conversation in the home should be avoided, but it does mean to eliminate in your spare time any thinking or impressions upon the mind which are not of the highest nature. You should retire as early as possible each evening, certainly by 10:00 o'clock if it is possible, and let your closing thoughts each night be upon the coming of the Holy Ghost in the form of the first spiritual influx; and you should rise as early as possible after sun rise and give thanks for the day, take your deep breaths and invite by your attitude of mind the coming of new life and vitality. If these suggestions are followed until you receive the next lecture with further instructions, you will be conscious of a great change taking place within you. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carerulíy read the complete mono graph, try to recaü as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

A diet is recommended for this week. Fruits, nuts, milk producís, cereals, and ali vegetables may be partaken of freely; potatoes should be eaten very sparingly. Avoid all meats, fish, eggs, vinegars, sweets, coffee, tea, alcoholic beverages, and tobacco. Eat only enough to satisfy the hunger. s-

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Do not fast against the doctor’s orders, or to the point of endangering the health. fl See that the body is kept clean inside and outside. Keep up the exercises in deep breathing. Indulgencc of the flesh should be withheld during the week. Elimínate thoughts which are not of the highest nature. Retire early with thoughts of spiritual influx. Rise early, breathe deeply, give thanks for the new day, and become receptive to new life and vitality.

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Thí* monograph afways remaíns the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M . O . R.C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receíving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Nineteen

Eleventh Degree Monograph Nineteen


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^ No matter what path one chooses of an esoteric na' ture, in order to reach the Ultímate Goal, there is temptation constantly brought upon the traveler, to test his worthiness of proceeding. Those qualities which make one worthy of continuing along the path are pointed out in the Vedic Hymn, the Bhagavad'Gita, by Krishna, speaking to his loyal subject Arjuna: Those who worship me with constant zeal, with the highest faith and minds placed on me, are held in high esteem by me. . . . My devotee, who is unexpecting, puré, just, impartial, devoid o f fear, and who hath forsa\en interest in the results of action, is dear unto me. He also is worthy of my love who neither rejoiceth ñor findeth fault, who neither lamenteth ñor coveteth, and being my servant who is equaVminded to friend or foe, the same in honor and dishonor, in coid and heat, in pain and pleasure, and is unsolicitous about the event of things; to whom praise and blame are as one; who is o f little speech, content with whatever cometh to pass, who hath no fixed habitation, and whose heart, full of devotion, is firmly fixed. But those who see\ this sacred ambrosia— the religión of immortality— even as I have explained it full o f faith, intent on above all others, and united to devotion, are my most beloved. — BH AGAVAD'GITA t

ELEVENTH DEGREE


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N U M B E R NINETEEN

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Beloved Members, Greetings! I am presuming that each of you who receives this monograph from me today will have completed one week of preparation through proper dieting and the attention to other details as described in my talk of last week. I believe I am right in assuming that all of you are £ succeeding, at least 90 per cent, in following all the advice given in these lessons just as you would try to do if you were actually a candidate in waiting and preparation in one of the temples in Egypt as in the olden days. The mere fact that you are in the Western world and studying under a Western-world teacher should not change your impression and belief regarding the efficiency of these instructions or any advice that I give you. After all is said, the fact remains that what I am telling you is what has been told to me and it can be traced back through reliable sources to the very best instructors in these subjeets. Furthermore, I know from personal experience what these things have done in my own life, and I have the additional proof in the letters coming from the members of this class as to just what these lessons are doing for most of you who follow them. The valué of such instructions does not lie in the source from which they come at the present time, ñor in the manner in which they are presented, but in the nature of their helpfulness. Therefore, I believe that most of you are doing your utmost to live up to the spirit of the work of this class and not just to the letter of the law. This being true, each of you should be able to say at the present time that you realize some benefit from the past week's method of liv ing. Of course, if you have not been able to follow my suggestions or instructions completely or even more than halfway, then you may not be able to say that you have been helped or that you have noticed any difference. But I know that if you have gone at least three fourths of the way in following all the instructions given in the last mono graph that today you must feel inwardly and outwardly greatly vitalized, purified and happier. This week's preparation has laid a foundation inwardly that should serve you well for the next few weeks. I am not going to com mand or even urge that you repeat, during the coming week, the same methods of living that you used last week. If you have found that the elimination of meat has affected your strength in any way, or if you have found that any other feature of the instructions has left you ^ wanting in any necessity, then during the coming week you may make some slight modifications according to your individual analysis of your requirements; but in a general way you should try to follow as much of last week's processes as possible during the next two or three weeks. Again I say, slight modifications may be made. You may change your diet, your method of sleeping, or meditating or any form of exercise as you wish.


NUMBER N INETEEN

— D— PAGE TW O

What you did last week has established a certain quality of cleanliness inwardly that will have its effect upon your progress regardless of what you do during the next few weeks, unless you wilfully over-indulge in things that you should not indulge in. If you proceed to eat too much meat during the next few weeks, or drink a lot of alcoholic liquors, or a lot of coffe, or eat too many starchy foods, you may partially undo what has already been established. But if you use a little judgment and slightly modify your eating and drinking for the next two or three weeks, or even continué what you did last week, you will find your improvement and development progressing in accordance with how nearly you duplícate last week's methods. There are a few spiritual thoughts that I wish to give you to meditate upon during the coming week; for you are now beginning to approach the condition of higher attunement where inspirational messages or impulses may come to you from the Cosmic, often planting a peculiar thought in your mind regarding your daily activities or your business affairs, or social affairs, or about your manner of living. At times you may feel that these thoughts are merely passing fancies and should be rejected or ignored, but at other times you will feel that the same thoughts are repeating themselves upon certain occasions or during moments of relaxation as though urging you to meditate upon them and give attention to them. Therefore, the following spiritual thoughts should be used as key thoughts for meditation and contemplation on different occasions throughout the coming week. First of all, I want to speak on the subject of faith. At first you may think that it has nothing to do with our present teachings and present work, but while the subject of faith may seem to be outside our present study, the subjects of trust and confidence are certainly important at the present moment. There is a considerable difference between trust and faith although many persons seem to think that they are identical. I do not want to have any members of this class accept the work of this Degree purely on faith, but I do want them to have complete trust and confidence in the results of our present preparations for the coming of a new day in their lives. We speak of the perfect faith of a child, but when we qualify the word faith with the word perfect in front of it, we really mean more than simple faith for we are referring to complete trust and confidence. Faith may be assumed and built up in the human consciousness even when some doubt and hesitancy also exist, but when there is trust and confidence there is no doubt. Experience begets trust and confidence. If faith is trained by experience it becomes trust and confidence. If experi ence runs contrary to faith it turns faith into a wabbling belief that amounts to nothing. I wish that I could impress upon our members that importance of a great degree of trust in what is to be in connection with these lectures and preparations. Think, for a moment, what Jesús, the great rnystic, said in this regará. At one time He criticized the doubting ones by


NUMBER N INETEEN

— D— PAGE THREE

saying that He had come in His Father1s ñame and they did not receive Him. Again He asked them, "Believest thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in Me? The words that I say unto you I speak not from Myself: but the Father abiding in Me doeth His works." Here He was urging them to believe what He said and what He was doing. He was not attempting to establish faith, for in this case He wanted their belief to be a trust and a conviction. and not a faith such as they had held for years in their own religión regarding things they had never experienced and could not demónstrate to be true. Jesús further said to them on this subject, "Believe Me that I am in the Father, and the Father in Me: or else believe Me for the very work's sake." Here we see that in the typical manner of a true mystic He said that if they could not find a conviction that the consciousness of God was in Him and He was part of the consciousness of God then at least they should become convinced of His divine message by the demonstrations He made and the work He was able to accomplish. Now this is the very point we want you to keep in mind. We want you to notice every day as you arise from your sleep what a higher and more lofty sense of dignity and sublime regeneration you feel mentally and physically. I would cali your attention to the fact that each day brings you a step higher in your attunement and a step closer to that very vague and distant goal that we all are striving to reach. Still the distance is only one of time and not one of sensation. While it may take eternity or an endless number of incarnations for any one of us to reach the ultimate goal of our perfect development, and there fore the goal may seem to be vague and distant in degrees of time, nevertheless, each day of our preparation brings us closer in attune ment and sensation with that goal. We can begin now to feel it, to sense it, and understand it, and especially to be benefited by the spiritual blessings of that ultimate goal. It is as though we were standing on one of the sand dunes in Egypt facing the east just at sunrise. In the matter of time and space the rising sun on the horizon actually may be hundreds of miles distant or perhaps thousands of miles, but through our greater appreciation of its significance we are thrilled at the sensation of being bathed with its golden light which shines on every part of us as though the sun were within a few feet of where we stand. So I would have you meditate this week on the subject of your trust and confidence in the ultimate success of the processes which are now going on within you. Our manuscripts show that in the ancient days the candidates were urged in the morning talk, made by the guardian, to retire to their cells and to kneel in prayer all day, thanking God in a trustful and confident way for the coming benefits. They were to thank God as though they had already received them because this would typify a perfect expression of trust and confidence. It is not necessary for you to kneel in prayer; for this was only a symbol and salutation in the Orient. Some of these people


NUMBER N IN ETEEN

— D— PAGE FOUR

still kneel upon prayer rugs to pray at sunrise and sunset. You need not humbly lower your body to raise your spirit inwardly and your di vine self to adoration and communion with God. The outer self always should be so humble that the spiritual self is continuously above it and filled with richness of expression. But you can be prayerful many times during the day. You can spend this entire week in doing your work, fulfilling your obligations and yet sensing that each min ute, each hour, is bringing you cío ser to the moment when suddenly there will be an outburst of emotion all through you and with tears in your eyes and the audible strains of Cosmic music and inspirational words in your hearts and mutterings upon your lips you will cry aloud that the hour has come, the moment when it is the darkest before sun rise and the moment of your being lifted up upon the physical cross of test and trial for rebirth into the spiritual kingdom at the Dawn of the Golden Day. When that time comes you will rejoice in every way, and then you will find in a twinkling of an eye that you have been remade, reborn, and that a great and mighty power is surging through your being which will enable you to carry on God's Creative work or the accepted challenge of the Great White Brotherhood. Think of this throughout the week; I will have another vital message for you in seven days. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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If helpful, the recommended diet should be continued. In general, you should con tinué the suggested regimen of last week for two or three weeks. Slight modifications may be made to fit the individual. Members should accept the work of this Degree with trust and confidence, not faith alone. ^ Medítate upon the subject of trust and confidence in the ultimate success of the processes which are going on within you. íj[ Every day brings you closer to the Ultimate Goal. Sense that every minute of the day brings you closer to rebirth. You need not kneel to pray; be humbly prayerful inwardly.


"C o n se c ra te d +o truth and dedicated to every Rosicrucian"


ROSICRUCI AN ORDER

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This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Granel Lodge of A. M. O. R. C . It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty

The matter contained herein is ofFicially issued through the Supreme Coundl o í the A . M. O . R. C . under the emblem ebove, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, engraved. typewritten. and photographic copies of official. prescribed. and copyrighted monographs. dissertations, scientific postulations, phílosophical discourses, and ecademic studies, diagrams, illustrations. and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A. M. O . R. C . All matters herein contamed are strietty confidential to the member receiving. and are imparted only as an inodent to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to this monograph is and shell remain in the Supreme G rand Lodge of A . M . O . R. C. and it shall be returned to it upon ¡ts request. The :ontents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and e>clusive Information of the receiving member and n |t otherwise. A ny other use or ettempted use does. ipso facto. termínate all rights of the member. and i* a violítion of the Statutes of this Order. A . M . O . R . C . is the only organizaron authorized to tse the Registered ñame and symbots. and the Imperator feas tole right to grant the use of them to other ellied o ganizations or movements.


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9 One of the greatest sources of Arcane Wisdom is the Divine Pymander. This great work, attributed to Hermes Trismegistus, who supposedly antedated Moses in Egypt, gives esoteric instruction relating to theosophy, properly scrcaUed, that is, the knowledge of divine power and beings, and the connection between man and the Divine Source from which he was animated and inspired. The Divine Pymander, down the ages, has been funda' mental in the founding of Mystery Schools, which have developed from that source in three directions: Theosophy—religious and ethical teachings: Alchemy— the relation of the material to the spiritual and the transmutation of the former into the latter; and Magic— the employment of the higher powers latent in man upon the physical plañe. The ñame Pymander, or Poemander, is of Greek origin, meaning Shepherd of Men, and is equivalent to Messiah. Henee, Pymander is the Shepherd who offers to guide Hermes in his quest for divine knowledge. The following selection from the Tract of the Divine Pymander gives the illuminating experience of Hermes with the Divine Mind:

My thoughts being once seriously busied about the Things that are, and my Understanding lifted up, all my bodily Senses being exceedingly holden bac\, as it is with them that are very heavy with sleep . . . Me thought I saw one of exceeding great stature, and an infinite greatness cali me by ñame, and say unto me, "What wouldst thou Hear and See? or wouldst thou Understand, to Leam, and Know?' Then said I, 'W ho art Thou?' ‘I am,’ quoted He, ‘Poemander, the Mind of the Great Lord, the Mighty and absolute Emperor: I \now what thou wouldst have, and I am always present with thee.’ Then said I, ‘I would Leam the Things that are, and Understand the Jâture of them and \now God!’ ‘How?’ said He. I answered, ‘That I would gladly hear.’ Then He, 'Have me in thy mind, and whatsoever thou wouldst leam, I will teach thee.' When he said thus, he was changed in his Idea or Form, and straightway in a twin\ling o f an eye, all things were become light, both sweet and ex' ceedingly pleasant; and I was wonderfully delighted in the beholding it. HERMES TRISM EG ISTUS


NUMBER TW EN TY

PAGE ONE

Beloved Members, Greetings ! We are now face to face with the last seven days of your preparation so far as anything of a definí te nature can be given to you to help you. If at the end of the coming seven days, you have not crossed the line from night into day and from darkness into light you will have to dwell in meditation and patience for a few more days without any particular guidance from me. But I believe that this coming week will be sufficient for all of you to make the first contact with the Golden Dawn. Therefore, in accordance with one of the oldest records in our archives, I am calling your attention to the sacred psalms. There is one which has become well known in the Christian religión although it is translated from the Jewish manuscripts and was originally taken from the Egyptian rituals by the Jewish people and slightly modified to fit the advanced understanding of the newer race. This ancient psalm of thankfulness, faith, trust, and hope is known in the Chris tian Bible as the twenty-third psalm. This psalm is to be read by you once a day either in the morning or in the evening during the next seven days, and you are to meditate as often as possible upon the various passages, phrases, and symbolical thoughts contained in it. I am quoting the psalm here for you and would cali your attention to the fact that such words as Lord should be interpreted as God, Father, or Personal Ruler, and many similar words in it must be interpreted in the light of the understanding of the Jewish people and of the Egyptians who preceded them. With these few suggestions in mind, the following translation of the twenty-third psalm should be meditated upon because of its significance to you and your progress during the next seven days. 1.

The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.

2.

He maketh me to lie down in green pastures; beside the still waters.

3.

He restoreth my soul; for his name's sake.

4.

Yea, though I walk through the val ley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evils for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.

5.

Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of mine enemies: thou anointest my head with oil; my cup runneth over.

6.

Surely, goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life ; and I will dwell in the house of the Lord for ever.

he leadeth me

he leadeth me in the paths of righteousness

Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER

Summary of This Monograph \ V

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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contaras the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recaí! as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

This marks the last seven days in preparation for the Golden Dawn. Those who have not crossed from the darkness into the light will have to dwell in meditation a while longer. During the coming week, you are to read daily and meditate upon the symbolical thoughts of the twenty-third Psalm from the Christian Bible. tff Any words referring to Lord should be interpreted as God, Father, or personal Ruler. Understanding that this Psalm originally was taken by the Hebrews from the Egyptian rituals will give a deeper insight into the esoteric meaning therein.

flNRSH


This monograph afways remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-one

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-one

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O R. C. under the emblem aboye,, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the printed, engraved, typewritten, and photographic copies of officially pre sen be d and copyrighted monograph», dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses academic studies, diagrams, illustrations. and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A . M . O . R. C. (The above emblem and ñame of the O rde r are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving, and are imparted only as an inciden* to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M . O. R .C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, terminate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A. M. O . R .C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organization» or movement».


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ÍJ One of the most beautiful of all prayers ever to be recorded in the annals of sacred scripture is that of King Akhnaton to Aton. Those members of the group who had the unforgettable experience of preparing for mystic initiation in the land of Egypt, perhaps felt the same inspiration which filled Akhnaton during his prayer:

I inhale the sweet breath that cometh forth from Thy mouth, I behold Thy beauty ever y day. It is my desire that I may hear Thy sweet voice, even the north wind, that my limbs may be rejuvenated with life through love of Thee. Give me Thy hands, holding Thy spirit, that I may receive it and Uve by it. Cali Thou upon my ñame to eternity, and it shall never fail. — AKHNATON (about 1358 B.C.)


NUMBER T WENT Y-ONE

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! I rejoice in saying that I greet all of you at this time as dwellers on a new threshold, standing midway between the outer chambers of a great temple and the inner chamber of new mysteries. For a long time you have been dwelling in the outer chambers in preparation for the entrance to a greater and larger chamber, and you have been advised and instructed as in the ancient days so that your meditations, your prayers, and contemplations would make you qualified to understand the greater mysteries which are to come, During your preparation you have been dwelling in the Obscure Night waiting the coming of the Dawn, and I rejoice in the fact that most of you have already perceived the golden light on the horizon which indicates the coming of a new day. Some few may still see little or no light ahead, but merely sense that the night is done. They, too, are dwelling on the threshold just as truly as those who already see the first golden tints of the rising sun. I recall that when seventy-f ive or more of us stood in the desert of Egypt one glorious day far from the sight or sound of any city and waited for the coming of the magnificent dawn and the rise of the golden sun in the east, prepared to make the ancient mystic's salutations to the coming of Ra, we separated and each went apart from the others that each might be alone at this sacred moment to shed our tears, to cry aloud, to confess our sins, and express our prayers. We all had agreed that we would obey the ancient rules and, at the first sight of the golden disk showing its vibrating fringe above the edge of the sand dunes in the east, we would raise our arms high in the air and then extend them at right angles to the body, making a cross of the physical form in salutation to Ra. Some wandered many hundreds of feet away from the encampment where we had spent the night in preparation for this part of our mystic initiation in the land of Egypt; some even journeyed to the foot of the Pyramid, or climbed part way up its walls, while others went to the Sphinx; some stood on top of the sand dunes, others stood on level planes. From where I stood I could see our members scattered over a wide distance, and were it not for the strange and mystic clearness of the atmosphere of Egypt, many of them would have been invisible to me because of the great distance that separated us. As I waited for the coming of the sun disk, whose first rise above the sand would also reflect in the waters of the Nile flowing between us and the eastern horizon, I noticed hat to my left, to my right, and in front of me, at distant points, the arms of other members were raised and the salutation was being made to Ra before I saw even the first evidence of its disk. For a moment I was surprised, and then I realized that in accordance with the height of the sand upon which each one stood, there would be a slight variation of a few seconds in the time in which each one would see the sun di: The few who had climbed high upon the Pyramid saw the si the horizon before we did; those who were upon t h e ^


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saw it next; and those of us who were on the lowlands of the desert saw it last. So it is with all of us. We may all be waiting for the same sunrise on the same horizon on the same day, but to some of us it will come a little sooner than to others because of our position in life, and because of the angle from which we view it mentally and spiritually. Those^ who saw first that sunrise in Egypt saw no more beautiful picture than those of us who saw it later, or last of all. It was their time to see it, as it was our time to see it, and everything in its own time will come according to law. Therefore, those who are still scanning the dark horizon, looking for the first glimmer of light, need not feel that those who have already seen the Dawn and its symbolical radiations are more advanced or have any advantage over them. Each in his good time will bear witness to the light. As we all stand waiting, either for the first glimpse of light or for the further fullness of its illumination, we are dwellers on the threshold. It is a new threshold for each one of us and our anticipations, expectations, and hopes are higher for this than they have ever been on any of the thresholds of the past. Just at this time, however, I must warn you of the fact that even though the threshold is different and so high in its spiritual aspect, nevertheless, the fundamental law expresses itself again, and there is present, as at every other threshold, the inevitable, unseen terror known as the Tempter at the Threshold. You were advised early in your initiation in this Rosicrucian Order that the Terror at the Threshold which you met on the occasion of your first initiation typified the Tempter which you would meet at every threshold throughout your life, and, even so, you are face to face right now with such a Tempter. This Tempter is not one who becomes easily discouraged in his work on behalf of the black forces and evil powers of the universe. It means nothing to him that he has whispered to you many times and urged you often to retrace your steps and to accept the pleas he makes and that each time you have refused to listen and ignored him. It means nothing to him that even now your determination is greater than his will and that the evidences of your own experiences are more alluring and more convincing than any argument that he can give. It means nothing to him that some of you have already seen the coming of the Dawn or the first tinges of the golden light of a new life, and that, therefore, you haveí good evidence to warrant you in seeking to pass across the threshold from darkness into light. The Tempter is ever-hopeful that regardless of your experiences and your convictions, your faith, and your hope, he may be able to express some opinion or suggestion, some doubt, or raise some hesitancy in your action that will delay you, and hold you back. He represents mighty forces of evil, determined to meet the contest of light, life, and love, and existing solely


NUMBER TWENTY-ONE

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for the purpose of making the contest continuous and ever stronger. The Tempter is the personification of all the principies and principalities of evil, and as such, he has the determination that is just a little less than the supreme determination of the forces of good and love. There fore, he hopes that he may find in everyone a weakness or a willingness to yield a point and to listen, to doubt and thereby become lost in his grasp and snatched back from the threshold into darkness. In the ancient days, the guardian of the threshold pointed out with clearness and care the age-old warning to listen not to the voice of the Tempter. Always the dweller on the threshold had the privilege of choosing, and thus the guardian in a clarión voice of sincerity fraught with warning, yet expressing the freedom of the soul, called out, "Choose ye your way to light or darkness!" From that moment on, the Guardian would not lift his hand ñor raise his sword to protect the dweller on the threshold from the temptations of the Tempter, or the whisperings of the evil being. Well he knew that within each of us dwells the personifica r o n of good as well as of evil and their representatives within us whisper as a still, small voice, urging us on, tempting us, advising or trying us, and that we as divine beings have the ability and the power to choose our ways and abide thereafter eternally. Therefore, I, too, acting as your guardian at the threshold, can do little more than sound the ancient warning: "Beware of the Voice of the Tempter!" Before you decide, however, in choosing your way, I may add to my warning an explanation of what the Tempter may say to you. I know that in his whisperings he will attempt to explain to you what we have said and what the forces of good and love have been saying to you for a long time. I feel that we have as much right to explain his whisperings and his urges as he has to explain ours. In the first place, he will whisper softly to you in moments when you are in relaxation, and try to make you feel that, after all, you have not made any great progress in your journey to this threshold and that you have crossed other thresholds in the past with high expectations and hopes, yet found no great illumination, no great joy or satisfaction in the néw day, the new temple, or the new sanctum. He will explain to you that the present threshold is just like all the others, and that what lies beyond is fraught only with more effort, more study, more irksome du^ties, more obligations, more denials and sacrifices of the pleasures of life, and will end only with more delusions and more false conceptions. He will grasp your reasoning and try to make it convince you that you have gone as far as you can in your understanding of mystical laws and principies; that during the past year you have added little to that knowledge ; and that all that was said in the instructions and lessons you received were mere prophecies of


NUMBER TWENTY-ONE

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what was to come, mere allurements to lead you on, and mere attempts to convince you against your better judgment that you had received something, whereas you had received nothing. The Tempter will try to convince you that your time is being wasted, that your sacrifices of money and energy are merely donations to a foolish cause, and that it is an endless search for something that does not exist. He will smile with a diabolical expression and point out to you that you have had no peculiar experiences during the Obscure Night, that even now you do not sense any change taking place within you; that the Word you have been seeking has either not come to you at all, or if any word has come, that it is only a creation of your imagination. He will tell you that you cannot see any dawn beyond the present horizon, that there is no greater light coming except that which you fictitiously build up in your mind and delude yourself into accepting. He will tell you that you may remain on the threshold for many days, weeks, months, or years, without having any experience. He will tell some that they have had no sensation of spiritual or Cosmic contact during the past few weeks; that they are deceiving themselves in expecting anything more than they have had and that those who think they had any experiences simply imagine it. To each of the others who have sensed certain conditions and have reported thus to me, he will attempt to minimize these things, and to explain them away as self-deceptions. Thus will the Tempter speak to each one of you. On the other hand, the still small voice of the Cosmic self within will urge you to go on and on with your developing contact with the higher spiritual prin cipies of the universe. If you will listen to this still small voice as carefully and as often as you do to the voice of the Tempter, you will find it making plain to you the fact that all of us do not develop and progress equally and that, in fact, our entire lives are unequal from the moment of birth to the time of transition. What seems to be great progress for one would be insufficient progress for another, or too much progress entirely for one's own good. The Cosmic will try to impress you with the fact that whatever your progress has been, it is the best for you in the present circumstances, and under the present conditions in which you are living and developing. After all, it is a fundamental fact that even our needs are not alike. Each one of us has not only different needs and requirements, but different ambitions and desires, and we are seeking more or less different goals in life. Furthermore, there is the great fundamental fact that our ultimate missions in life are entirely different. The Cosmic alone knows what each mission is for each one of us, and it is the only power that can prepare that mission. The Cosmic has ways and means of developing us in such preparation, giving such


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experiences and allowing such progress as will bring us to our goal and our mission in due time and proper f orm. The one who has the greatest number of spiritual experiences may not be the one who is the most greatly developed in his progress toward his real mission in life, for the mission of one person may require more spiritual experience of one kind or another than the mission of another requires. The past experiences £ of thousands have proved that those who make the greatest progress at the beginning of their development do not always reach the goal first or ahead of those who have been more slow in their development. I cannot tell what your goal is or what mission the Cosmic has ordained for you. I cannot tell which one of you shall reach heights even greater than the leaders in our organization have reached. It is always the ambition of every true teacher that his pupils shall progress to a great er degree of understanding and development than he has attained, and this is my constant prayer, but I cannot tell which one of you in this class shall reach to greater heights. It may be that some of you are to find your greatest joy, your greatest happiness, your greatest prosperity and contentment, in positions and places that some would consider mediocre or commonplace, but which you would consider as truly the ideal of your life. There are thousands upon thousands of businessmen who would con sider my present position in life as being far from ideal, and far from satisfactory from a purely business, social, or economic point of view. There are many of my former associates, who had envied my youthful attainments, who remember that early in my life I made more rapid progress and development in the attainment of a high position in the business world than they. Today, these same men would not exchange places with me, for, in a purely business sense, they have reached greater heights, occupy a more dominating position in the business world, have greater access to unlimited funds, and in every way feel that they have attained the goal of their ambitions; while I, in recent years, have retarded and isolated myself, and for some strange reason haye chosen to retire from the business world and live in a small city in an almost provincial manner, and be known only to a few thousands. Yet if the opinion of many were true and if the picture of my position were correct, I would not ex change with them for all the inducements that the world had to offer; I would still be happy if my home and my office were isolated on a mountaintop far from civilization where it would require days to travel by oxcart and foot to reach even the outer gate of my gardens.

41

Thus, the ambitions and desires of men change and are different throughout life, and we cannot measure the success of one by the success of another. There are some in this class who would feel that they had attained the greatest heights possible in this life if they could live in a little garden spot and be in contact with those who are spiritually attuned to them, and just read and study, and meditate on the spiritual things of the universe. That they


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lacked modern conveniences, theatres, stores, daily newspapers, or things of this kind, would mean nothing to them. On the other hand, there are those in this class whose success in life depends upon attaining great heights in the business, the scientific, or the social world. The experiences of such persons during the process of development must be different from the experiences of those who have other ambitions. Thus the arguments of the Tempter are unsound, and do not take into consideration the individual soul development of each one of us. The Tempter tries to tempt all of us with the things of life that are common to the common people, or that are pleasing to the mass or satisfying to the multitude. He wants to assume that each one of us is still interested in the f leshpots of the world, that the sordid lusts, common things of the uneducated and uncultured persons, still appeal to us. He assumes that at any time any one of us would gladly sacrifice a spiritual hour for one of the flesh. In this assumption he is wrong, and therefore his arguments are wrong. He cannot see any beauty, grandeur, profit, or contentment in things of a spiritual nature. He cannot believe that any human being would sacrif ice all of the material things of life to dwell in spiritual peace and happiness. He cannot understand that any one of us would con tinué studying year after year, even if we never had any experience, never had any proof, but still depended upon the faith and hope that ulti mate ly we would be bettered by what we were studying. So at this time I ask you to think over the temptations that have come to you to turn backward, to hesitate or pause, and I especially urge you to be careful of your analytical thinking of what is taking place within you, and your analytical thinking of conditions, laws, and prin cipies around you and in the universe. Listen more to the voice of the Cosmic, and reason and meditate on the greater things of life, as outlined in the above paragraphs ; and in my talk to you next week I will dwell again on the above analytical thoughts of the Tempter, as he explains them to us. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER

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Each will witness within himself the Gol den Dawn according to his level of develop ment. Every occurrence will come about in its own time, according to law. Again, you are warned to be on guard against the Tempter which may appear at the Threshold. Listen only to the still small voice of the Cosmic self within you, urging greater spiritual development at the rate of speed best suited for your own individuality. CJ Analyze carefully the gradual development that has been taking place within you. C¡| Listen to the voice of the Cosmic and medítate upon the higher things of life.


’C onse crated to truth and dedicated to e very Rosicrucian 1

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Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-two

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-two


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<| As we approach the Golden Dawn, our understand' ing is greatly increased. W e are better able to recognise familiar experiences in the references given by those phi' losophers and mystics who reveal to us in their writings their experiences with the Divine Light of Illumination. Such is the selected passage from the pen of Jan van Ruysbroeck, the Flemish mystic and philosopher of the fourteenth century: AH men who are exalted above their creatureliness into a contemplative life are one with this Divine glory— yes, are that glory. And they see and feel and find in themselves, by means of this Divine Light, that they are the same simple Ground as to their uncreated nature, since the glory shineth forth without measure, after the Divine manner, and abideth within them simply and without mode, according to the simplicity o f the essence. W herefore, contemplative men should rise above reason and distinction, beyond their created substance, and gaze perpetudly by the aid of their inbom light, and so they become transformed, and one with the same light, by means o f which they see, and which they see. Thus they arrive at the etemal image after which they were created, and contémplate God and all things without distinction, in a simple beholding, in Divine glory. This is the loftiest and most profitable contemplaron to which men attain in this life.

— JAN VA N RUYSBROECK, 12934381


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! Before speaking any further to you about the voice of the Tempter, I want to introduce in these lessons a letter I have received, because it is typical of the spirit of the work, typical of the experiences our members in this class are having, and typical of the kind of expressions that each one of you may make, perhaps silently, to yourself, even though you do not write them to me. I do not mean that the following letter is one that is a model for each one of you to go by in writing to me, for I would not want you to follow a model of any kind. But it is a model of what most of you have said in various ways, and what I know most of you are feeling in your private thoughts. Here is the letter: It is from E. B. L. in Seattle, Washington. "Dear Master and Imperator: I feel happy to be able to send in a report of my success in having passed through the Obscure Night and in discerning the first touches of the Golden Dawn, the Grand Drama of the Soul, as I wish to cali it. Last night, the 17th, I received this great Cosmic blessing. I was feeling so wonderful, Joyful, and jubilant because I could feel very distinctly the new energy pulsating throughout my being, and the awakening of a power and centers that I had never sensed before. I received some wonderful messages and inspirations, and in every other way I was convinced that it was the beginning of the first touch of the Golden Dawn. Naturally, I can hardly express my appreciation in the manner in which I would like to do, but I will say that I am very thankful for having received this great blessing, and I will also express my deep appreciation to you and the Order for your unselfish work for us, and for your decisión in selecting me to be one of the members of this wonderful class, and I pray to be allowed the privilege of continuing to the very end. In my great happiness today, I began to review my development and progress through the Order, keenly realizing what a great change had occurred in my life. In looking over my records and reviewing what I had accomplished I find that yesterday was the ninth anniversary of my Joining the Order. I feel happy and contented in looking back and noting how I have improved and advanced in so many ways, and I feel deeply thank ful for what I have received. May the time and opportunity come when I will be able to give to the Order something that will adequately express my obligations and gratitude." Aside from the sincere note of thankfulness and appreciation, which this good Frater expresses, because he has sensed the Golden Dawn and feels the changes of regeneration throughout his being, there is the interesting fact that this contact with the Golden Dawn carne at practically the ninth anniversary of his membership in the organization. Nine long, tedious years of patient waiting and hoping, longing, praying, for something indefinito. That


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is a gloomy picture, is it not? Yet, that is the way some of our impatient members in the lower Degrees would think of it. They would say that waiting nine years to have such a wonderful contact is a very long time, and that if the organization cannot bring any great manifestations into our lives sooner than nine years, what is the use of starting? Some of these persons are impatient because at the end of the third month or the first year, they are not in contact with all of the spiritual powers of the entire universe. This Frater in Seattle does not express such an idea. He wasn't even worrying or thinking about the number of years until he began to review his success and his progress. His letter clearly pictures the idea that while sitting down, on this momentous ninth anniversary, and thinking of what the future he Id in store for him at this Golden Dawn, he could not help thinking of the many wonderful changes and benefits that had come into his life in the past nine years. As he turned his thoughts backward, he did not see a gloomy picture of nine long years of patient waiting and studying, but a picture of nine years of cheer and happiness, advancement and progress. He would have lived these nine years anyway, whether he had joined the Order or not. The only difference would have been that if he had not joined the Order, he would not have had the same advancement and progress that he has had, or all of the blessings and benedictions that have come to him in those nine years, and he would not now be standing on the threshold of a wonderful life. And, after all, can we say that nine years is a long time to bring any great change into our lives? Here in California we have a number of universities that are typical of the average university in trying to perfect students as rapidly as possible and to gradúate them as soon as possible in the various professions. There is one university here, however, an exclusive, private one, known as Stanford Uni versity, where the time element is given least consideration. Some time ago I talked with some of their students and found one who is studying to be a physician. He pointed out that whereas the average college used to gradúate physicians in four or five years, and four years was considered a long time to give to one study, Stanford University does not gradúate its physicians, or its specialists in other lines, in any such short time. He pointed out that before he was through with all of the studies and all of the work that he would have to accomplish to become a true Stanford gradúate as a physician, it would take at least nine full years of intensivo devotion and study. When I suggested to him that that was a long time, he smiled and said: "What difference does it make? I am a young man now and I expect to live to be fifty, sixty, or seventy, and I have to live through the next nine years anyway. In comparison with what I will be able to do after I gradúate, and in comparison with the twice nine years that I have already lived, nine more years doesn't seem very much." There are many professions that require eight or nine years in which to attain perfection, and more than one person in every



— D— PAGE THREE

community has spent more than nine years in trying to regain health or to reach the top of the ladder in some business venture or enterprise. If we take the average man or woman whom we meet who is a failure in life at sixty and say to him, "If you had your life to live over again, would you be willing to devote nine years out of the sixty to a gradual perfection and development of yourself to a point where you would attain complete mastership and regeneration?" I am sure that every one of them would say that he would gladly give nine of his years to such work. We cannot tell new members who enter into our organization that it may take nine years to reach the point of regeneration and the Golden Dawn, because they would become discouraged. We have to point out to them that from the very first few months of their study with us, they begin to reap certain little benefits and to make some definite progress. We have to assure them at the end of the second or third year, they will find through serious devotion to the work that they have accomplished a great deai. All of which is absolutely true. But it is peculiar how impatient human nature is and how it becomes dis couraged when we state that it might take eight, nine, or ten years to reach a certain point of satisfaction. Now this is one of the weak points which the Tempter at the Threshold uses in his arguments with each one of you. Our good Frater in Seattle does not say whether the Tempter has been speaking to him in the past, and telling him that he has been in the organization a long time without reaching a certain point. But we feel sure that the Tempter would talk to him in that very way. A young man of my acquaintance once told me that he would like to learn to play the saxophone so that he could join the high school orchestra. The day after his father bought the saxophone, he took the first lesson. He practiced the first week and took a second lesson, and then began to complain because the teacher told him that for three months he would have to work on certain exercises without any melody of any kind. He was Consulting some of his friends, trying to find out if there were not a quicker way of learning to play. The thought that he would have to practico for six months before he could play Yankee Doodle or America or any other simple melody was highly discouragng to him. Is this not typical of our modern, mad desire to rush to conclusions and reach ulti mate heights in the shortest time possible? The Tempter at the Threshold knows our human weaknesses and stirs them into action. He elaborates upon them and exaggerates them, and paints them into beautiful pictures with his silver tongue. He tries to make us believe that the time element is one of the biggest things in life. He almost makes us forget that we hope to live more than a few years, and that as long as we are here on earth we might as well be busy doing something.



— D— PAGE FOUR

Certainly, this letter from our Frater is encouraging, and it is typical of many that I have received from this class. A few are wait ing for the Dawn, and the others have sensed it and are waiting for future developments. But all of you are now in the presence of the Tempter and will be for the next few months, and that is why I am going to spend the time in the next few monographs pointing out to you the errors and pitfalls that lie before you and how to avoid them. Contémplate upon them, and pray for the coming of the Dawn so that you will be ready for it. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summaiy of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

Members of this class are writing to attest the arrival of the Golden Dawn and are ex-

pressing gratitude. Those who conquer the Tempter of the Threshold are well rewarded by renewed strength. Contémplate the dangers of the pitfalls laid by the Tempter. In retrospection, the time spent in arriving at the Golden Dawn is brief and filled with pleasure. Impatience must be overcome in becoming an adept. Cosmic Illumination cannot be rushed. 1

Pray for readiness for the coming of the Dawn.



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MASTER MONOGRAPH R O S I C R U C I A N OR D E R

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Eleventh Degree Monograph


THE CONCURRENCE This Week’s Consideration of a Famous Opinión V ^ There are three stages in the ascent of the path of mysticism, according to the fourteenth century Germán mystic, John Tauler. The first is the practice of selfcontrol; of the second, he says, “W ilt thou with St. John rest on the loving breast of our Lord Jesús Christ, thou must be transformed into His beauteous image by a constant, eamest con' templation thereof.” And of the third stage, a purely passive state of the will and intellect is advocated:

God draws us in three ways, first, by His creatures; secondly, by His voice in the soul, when an eternál truth mysteriously suggests itself, as happens not infrequently in morning sleep. Thirdly, without resistance or means, when the will is quite subdued. 'What is given through means is tasteless; as is seen through a veil, and split up into fragments, and bears with it a certain sting of bittemess. Speaking of the final stage of illumination, and means of reaching it, after having passed the Obscure Night, he says: The \ingdom is seated in the inmost recesses of the spirit. When, through all manner o f exercises, the outward man has been converted into the inward reasonable man, and thus the two, that is to say, the powers o f the senses and the powers of the reason, are gathered up into the very center of the mans being— and thus he flings himself into the Divine Abyss, in which he dwelt eternaüy before he was created; then when God finds the man thus firmly turned towards Him, the Godhead bends and na\edly descends into the depths of the puré waiting soul, and transforms the created soul, drawing it up into the uncreated essence, so that the spirit becomes one with Him. •JOHN TA ULER, 1300(7)4361 A.D.


NUMBER TW ENTY-THREE

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! I am happy to say that during the past week more favorable reports have come to me from the members of this class, showing that the Golden Dawn has made its impression upon them in various ways. Many have actually seen its first bright oolors. While the majority of the members are still dwelling at the Thresh old and experiencing minor effects within their beings, we must pause and wait for them, so that we may all go on together. Nothing is lost, by those who have reached the Dawn, in waiting for those who are still pausing at the Threshold for it. Our inner development goes on just the same and is unquestionably keeping pace with our intellectual comprehension of the principies. I am safe in saying that if all of us were to have no further lessons for a long time, for many months in fact, we would not lose one iota of the inner development that is taking place. We all have so much to think about, and find in our daily actions and thoughts so many ideas upon which we can easily elabórate and concéntrate to our own benefit, spiritually and mentally, that lessons can help us only in directing some of our thinking. I am not presuming at this time to be able to tell you anything that the Cosmic would not inspire in your mind anyway, and which your own experiences during the day would not reveal to you in your periods of con templation. I can only hope at the best to direct your thoughts toward certain principies or ideas and then allow your own inner self to seize upon these and develop them into real lessons for you. That is why I have been speaking so freely about the urges of the Tempter. This is one of his active and busy periods for the members of this Degree, because he realizes that during the next period, after Crossing this Threshold, the members are very likely to have wonderful revelations that will carry them far into the highest development, and then his power to tempt all of us will be greatly weakened. Practically every week I receive letters from members in the Ninth, Tenth, or Eleventh Degrees who tell me that experiences now occurring in their lives have convinced them that the Rosicrucian Path is the only Path for them through life, and that nothing can ever deter them or sway them from this Path. Usually, these letters cióse with a voluntary and wholehearted offer to devote the remainder of their lives to service in the organization. This sort of person can never be influenced by the Temp ter. Most of them have reached this high opinion of our work and have had wonderful experiences solely through the temptations that the Tempter presented to them in the earlier Degrees. In fact, some of them were tempted so greatly that for a time they dropped out of the work and out of the organization while still in the early Degrees. Then during the period of separation from us the promises of the Tempter were not fulfilled. Life did not seem nearly so happy, and many triáis and tribulations occurred which



—D — PAGE TW O

proved that being away from the Path had no advantage. After coming back onto the Path again and realizing the great difference, they are no longer susceptible to the honeyed arguments of the Tempter. One of the great arguments which the Tempter uses with members in the early Degrees is a very oíd one. He calis their attention to the fact that they are still occasionally having spells of illness and that every now and then some of their dreams or hopes fail to be realized, and that occasionally business depressions or other conditions go wrong or affect them seriously, and he laughingly points out to them that perhaps some of the troubles that they are experiencing are because they have been "dabbling with the occult." It is strange to say that this sort of argument often convinces new members, or even oíd members, that they might just as well give up the Rosicrucian work. The Tempter says to them that they joined the organization expecting great changes would come into their lives, and now after being in it a year or two years, or f ive years or more, they are still having the same oíd problems to deal with, and do not demónstrate any new or greater mastership and, therefore, they are wasting their time. He likes especially to do his whispering when things go wrong with our members. He likes to catch one of our members at home, sick with a coid, or catch him just after he has lost his position, or has been reduced in salary. Then he mocks the discouraged one and says to him, "How do you know that this trouble is not a result of your foolish studies and experiments?" We know how this is, because occasionally we receive letters from new members, or fairly oíd members, saying they are afraid they made a mistake in joining the Order and they blame our Order for their new troubles. How can you write anything to such persons and save them from the delusion they have in their minds? What would you say to such a person? Regarding illness, the only thing you can say that is truthful and reasonable is that as long as we live in physical bodies and live unnatural lives in so many ways, we are bound to have some illness or periods of ill-health, as a natural result of our violations of natu ral laws. Being a member of the organization will not prevent the laws from working, and being a member of the organization cannot increase the activity of the natural laws. A person will not be less ill just because he is a member of the Rosi crucian Order, ñor will he be more ill. If he has any illness at all, it is due directly to natural laws being violated and natural results coming therefrom. The same is true in regard to business conditions or any of our personal or social affairs. I presume that there always will be thousands of persons who will believe that the moment they are accepted into membership in the Rosicrucian fraternity their "luck" will they are protected against ession of the magic membership card conditions which are unfortall illness and all business change, and that by the possunate.


NUMBER TWENTY-THREE

—D— PAGE THREE

On the other hand, we know that when our members reach a certain stage of development and progress in the work, their lives do become somewhat upset. Some of the friendships they used to have become unsatisfactory or uninteresting, and they forget these friends and seek newer ones who are of the same opinion and mental attitude as they are. Also, our new way of thinking causes us to act differently from the past ♦3 in regard to our social and business obligations, and this causes some changes and some upset conditions. We attune ourselves with different vibrations through our development and progress, and this is bound to bring about some modif ications in our affairs, which for a short time may seem quite upset and unsatisfactory. However, no one can move out of one atmosphere into another, out of one line of thought into another or out of one way of living into another without passing through a transitory period of change with the resulting upset conditions. Here is where the Tempter steps in again, and points to the upset conditions and says, "See what you have now I If you were not studying the Rosi crucian teachings, you would not be in this upset condition. What good is it going to do to change your life and go through such upset condi tions as this?" It is hard to answer persons who ask such questions without simply telling them the truth, and trusting to their own logical minds to see the point. I remember that when we finally decided to pack our belongings and move from New York to California, after considering all of the freight rates and express charges and everything else, we decided to sell all of our household furniture and to move nothing more than our personal be longings, and come out West here to start life over in a new world. We all were happy on the train for four or five days, and very happy the first few days we were in California, because we had left coid and miserable weather in the springtime in New York and found balmy summer weather in California. The scenery was all new, the atmosphere was invigorating, the spirit of the people was charming, and the progressiveness of the West was captivating. We had possibly eight or ten acquaintances in the West, made through correspondence, and some of these were developing into new friendships. After a few weeks had passed we began to realize that there were many things lacking to which we had been accustomed. Instead of our own home and our own furniture, and all of the conveniences we had enjoyed, we were living temporarily in a furnished apartment with many things lacking. We missed a great many friends whom we had known for years in the ** Eastern cities, and we missed familiar faces, familiar places, and fa miliar habits and customs. Our realizations of these changes brought about a sort of depression for quite a while. During this period, my wife and children were tempted, as I was, to ask whether this new life in this new world was making us as happy as we had been in the past. If we had thought that it was always going to be just as it was for the first six monthes, I don't think we would have hesitated to repack and go back East again. Common sense pointed out to


NUMBER TWENTY-THREE

—D— PAGE FOUR

us, however, that the things which depressed us the most were things which were temporarily lacking and could be secured in the near future, or were due to upset conditions which could not exist very long. So we cast our visión forward into the future instead of scrutinizing and analyzing the present. Gradually conditions improved, and in another year we were enthusiastic citizens of this new world. After making yearly visits to the East for a number of years and finding on each occasion that we were anxious to return to the West again, we finally discovered that, after all, the new environment had advantages which the East did not have, and that our period of depression during the first few months of change had been worth while. If all of us could look at all of our affairs in this manner, we would see the advantages which we now enjoy, even in a modified form, and realize that these can grow to greater heights than anything we have had in the past. The point which most persons overlook is that the great happiness and pleasures and enjoyable things which they had in life before they joined our organization represented the ultimate that such a life had to give. For years and years we build up an attitude of seeking for and finding happiness and contentment in the grosser, material things of life until we become accustomed to them and have obtained as many of them as life has to give. Of course, this places us in a position where we feel fairly well contented. When the great change comes in our lives, we have to leave all of the great pleasures we have enjoyed, and start at the bottom again to build anew. During the process of building up the new life and new way of living, we do not enjoy the ultimate of things as we did beforehand, but we are gradually reaching that point and can go beyond. It is a fact that living the new and higher life and the more abundant life enables us to reach greater heights of pleasure and happiness than the other way of living could ever provide for us. Because the new life has a longer Path reaching a greater field of enjoyment, it is only logical that we should have a longer journey with its more tiresome effects. However, we must not judge the ultimate by the present conditions any more than a person traveling across the ocean to Europe can judge what the end of his journey is going to be for him, by the storms and weather that he may encounter on the ocean. Many Easterners who travel in California come to San Francisco first, then proceed by automobile to Los Angeles. On the way south from San Francisco, they may go through the many beautiful suburban cities with their magnif icent residences and parks. In a short time they reach Palo Alto, the famous city of the University of Stanford and the home of the former president of the United States, Herbert Hoover. After another few minutes drive they reach the city of San José in the beauti ful Santa Clara Valley, rightly called the Valley of Heart's Delight because its many fine fruit trees make it a garden spot of the world. These travelers, on their southward journey are anticipating the wondrous beauty of Los Angeles and Hollywood of which they have read and heard so much. Some Easterners have an


NUMBER TWENTY-THREE

—D— PAGE FIVE

idea that Los Angeles and Hollywood consist of nothing but parks, beau tiful homes, and motion-picture studios. To them this is the ultimate of their journeys to the West, but, as they continué to drive for a few more hours toward the south, they begin to reach the desoíate, unimpressive ranch sections. They pass through land studded with oil wells and the accompanying workers' huts ; they pass through great stretches with har taren scenery, until the tourists begin to feel depressed, and wonder if this tripwere really worth while. They wonder how any beautiful city could exist in the midst of such a wild and unpicturesque country. The Tempter might tempt some to turn back, but they heed not, for once they pass this undesirable section and cross over one final hill into a valley, they find spread out before them the beautiful environs of Los Angeles and Hollywood. In spite of all their anticipation, they find these cities not unlike those they were familiar with in the East. Yet they are pleased that they resisted the temptation to turn back, now that they have completed the long day's journey. We are all journeying on a Path as are these tourists. Not only are changes taking place within us, but these changes are affecting con ditions around us, and cause us to sense a restlessness and an upset con dition in all of our affairs, which the Tempter points out to us as being all there is to life, so that we need not seek anything beyond it. To continué the analogy— no real tourist, or no real mystic on the Path, ever ceases seeking. The discouraged tourist who proceeds no farther toward his destination does not remain and live his life dissatisfied. He either turns back or*proceeds on a new Path, still seeking the paradise he had in mind. The seeker on the Path does the same thing. The Tempter is perfectly satisfied to have him change his Path every few months, because in this way he will never reach any paradise or any goal that is satisfactory. As long as we are going to seek and keep on jour neying in some direction, why not stay on the one Path we have started and trust to the friendship and good advice of thousands who have gone on ahead of us? We have our choice between listening to the Tempter who says the Path leads nowhere and to the voices of thousands of others who tell us that it leads to the grandest things in life. If we are going to con tinué the remainder of our lives seeking and journeying, why not accept the advice of those who have gone ahead, and keep on the Path we have started? rj

We will use no more energy, time, or thought, in staying on the Path that has carried us along safely for a long time, than we would by changing the Path and going in other directions. Another point that the Tempter tries to explain is that our journey, and our seeking, are costing us something. If we happen to be in moderate financial circumstances, he points out the cost to us in dollars and cents, and tries to tell us that we would save money by stopping our search right now. If we happen



—D— PAGE SIX

to be in good financial circumstances, and can easily afford the little expense, he will try to point out to us that we are wasting time or energy, or missing other pleasures that we should be paying for instead of what we are getting. Here again the argument is foolish, because those who have the determination, the desire, the restless urge to seek will continué to seek somewhere, even though they turn away from their present Path. They will continué to spend money in their seeking, regardless of whether they spend it for one purpose or another, and they do not save anything at all in dollars and cents by turning from one Path to another. Ñor do they save any time, energy, or miss any real pleasures. Our records plainly show that the average member who joined our organization previously spent each year from twenty to thirty dol lars for books and lectures, hoping that they would point out to him the knowledge he desires. After joining our organization, his obligations and dues only amount to about the same sum of money he spent on books. He is not spending any more in regular monthly payments of dues. The Tempter likes to point out this fact and say that you are spending money each month for something that may not ever amount to anything. His emphasis on the fact that the payments are made regularly each month of your life seems to give weight to his argument. He could not face a counter argument to the effect that in the past each one of us may not have spent two or three dollars each month, but we may have spent five dol lars in one month for some books and only fifty cents in another month, and then again in another month we may have spent six dollars for some lectures, and only twenty-five cents the following months, but at the end of the year, the amounts might total far more than the amount for dues for a year. He forgets also the advantages the seeker has in being in companionship and association with others of like mind, and he willfully lays aside the fact that in spending this money each month our mem bers are not simply paying dues or paying for what they receive, but they are contributing to and helping to support a great organization in a great work. The Tempter wouldn't allow you to think for one moment of the great fundamental truth that: as you give, so you receive. That great truth is shocking to him, and it is the one thing that he will try to keep out of your mind at every opportunity. The fact remains that the most advanced members in our organization, and the ones who have received the most from us and from the Cosmic, are the ones who have given the most, both in time and money or in service, or all of these. The members who, after being with us a year or less, complain that they have received very little, and are deriving very little benefit from their connection with us, are the ones who have only paid their dues and have never given an additional stamp, or have never given their services in the way of distributing any leaf lets or trying to get a new member, or anything of the kind. They simply belong to the organization, pay their dues, read their monographs, and enter no further into the spirit of the work.


NUMBER TWENTY-THREE

—D— PAGE SEVEN

Now I have given you many things to think about, and I hope that some of these points will help you in realizing how false the whisperings of the Tempter can be, and how they are designed to be of injury to your best interests. After all, what does the Tempter offer you that is better than what you now have? He is not the least bit constructivo in his criticisms, and while he tears down the work we are trying to do, he does Q not offer you anything in its place. He tries to make you think that by returning to your worldly interests and the joys which you had before you joined in your present studies or efforts, you will be having all that life has to give. He does not argüe this very intently or hopefully because he knows what a false statement it is, and how weak it is. You could promptly say to the Tempter in return, "If the material and gross things of life afford such great happiness, why do you suppose I ever became a seeker? I was dissatisfied or wanted more than that, and that is why I became a seeker." And this is true. The average member who joins our organization is not one who is so poor and so miserable in his social and physical position in life that he has not enjoyed many of the material things in life. The average member is one who has been tasting of most of the things of life, not all of its luxuries, but at least all of its regular pleasures and benefits, but has still felt the need of something more and realized that he must look beyond the material things in order to find the Path that leads to happi ness and success in life. That is why he became a seeker. The Tempter's argument, therefore— that you will gain by giving up your present search and returning to the conditions in which you originally lived— is foolish and untrue. By thinking over all of these things during the coming week and analyzing them, you will be justifying yourself against any further remarks on the part of the Tempter and protecting yourself against being delayed or misdirected at this crucial time. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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^ Once the Tempter has been overcome the victor is a stauncher member. IHnesses result from violation of natural laws. 9

Membership in the material body of an organization does not assure the harmonious manifestation of Cosmic laws; rather, it is the self>application of the member.

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As we progress, we attune ourselves to different vibrations; this brings changes in everyday aífairs.

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Through retrospect and comparison, things take on a traer light.

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To continué on one long Path will enable us to reach our goal more quickly than to change paths many times.

A true seeker feels the need of something beyond the material things of life.

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R O S I C R U C I A N ORDE R

This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Granel Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-four

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-four


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9 By sending out thoughts of love and cooperation to' ward the members of this class, we are uniting in a period of concentration with that source of mystical brotherhood. In many great works of mysticism, we are admonished to send out thoughts of love. Two different selections have been chosen which give such admonitions: that of Lao-tse, Chínese philoso' pher of the sixth century, B.C.; and that of John, the Apostle of Jesús the Christ.

The sage comprehends the connexions between himself and others, and how they all go to constitute him of one body with them, and he does not }{now how it is so;— he naturally does so. In fulfilling his constitution, as acted on and acting, he (simply) follows the direction of Heaven; and it is in consequence of this that men style him (a sage). The love of the sage for others receives its ríame from them. If they did not tell him of it, he would not \now that he loved them; and when he \nows it, he is as if he \new it not; when he hears it, he is as if he heard it not. His love of others never has an end, and their rest in him has also no end;— all this talles place naturally.

—LAOTSE, 604^531 B.C. Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and everyone that loveth is born of God and knoweth God.

—JOHN THE APOSTLE


NUMBER TW EN TY-FO U R

— C— PAGE ONE

Beloved Members, Greetings ! We must wait a little longer for a few more of the members to see the Golden Dawn before we go on with our class studies'. I am sure that not one of you will feel reluctant to wait for those who are just about to emerge out of the darkness, for it is the spirit of cooperation and good will, fellowship and sympathy, that binds us all together and gives each one of us greater strength. In the meantime, may I suggest that if you have found the system of regulating your diet and of partial fasting as being helpful to you in the past weeks, you should modify it slightly and continué it for a while longer, regardless of whether or not you have reached the Golden Dawn. So many have stated in their letters that after trying for a week or two the modified diet, or the modified fasting system, they wished to continué it. I have found it helpful and, in fact, more invigorating than anything along this line that I have tried in the past. If you find, however, that continuing the modified diet or continuing to partially fast is causing you to lose too much weight, then you may add slightly to the diet, to a point where you will maintain the proper weight. Try to cut down the amount of food that you formerly had been eating, and continué this modification for another few weeks. During this stage of psychic and spiritual experiments, this will be helpful to every one of you, regardless of whether you are still in the Obscure Darkness waiting for the Dawn or are now wait ing to go ahead. Once before, I mentioned that there will be periods with no definite instructions, due to the fact that changes taking place within you are not to be disturbed by any new consideration or new practices. I hope that when there are occasions, like that of the present week, when the lesson is brief, you will not feel neglected in any sense. After all, the great revelations of truth and enlightenment that you are to receive in this Degree are to come from within and from the Cos mic, and not from me. Whether or not I send you any definite knowledge you will continué to receive the great wisdom in accordance with your loyalty, sincerity, and your attunement with this class. We are all bound in one group, and soon another group will be formed that will follow behind us, and go through the same experiences that this present class has gone through. We must see to it that not one ever resigns or drops out through any cause whatsoever except through transition, and ^ even this will not separate the member from our group. I have nothing further to say to you this week, because I do not wish to get ahead of those who are still waiting at the Threshold. I do not want to begin any new thought until each member is ready to go along with us in the progress we will make. Keep up your contemplation and concentration periods, and send out thoughts of love and cooperation toward the members of this


NUMBER TW EN TY-FO UR

— C— PAGE TW O

class, so that each one will feel that he is a part of a holy assembly and in this way gain strength to develop and attain the same degree of progress that the highest in this class have reached at this point. This is all that I have to say at the present time, except that my sincere benediction and blessing goes to each one of you. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER SELF-EXAMINATION QUESTIONS The following questions are given merely as a self-quiz to test your understanding of the important points in the lesson. It will not be necessary for you to send your answers to the Grand Lodge. 1. How could a restricted diet over too long a period of time prove detrimental to one's health? Reason this out for yourself. 2. Why does the A.M.O.R.C. occasionally prepare for its students only a brief monograph? 3. Are you making it a habit to send out thoughts of love and cooperation to your classmates? Do you yourself at such times sense about you a condition of well-being?


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If helpful, the modified diet, which you have been practicing, may be continued for a few more weeks. T he great lessons of truth and enlightenment will come from within, and from the Cosmic, and not from any material, extemal forcé. ÍJ Continué concentration periods. Send out thoughts of love and cooperation toward members of this class.





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Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-]our

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-]our

The matter eontained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A. M . O . R. C. under the emblem above. which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, enqraved, typewritten^ and photographic copies of officiaily prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertations, scientific postulations philosophical discourses. acaa'cmic studies diegrems, illustrations, and charts" es authorized by the Imperator of A. O. R. C. (Trie above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained ere strictly confidentiel to the member receiving and are imparted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of. the legal title, and the riaht of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M. O. R. C. and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive Information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or ettempted use does. ipso facto, terminate all rights of the member. and is a violation of the Ststutes of this Order. A. M. O. R. C. is the only organization authorlied to Use the Registered neme and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizat'ons or movements.


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9 By sending out thoughts of love and cooperation txy ward the members of this class, we are uniting in a period of concentration with that source of mystical brotherhood. In many great works of mysticism, we are admonished to send out thoughts of love. Two different selections have been chosen which give such admonitions: that of Lao-tse, Chínese philoscK of the sixth century, B.C.; and that of John, the Apostle of Jesús the Christ.

The sage comprehends the connexions between himself and others, and how they all go to constitute him of one body with them,and he does not \now how it is so;— he imturally does so. In fulfilling his constitution, as acted on and acting, he ( simply) follows the direction of Heaven; and it is m consequence of this that men style him (a sage). The love of the sage for others receives its ñame from them. If they did not tell him of it, he would not \now that he loved them; and when he \nows it, he is as if he \new it not; when he hears it, he is as if he heard it not. His love of others never has an end, and their rest in him has also no end;— all this talles place iviturally.

— LAOTSE, 604^531 B.C. Beloved, let us love one another; for love is of God; and everyone that loveth isborn of God and knoweth God.

— JOHN TH E APOSTLE


NUMBER TWENTY-FOUR

—C— PAGE ONE

B eloved Members, G r e e t in g s !

We must wait a little longer for a few more of the members to see the Golden Dawn before we go on with our class studies. I am sure that not one of you will feel reluctant to wait for those who are just about to emerge out of the darkness, for it is the spirit of cooperation and ®good will, fellowship and sympathy, that binds us all together and gives each one of us greater strength. In the meantime, may I suggest that if you have found the system of regulating your diet and of partial fasting as being helpful to you in the past weeks, you should modify it slightly and continué it for a while longer, regardless of whether or not you have reached the Golden Dawn, So many have stated in their letters that after trying for a week or two the modified diet, or the modified fasting system, they wished to continué it. I have found it helpful and, in fact, more invigorating than anything along this line that I have tried in the past. If you find, however, that continuing the modified diet or continuing to partially fast is causing you to lose too much weight, then you may add slightly to the diet, to a point where you will maintain the proper weight. Try to cut down the amount of food that you formerly had been eating, and continué this modification for another few weeks. During this stage of psychic and spiritual experiments, this will be helpful to every one of you, regardless of whether you are still in the Obscure Darkness waiting for the Dawn or are now waiting to go ahead. Once before, I mentioned that there will be periods with no defi nite instructions, due to the fact that changes taking place within you are not to be disturbed by any new consideration or new practices. I hope that when there are occasions, like that of the present week, when the lesson is brief, you will not feel neglected in any sense. After all, the great revelations of truth and enlightenment that you are to receive in this Degree are to come from within and from the Cos mic, and not from me. Whether or not I send you any definite knowl edge you will continué to receive the great wisdom in accordance with your loyalty, sincerity, and your attunement with this class. We are all bound in one group, and soon another group will be formed that will follow behind us, and go through the same experiences that this present class has gone through. We must see to it that not one ever resigns or ^ drops out through any cause whatsoever except through transition, and ^ even this will not separate the member from our group. I have nothing further to say to you this week, because I do not wish to get ahead of those who are still waiting at the Threshold. I do not want to begin any new thought until each member is ready to go along with us in the progress we will make. Keep up your contemplation and concentration periods, and send out thoughts of love and cooperation toward the members of this


N U M B E R TWENTY-FOUR

— C PAGE T W O

class, so that each one will feel that he is a part of a holy assembly and in this way gain strength to develop and attain the same degree of progress that the highest in this class have reached at this point. This is all that I have to say at the present time, except that my sincere benediction and blessing goes to each one of you. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER SELF-EXAMINATION QUESTIONS The following questions are given merely as a self-quiz to test your understanding of the important points in the lesson. It will not be necessary for you to send your answers to the Grand Lodge. 1. How could a restricted diet over too long a period of time prove detrimental to one's health? Reason this out for yourself. 2. Why does the A.M.O.R.C. occasionally prepare for its students only a brief monograph? 3. Are you making it a habit to send out thoughts of love and cooperation to your classmates? Do you yourself at such times sense about you a condition of well-being?


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete monograph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory. j

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If helpful, the modified diet, which you have been practicing, may be continued for a few more weeks.

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The great lessons of truth and enlightenment will come from within, and from the Cosmic, and not from any material, external forcé.

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Continué concentration periods.

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Send out thoughts of love and cooperation toward members of this class.


"C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedicated to every Rosicrucian

i'i i ' '¡ t i 1.-

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_____________________ A M O R C _____________________

This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A- M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receivíng member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-five

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-five


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9 The psychic development which has been taking place within the students of the Eleventh Degree has been gradual and unperceptible. However, when there is an actual need for the psychic powers to make themselves manifest, there are revealed the vast strides that the eamest student has made. Many have glimpsed the firstrays of the Golden Dawn; others are stillsearching. However, through continued persistency and sincerity of purpose, allwill gain the divine power of enlightenment. Meister Eckhart, the great Ger mán speculative mystic of the thirteenth century, describes this power thus: There is in the soul something which is above the soul, Divine, simple, a puré nothing; rather nameless than named, rather un\nown than \nown. Of this I am accustomed to spea\ in my discourses. Sometimes I have called it a power, sometimes an uncreated light, and sometimes a Divine spar\. It is absolute and free from all ñames and all forms, just as God is free from all ñames and absolute Himself. It is higher than \nowledge, higher than love, higher than grace. For in all these there is still distinction. In this power God doth blossom and flourish with all His Godhead, and the Spirit flourisheth in God. In this power the Father bringeth forth His only' begotten Son, as essentially as in Himself; and in this light ariseth the Holy Ghost.

— MEISTER ECKHART, 1260(?)4327(?)


N U M B E R TWENTY-FIVE

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! I find that we have reached a point where it is permissible for me to give you a few more extracts from some of the ancient writings relating to your present stage of development, We must remember that even though some have not yet reached a realization of the Dawn, and ®bthers have been sensing it for some weeks, this difference in the members in regard to their outer realizations does not necessarily mean that there is a considerable difference in regard to the inner spiritual development that has been taking place in the last six months or year. Therefore, there are certain equal degrees of development in all of you from a purely spiritual and psychic point of view, and this development is continuing to take place and makes each one of you ready for certain other instructions that will perhaps feed the psychic and spiritual self within more than it will feed the outer mind. This brings me to a point that I have been trying to work out for some months. It really constitutes a problem. I have been trying to figure out how I could explain to each one of you one interesting principie in connection with the spiritual and psychic development. I remained in my sanctum one night till a very late hour trying to draft or word a complete and understandable explanation of this prin cipie and after writing many pages and tearing them up and trying it again, I finally found, long after midnight, that I was getting nowhere in my attempt and that I had produced nothing that had not al ready been explained in earlier monographs in the various Degrees. Still this problem faces me and I am going to make an explanation now that I believe is as understandable as I can put it in words of the English language or any language. The problem, really, is to convey the thought from my mind to your mind and to do it in a way that will leave no room for doubt or misunderstanding. What I want to make plain to you is this: That just as what we read, and hear, and see, and comprehend in a mental way constantly adds to our mental development, so in the same manner do certain things that we read, or hear, or sense, tend to develop the spiritual part of ourselves. Now, you will notice that I am making a distinction between the mental development going on within us and the continuing of the spiritual or psychic development. Of course, there is the purely physical development of the body constantly going on also. The food * w e eat, what we drink, the physical exercise, sleep, breathing exercises, light, the warmth or heat of conditions around us, coldness, and many other magnetic and subtle conditions of which we know very little have their effect upon our physical development. Some persons are far more susceptible to the peculiar conditions around them than are others, and that is why we find that certain people must take a sea voyage, others go to mountains, and others to valleys or dry or moist places, in order that their physical bodies may develop properly.



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There are some persons who cannot continué in good health if they work near or live cióse to electric powerhouses or places where there are strong magnetic or electric currents, and there are others who cannot live where there are certain odors which many of us would not even recognize or detect. I am not going to elabórate upon the many conditions or things which can affect the physical nature and body. When it comes to the mental development, we find that there are even 1 many more subtle or invisible and unnoticed conditions and elements which greatly affect the mental make-up and mental development of hu man beings. Most of the time we are absolutely unconscious of how our mental development is progressing and what is affecting it more than anything else. Since the popular development of the science of psychoanalysis, we have learned through these specialists how greatly each one of us has been affected mentally— and indirectly physically— by thoughts and impressions, ideas and mental elements that we hardly realized in a truly objective way. Sometimes we are surrounded by persons who have a strong fear complex or who are of a depressive or pessimistic na ture, and their viewpoints and expressions, although seemingly unimportant to us, gradually affect our own mental development and leave a condition that we do not know exists until some expert discovers it and shows that it has been affecting us for some time. When it comes to the spiritual or psychic development within us, there are even many more subtle and intangible elements which greatly affect this inner development and make it difficult for us to discover what these things are. Now I want to cali your attention to one or two very self-evident facts to which you may never have given sufficient thought. The only way in which we can judge of our physical development and condition is by physical standards. We can only judge of the health and con dition of the physical body by physical symptoms and indications. In other words, we have to judge the body by material standards and tests. We must use the scales to determine the weight of the body; we must use the sense of touch to determine the pulse beat. We have to use chemical processes to analyze the blood and other serums in the body, and we find that we have to place ourselves in the materialistic or physical frame of mind in order to judge of our physical developments. Spiritual and mental standards will not reveal to us the con dition of the physical body. When it comes to testing the mental development within us, we ^ have to lay aside the material, physical standards, and use a new set of standards and a new set of principies. The mental development can be tested and understood only through mental tests. The man with the stronger physical body may have the weaker mental development, and we very often find that a person who is unusually developed in a mental sense has neglected his physical body, so that in a purely physical test he would be below par and this



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would be no indication of his mental standard at all, If all this is true regarding the mind and body of man, or the brain and body of man, it is certainly more true of the spiritual and psychic part of man. We cannot possibly judge of the spiritual and psychic development go ing on within us from a purely physical point of view. It seems to me that this matter should have been well understood by all of our members in the lower Degrees, but it has been overlooked by many. Perhaps it should be emphasized more prominently in the earliest Degrees of our work. The spiritual and psychic development going on within us is aroused, fed, and nourished by certain experi ences and knowledge that create certain beliefs and convictions in our consciousness ; much of this can occur without our being wholly aware of it. Take the man, for instance, who finds that he has an interest in ancient history and proceeds to buy or read many books dealing with ancient history. He discovers, perhaps, as he reads, that he has an increasing interest in such a subject and will go out of his way to get a new book or to find one in the library any day or night so long as it promises to reveal some more facts to him regard ing the lives of ancient people or their activities. He may do this for a year or several years without telling anyone about it or with out thinking that he is doing anything other than enjoying the indulgence in something that gives him a great deal of satisfaction. Perhaps a few years after he has read everything available and analyzed it, and read other books commenting on ancient history and so forth, one of his friends in talking with him about history, or some professor of history in a university in discussing ancient history with him, will discover that this man who has been reading so many books on ancient history has developed an unusual knowledge and unusual comprehension of ancient history, and then it will be revealed that this man who has been doing so much reading merely for the sake of pleasure, or to pass interesting hours, has been developing himself into an authority and a well-trained specialist in the subject of ancient history. Perhaps in discussing ancient history with the professor of the university the man, himself, will be surprised to find how many thousands of facts he has stored away in his mind and how quickly they come to hand when he wants to repeat them or refer to them. And this man who has been merely reading for the sake of pleasure discovers that he has been developing his mind into that of a specialist, and that he has a special mental development that he did not know he was building up. Many men in indulging in their hobbies with radio, or photography, or chemistry, or perhaps in carpentry, or mechanical things, do not realize that they are gradually building up a certain degree of mental development pertaining to that subject. • Now this same thing is true in regard to spiritual and psychic development. When we take even the ordinary book containing an interesting story such as Bulwer-Lytton*s book called The Strange Story or one like Marie Corelli's



— D— PAGE FOUR

Life Everlasting and read it through carefully, we may think that we are mentally acquiring some interesting facts and that otherwise we are simply enjoying a fascinating story that gives us some food for thought. We do not know or stop to realize that as we are reading, there will be certain words or phrases, or certain ideas which the mind will grasp and transfer to the inner consciousness as food for the spiritual or psychic self ; and this transfer occurs so unconsciously, or rather in such manner as to make it unconscious to us, and the development of the spiritual self proceeds so gradually that we do not know it is going on.

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The monographs of our work are prepared carefully so that the student of them will benefit in three ways: First, through the instruc tions regarding the care and development of his physical body, the prevention of disease, the prevention of violation of natural laws that would bring disorder or inharmony in the physical body, etc. Second, the building up of the mental knowledge and standards of the brain and the intellect so that he will become more familiar and better acquainted with the important truths of life. And third, so that he will be feeding spiritual and psychic food to the spiritual and psychic part of himself and awakening, nourishing, and fostering that development without any special effort or without any delay. One of our students, therefore, in reading through one of our monographs, is carrying on a triple form of development. It is easy for him to test the physical development that takes place, for if he relieves a physical condition that is wrong, or improves his health, it is easily noticeable. He will not know, however, to what complete degree he has gradually improved his physical body until he makes some definite physical tests. In the same way he is conscious to a small degree that he is developing the mental part of himself and is quite satisfied with the knowledge that he has added some more facts to his storehouse of wisdom, and that some of these are practical and useful in everyday life, and others are just inspiring and beautiful. But he will never know just how completely he has developed the mental and intellectual part of himself until he applies some mental or intellec tual tests. This may come about through his acquaintanceship with some very learned and well-informed professor of metaphysics or psychology, and in discussion with this person he will realize that he has acquired almost as much knowledge as this other man who has spent many years in study. Or, he may find himself called upon some day to i give a lecture or to teach a class or to write some magazine articles, or perhaps write a book, and then he will be surprised at the vast amount of knowledge he has gradually built up in his mind and con sciousness through the lectures and lessons he has had. Until such a time comes for a very definite test of what he has mentally acquired, he cannot be sure of what mental benefit the lessons have been.



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We constantly read in our correspondence from members where something of this kind has occurred, or where a member has spent an eve ning reviewing his life before he joined the Order, and reviewing it in the light of conditions since he joined the Order, and discovering what a great change has taken place in his thinking and in his other activities as a result of the mental development that has come to him ^through the lessons. Then they write letters to us and say that they are surprised and astonished, and only wish they had started to study such lectures many years ago while younger in years and while the mind was filled with less false information. When it comes to the spiritual and psychic development that is going on within our members, we are face to face with a problem. It is only when the members test this inner development with spiritual or psychic tests or standards that they really discover how much development has actually taken place. The true psychic or spiritual development of a person cannot be tested by experiments just made for the purpose of seeing just what has occurred, and such tests are never sincere and never actually bring the psychic or spiritual development to the front. The psychic or spiritual part of ourselves is not inclined to exert itself and use any of its highly developed powers in any insincere or halfhearted test that might be made. It does not like to be frivolously tested merely for the sake of a test any more than any one of us would like to have someone come in and say to us that they are going to give us a mental test and ask us a lot of mental questions or mental problems. Such a test would not actually reveal what we knew any more than these mental tests that appear. in the daily newspapers which ask us a lot of questions about ancient history, mathematics, modern history, geography, and so on. We might not be able to answer one tenth of those questions and yet that would not prove that we were mentally undeveloped.

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The only time that the true psychic and spiritual powers within us give a perfect manifestation and a reliable demonstration is when there is some real and actual need for them to manifest themselves. This may come about in an emergency through a great desire to reach some distant person who is suffering or who has been injured, or it may come about through our desire to save the mind and body of some person who is in distress, or it may come about through our desire to commune with God in a sincere and most sacred manner, or it may come about in many ways that are absolutely necessary and highly desirable. In such a case we have a reliable indication of some of the develop ment going on within us. But it cannot tell us about all of the de velopment that has taken place. Each phase of our psychic and spiritual development requires its own channel of expression at the right time, and in the right manner, to reveal itself. I think that this should be made plain to all of our members, and they should realize, there fore. that they cannot judge the spiritual and psychic part of



— D— PAGE SIX

our lectures and lessons by looking at them from the purely mental point of view any more than they can judge the mental part of them by examining the physical part of them. We all know also that even though a member ceases to study the lessons for a few weeks or months, that the psychic and spiritual development started will continué, but it soon needs more nourishment, more help, and if the student does not continué his reading and his study, he soon stops his spiritual and psychic de velopment. On the other hand, he who studies books or lectures that deal only with the mental explanation of psychological or metaphysical principies, and do not contain any carefully hidden and properly worded thoughts for the spiritual and psychic development, will find himself building up his intellect with a mass of facts that may make him a brilliant student of theories and philosophy without giving him any real psychic or spiritual development. It is in this impor tant factor that the carefully prepared and subtly devised system of the Rosicrucian work is superior to every one of the other schools of philosophical or metaphysical study. I can say this just as freely and frankly as any one of you who has discovered it can say it, for I am not paying myself a compliment or taking any credit to myself in a way that would be void of modesty. I did not invent the Rosicrucian system and I did not discover it by accident, and I am not the founder of the Rosicrucian Order, or the one who prepared the original outline of all of the monographs and graded lessons. I have simply added to them and carefully worded them in present-day form, in accordance with a rule and system that has been established for centuries, and I do not take to myself any credit when I say that the present Rosicrucian system of instruction is the most superior one in the world. Now I believe I have given you something to consider. Think over these pages and you will soon realize that this explains why you are not always conscious of the development that is taking place within, and why the monographs are graded the way they are, and how it is that as you reach each higher Degree, you suddenly discover that you are able to do things that you have found difficult to do in the earlier Degrees. You will also realize that there is a great amount of stored psychic and spiritual power within you that is ready and in reserve for any real application when the proper time comes, or the need for it presents itself. This is your great protection, your great blessing, and the thing that you have wanted ever since you became inter ested in this work. It behooves you, therefore, to keep on with your studies and with your work and experiments, so that you keep this inner psychic and spiritual development progressing without interruption until at a certain point in your development in the higher Degrees you will find yourself ready for the great revelation and the hour of regeneration. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefulíy read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Al so refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

ÍJ All the lessons of this organization have been prepared for three types of develop ment: mental, physical, and psychic. It is easier to measure mental and physical growth than psychical growth. The rate • of psychic development is not always apparent. ÍJ Psychic powers make themselves manifest only when there is an actual need for such. Each phase of psychic development requires its own channel of expression at the right time. Although psychic development continúes after one ceases to study, it soon becomes static and will need additional guidance. fj Mental training alone of metaphysical principies does not assure psychic develop ment. *1 The Rosicrucian studies are well balanced in that they train for both mental and psychic development.

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This monograph always remains the property of the Supremo Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-six

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-six

This Week’s Gonsideration of a Famous Opinión

Many great mystics have written conceming the means of wakening the spiritual forces within us, and the attaining of knowledge of the Infinite. The following excerpt from the writings of Plotinus, gives various means of attaining Illumination, and the resulting ecstasy and power from such an experience:

Tou as\, how can we \now the infinite? I answer, not by reason. It is the office of reason to distinguish and define. The Infinite, therefore, cannot be ran\ed among its objects. Tou can only apprehend the Infinite by a faculty superior to reason, by entering into a state in which you are your finite self no longer— in which the divine essence is communicated to you. This is ecstasy. It is the liberation of your mind from its finite conscious' ness. Li\e can only apprehend li\e; when you thus cease to be finite, you become one with the Infinite. In the reduction of your soul to its simplest self, its divine essence, you realize this unión— this identity. A ll that tends to purify and elevate the mind will assist you in this at' tainment, and facilítate the approach and the recurrence of these happy intervals. There are, then, different roads by which this end may be reached. The love of beauty which exalts the poet; that devotion to the One and that ascent of science which ma\es the ambition of the philosopher, and that love and those prayers by which some devout and ardent soul tends in its moral purity towards perfection— these are the great highways con' ducting to the height above the actual and the particular, where we stand in the immediate presence of the Infinite, who shines out as from the depths of the soul.

— PLOTINUS, 205(?)'270 A.D.

ELEVENTH DEGREE


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N U M B E R TWENTY-SDC

PAGE ON E

Beloved Members, Greetings! Last week I started to give you a few more extracts from the ac tual writings, but I suddenly realized that it was necessary to make plain to you that certain parts of our teachings and instructions were for the purpose of developing the psychic and spiritual part of you, and not wholly for the mental development. That explanation took longer than I expected and contained so much food for thought that I decided to withhold some of the extracts that I was going to give you and save them for this week's talk. Now let me give you a few of these highly spiritual and mystical principies from the ancient writings, so that you can meditate upon them and thus feed the spiritual and psychic self with a real banquet. It may take several days for you to discover how important these ex tracts are ; it may be months before you have any manifestation of the nourishing effect they will have upon the spiritual and psychic part of yourself. First, we have a very oíd and highly praised statement by a mem ber of the Egyptian Supreme Council of ancient days who said in one of his famous Communications of instructions to pupils: "There are three ranks of workers in the secret brotherhood; first, those who are simple Neophytes; secondly, those who have been accepted and tested and proven worthy of advancement; and third, those who are the Masters. These latter live in personal communion with the Divine or Cosmic Masters and are not bound to live in the flesh for the same length of time as those who are living a purely earthly, ma terial life. In fact, their earthly lives are determined by two laws. First, the law of their own will, which they may exercise to release themselves from physical bodies and transcend to the Cosmic through transition and there carry on the remainder of the work. Second, the J.aw of the Cosmic by which they are held on the earth plañe only so long as they are required as teachers. When they have completed their task and the Cosmic believes the task to be completed, they will be raised to the Cosmic plañe. Or, if they themselves decide that they have completed their earthly mission, they may use their will to break the earthly contact and through transition ascend. Very often their transition and ascensión through their will power enables them to a . dematerialize or become invisible and ascend in a cloud. Many of the ^ great masters have left the earth plañe in this manner and the going into a cloud has seemed to the adepts and students a miracle." This very remarkable thought makes us wonder if the Master Jesús believed that His earthly mission had been completed because of His attempted crucifixión by the multitude and if therefore He called His Disciples together and dematerialized before them only to materializo again in secrecy at some other place so

ELEVENTH DEGREE


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N U M B E R TWENTY-SIX

PAGE T W O

as to prepare His Disciples for further work. However, this ancient statement explains how and why some of the great Masters in the past disappeared in a cloud or in the midst of their advanced Disciples and now appear to us only as Invisible Cosmic Masters. In another address made by one of the great Masters of the past, we find this gem of instructions marked as a rare jewel: "In meditation, contemplation, and ecstasy, the human spirit seeks to free itself from earth and rise to the greatest heights of which it is capable. But the human brain is limited in its ability to take the spiritual thoughts and transmit them into space unless it becomes attuned with another mind capable of vibrating in harmony with it. Prayer is somewhat different in this regard because, since it is directed to the Supreme Mind— which Mind is capable of attunement with every human mind— it brings the individual into direct communion with God and it wakens and formulates certain spiritual forces within our being which are dormant at other times." Another gem that is indicated as helpful to the higher students is as follows: "The invisible Cosmic Masters are constantly passing us or coming cióse to us if we are advancing on the Path. In passing us they drop their messages swiftly, or they touch us with their auras or they may swoop past us causing merely a magnetic change in the atmosphere around us so that for a moment we are aware of some peculiar sensation. Their purpose is to increase the magnetism of our auras and to give us additional spiritual strength that they believe we need. They are inclined not to speak unless words are absolutely necessary, and then they prefer to do it in a manner that leaves us more in doubt as to the source of the words than the importance of what is said. For they are not inclined to want to give us demonstrations or convince us against »our will of their existence. They prefer to inspire us, to help us by their contact, or give us a message the source of which we may not understand, but the valué of which is unquestioned. In such mysterious and wonderful moments they leave within our consciousness a mes sage that is divine, and we miss a great opportunity to advance and to carry out what is best for us if we do not accept these messages or impressions, and meditate upon them. However, we lose the power of the message and often confuse its wording and meaning by devoting our attention to an analysis of how or by whom the message carne to us instead of meditating upon the message itself. We should keep our ears alert, and our eyes open, and never fear the lights or other sensations that impress us when in meditation or concentration. So long as we keep our heart and mind attuned and in perfect love, we need have no fear and certainly no doubt." With these few quotations to meditate upon during the

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The Rosicrucian Order

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NUMBER TW EN TY-SIX

PAGE THREE

coming week, I believe that all of the members of this class— regard less of whether they have contacted the Dawn or not— will find some thing to use in their contemplations and meditations that will be extremely helpful to them and prepare them for some experiences they may have very shortly. <|

We shall have more of these quotations in future lessons. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER

SELF-EXAMINATION AND ANALYSIS The following suggestions are for your personal analysis. NOT send your answers to the Grand Lodge.

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1. For many people, one of the "peculiar sensations" mentioned on Page 2, Par. 5, is that internal ripple of responso loosely called "chills up and down the spine." It is involuntary, and, paradoxically, must be prepared for and yet be unexpected. You yourself perhaps have experienced certain sensations that you classify as part of that peculiar awareness alluded to throughout Par. 5. 2. When one reflects that only occasionally and almost casually do the above-mentioned sensations occur, we should appreciate the inspired goal of those artist-pioneers of today who are far in advance of this century in their preparations of rituals designed to awake inner responso.


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. TTien read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

There are three ranks of workers in the secret brotherhood: first, Neophytes; second, those proven worthy of advancement; and third, Masters. íff The earthly lives of the Masters may be determined by two laws: First, by their free will they may release themselves from physical bodies to carry on their work in the Cosmic. Second, by the law of the Cosmic, they remain on the earth plañe so long as they are required as teachers. Through meditation and ecstasy, the human spirit seeks to free itself from the earth. (][ The human brain is limited in transmitting spiritual thoughts into space. Spiritual forces within us are awakened through prayer. Spiritual strength, knowledge, and information may be obtained from invisible Masters. Through too much analysis, messages from Masters lose their importance. During meditation, have no fear and keep alert for any manifestations.

MASTER MONOGRAPH ROSICRUCI AN ORDER

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Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-seven

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-seven

R E G I S T E R E D IN U . S . P A T E N T O F F I C E PfUNTfD IN U. t . A.

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A. M. O. R. C . under the emblem ebove. which wat registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed. engraved. typewritten. and photographíc copies of official. prescribed, and copyrighted monographs, dissertations, scientific postulations. philosophical discourses. and academic studies. diagrems. illustrations, and charts" as authoriied by the Imperator of A . M . O . R. C . All matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving, and are imparted only as an incident to membership, The ownership of. the legal title. and the right of poisession to this monograph is and shall remein in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M .O . R .C . and it shell be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does. ipso fecto. termínate ell rights of the member. and is e violation of the Stetutes of this Order. A . M . O . R .C . is the only organiiation authorized to use the Registered neme and symbols. and the Imperator has solé right to grent the us» o f th#m to other ellied orgenizetions Ot movementj.

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^ As long as we remain on the earth plañe, we must take into account the dual aspect of things: the positive and negative manifestations, the spiritual and the material constituents of things. That man must regard both the world and the Source is pointed out by Lao-tse, the great Chínese mystic and poet of the sixth century B.C.:

Too existed before the creation, Tet Tao mothered all the sons of the world. Know the Mother, Enter into the brotherhood of the sons; Know brotherhood, Tou are at one with the Mother; Then can you meet no harm . . . To understand the small, yet.exalt the great, To be strong in guarding tenderness; To employ the earth'light, Tet share in Heavens illumination: This is to escape earthly cares, This is to merge in the ageless.

— LA O TSE, 604-531 B.C.


NUMBER TWENTY-SEVEN

—B— PAGE ONE

B eloved Members, G re e tin g s !

We have reached a point where some special information is to be given to you. It is necessary to approach this matter carefully, and I trust that those few members, in different parts of the country, who elong to this class and who come together for the purpose of united tudies and comparison of experiences, will make sure that no other person near them or around them overhears any parts of this present lesson. Those who are studying at home privately and quietly and who do not come in contact with other members of the lower Degrees need not take this precaution, for they have no one near them to overhear what may be said out loud. In other words, what I am about to say to all of you must be kept secret, and sacredly so. In this class, therefore, we have two kinds of members at the present time: Those who have already outwardly or objectively sensed the Dawn of the new day and those who are still on the Threshold or borderline and are not yet outwardly conscious of the great change that is taking place inwardly. If you are receiving a copy of this lesson, you will know that from my personal contact, psychically and otherwise, and from the con tact made by two others of this class who are helping me in this work, we all three agree that each one who is receiving this lesson is qualified inwardly for this special announcement and for the next step in the progress of this class. Regardless of whether you actually have sensed anything of an objective nature or whether you have had the ex perience that you expect to have and which you will probably soon have, the fact remains that your adherence to the general instructions of the recent lessons has brought about a development and progress within you of a spiritual and psychic nature that is satisfactory to us and satisfactory to you. Now let me touch upon the principal high lights of the special announcement, and then in a future number of lessons, we will take up each one of these high lights in greater detail and benefit by the knowledge it reveáis. I am going to refer to and utilize some of our oldest Rosicrucian facts and tell you facts which are not revealed in any printed books ^»f the Order, and which the general public, and even the most advanced research workers in Rosicrucian history, have never had revealed to them.

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Occasionally, some new book on mysticism or occultism published in Europe reaches America and gets into some of the librarles, and then hundreds of persons write to us and say that they read in......... such a book a statement that the Rosicrucian organiza...... . ................................ _ tion is an invisible organization and, therefore, our AMORC


N U M B E R T W ENT Y -SEVEN

— B— PAGE T W O

must be wrong in claiming to be the true Order, No doubt, you have heard this criticism made many times and have wondered about it, and wondered why such statements were made by foreign authorities and what the AMORC had to say about it. Now we can compare this statement with some others. Let us a say that someone was to claim that a little one-year-old child is not 9* human being because all human beings are grown up and strong, and able to read, write, talk, and carry on great work, and support themselves, and so forth. You would say to such person that the average conception of a human being is as an adult but a child also can be a human be ing in process of developing into an adult. You remember that one of the great professors of comparative religions once said that: 11If the early religions were false religions, then a child is a false man.11 If there is a great and true Rosicrucian organization that is wholly invisible, as so many thousands of persons believe, then common sense should tell them that there must be some pathway, some process, some system that leads from the visibility to the invisibility, and that these invisible members of the invisible fraternity of Rosicrucians must have had some definite method of becoming members of the invisi ble fraternity. In other words, the invisible fraternity that they talk about could not have been born overnight and could not take mem bers into its invisible body by mere absorption and without prepara tion. I think that even a child would say, "How did persons get into the invisible fraternity of the Rosicrucians?" That is a point that is never explained in any of these foreign books. Now I want to say to you definitely that the true Rosicrucian Brotherhood, or, in other words, the true fraternity or secret assembly of Rosicrucians IS an invisible organization, just as thousands of books have referred to it. Why this is so and how it is so will be discussed in detail in later monographs. Next, I want to say to you definitely that the A.M.O.R.C. in all of its outer, objective, material operations is a part of that invisi ble brotherhood. It is peculiar how many persons are always seeking to join something that is very oíd, authentic, and genuine. I think that out of thousands of inquiries a month that come to our Grand Lodge asking for literature about our organization, there are at least three or four hundred of these letters which plainly state: "I have been seeking for the genuine, ancient, true Rosicrucians for many years anc^ I hope that at last I have found them, although I always understood that the organization was an invisible fraternity." We ignore all those kinds of statements and send our books and literature to such inquirers just as though they had said nothing about what they wanted or what they expected to find. I often feel like saying to such foolish persons something like this: "If you are not going to study anything or join anything unless it is the true, real, genuine, invisible Rosicrucian organization, how


N U M B E R TWENTY-SEVEN

— B— PAGE THREE

are you ever going to be able to tell which is the true ancient, genuine organization, and which is a modern imitation of it?" I would like to ask these persons how they ever expect to find the invisible fraternity, or the genuine Rosicrucian Order, and by what signs or symbols they would be able to tell the real organization from the unreal. If they believe that the real organization is invisible, why are they seeking literature and reading books? Certainly an invisible organization, such as they think it should be, wouldn't have any books or offices, or any place to which they could write letters or apply for membership. When I have asked this kind of person such a question as that, he invariably states that he had never given the matter any real thought. Can you imagine someone living on one of the islands of the Pacific who never saw a diamond in his life but who looked at some glass beads for the first time and said, "I don't want to buy any of these stones or beads unless I know it is a genuine diamond." Anyone would say to such man or woman, "How will you recognize the genuine diamond when you do see it; or if you had one right in your hands now, how would you know it was genuine?" You see, such persons are seeking for some strange, indefinite, peculiar thing about which they have no definite idea in their minds, and they are only making parrotlike statements. The arguments of these persons are foolish from another point of view also. Why is it that such persons think that a thing can be good or beneficial only if it is very antique? A few years ago, I was happy in being invited to join the Kiwanis club of San José where we have our general offices located, and thereby almost daily come in contact with a hundred or more of the managers or owners of the leading stores and lines of business in the city. The benefits of membership in the Kiwanis to a businessman of the community are unlimited, for, at least once a week, he associates with all of these men on an equal basis. The biggest bankers, department store owners, the city mana ger, government officials, wealthy physicians, and lawyers, and others cali each other by their first ñames such as Bill, or John, and they compare notes, compare experiences, plan ways of improving the city, of taking care of some of the city's problems, looking after the poor, having new rules and regulations made for the best interests of the people of the community, and of being truly friendly in every business and social way. The benefits of such membership are definite, con crete, and unmistakable. Now when I was invited to be a member of this club, limited exclusively to just one hundred members, and learned of all the benefits that would come from such membership, I did not turn around to the two businessmen who invited me to join and say to them, "I want to know if this club is an ancient organization or if it is something new, because if it is something new I don't want to join it." Each one of them would have said to me: "What difference does it make how oíd it is if you are getting the benefit you expected?"


N U M B E R TWENTY-SEVEN

— B— PAGE FOUR

The same thing might be said to these seekers for new knowledge, new light, and new wisdom. If the lectures and lessons will benefit you and if the membership in the Rosicrucian organization will help you, what difference can it make whether it is a part of a very oíd, ancient organization, or a modern form of it? But you will find that the average person will say to you that he or she would feel disappointed and unhappy if he thought that the organization was just a new one and not the continuation of a very oíd one. Such persons are overlooking the fact that if the Rosicrucian Order is as oíd and as select and as hard to get into as they have always heard, then there must be some method of preparation whereby persons can become qualified and ready for such membership. This is precisely what the A.M.O.R.C. is today. Therefore, I repeat again that the present A.M.O.R.C. in America, Cañada, México, and twenty or more other countries throughout the world is the preparatory organization of the great invisible brotherhood. I may be mistaken but I do not think there is anyone in our pres ent class of this Eleventh Degree who has been a Rosicrucian student for more than twenty some years. We have a few members in our Order who have been studying Rosicrucianism under competent and reliable guides for twenty-five or thirty years, but they carne to us from other foreign jurisdictions and are now very high Degree members. Practically every one in our present class, however, joined the AMORC since I became its Imperator in 1915.* That means that the longest period that any of you have been preparing or studying for your present posi tion is between twenty and twenty-five years. I know also that some of you have been studying for a much shorter period than that and yet you are in the same class with those who have been studying for a long time. However, even if all of you had been studying for twenty, twenty-five, or even thirty years and were now told you were ready for admission into the invisible fraternity, would you think that these years constituted too long a preparation to attain such membership? You know that some of the ancient philosophers and mystics plainly stated that they spent an entire lifetime in preparation for admission to the first outer portáis of the fraternity. When you come to realize that your membership in the invisible fraternity is not for just the balance of this incarnation but will last throughout many incarnations and for as long a time as you prove worthy, then twenty-five or even thirty years of preparation seem like a very short time indeed. Therefore, I make my next positive statement; namely, that each one of you has been in preparation and in guidance as an adept for ad mission into the higher and the highest invisible fraternity of the Rosicrucians. The how and the why of this will be explained to you later on in future monographs. *This monograph was written by the late Imperator, Dr. H. Spencer Lewis.


N U M B E R T W E N T Y -SEVEN

— B— PAGE FIVE

The next important announcement is that this invisible fraternity has two great functions. First, it is the mass of prepared members out of which are selected the future members of the Great White Brotherhood, and second, those who reach the invisible brotherhood or fraternity have definite work to do on both the Cosmic plañe and earth plañe, and they support the moral, spiritual, and mystical work of the preparatory organization known as A.M.O.R.C. All of this also will be explained to you in future monographs. Now this is all that I am going to explain to you this week, for I want you to contémplate, and through prayer and meditation cleanse yourself and make yourself ready for the processes of admission to the invisible fraternity— for this admission will occur within the next few months in accordance with a very definite plan and after you have been told more about it. I want you to remember this twentyseventh monograph of this Eleventh Degree to which you will have to refer at times in order to read over again the definite statements that I have made in it. You can remember the number twenty-seven by remembering that the digits in it added together make a total of nine, which is the key number of the first lessons of instruction regarding your admission to the invisible fraternity. Please remember that you are not to say anything about your ad mission into the invisible fraternity, or that you know much about its details. If you are ever questioned, or there is an opportunity for you to make the statement, you may say to other members, or in a lodge meeting or in anything that you may write to anyone, that you know that there is an invisible fraternity of the Rosicrucians just as there is a visible brotherhood, but that more than this you cannot say, and that anyone who does know anything about the invisible fra ternity will not tell anything that he does know. If you are asked any further questions, you may simply say that every seeker and every person desiring to know more about the invisible fraternity must begin first to work through the visible fraternity known as A.M.O.R.C. I hope that this information will make you extremely happy and give you much to think about and to discuss in your own mind during the coming week. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete monograph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this‘summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

The Rosicrucian organization consists of an outer and of an inner spiritual assembly. í

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f¡ The true Rosicrucian brotherhood is an invisible organization dating back to antiquity. t]j The material operations of the A.M.O.R.C. is a part of that invisible organization. tjj The present A.M.O.R.C. is a preparatory organization for the great invisible brother hood. ÍJ The actual age alone of an organization does not indicate the greatest source of wisdom and light. ^ The time spent in preparation for membership in the invisible organization through out many incarnations is relatively short. fl Admission into this invisible organization may come soon.

/ftv/ :1Í

T H E IN S T IT U T IO N B E H IN D T H E R O S I C R U C I A N O R G A N I Z A T I O N Rosicrucian Parle, San José, California, U . S . A .


—F"Tr~



7his monograph always remains the properfy of the Suprema Grand Lodge of A- M. O. R. C. If is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receivíng member.




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•J Through attunement with the Cosmic, by means of the detachment of meditation, we lose allsense of the pet' tiness of political intrigues and of the limitations of nar' row physical boundaries; instead, we become universally minded, with the knowledge that we are a segment of the macrocosm, which functions perfectly through divine law. This viewpoint has been presented in trea' tisesby the scholastic, Albertus Magnus. The following paragraph istaken from the short treatise, De Adhaerendo Deo:

W hen St. John says that God is a Spirit, and that He must be worshipped in Spirit, he means that the mind must be cleared o f all images. W hen thou prayest, shut thy door— that is, the doors of thy senses . . . \eep them barred and bolted against all phantasms and images . . . Nothing ple¿ises God more than a mind free from all occupations and distractions . . . Such a mind is in a manner transformed into God, for it can thin\ o f nothing, and understand nothing, except God; other creatures and itself it only sees in God . . . He who penetrates into himself, and so transcends himself, as' cends truly to G od . . . He whom I ¡ove and desire is above all that is sensible and all that is intelligible; sense and imagination cannot bring us to Him, but only the desire o f a puré heart. This brings us into the dar\ness o f the mind, whereby we can ascend to the contemplaron even of the mys' tery of the Trinity . . .D o not thin\ about the world, ñor about thy friends, ñor about the past, present, or future; but consider thyself to be outside the world and alone with God, as if thy soul were already separated from the body, and had no longer any interest in peace or war, or the State o f the world. Leave the body, and fix thy gaze on the uncreated light . . . Let nothing come between thee and God.

— ALBERTUS MAGNUS, 1193(7)4280


N U M B E R TWENTY-EIGHT

— D— PAGE O N E

Beloved Members, Greetings ! It is my pleasure now to make a few definite remarks relating to the details of some of the points presented in the last monograph sent to you. I have received a number of telegrams from members in this ^plass saying that they have been surprised at the statements, although ^íoping and praying for the time to come when they would enter into the higher membership which they fully believed existed. On the other hand, some telegrams admitted that a few members did have psychic impressions of these facts but they were so indefinite and vague that they could not quite understand them. All of you will have interest ing experiences in the very near future, and very often you will feel in the morning that you have had some peculiar dream or visión, but will not be able to recall all of its details. You should not be worried or deeply concerned about this, for much of the psychic develop ment that will go on within you is in relation to your soul and the inner self and is not for the benefit of the outer self at all. Certainly none of us can explain any of these experiences to you or interpret any of the symbolism that you may receive ; and the best thing you can do is to keep a notebook for the purpose of writing down the dates and vague facts that you recall from any of these experiences or dreams. Preserve these notes so that you can compare them and check up with them later on. The first point, or detail, with which I wish to deal as promised in the last monograph is in regard to why and how it is that the true fraternity of the Rosicrucians is an invisible organization instead of a visible one. I feel just at this moment as though I were going to attempt to argüe a point that all of you agree in and to which I had no opposition whatsoever. I feel as though I would hear each one of you say when I am through with this explanation, "I can understand that, and it is what I always believed." However, as a matter of rec ord, and to be sure that all of you do understand, I am going to make the following comments: In the first place, you will have to admit that any organization of human beings intending to carry on any real specific work among human beings without appearing to be reformers or preachers, or attempting to compel others to do things, must be a more or less secret organization. In other words, you cannot take four or five hundred A;omen or men in any country and send them out in uniforms, with a brass c>and, and have them go into various communities and start to explain to persons how they should live or what they should do, because immediately the human minds in the multitude would think that this group of special workers is trying to forcé something on them or trying to compel them to do certain things. The safer and better way is for these four or five hundred persons to work secretly and more or less silently in various ways, without revealing themselves and without attracting too much attention. In this



PAGE T W O

way they can speak personally to many individuáis and make recommendations; in addition, they can do certain things without attracting attention, and can demónstrate by their lives what is the best thing to do. I am sure that all of you will agree with me in this regard. There are many branches of every government that are busily engaged in doing things for the betterment of the country, and these commis- ▲ sions, or committees, or groups, often work in complete secrecy and ™ silence. In every community there are a few persons who have either wealth, or power, or intellect, who devote themselves to trying to help the community without telling the community about it. They find that they can do more and succeed better by remaining unknown. You will agree with me also that this is the better plan. Now, the Rosi crucians have always looked upon themselves as Cosmically appointed to do certain things in life. Each member who reached the highest ranks and was capable of using great psychic power and of directing some of the natural laws to carry out his wishes was admitted into the secret fraternity of the Rosicrucians, where he could cooperate with others in doing similar work and thus work without attracting the attention of the public and without raising objections or criticisms. When the Rosicrucian Order was a very small organization in the Oriental lands it was wholly and completely secret. No member admitted that he was a Rosicrucian, ñor did he ever tell where the meeting places were, where he went or what he was doing. There were several reasons, a principal one being that the government was usually in the hands of a priesthood or a group of persons who were selfish and tyrannical and who did not like the idea of anyone taking the part of the public and helping the people to become acquainted with the real facts of life. The brotherhood had to be very careful, therefore, as to whom it admitted into its ranks, so as to avoid persecution at the hands of the government officials. For this reason they carefully se lected persons here and there whom they could trust, and prepared them quietly and secretly for the great work without ever letting them know what they were being prepared for. In such days the fraternity had to be small, for there would have been no advantage in a great number of members, and the masses were not intelligent enough to be admitted to any outer circle or preparatory school. Therefore, we find that for several centuries the Rosicrucian fraternity was very secret, and even covered up its ñame and symbols. But as the work spread to other lands it was found inadvisable to keep up such secrecy for it was nec essary to enlarge the Fraternity to take care of the great work that ^ had to be done. In the second place, it was impossible for the most advanced mem bers to go into every community of every country and live there long enough to become acquainted with people and thus learn who should and who should not be admitted. For this reason the Fraternity gradually allowed some of its workers to speak of the organization, telling of it in a way that would attract the



— D— PAGE THREE

attention of intelligent men and women. Then these persons were care fully tested and qualified for membership. As conditions improved in the Orient and in Europe, and heathen priesthoods and selfish politicians lost their control of the governments of these countries, the secret brotherhood gradually allowed itself to become known, for there was no danger of persecution. In this way the organization did become known to a large portion of the public. Finally, in 1614, the famous book called Fama Fraternitatis and others of like nature were published, with a veiled message in them to all persons who believed that they were qualified to do some great work in behalf of the Cosmic. This was the first outer form of activity and, if you will recall, the Fama Fraternitatis was translated into many languages and distributed freely throughout many countries. Such publicity, however, brought thousands of persons to the doors of the organization seeking membership, and the organization was face to face with a problem such as we have to face here at the Grand Lodge. Many hundreds of letters and post cards come to us each day from per sons who think that they are proper ly qualified to be Rosicrucian students, and qualified to join the organization. It is impossible to investigate all of the applicants personally today, just as it was im possible to investigate them in the years gone by when the organiza tion became publicly known in Europe. So we have followed the same plan that was adopted in Europe in 1614 when all of the books were translated and distributed. An outer or public form of membership was immediately established called the "Outer Congregation," or the "Outer Circle." All the new seekers and inquirers were introduced to this "Outer Circle" and taken into it on probation. Most of these seekers never knew there was an inner circle, and did not care anything about the inside part of the Fraternity as long as the outer part gave them helpful instructions and guided them in their seeking. Gradually, the real inner circle became completely hidden until, at the beginning of the 19th century, it was hard to find any trace of the inner circle; and at the beginning of the 20th century— or in the year 1900— it was almost impossible to find any really high officer of the inner circle anywhere in Europe or the Orient who would admit that he was an officer or member of the inner circle. In this way the really secret work and power of the organization were preserved. The outer circle of membership was the circle that had to contact the world and stand all of the rebuffs, criticisms, and heavy work. Naturally there was much unrest and disturbance in the outer circle. Our records show that during the 17th and 18th centuries, there were men and women of the outer circle of the Order who acted exactly like some of those who are in the outer circle of the Rosicrucian Order today. They felt that they were not getting enough instruction or developing enough power, or that the principal officers they met were not advancing the pupils fast enough, and so on. Therefore many of these dissatisfied persons resigned and



— D— PAGE FOUR

dropped the studies altogether or, in some cases, started a Rosicru cian organization of their own with the idea that they could help others more than the real outer circle was helping men and women. For this reason we find traces of hundreds of independent Rosicrucian groups existing in Europe and the Orient during the 17th and 18th centuries. A few of these took the ñame "Rosicrucian," while a great * many others took some other ñame or a slightly different ñame. Even- * tually, however, these independent groups discovered their mistakes, or their leaders abandoned them to start something else, and we find that these independent groups soon died out. A few of them were strong enough and intellectual enough to remain for a number of years and were gradually absorbed into the real organization. None of these people knew anything of the secret inner circle and, in fact, did not believe that there was any real secret brotherhood of the organiza tion. They looked upon the officers and members of the outer circle as being all there was to the Rosicrucian organization and for this reason they never hesitated in jumping out of the Rosicrucian organ ization into something else. We have the same situation to deal with today. We have members in every community who feel that they could conduct the Order better than we can and if they have half a chance they want to start independent groups and movements of their own. Only two things prevent a good many of them from starting new move ments. First, they know that they daré not use the Rosicrucian teach ings; and second, they daré not use any of the symbols. A few, however, do not think of these things and they rush ahead into forming what they cali a true Rosicrucian Brotherhood. Now the outer circle of the organization today is naturally the biggest circle of members we have. It is composed of all the seekers and inquirers who think they are ready to join the Rosicrucians and study with them and become prepared. They do not know anything about an inner circle and, therefore, they do not try to forcé themselves into it. They remain students of the outer circle and advance slowly and successfully or drop out of the work altogether. Out of those who advance and who have been loyal and devoted for many years a few are selected each year to join the inner circle. This should make plain to you in a few words what is going on in the secret branch of our work. Of course, it is necessary to keep the activities of the inner circle quiet and secret, otherwise every member in the outer circle \ will grow anxious and restless and want to demand initiation into the inner circle. None of you probably realizes how many letters we re ceive each week from members in the First or Second Degrees who say that they believe they have sufficient knowledge of their own, and sufficient understanding, to jump over the first four or five Degrees of our work and go right into the higher Degrees. It is a difficult thing to hold some of these members down. When they are too anxious and become insistent that they are too



— D— PAGE FIVE

smart to be held in the lower Degrees, we have to let them out of the organization altogether, because they do not study, do not try any of the experiments, and therefore are undesirable in every way. On the other hand, the really sincere student who writes to us and thinks he ought to be advanced more rapidly has to be handled very carefully. We want to help these students to get into the higher Degrees, and at khe same time we do not want them to skip a single lesson. It would be a detriment to them and would check their proper inner development to let them skip over any of the lessons or lectures. Therefore, we have a problem on our hands in trying to hold them down to the les sons or lectures of the lowest Degrees, and yet keep them interested enough so that they will develop and really be worthy of the higher teachings. We can usually tell after a member has been with us for a year whether that person is ever going to reach the higher work or not. When we find that he or she is the kind who will reach the higher Degrees, then we have trouble in keeping him from wanting to jump over and beyond the lessons that we are sending to him. If it were only a matter of reading the monographs or understanding the lessons we could send him eight or ten lessons in one week and let him read them. But although that would help us considerably to enlarge our organization and prevent us from losing many impatient members and losing the income from their dues, on the other hand, such members would not properly develop inwardly and would never become useful Rosicrucians in any sense. Therefore, we allow the oíd statement to be made that the secret fraternity is an invisible one. Nobody wants to belong to something that is invisible unless he understands what is meant by "invisible." If you spoke to the average member in the First Degree and asked him if he would like to be placed in the invisible class of students he would be very much surprised, and would probably say he would rather remain visible and enjoy some of life. We do not refer to the "inner circle" because immediately members would think that the inner circle consisted of just a select few who were chosen because of loyalty or the amount of dues they pay, whereas the truth of the matter is'that the dues are no different for them than the dues paid by the outer circle and there is no initiation fee. Money cannot have any influence in select ing the persons who are to go into the inner circle. Now, as far as you are concerned you must be careful in all of ^your conversations and talks to other members not to refer to any inner circle or select group of advanced students. As I told you before, you should not admit that you have had any temple initiation other than the Ninth Degree because this is the truth. Furthermore, your not mentioning it will keep others from asking you questions about the higher Degrees. Simply state that the last temple initiation you had was the Ninth Degree and that you are still a member of the Ninth Degree of the Order. The fact that you are a member of the Illuminati, or that you are studying beyond the



— D— PAGE SIX

Ninth Degree, does not take you out of it so far as temple membership is concerned. Therefore, never admit that you are in any higher se cret or inner circle. If, on the other hand, anyone asks you whether or not it is true that the real Rosicrucian fraternity is an invisible fraternity you may safely say, "yes." You may explain that the invis ible fraternity is composed of those members who carry on their work unknown and unconnected with any lodge and who are not a part of the visible organization. If they ask any questions about the visible group, you may truthfully state that the visible organization is the active organization of the workers here on the earth plañe who are carrying out the instructions of the invisible workers, for this is really true. As you will learn later on, all of the officers, members, and workers in the outer organization, from which you have just recent ly graduated, are carrying on the principies and ideáis of the in visible fraternity. After you are fully acquainted with the invisible fraternity, it is your duty to help in making plans and in arranging details of the work throughout the world, which the outer circle carries into effect. Now I hope you will read this very carefully and understandingly, so that I will not have to touch upon it again. Continué the most helpful experiments in your contemplation work in preparation for the climax in the change taking place within you. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summaiy of the important principies of this monograpt. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Al so refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

Through fear of persecution, the original activities of the Rosicrucian organization were secret operations. Its membership was very select. This was the inner circle. t• An outer form of activities resulted from the requests for membership following the publication of the Fam a Fraternitatis, in 1614. The inner circle became completely hidden until the beginning of the nineteenth century. From the outer circle, there sprang up many spurious, short-lived organizations. €f From the large membership of the outer circle of today, a few are chosen for the inner circle. íjj Advancement does not depend upon the number of monographs read, but upon the extent of inner development. Do not reveal that you are a member of the inner circle, ñor that you have passed the Ninth Degree.



MASTER MONOGRAPH * L

ROSICRUC IAN ORDER a m r> p r-

*

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This monograph always remaíns the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A- M. O. R. C . It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-nine

Eleventh Degree Monograph T wenty-nine

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O . R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered ir» the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, engraved, typewritten, and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses, «cad e'T ''c studies, diagram s, ¡llustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A . M . O . R. C. (The above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries Inroughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving and are imparted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal tifie, and the right of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M . O. R. C. and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all ríghts of the member. and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M . O . R. C. is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizatíons or movement*.


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9 The fact that there are many within the outer circle of the Rosicrucian organization, and only few who reach the advancement of the inner circle, is made more understandable through the emanation theory, as expounded by many deep-thinking philosophers such as is illustrated in the writings of the mystic of the early Greek Orthodox Church, A w a Dorotheus:

Imagine a circle, and in the middle o f it a centre; and from this centre forthgoing radii'rays. The farther these radii go from the centre, the more divergent and remóte from one another they become; conversely, the nearer they approach to the centre, the more they come together among themselves. Tôw suppose that this circle is the world; the very middle of it, God; and the straight Unes going from the centre to the circumference, or from the circumference to the centre, are the paths of life of men. And in this case also, to the extent that the saints approach the middle of the circle, desiring to approach God, do they, by so doing, come nearer to God and to one another . . . Reason similarly with regará to their withdrawing from God . . . they withdraw also from one another, and by so much as they w ith draw from one another do they withdraw from God. Such is the attribute of love: If we love God then to the extent that we approach to Him through love o f Him, do we unite in love with our neighbors; and the closer our unión with them, the closer is our unión with God also. —A W A DOROTHEUS, V II CEN TURY A.D.


NUMBER TWENTY-NINE

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! The next important point that I want to take up in detail is in regará to the activities of the present, outer, visible organization and your relationship to it, and why it carries on its work in the way • i t does. Keeping in mind that there are actually two branches of the Rosi crucian Order, the real invisible fraternity and the outer visible brotherhood, and keeping in mind that the invisible one is the real controller and director of the visible one, you will see at once that there are many complications and problems to be solved in attempting to maintain a nationwide visible brotherhood along material lines. Now this brings me to the one important point that I think each one of you should have clearly fixed in your mind before you proceed much further. This point deais with the origin and authenticity of the present AMORC. I am not going to take time and space to tell you good members about the documents and charters, legal papers, and papers of authority which are in our possession, proving the genuineness of the AMORC. Even if we didn't have any single piece of paper of this kind, we would still be able to prove that the AMORC is the gen uine Rosicrucian Order. It appears that in several court inquiries instituted by us, we have had our documents and papers, charters, and other incontestable proofs ready for examination, and at our various international conventions at the Grand Lodge, hundreds of delegates have examined these things. Many committees voluntarily organized for the purpose of examining our documents of authority have looked at them and have returned a report stating that the AMORC possesses in contestable proof of its official origin and genuineness. But aside from these papers, there are several factors which prove that the AMORC is the outer, visible organization of the inner, invisible one. In the first place, the Rosicrucian organization has been known to thousands of persons for many, many years. Back in 1902 and 1903 and thereafter, I was thoroughly familiar with the fact that the Rosicrucians had once existed and that they had wonderful teachings, which had been carefully preserved somewhere. I wasn't the only person in New York City who knew these facts, and at the great public ® “library in New York there were many books at that time which referred to the Rosicrucians and their history and great work, and occasionally there was a magazine article referring to them. I remember very well that I was in contact with hundreds of men and women who were investigating psychic laws and studying New Thought principies, who constantly heard "the Rosicrucians" mentioned. All of us believed that the Order still existed somewhere, but we could not discover how to get in touch with it. Now it seems that there must be some reason why any one individual in


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America should be drawn toward the Rosicrucian organization and eventually announce that he was appointed to establish its activities once again on the American continent. If any one could do this sort of thing (as some of our enemies say) and if it were merely a matter of making up your mind that you would start a Rosicrucian organization of your own without any authority, or help, or training from official . sources, how is it that for years and years thousands of people in ▼ America were waiting and looking for the Rosicrucian Order, yet nobody started one? Of course, some did go to Europe and tried to get in touch with the original Order, and did find out some facts about the Rosicrucian principies ; and they did return to America and write a few books which they claimed outlined the Rosicrucian teachings, but the difference between publishing a few books and starting the organiza tion in its regular and proper form is very great. Even today, after the above-mentioned books have been on sale in America for a number of years, there is still no genuine Rosicrucian organization back of them. There was also a Mr. Clymer in Pennsylvania who published a few books claimed to be Rosicrucian, but he never did anything more than turn his farmhouse into a headquarters for the writing and printing of his books. Even today, after many years of book selling, he has no actual lodges in any city or part of America conforming to the Rosi crucian standards. How is it, then, that one individual like myself should suddenly come forward and announce that he is going to estab lish the true Rosicrucian Order and create lodges and maintain them, and carry on the work with a constant growth, and constant increase of power, without any interruption, and without any serious interferences of any kind? Naturally, if there is a genuine organization of the Ro sicrucians anywhere in the world, visible or invisible, such an or ganization would not permit some individual to create a false organi zation in America, and establish lodges and claim connection with the genuine organization. The genuine organization would see to it that his work failed, that he was stopped in his misleading activi ties, and prevented from defrauding anyone. If there is no genuine invisible or visible organization anywhere in the world that could stop pretenders and wrongdoers from establishing lodges all over the country, then whoever would start one in America that would be the only and exclusive Rosicrucian organization in the world, and he would have a right to do as he pleased. Therefore, either way you look at it, the fact that AMORC started and established real lodges, and has done its utmost to spread the light, and has continued to grow all these years without any interferences, without any scandal, without being stopped in any of its activities, is sufficient proof that it is either sponsored by the true, invisible organization, or there is no invisible or other organization of any kind except the AMORC in America. But the genuineness of our work lies in the results we are producing. Good cannot come out of evil except as it


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evolves. You cannot take a fraudulent, scheming, evil plan and carry it on and yet have it produce good fruit. The whole history and entire records of AMORC in the United States since I established its first meetings in 1909 are absolutely clean and approved by every member who has been in the organization long enough to understand it. This is the important thing for each one of you to keep in mind. Why the AMORC does certain things as it does is another matter. I know that some of our very conservative and dignified members occasionally have criticized some of our advertising. They think that our propaganda is becoming a little too bombastic. They say that when we first started our advertising our literature was more conservative, and not so widespread. Now all of this is true. In the early days, we put only small advertisements in one or two magazines, and I think our records show that we received more answers from those two or three small advertisements than we receive today from the many advertisements that we put in different magazines and newspapers each month. But there is this great difference. Today we find each and every magazine crowded with advertisements of lecturers, teachers, and schools offering their courses of study in a very bombastic and circus-advertising style. Each one of these organizations and teachers and leaders makes more noise than a circus band, and if we would put our same oíd small advertisements in our magazines today, with all of the noise of adver tising around us, we would be absolutely lost and no one would see the advertisement. So long as the outer organization of AMORC has to carry on the outer worldly activities and be a physical, material or ganization, it has to operate like any physical, material business, so to speak. Any dry goods shop or shoe shop, candy store, or hardware store in any place today that advertises only in a small way while its competitors advertise in a big way is sure to pass out of existence soon. In the march of progress, every successful and growing organi zation or business proposition must keep pace with its competitors. The seeker must have his attention attracted and that is what we are trying to do with our propaganda. The invisible organization, of which you are now a member, does not need any advertising or any propaganda because it will always de rive its members from the selected ones in the outer organization. However, this outer organization has no place from which to draw its members except out of the mass of seeking minds, most of which do not know exactly what it is that is being sought. Seventy-five per cent of the persons who write to us for copies of The Mastery of Life or our literature, after reading our advertisement, frankly state that they are seeking for something in life, but they cannot ñame it or describe it. They hope that the Rosicrucian literature will help them to discover what it is they want. Each month out of thousands of copies of The Mastery of Life that we mail to inquirers, a few hundred of them become members. The rest


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of them say either that they cannot afford to become members or that they do not know whether the Rosicrucian work is what they want or not. Think of it ! Ten thousand people every month reading advertisements and hoping to find the thing they are looking for, but not sure of what it is they want, and out of the ten thousand, six or seven hundred hope to find it in the Rosicrucian organization. If we did not advertise in such way as to attract the attention of these ten thousand persons, we would not get the few hundred new members each month. If we do not get this many new members, we cannot grow; we cannot expect in one lifetime to reach enough people to carry on the work. You will remember that the same criticism was made of the work done by Jesús. Some of his enemies accused him of going among publicans and sinners and seeking for followers there instead of holding himself exclusively for the cultured and refined persons. We have to reach all types of minds in order to find the few who are looking for us. After all, it isn't our advertising or our literature that constitutes what we are doing, but the work that we are doing for our members after they join the organization— that is the great work and that is the principal thing to take into consideration. Month after month, for the past ten years, between eight and twelve thousand copies of The Mastery of Life have been mailed to people at their homes. That means that hundreds of thousands of copies of The Mastery of Life are somewhere in the homes of persons who wanted this information, or at least have been read once or twice by many thousands of people, who will always remember what the ñame Rosicrucian means and what it stands for. This is preparing the way for the future. I mean that gradually more and more persons will know something about the Rosicrucians, and if this continúes long enough, in a few years we will find the Rosicrucians recognized by their ñame or by the symbol of their organization in every part of this jurisdiction. You are, therefore, workers in the outer organization as well as in the inner organization, and you should allow no one to criticize the methods that are being used by the outer organization, for it is like the Salvation Army and its band that goes out and pleads and plays on the Street corners. The purpose of that band is not to represent the highest spiritual work of the Salvation Army but to go out with a simple, easily understood, human plea and present this plea among the multitudes where the seeker will easily find it; and then, after hav ing made this contact bring him back into the fold and give him the spiritual truths that he wants. If we were to judge the Salvation Army only by what we see of it on the Street corners, or when we see their workers going in and out of drinking places or gambling places, we would say that the Salvation Army was nothing more than a circus band with a lot of persons begging


for money. justice.

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That would be a horrible mistake and an absolute in-

So please keep these things in mind and always be ready to defend the outer activities as being purely on a material basis, preparing the student for the higher spiritual things. We have to begin with all beginners in the same way, whether they are children just learning to walk and talk, or adults learning to walk on the right Path. We have to attract the attention of babies and little children with music and noise, with bright colors and things in which they can quickly find some interest; otherwise we fail to attract them. With the public we must deal in the same way regarding our work. Having made these points clear to you, we will now drop this sub ject, and in our next monograph take up some of the signif icant points of the higher spiritual teachings of the invisible fraternity. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER

Summary of This Monograph v

v

v

Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograpt. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recaíl as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

•J The invisible branch of the Rosicrucian organization is the real controller and di rector of the visible branch. The AMORC possesses uncontestable proof of its official origin and genuineness. Results also prove its authenticity. No authentic Rosicrucian organization has resulted from the spurious books published. ffl The growth of the outer organization depends upon material activities much as does any other business organization. All types of minds must be reached to contact the few ready for growth. The in visible organization needs no advertisement. The results of advertising offer proof of the worth of advertising. Defend the outer organization as being a material basis preparing the students for higher spiritual things.

*



This monograph always remains the property of the Supremo Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty

Eleventh Degree Monograph Thirty


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9 The adept who has entered upon the Path of regeneration, and now is a member of the inner circle, has leamed that much of his future incamations can be controlled, and predetermined here upon this plañe of exist ence. First, he must form for himself a purpose. The following selection from the Upanishads, one of the oldest examples of mystical literature, should serve as an inspiration in establishing that purpose:

Verily, this whole world is Brahma. Tranquil, let one worship It as that from which he carne forth, as that into which he will be dissolved, as that into which he doth breathe. He who consisteth o f mind, whose body is life, whose form is light, whose conception is truth, whose soul is space, containing all wor\s, all desires, encompassing this whole world, smaller than a grain o f millet or the \ernel of a grain o f millet, greater than the earth, the atmosphere, these worlds. This is the Soul of mind within the heart, this is Brahma. Into Him I shall enter on departing henee. Tôw verily, man is a creature of will. According to what his will is in this world, so will he become when he departeth henee. Let him therefore form for himself a purpose! That verily, whence beings here are born, that by which when born they live, that into which they enter at their death, that try to understand. That is Brahma! — UPANISHADS


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Belov ed Members, G r e e tin g s !

We must now take up some of the spiritual points connected with your progress and development in the new Path upon which you are about to tread, or upon which you have taken the first steps. In many of the monographs and in all the literature of the Rosi crucian Order, you find reference to the fact that somewhere during your studies and development as a Rosicrucian, you will have some control and direction over your future destiny and your true mission in life. In fact, considerable emphasis is given to the possibility of every spiritually developed Rosicrucian creating and controlling his fate and destiny. Throughout all of the early lessons and early Degrees, many simple methods are given whereby the Rosicrucian student does actually lay out a course of procedure. His lifework has a distinct bearing upon his fate and his destiny, and every Rosicrucian learns sooner or later that he is master of his own life to a very considerable extent. The wonderful result attained by most of our members in this regard is what has made them so enthusiastic and such sincere supporters of the work. You and the others of this Eleventh Degree, however, are now in a more prepared position to map out your future and create a destiny for yourselves than are the members in the lower Degrees of our work. To put the matter briefly in this one particular talk so that you can have time to think it over, and in order to keep this one subject separated from others which are to follow, I will explain my ideas and the principies of this Degree in the following manner: Since each one of you has entered upon the Path of regeneration and will become an important worker in connection with the inner circle of the organization, you will be given the methods and the privilege of determining now what principie work or definite place in the world you wish to carry on, and fill in your next incarnation. This does not mean that you may decide upon anything you please and that the Cosmic is obliged to follow your decisión and carry out your wishes to the very letter. But it does mean that all things being equal, if you maintain the same devotion and enthusiasm as you have shown in the past years, the Cosmic will be inclined to grant your petitions and wishes while, on the other hand, you will be able to lay the very foundation of your future through what you do here and now in the next years, or between now and the time of your transition. In other words, it is not going to be wholly a matter of wishing or desiring, or asking, that the Cosmic carry out your wishes; it will be partly a process of creating and establishing your future here and now by laying the proper foundation for it. You realize that just prior to the period of reincarnation for each one of us our soul-personalities are directed


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toward certain physical bodies about to be born where we will reincarnate again in circumstances and under certain conditions that will enable us most fittingly to carry out the work that we are destined to do, and at the same time compénsate for any wrong we have done, and receive rewards for any good we have done. In other words, when it comes time for each one of us to be reborn in a physical body as a child, the Cosmic brings this rebirth in such a family or in such cir cumstances and conditions as will enable us to carry out the Cosmic plans. If we have earned in this life certain Cosmic benedictions and blessings, the Cosmic will see to it that we are reborn again in such circumstances and conditions as will give us even in our childhood and youth the blessings and benefits that we have deserved. If, on the other hand, we have failed to labor properly or to create as we should or to benefit by the things we have enjoyed, we will be born in such conditions and circumstances as will forcé us to work and learn to support ourselves, and eventually learn the lesson of the proper valué of life, and what things we require. In the same way, if one of us who is now a man fails to learn the lesson of sympathetic attunement toward women and fails to be appreciative of the female problems and female position in this world, it is very likely that in another incarnation sometime in the future he will be born of the female sex instead of the male sex in order that he may learn through many experiences the important lesson that he failed to learn as a man. If any of our sorores at the present time fail to give proper valué and position and place to the male of the race, there will surely come a time when the Cosmic will decree that such a person be born as a male. Those who fail to use their political or social power properly but use it to bring pain and suffering to the working classes and the poor will find themselves in a similar position of limitation and suffering some time in the future. So we plainly see that according to the law of compensation and adjustment, many things that we do and think here and now are having a definite bearing upon our future experiences. Certainly, we are responsible every day for what we are build ing in our own future s in regard to our ultimate destinies. Taking all of this into consideration, it is only logical that if we understand the law and work with the law, and map out the proper course of procedure, we will more than likely have the results that we desire. In other words, if we are going to discover that as we act and think and cooperate, or fail to cooperate with the Cosmic laws and principies here and now, so we will reap conditions in the future, it is only reasonable to believe and understand that we can proceed at once to take these laws and principies into consideration and consciously cooperate with them instead of doing so unconsciously. Undoubtedly, each one of you has given some thought in the past months or years to what you would like to have been


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in this life and what you would have done for your present situation and conditions if you had had the opportunity of going back to childhood and starting life over. One clergyman in this class wrote to me stating that if he had his life to live over again and could start back in his youth, he certainly would pave the way for a different position in life from the one he now occupies. He says he would pre pare himself in every way to be a teacher of sciences or the philosophies in high school among boys and girls in their youth. He finds his present church work falling just short of the goal he would like to reach, and he has a strong desire to deal with children or young people rather than with adults, but, also, he wishes to work with them in broader subjects of education than religión permits. Suppose that each one of you had the privilege of stating to some fairy queen your wish as to what you would like to be today, or what you would like to become in the near future. Would not each one of you have some definite goal or definite position in life as a real wish to give to this fairy queen? Of course, there are probably some of you who would wish for no better position in life than you now have, and for no better opportunity to serve and work than you now have, but the majority would most certainly have a beautiful wish to express, and I am quite convinced that very few, indeed, if any of the members of this class, would wish for wealth or social position above everything else. Instead of a fairy queen coming to you and saying that your wish will be fulfilled, the Cosmic promises that if you carefully plan your life and try to give it more or less unselfishly to the bene fit of others, or discover some line of activity in which you could meet with the greatest success and through which you would contribute most to the happiness of others, there is a possibility, and even a great probability, that the Cosmic will help you to bring this wish or these desires into realization. It may also be that some of these wishes will be fulfilled here and now in the present earthly existence, and that, in fact, you may be making progress toward that very thing, or those very desires, from now on. The Cosmic will surely see to it that your unselfish and noble desires will be given their expression of realization at the time of your start in the next incarnation, for this will give the Cosmic an opportunity to have you reborn in such environment and in such a family and with such associations and connections, as will contribute to the material and physical necessities of your desires. Therefore, looking at the matter broadly, we find this very beau tiful spiritual picture unfolded to the members of this class, who are about to enter the great inner temple and study the highest laws and principies known to the organization. This is a picture of your future, not only your present life's future, but the future of your next incarnation, and this picture can be painted and colored and perfected by your own desires and wishes here and now. The picture includes the fact that you are now entering


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the inner circle of the Rosicrucian fraternity, and that you will be a director and principal worker in the great work of this brotherhood in your next incarnation. It also includes, as part of the picture, the fact that you may also select and prepare for your other daily and hourly activities in your future life, thereby creating the family environment, the nationality, the social, financial, and other condi tions that make your worldly status. The important thing for you to think about this week is what you have experienced in your present life in the way of work, labor, study, business efforts, social efforts, education, and so forth— those things you have not enjoyed and those which you have enjoyed. You should take a sheet of paper and a pencil, sit down some evening this week and analyze your past years, your present years, and the possible future years of your present incarnation. See whether you have filled the niche or groove best suited to you, and how you would improve it or change it if you had the power to create a new life for yourself, beginning with tomorrow. Then also put down what you conclude would be the best position for you to occupy in the next incarnation. Do you think that you would succeed as a clergyman, a lawyer, a teacher, a carpenter, a physician, a chemical expert, a research worker, a slum and social betterment worker, a manufacturer, or a salesman? You should keep in mind that regardless of what business or so cial position you may select, you are also being prepared to be a silent, or more or less private, worker in the highest ranks of the Rosi crucian fraternity, but this does not mean that you will not be able to carry on certain worldly affairs with great success, great happiness, and great profit to yourself and others. Think these things over and try to discover whether you would be better in some other social and business position than your present one, or what line of activity would give you the greatest opportunity to reach people, study them, and work with them. Try to reach a conclusión during the coming week, regarding these points, so that with next week's talk, you will be prepared to see the various angles of this matter and realize what is the first step toward bringing your wishes into realization. Certainly, such analysis of your present and past experiences, with an outline of what you would like to be in the future, is the most inter esting and most profitable way that you can spend several evenings. Do not be hasty, do not be selfish, and do not be impractical. Try to choose some practical life for yourself in the future, while at the same time you would be helping to carry on the great work. In next week's monograph, I will take up some of the other spir itual points relating to this important subject. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER

m


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recaíl as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the «nsuing week to refresh your memory.

•V

’ v> '

i

f Prior to reincamation, the soul-personality is attracted to the parents best suited to ofíer the experiences necessary for its further development. «i As members of the inner circle, you will be able to fulfill and perfect your desires for good, during this as well as future incamations. You are laying the foundation for future incamations now. The present members of the inner circle will become the future directors of the Ro sicrucian organization. Try to discover what occupation may be best suited for your position as a silent, prí «I vate worker in the Rosicrucian fraternity.


"C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedicated to eve ry Rosicrucian"


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ROSICRUCI AN ORDER


Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-one

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-one

R E G IS T E R E D

IN U. S . P A T E N T O F F I C E

PftINTCD IN U. « . A.

The matter contained herein is officially iss-j ed through the Supreme Council of the A. M . O. R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the printed. engraved, typewritten. and photographic copies of official, prescribed, and copyrighted monographs, dissertations. scientific postulations, philosophical discourses, and academic studies, diagrams, illustrations, and charts as authorized by the Imperator of A. M. O . R. C. All matfers herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving. and are imparted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possession to this monograph is and shall remain in ttie Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M .O . R.C. and it shall be returned to it upon its irequest. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does. ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member. and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M .O . R.C. ¡s the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame ond symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of th*m to other allied organizations or movements.


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<1 Gradually, the Christ consciousness has been increased in each member and at the same time certain perceptive faculties and powers have been quickened. Of this quick' ening, or spiritual marriage of the soul to Christ, St. Bernard, Christian mystic and monk of the early twelfth century, writes:

If this love be perfeeted the soul is wedded to the Word. W hat can be more replete with joy than this unión? If one among us feels that it is a blessing to draw near to God, if he longs for that meeting, if he desires to be dissolved and to be with Christ, such a one, thirsting for it ardently, dwelling upon the thought of it cease' lessly, shall receive the Word. This visitation will be the Bridegroom come to the soul That is, he shall feel himself inwardly embraced, as it were, by the arms of Wisdom, and then he shall receive an inpouring of the sweet' ness of Divine Love. Thus is the desire of his heart granted him, though he is still in the body, a pilgrim on earth. — BERNARD DE CLA IRVA U X, 10914153

ELEVENTH DEGREE

TEMPLE MONOGRAPH

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NUMBER TH IRTY-O N E

PAGE ONE

Beloved Members, Greetings ! Let us now take up some of the very highest of the spiritual points in the Rosicrucian doctrines and relate them to laws and prin cipies, which we will touch upon in future monographs, and become acquainted with the best application of these principies to our present processes of development. The moment the highest students of our teachings delve into the ancient secret manuscripts of the inner circle of our organization, they become surprised at the many pictures and many references relating to the Christ. At first it appears as though the Rosicrucians were great students of Christian doctrines and were analyzing the life and teachings of Jesús in a purely Christian way. But after some thought and examination of these manuscripts, the student discovers that the Rosicrucians are dealing with the Christ and not with Jesús, and that there is a considerable distinction in this. It is recalled then that the Christ idea, including the Christ consciousness, became known to the mystics many centuries before the birth of Jesús, and, in fact, the Rosicrucian manuscripts speak of the Christ without associating the Christ consciousness exclusively with Jesús. This would tend to show that the Rosicrucians have always been students of Christ or the Christ teachings— but not necessarily of the present Christian teach ings founded exclusively on what Jesús said and did. To the mystics, Jesús was undoubtedly the greatest demonstrator and the greatest master of the Christ consciousness. All of the early mystic writings produced during the time of Jesús, or after His life, distinctly stated that Jesús was the most recent and the greatest of the Initiates. Looking at the matter very fairly and honestly, we see that the early Fathers of the Christian church made the serious mistake of basing the Christ teachings on a system surrounding the Man, Jesús, exclusively. The mystics always knew that great Avatars, or special "Sons of God," were born through what the mystics called immaculate conception, and it was not surprising to the mystics when the announcement was made that Jesús was born of immaculate conception. Where the early Church Fathers made their mistake was in the fact that, being unfamiliar with the entire history of mystical literature and mystical doctrines, they believed that Jesús was the first and only Son of God that was born on earth and, therefore, the only one who had ever been born of immaculate conception. Taking this as their clue they built up an elabórate set of doctrines based upon such an assumption or such a belief. From the mystical point of view, the Christ consciousness is in every one of us to some degree. It is this consciousness that makes us living images of God. Undoubtedly, many attain higher degrees of the Christ consciousness through development, and none of us are equal in this regard. That Jesús attained the highest degree of development is acceptable and understandable

ELEVENTH DEGREE

TEMPLE MONOGRAPH

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PAGE TW O

to all mystics, But to pick out one of these great Avatars, such as Jesús, and describe Him as the only child born of immaculate conception and as having attained such Christhood is a serious mistake, and one which is being rapidly recognized as a mistake throughout the world, The Christian church insists that the orthodox Christian must subscribe to the idea that Jesús was a unique Son of God and this the mystic cannot accept because of his better knowledge, The Christ consciousness is the very heart and essence of the soul of man, It is the consciousness or personality around which the soul of man accumulates its additional knowledge and builds up its great strength. Through the teachings and exercises of recent months, you have been building up the Christ consciousness within you and, from another point of view, you have also been building up a still higher consciousness, or power to do things, which can hardly be touched upon at the present time. Until these additional powers are ready to manifest, they must remain unknown and unblemished by any speculation or attempt to forcé them into manifestation. During this coming week it is going to be my pleasure to have one or two of the great Masters cooperate in getting in touch with each one of you to quicken a certain perception or perceptive faculty in your consciousness, and thereby assist you in realizing some of the powers that are lying dormant in your being at the present time. I do not know at the present moment just how we will contact you or when, or what we will do after we make such contact, but you may feel sure that whatever you have in mind that is good and noble, and which is not taken from your mind by causing you to forget certain things, must be approved by the Masters and will, therefore, be strengthened and encouraged as time goes by. Do not speculate upon what may happen or will happen, but just go about your affairs during the coming week as you do normally, and simply make a notation in your notebook if there appears to be any outer manif estation or visión of any kind. The real work will be done inwardly and you will have a gradually increasing sense of holiness in your being and of a stronger character along cer tain fundamental lines. Remember what has already been said about the marriage of the self with the Christ consciousness, and remember that many of the alchemi cal references in the early lessons and oíd manuscripts were allegorical, and referred to spiritual attunement rather than to physical or chemical attunement. Do not speak to other persons about your experi ences this coming week or hereafter, and do not write to me about them unless there is something important you want to say concerning them or ask about them. I mean by this that I will be delighted to have you let me know whenever you have an unusual experience but, on the other hand, do not look forward to personal contacts with individuáis. This week should be a period of careful watching and waiting, meditating and prayer, and a very profitable week

Weekly Master Monograph---------------------- A M O R C------------- The Rosicrucian Order 4

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for your inner self, even though you sense little of it from the outer self, This is all for the present, for there is nothing you can do except to continué the most helpful of the exercises that have been given to you in the past year and wait for the Cosmic to adjust many of the present-day conditions so that you will be better situated in all of your activities and plans. Remember that you are going to come cióse to an understanding of the Christ consciousness and of the real nature of Him who was Jesús, and of others who were also "Sons" of God. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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ÍJ The Christ consciousness was known to the mystics centuries before the birth of Jesús. Of the many Avatars possessing the Christ consciousness to a high degree, Jesús was the most recent and the greatest. f]j The Christ consciousness within each individual makes him the living image of God. C[ The Christ consciousness is the essence around which the soul of man accumulates additional knowledge and strength; this will manifest in due time. t]f Some of the powers dormant within you will be quickened through outside meta physical assistance. fj Do not discuss your psychic experiences with others. Write to the Grand Lodge only when there is an unusual experience you wish to relate or ask about. íf Do not expect manifestations of personal contacts with individuáis. This week should be a period of watching, meditating, and prayer, from which the inner self should benefit.


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It is not

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Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-two

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-two


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CJ The founders of the Christian church have erroneously stressed that Jesús was the only one to receive the Holy Ghost. However, that many Avatars, centuries before Christ, have known and felt the power of the Holy Ghost is clearly seen in the following extract from the Indian Bhagavád'Gita, one of the earliest known records of religious truths:

An externaI ray from myself, having attained a distinet existenee in the world of personal life, draws around itself the five senses and the individual soul, which belong to nature. When the spirit, shining from above, embodies itself in space and time, or when it quits embodiment, it seizes upon things and carries them away with it, as the zephyr seizes the perfumes of the flowers and bears them away with it. The inner light rules the ear, touch, tosté and smell, as also the emotions: it 1{nits together the lin1{ be' tween itself and the objects o f the senses. The ignorant \now not when the inner light shines forth or is extinguished, ñor when it is married to objects; only he who partaês of the inner light can \now thereof. — BHAGAVAD'GITA


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Beloved Members, Greetings I Before we continué the discussion of our understanding of the spiritual processes now taking place in each one who is on the Path toward regeneration, I want to go back for one moment and have you recall what was said about the Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit descending upon man and J^ringing him the new life and new power that constitute his regeneration, Many Avatars in the past have received the Holy Spirit, but unfortunately for the proper understanding of this great spiritual and mystical prin cipie, the organizers of the present Christian church have given a very limited interpretation and association of the principie of the Holy Ghost in the Christian doctrines, and have emphasized the descent of the Holy Ghost into the being of Jesús as though it were a unique or entirely different principie. Of course, in a careful reading of the Bible, even with the many passages eliminated that were originally in the text, and even with the emphasis that has been placed on certain parts by the addition of a few phrases, one will still note that the descent of the Holy Ghost upon Jesús at the time of his baptism was not the only incident of this great law recorded in the lives of persons mentioned in the Bible. In fact, the same incident is very clearly pictured later when Jesús told his Disci ples that a time was coming when they would be empowered and prepared to carry on his work and do even greater things than he had done. He told them this when they were assembled with him in a little room and in strict privacy. We know from reading between the lines of the Gospels that the Disciples were waiting with patience for the coming of this Holy Ghost or Cosmic power. Then later on when Jesús was ready to ascend, symbolically, from all earthly activities, the Disciples anticipated the descent of this Cosmic power into their beings coincident with the ascent of it from the being of Jesús. According to the words of Jesús, this incident constituted not a transfer of his power to the Disciples but the establishment of a new Cosmic power among the Disciples thereby making them quali fied to carry on his great work. Several centuries later when the founders of the Román Church sought for some Biblical authority for the establishment of their earthly church, they used this incident of the descent of Cosmic power into the beings of the Disciples as proof that the Disciples were divinely author ized to be the founders of a new religión. Peter was considered as the -JLeader and, therefore, the first pope or vicar of Jesús, but every stu%Qent of mysticism, and most students of theology, hesitate to say that there is any reason for believing that Peter was given any more authority or Cosmic power than were the other Disciples. It is true that one of the group had to be the chief or the prime leader, and it was probably fair to select Peter for this traditional honor. Of course, all this was done long after these Disciples had passed through transition. However, we read on the pages of church history that Paul and John were looked upon as equal with Peter and the others in power


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and authority, and we have today many Christian churches named after Saint Peter, Saint Paul, and Saint John. Why the other Disciples are not as popularly named in connection with churches and cathedrals is explained by the fact that Saint John and Saint Paul were especially brilliant in their interpretations of the Christian principies. Saint John was especially mystical in his presentation of what Jesús had taught. There also are many churches named after Saint Matthew, Saint Mark, an^ Saint Luke. You realize, of course, that these men were canonized or honored with the title of "Saint" many centuries after their transition, and not at the time they received the Holy Ghost. The point I wish to make is that the descent of Cosmic power upon Jesús, or into his consciousness at the time of his baptism, was not the first ñor the only incident of its kind in even the Christian accounts of sacred history. The same thing had occurred to many great Avatars in the past and even John the Baptist, who baptized Jesús, had been thus empowered before Jesús was blessed with the Holy Ghost. Of course, you must also realize that the term Holy Ghost is really a symbolical term and, personally, I think it is a poorly translated phrase. The real term in the original text is more correctly translated as Holy Spirit. We must keep in mind, however, that in Latin the word spirit is practically the same as the word for "breath of life" and for "soul" and for the soul's aura. Only a childlike interpretation of soul aura would turn the word into the unpleasant term ghost. In the Vulgate, the word is "spiritus" and in the Hebrew the word is "ruach." From the etymological origin and meaning of these words we get the thought of "blowing," referring, of course, to breathing and to the original entrance of the breath of life into the body of man at the time of the original creation. It is interesting to note, however, through a cióse study of the Hebrew theological writings, that the word ruach finally became a Hebrew theological term denoting exclusively the personal energy or personal con sciousness of God. The Greek word equivalent to ruach was pneuma, and in the Greek philosophy and medical science this term gradually developed into the exclusive idea of a permeating power much like our present word ether. The Latin word spiritus became the equivalent of the Hebrew and Greek words and is, therefore, the most modern of the three ; it has gradu ally developed an exclusive religious meaning from which we now have the English word spirit. I am going as far as possible at this time in elucidating the subject for I feel that each one of you is somewhat as I was at the time I first delved into the Rosicrucian teachings. I became fascinated with the logical and scientif ic manner in which the Rosicrucians selected their terms and words. I was interested also in the many explanations of why the Rosi crucians had decided upon certain words and terms. These expla nations often gave me better ideas of some of the mystical prin cipies than anything else that I had read. I consider the members of the present Eleventh Degree class as being of the highly intel-

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ligent and intellectual type whose minds readily grasp the deeper and more intellectual ideas in our teachings as a hungry person grasps a morsel of food or a person dying of thirst reaches for a drink. The typical Rosicrucian attitude of asking, why, why, and why, always leads to a better understanding of things. Since we are dealing with a subject that the Christian church and some others consider as one of the most holy, as well as the most mysterious gifts of God to man, I think that we, who are on the Path toward the reception of this same holy gift, should know as much about it as is possible to learn from the experience of those in the past. For this reason, I am going to continué telling you about what is understood of the Holy Ghost or the Holy Spirit. In regard to the Oíd Testament and the original Hebrew records, we find an explanation made in a Rosicrucian record that is extremely interesting. It is especially interesting to Rosicrucians who realize that the great foundation of our mystical teachings was brought to a high period of development at the time of the life of Amenhotep IV, the ruling Pharaoh of Egypt during the exodus of the tribes of Israel from Egypt. In the Tenth Degree, historical reference has been made to these people, but I wish now to cali your attention to the fact that until the time that these tribes of mystically inclined Aryans came in contact with the mystery teachings of Egypt, they had not organized or systematized their mystical or religious beliefs. We find them readily absorbing the teachings which Amenhotep was promulgating among the sympathetic listeners and students in his country. There was, of course, the pagan priesthood which was very active and powerful in Egypt and which was attempting to forcé its teach ings upon all persons. But under the Pharaoh1s ruling those who did not want to accept the pagan principies could accept the newer principies, which he had openly praised after his forebears had been secretly and privately presenting them in a limited way. At the same time, in the countries of Palestine and Syria, there were those who had still other religious beliefs. When the tribes of Israel left Egypt and journeyed to Palestine, they carried with them the elements of a new religión, and you will recall that their great leader had difficulty indeed in maintaining the new conception of God and religious principies among his tribes, even after miracles had been performed enabling them to leave Egypt and reach Palestine. A majority wanted to return to the pagan religions or the pagan practices they had seen in Egypt, and, during their leader's absence on amountaintop for new inspi ration, they attempted to build idols of gold and to worship in pagan form. But from that time on the new idea of a "solé ever-living God," as promulgated by Amenhotep, was gradually established by the Israelites in Palestine, and here began a new Hebrew religión. Now it is a notable fact that in the earliest Hebrew writings the word ruach is not used in any sense to indicate the processes of human breathing or any connection with psychic, mystical or divine energy. In the early writ ings the word ruach refers exclusively to the wind and to the blowing of wind with the thought that it was a mysterious forcé.


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I am sure that you can realize why they would look upon strong winds as the result of some very mysterious and invisible power. Even our present-day scientists are still mystified about it. However, after the development of the Amenhotep teachings among the Hebrews, the word ruach ceased to re fer to the blowing of earthly winds, and was used exclusively to mean a superhuman, divine spirit energy that entered into the human body through the processes of breathing. This, therefore, definitely marks the begin ning of an understanding of mystical principies. Coincident with this understanding was the development in the Hebrew religión of the existence of a solé ever-living God from whom this energy proceeded, and this God was named Yahweh. Therefore,the energy was called a holy one since it proceeded from a holy source. Through the translation of words into other languages the Latin word spiritus supplanted the Hebrew word ruach because Latin was becoming and did finally become the international language. Out of "spiritus” we have the English word spirit and thus the Holy Spirit today is merely a translation of the original Hebrew word ruach which, itself, was a word selected out of the Hebrew language to explain the thought picture of the Egyptians which they taught in their secret schools out of which the Rosicrucian movement had its origin. In a further analysis of the sacred writings of the Orient from which were selected the main books and passages now assembled in the Oíd Testament of the Christian Bible, we find many references to this Holy Spirit, or Cosmic Power as we now cali it, coming upon persons who were qualified by prayer and right living, or otherwise, to be especially charged with this power. By reading Judges 14:6 to 19, and Chapter 15, Verse 14, and Ezekiel, Chapter 36, Verses 26 and 27, we will find that even changes of the heart in a moral sense were manif estations of this Cosmic power real ly bringing about a degree of Cosmic consciousness. Further reference to this Cosmic consciousness and the ability it gave to prophesy will be found in First Samuel, Chapter 19, Verses 18 to 24, and in the Book of Joel, Chapter 2, Verses 28 and 29, and also in Jeremiah, Chapter 31, Verses 31 to 34. In reading the Bible, however, we must remember that translators wilfully or unconsciously made many mistakes and often used the word spirit in a sense that had no connection with ruach or with what was meant by the Holy Spirit, and wherever the word spirit is used in this wrong sense, we must not understand it as having anything to do with the Holy Spirit or the Cosmic power. At the time of the coming of Jesús, the Jewish people were expecting a great Messiah who would be abundantly endowed with this Cosmic power of the Holy Spirit. Since they had seen evidence of great and learned leaders possessing a small degree of it, they expected that the true Messiah or world leader would have such an abundance of this Cosmic power that he would be equal to a god on

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earth. This is plainly indicated in such passages as Isaiah, Chapter 11, Verses 1 and 2. We need not be surprised, therefore, that when Jesús appeared among these people after his study and preparation in the mystery schools, and his holy preparation in every sense, that many believed that he was the chosen One filled with the Holy Spirit. This belief was further strengthened by the statement made by those who witnessed his baptism, claiming that they saw during the processes of this mystical ceremony the descent of the Holy Spirit upon him. We will find some interesting points about this matter by considering how the Christian church seized hold of the metaphysical principies involved and translated them into purely dogmatic religious principies without ever really understanding the metaphysical origin or nature. After many years of reference to the coming of the Holy Spirit into the chosen Disciples and followers of Jesús, the idea developed that the Holy Spirit was a blessing that was given to all believers. This gradually brought about a discussion in the early Christian church as to whether all believers would receive the Holy Spirit or not, and it was finally argued that this could not be true because then there would be innumerable per sons endowed with Cosmic power or superhuman power, and it would become so common as to be of no particular honor or distinction. Evidently the idea that any man or any woman might become holy and endowed with Cosmic power did not please the leaders of the Church, for they wanted to establish some very high and distinct honor that would be reserved only for themselves, or for those whom they wished to canonize as saints. Immediately, therefore, the Church leaders began to limit the definition and to make the Holy Spirit an exclusive power, as though it were something that was under their control and which they could bestow on any person as an honor, just as a medal or cross is pinned on the breast of a soldier. This is one of the illustrations of the weaknesses of religious dogmatism whereby artificial and purely arbitrary interpretations, limitations, and distinctions are made by men regarding things that are of a Cosmic nature. Therefore, we see that in their desire to keep the thought and idea of the Holy Spirit mysterious and quite out of reach of the average person, the great Church Council of Nicaea in 325 A.D. spent a great deal of time in preparing the elabórate definitions of what was meant by the Father and by the Son in a description of the Trinity, but there is no definition given of what is meant by the third point of the Trinity known as the Holy Spirit. In fact, the third point is simply named and left without any description or definition. Finally, however, in the sixteenth century, the Council of Trent de cided that something must be said about the nature and power of the Holy Spirit. It determined that the Holy Spirit, when present in a being, inspired that being to speak with authority and wisdom equal to that contained in the Holy Scriptures. In

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other words, in a metaphysical sense, when a person was really infused with the Holy Spirit or Cosmic consciousness that person was an inspired and attuned representative of God, and what he said or what he thought, or what was implanted in his consciousness through this attunement, was to be accepted as equal to anything that had been written or inspired in the Holy Gospels in previous centuries. Metaphysically, this meant that any man or woman receiving the Holy Spirit and being thus Cosmically attuned with God would at times, under inspiration, speak with such holy authority and wisdom as would be equal to anything that had been said by similarly inspired beings in the past; that is, truth spoken through such in spired persons was always the truth and equal to any truth ever spoken by inspired ones of previous ages, All of us can agree that this was an excellent understanding, but the Church leaders soon narrowed this definition because it permitted some of their selected holy leaders to rise and say that since they were admitted by the Church as being holy, the Church would have to accept anything they said as being of divine authority. Thus some of the popes forced the Church to accept their statements as equal to any thing that Jesús or any inspired leader had ever said, even though it was contradictory or inconsistent— or even detrimental to the activi ties of the Church, So we see that once again man's attempt to put a limited meaning on the Cosmic powers and qualities was futile. The eventual interpretation, however, of the Holy Spirit as it was developed and understood by the mystics of the Middle Ages, was that the Holy Spirit— when it carne upon a human being who deserved it and had earned it through Cos mic attunement— constituted the indwelling presence of God through the surrender of the human will to Him. While we are on the subject of spirit, let us note how perfectly this word applies to the underlying source of all matter. You will recall that in the First Degree we stated that the electrons are partióles of "spirit." By tracing the word spirit back to its origin, as was done in this monograph, you see it has a paral leí meaning to energy* Science to day is searching for the fundamental energy in which all radiation has its beginning. We are, therefore, proper in calling such basic energy spirit. Thus we have reached the first step of the true mystical understand ing of what is about to take place in each one of you who is striving for this regenerative power and offering himself as a channel for its expression. From this point on, our future talks will deal with the processes and the principies involved that will help you to attune yourself more closely with this Cosmic power. Next week I will take up more of the modern mystical understanding of it, and gradually lead to definite examples and illustrations. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Many Avatars have received the Holy Spirit, or Holy Ghost: Jesús was not a unique ex ampie. ^ The Disciples of Jesús awaited the influx of the Holy Ghost at the time of the as censión of Jesús. Although Peter was selected arbitrarily to become the first pope of Jesús, no one Disciple received more divine authority than any other Disciple. The “Saints” were canonized many centuries after their transition, not at the time they received the Holy Ghost. ^[J The early Christian church, consciously or unconsciously, translated the metaphysical principies into dogmatic, religious principies. í| The term H oly Spirit became an exclusive terminology received by church dignitaries to bestow upon a chosen few. CJ The mystics of the Middle Ages interpreted the Holy Spirit as the indwelling presence of God through the surrender of the human will to Him. Many misunderstandings have resulted from material interpretations and evaluation of the Holy Scriptures such as were imposed upon the Church at the Council of Nicaea and the Council of Trent.




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The matter contained herein it officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O . R C under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the ’pnnted, engraved, typewritten. and photographic copies of officially pre sen bed and copyrighted monographs, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses academ ic studies, diagrams, illustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator ot A . M. O . R. C. (The above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throuqhout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving and are im parted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of possesslon to this monograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M . O . R .C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contenti herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive Information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does; ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M . O . R. C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and Symbol*, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movements.


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flj More and more it is being discovered that mind plays a great part in the curing of diseases, both of the mind and the body. Mental patients are being given greater consideration than ever before. A great many of the healing demonstrations performed by Jesús the Christ were made by first removing the mental stumbling blocks. The power of the Holy Spirit as opposed to the evil influence of materiality is illustrated in the follow' ing quotation from the Ethics of Baruch Spinoza, Portuguese Jewish philosopher of the seventeenth century:

Here is concluded that which I aimed to bring forward in regará to the power o f the soul over its affections or in regará to the freedom o f the soul. Henee it is clear how very greatly the wise man is superior to the ignorant, and how much more powerful than he who is ruleá only by his lusts. For the ignorant is not merely driven hither and thither by externa! causes in many ways and never attains to the true peace of soul, but he also lives in ignorance o f himself, of God and o f things, and when his suffering ceases, his existence ceases also; while on the other hand, the wise man, as such, feels hardly any áisturbance in his spirit and ever enjoys the true peace o f the soul. Even if the road which I have outlined as leaáing thereto appears very áifficult, still it can be founá. A ná well may it be áifficult because it is so seldom found. For how could it be possible, if salvation lay cióse at haná aná coulá be founá without great trouble, that it shoulá be neglecteá by almost all? T et all that is noble is as áifficult as it is rare. — BARUCH SPINOZA, 16324677

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! Before we continué our talk about regeneration and the entrance of the Holy Spirit into the body, it might be well for us to stop a mo ment and consider the very opposite of this sublime and transcendental blessing. There is always an opposite to all effects and conditions of man and the universe. Very often we learn more about the positive side of any condition, argument or discussion, by momentarily studying the negative phase. Men learn more about light by analyzing dark ness ; more has been learned about health through a careful study of disease, its causes and manifestations. The incoming of the Holy Spirit is regarded as a positive manifestation of Cosmic power. Therefore, we must look upon men and women who do not have this Holy Spirit within them as being in a neutral condition so far as Cosmic or spiritual power is concerned. The nega tive side, however, is what we must consider for a few minutes. The negative side would be the very opposite of the positive and, there fore, would imply some sort of power or condition in the human body that is of the very opposite nature of that which exists when the Holy Spirit is in the body. This negative condition is evidenced in all the ancient records and sacred writings of every land, and of all peoples and religions. This negative condition would manifest in as many different ways as the positive condition would manifest; therefore, the ancient minds would describe it in different ways and give it different ñames. One of the most common expressions regarding the negative condition, found in the Oíd and New Testaments of the Christian Bible, is called Being Possessed. This is illustrated in the numerous cases in which Jesús dispersed the evil spirit from persons "possessed" of the evil spirit. In all of the ancient races and countries we find constant refer ence to evil influences, evil powers, and evil conditions, which had taken hold of the bodies and minds of persons and absolutely dominated them. Of course, the further back we trace this matter, the more pe culiar, exaggerated and misconceived the impressions. Primitive man had the tendency to personalizo every power and personify every prin cipie, even to the extent of having personified gods for the winds and the storms, the heat and coid, and other conditions of the universe and of human life. It is only natural then to find the tendency to personify this evil power that seemed to get into some human bodies and cause all kinds of trouble. Here is where we have the origin of various gods and characters of a mythological nature finally resulting in the universal adoption of the ñame of the "devil" as a personif ication of the evil forces working in man. This evil power in man manifested itself in various ways, as I have said. At first, the primitive minds of men and

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women attributed to this evil power every unfortunate circumstance in life. They considered that this evil power not only existed in the universe and could cause storms, hurricanes, earthquakes, floods, fires, famines, and general disasters, but after it once entered into a human body, it was responsible for disease and especially for extraordinary or unknown diseases, or for very unfortunate happenings to the physical body such as sudden blindness or deafness, or the breaking out of boils and skin diseases, or the birth of children without life. Such strange mental and physical conditions as epilepsy, fits, insanity and hallucinations were certain signs of evil influence, in their conception. As man's education advanced, he became better acquainted with the laws and principies of the universe and the real cause of many things. As he became better acquainted with the laws of health and disease, he gradually took away from this evil power the many things originally credited to it. For instance, he soon learned that fires of the forests were not caused by this evil power, but were caused through other natural agencies ; that famine might be due to the destructivo power of insects which would destroy his crops ; and that boils and skin dis eases were the result of neglect of his body. Even up to this very day, millions of persons still attribute to this evil power within them the cause of some of the physical and mental ailments which medi cal science has not been able to classify properly. Therefore, even though the list of terrible things for which the evil power is re sponsible gradually has been reduced to almost nothing compared to the original beliefs, still such strange conditions or maladies as epilepsy, fits, and some forms of skin diseases, such as leprosy, and some forms of insanity, are attributed ignorantly to the existence of the evil power within the human body. Analysis of the work that Jesús did shows that many of his cures merely consisted of removing this evil influence from the lives of persons, thereby changing their afflictions. With great seriousness Jesús referred to this possession of evil power. It has been argued that these persons only believed that they were "possessed," that there was no real power affecting them, and that Jesús, knowing this, simply agreed with their false belief in order to use the psychological methods of removing that which they believed. It is argued that had he told them there was no such evil influence within them, they would have had no faith in him and would have benefited in no way from his work. This argument reduces the healing power and healing work of Jesús to purely psychological methods, or to processes of suggestion; it takes his great work entirely out of the field of divine heal ing through divine power. If you admit that Jesús had any divine power superior to the psychological actions of the mind, then it is absurd to argüe that he found it necessary to

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agree with their false beliefs. He easily could have told them their diseases and troubles were not due to an evil power, and, regardless of their lack of faith in him, he still could have healed their con ditions. The fact that Jesús admitted that these suffering persons were "possessed" and had some evil influence that must be removed, seems positive proof that such a condition actually existed. Furthermore, we cannot conceive of this great Avatar making false statements or agreeing with false beliefs merely to work a trick with the human mind. One of the unusual physical or nerve conditions generally attributed to the effects of an evil power within the human body is palsy. It is noticeable that palsy, epilepsy and similar conditions have evaded the scientific and medical minds for all these centuries. Now the mystics claim that this so-called evil power within the human body is entirely opposite to the Holy Spirit. It is negative, destructive, unsystematic, spasmodic, devitalizing; it causes despondency and a breaking down of the harmonium of the body; it causes wrong thinking and incomprehension of right and justice ; it creates a desire to do evil, a liking for the sordid and unhappy things of life, and a general inhuman, unspiritual attitude of mind. Certainly it is very fortúnate for human civilization that there is a neutral condition be tween being "possessed" of the evil power and that of being possessed of the Holy Spirit. Otherwise, all of mankind would be either in the negative or the positive classification and would be either wholly evil, sickly, unbalanced, and sinful, or wholly spiritual and healthy. As the world exists today, the large majority is in the neutral posi tion; however, taking the entire civilization of the world as a unit, we find that there are more individuáis in possession of the Holy Spirit to some degree than there are in possession of the evil Spirit. If we understand what this so-called evil power can do to an individual, we can realize what the opposite in the form of the Holy Spirit also will do for an individual. We must remember that some persons have only a minute degree of this evil spirit within them. In such cases it may not be enough to affect their health very seriously, but it does cause evil thinking and evil desires, and consequently some occasional attacks of ill-health. Such persons are very difficult to differentiate from the ones who are in a practically neutral posi tion, who are possessed of neither much of the evil ñor much of the good spirit. On the other hand, there are millions of persons who have some slight degree of the Holy Spirit awakened within them and guiding them in their affairs. These persons have fairly good health and fairly good positions in life. There is only one criticism that can be made of this type of person. They have just enough of the Holy Spirit or the spirit goodness and Cosmic power awakened within them to let them occasionally enjoy some of the Cosmic bene fits and to keep them in fairly good health and fairly happy. They, therefore, look upon themselves as fortúnate and as perfectly contented; they do not seek for any further Cosmic

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benefits. In fact, as they compare themselves with those who are constantly sick and in trouble, they think themselves superior beings, and, therefore, never seek self-improvement. Because these persons do not realize that all of the goodness they have is only a fraction of what is possible, it is difficult to interest them in any methods of improvement or further spiritual development. Also, we find that those who start upon the Path of development gradually increase the spirit- ' ual power and Cosmic spirit in such manner that they hardly notice the increase at all. They do not realize that there is just a slow change taking place and that when this change goes far enough and the entire being is ready for a sudden unfoldment of power, they then will begin to enjoy the real life of regeneration and rebirth. Each one of you is just in this very position. For many months and years now you have been gradually attuning yourself with more and more of this Holy Spirit. It has been cleansing your body, remaking many of the functions and organs of your body, and getting ready the temple within to hold the awakening power that will suddenly unfold itself and take complete possession of you. This gradual change that has been taking place is difficult for you to analyze or understand, or appreciate in any way. As you look back now over the past several years, you will notice probably that your health has been gradually improving and that you have been subject to fewer of the conditions that come within, and that your vitality has been improving. You will notice also that you have been gradually changing in a mental and spiritual way. For instance, many of the friends that used to be of great interest or consolation or enjoyment to you now seem undesirable. Your selections of books or plays now have changed, and perhaps you may even feel disdainful toward your former choice of literature. Many of your ways of thinking and of reasoning have been changed. Your viewpoint of life and the viewpoint of your human associations have been changed. All of these changes are preparatory to the coming of the new life and the new power that will have unlimited possibilities. In fact, you are going through the same changes that Jesús went through in his studies and periods of development in the mystery temples of Egypt and other lands prior to his baptism when the Holy Spirit sud denly enveloped him and shone like a great light around him. Do not think that I am in the least sacrilegious in saying anything like this, for even Jesús, himself, said that he was the Way and that if you followed in his path, you would be able to do even greater things than he did. Along with the development of this power comes complete absence and lack of boastfulness or self-aggrandizement. With this picture in mind, and with the many thoughts upon which to meditate, I cióse this week's talk. I will touch upon this subject fur ther next week. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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*1 The opposite of the positive manifestations in the Universe results in a negative condition. The Bible terms this condition as “Being Possessed.” The “devil” is the personifícation of evil forces at work. CJ As primitive man evolved, he gradually learned the real cause of many occurrences attributed to evil. The negative forcé manifests in evil thoughts and actions, which often appear as disease. *1 Jesús healed the body and mind by removing evil influences from the lives of those afflicted. fl By understanding the reactions of the so-called “evil power,” we may realize more fully the powers of the opposite, that is, the Holy Spirit. ^1 Unawareness of the great potentialities of the spiritual power within causes selfsatisfaction and stagnation. ^ The spiritual development of those on the path is so gradual that it is not percepti ble until one is ready for the sudden unfoldment of power at rebirth. In retrospection, many members may see beneíicial changes in their tastes, health, and mental growth. These changes are preparatory for the coming of the new life.

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Thís monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-four

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-four

THE CONCURRENCE

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^ There are many beautiful references in the sacred literature referring to the divine heritage of God’s power as the most sublime gift from God. This heritage is fore' told in the Apocrypha of the Oíd Testament, which may be found in II Baruch, LI:7'10:

But those who have been saved by their wor\s, A nd to whom the law has been now a hope, And understanding an expectation, And wisdom a confidence, Shall wonders appear in their time. For they shall behold the world which is now invisible to them, And they shall behold the time which is now hidden from them: And time shall no longer age them. For in the heights of that world shall they dwell, And they shall be made li\e unto the angels, And be made equal to the stars, And they shall be changed into every form they desire, From beauty into loveliness, And from light into the splendour of glory. The APOCRYPHA of the OLD TESTA M EN T, II Baruch

TEMPLE MONOGRAPH ELEVENTH DEGREE B e lo v e d Members,

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This week I want to give emphasis to a few thoughts mentioned in my last talk with you, and then pass on to the next interesting subj ect. £* I would cali your attention to the fact that what Jesús said to his Disciples was not intended for them alone; for, in such a case, he would have been speaking to only a few, and would have been limiting the continuance of his work to the period of his lifetime. Certainly, nothing else that Jesús said intimated that his great work and his new light for human beings was to enlighten the world for just a generation or two, and then cease to illuminate. He knew, as his Disciples knew, that his modern messages and modern interpretations of spiritual laws were to continué for ages, or until the light was added to by newer revelations from God, and thus made even more illuminating. Therefore, when Jesús said to his Disciples and to his followers that they would be able to do even greater things than he did, he did not mean that just these few trained workers would do this, but that all his followers— or the followers of the Christ principie in all succeeding generations and centuries— would be able to do what he had done, and even greater things. I dislike to quote the words of Jesús in quotation marks as though such words were precisely the ones spoken by him, for I realize that we have only the records from memory to deal with, and that Jesús never wrote anything ñor did he authorize anything to be written for him in the form of a definite statement. Some clergymen and high church authorities often explain this point by saying that because of the antiauity of that period, and because of the early age of civilization, there were no written records and that the records we have of Jesús are just as exact as any we have of anyone else. But that is entirely wrong and it is so misleading that it is unfair to use such an argument. We have, for instance, the definite statements of Amen hotep who lived and ruled thirteen centuries before the time of Jesús. These statements and thoughts of Amenhotep were well preserved and were written and carved during his lifetime under his authority, under his direction, with his approval and endorsement; and we know, there fore, that they represent precisely his ideas. The prayers of adora ción, which Amenhotep authorized to be carved on the walls of his wemple and on the great pylons and obelisks, represent in hieroglyphics his precise thoughts. They are just as much his authorized statements as though he had written them in manuscript form. Jesús authorized nothing like this. We have to depend upon the memory of his followers for any definite statement that he made. Although Paul, one of Jesús1 most enthusiastic supporters, never saw Jesús ñor heard him speak, he recorded


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what Jesús said and did as learned from a third person. So you see we cannot expect to have any direct statements from Jesús himself. But even in the case where the records were authorized and made at the time the person was living, as in the case of Amenhotep, we have the additional factor of translation and interpretation. Notwithstanding the fact that Amenhotep*s statements and thoughts are carved indelibl^ in stone and have remained unaltered for over thirty centuries and will probably remain for another thirty centuries, nevertheless, the very best authorities in the study of the Egyptian language disagree on the precise interpretation or translation of some of Amenhotep's statements. This is due to the fact that we have no perfect dictionary of Egyptian words, ñor a perfect interpretation of the Egyptian alphabet. For example, the Egyptian alphabet as carved in stone, would not always include the vowels. Thus, there is considerable disagreement as to whether Amenhotep changed his ñame to Akhnaton or Ikhnaten, or Chunaten. The absence of vowels will sometime form a problem in interpreting the precise shade of meaning in some of the words used. The most we can depend upon, therefore, is a general pieture or general thought of interpretation from what was intended. Thus in reading the Christian Bible and the records of the state ments of Jesús, it is foolish to quote any of his words in quotation marks, except in a very few instances. The best that we can do is to give a broad interpretation of that translation. The orthodox church people will interpret the word Way quite differently from that in which the mystics interpret it, although all of us agree upon the translation of the original word into the word Way. Mystics quite logically would interpret the word Way to mean "Path." In much mystical sacred literature of the time of Jesús and before his time, there was reference to "the Path" and "the Way," showing that both words were used synonymously. However, the very strictly orthodox church people will not interpret the word Way as meaning the "Path" because they know very well that such an interpretation immediately transfers the thought of Jesús out of the purely religious, doctrinal interpre tation into a broad, mystical, and metaphysical interpretation. They want to claim that when Jesús said "I am the Way" it meant that accepting him as a personal Savior and accepting his blood as a redeeming power and accepting the other doctrines of the Church was the only way to salvation. With the mystics, however, the phrase, "I am the Path," has an entirely different meaning, not associated with any per^ sonal acceptance of Jesús as an individual Savior. The mystical mean® ing of "I am the Path" is that "I am the Leader or Pathfinder of a Way that I am pointing out to you whereby you can follow in my footsteps along the same Path or through living the same life I lived attain what I attained." In fact, the mystical interpretation would prohibit the acceptance of Jesús as a God in the sense of his being the



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only divine Savior sent to man. Whereas the orthodox statement in the doctrinal sense is just the reverse of this. I have explained all of this solely for the purpose of helping you to realize that in reading any parts of the Christian Bible dealing with the statements of Jesús, you should not accept any of the statements or words as being absolutely correct and beyond individual interpretation or translation. You must merely get the sense of his quoted words and not try to hang your argument, or pin your faith, on any one word as being exact. It is unfortunate that in the past centuries wars have been conducted and millions have lost their lives, while hundreds have been burned at the stake over arguments regarding the precise meaning of individual words in the statements made by Jesús. In the past hundred years, the greatest theoretical experts and linguistic students have agreed that many of the words in the Bible have been mistranslated or misinterpreted, and yet thousands have lost their lives in past centuries because the Church insisted that not one dot over a single letter of any word was to be translated differently from the way the Bible had it. With this in consideration, I want you to recall one Biblical statement made by Jesús: "I am the fruit of them that sleep." Now, as I have said, this is not the precise wording in the Bible, ñor are they the precise words that Jesús used, whatever these may be. I do not care what words appear in the present Bibles or in the ancient manuscripts from which they were translated, for in each case the words are written from the memory of someone who heard Jesús say some thing of this kind, but the thought is there and the thought is an ancient one, and one which Jesús undoubtedly used in talking to his Disciples. The point that is of interest to us is what Jesús meant when he expressed such a thought, regardless of the words that he used. In the first place, as I have just said, the thought is an an cient one. In other words, we have a very oíd custom in speech, of speaking of the results of actions or the results of things as the fruits thereof. One of the oíd Rosicrucian slogans is "By their fruits ye shall know them." This is quoted from some Biblical or sacred literature and plainly indicates what is meant by the word fruit. When Jesús said, therefore, that he was the fruit of them that sleep, he meant just what other Avatars meant when they said that their work, their development, their progress was the result of the great work and great development on the part of Avatars who preceded them. Jesús was undoubtedly the culmination of the development of hundreds of great mystics and inspired beings in the preceding centu ries. His reference to "them that sleep" meant those who had passed on, and who were in a spiritual state and at that time not active on the earth plañe. It was a direct reference to his devel opment in the mystery schools at the hands of teachers, and especially his development through the studies of the teach-


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ings and principies left by the great teachers of past ages. There is no other way to give a logical and sane explanation of the thought con tained in his statement. The significant point, however, is that today it clearly illustrates to us another principie that the Church has adopted in a purely materialistic sense while overlooking the mystical or metaphysical. This point is the divine succession, or as the Church calis it, the apostolic succession. The Church claims today that all of its popes and all of its bishops and cardinals, even the bishops in the protestant churches, de rive their divine authority or ecclesiastical power through the divine heritage given to Saint Peter by Jesús, which has continued down successively through all of the apostles to all of the present authorities of the Church, just as the ownership of an estáte or a castle passes from father to son and son to brother or cousin, and all through a more or less straight line on the male side of the family. Surely, this is interpreting a great principie in a purely materialistic sense. Metaphysically, the divine heritage is the heritage of God's power given to man through His Avatars and specially selected messengers to reveal that power and heritage. If Jesús was the receiver of this divine heritage from the messengers of the past and his life and his acts were the fruits of their efforts, then the Disciples of Jesús and all of his followers, and all who are to succeed to his power in the future likewise would inherit this divine power as a divine heritage. There is no reason to think that God intended this divine heritage to culminate for all time in the life of Jesús. Hundreds of the thoughts expressed by Jesús are contrary to this, for his whole mission centered around the purpose of awakening the minds of the people to the fact that every one of them could become spiritualized and filled with the Holy Spirit and Holy Ghost just as he was filled with it. His mission would have been futile had he believed that with his transi tion, the inheritance would have ended or that when the Holy Ghost carne upon his Disciples and his followers at the time of his ascensión it would never go any further than those few men living at that time. Certainly another fifty years would have wiped out the inheritance if it had been limited to that group of followers. Furthermore, we have many passages in sacred writings proclaiming that all of us are joint heirs of God. The use of a word meaning "heirs" implies that there is a heritage to be inherited. There can be no heirs if there is no estáte. A person may leave relatives behind and children and others who may continué his ñame but, in every true sense of the word, there can be no heirs unless there is something to inherit of a very definite nature. Certainly, we could not be heirs of God un less there was something of Himself or of His divine estáte to in herit. There are many beautiful references in all sacred literature aside from the Christian Bible expressing the thought that we can inherit God's power as the most sublime gift of God.



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Personally, I like to think that the purpose of my individual creation, whereby I was permitted by the Cosmic to be conceived and born, and live here through many experiences, triáis, and tribulations, is in order that I might earn and attain some divine heritage which I would not otherwise attain. I think a beautiful sermón could I be written that would parallel the story of the prodigal son, by pic" turing God as the great, beneficent, and wise father, permitting a child of His consciousness to be born in a material world for the pur pose of earning the great estáte that he can acquire if found worthy. The story would be like unto a king having a child born, but immediately upon birth sending it to the family of some poor people far from his kingdom where the child was to be reared and educated, without knowing for a long time that it was a son of the king; and having the child pass through every trial and experience of poverty, illness, suffering, test, experiment, experience, that would make the child develop its best faculties and prove that it was worthy of the heritage which was its natural one. After the child had shown that he could earn his own way through life, provide for his own necessities, knew the valué of money and power, knew how to be tolerant, good, sympathetic, and loving, was acquainted with the viewpoint of the populace toward authority and privilege, then, when all these experiences were completed, the king would send for the son and crown him as his son and joint heir to the throne. This is precisely the position in which we find ourselves today. It is the picture that I like to hold in regard to myself. I like to think that I am constantly being tested and tried, that someday I will be advanced one step nearer to that degree of perfect develop ment, then transition will carry me into another stage where I will learn a little more, and ultimately, in some incarnation if not in this one, I will be a joint heir to the divine kingdom with all of its power and all of its beauty, and all of its goodness. This gives me courage and strength in meeting the obstacles and conditions of this life and it points out a perfect picture of the reason for my existence. With these thoughts in mind, therefore, I urge each one of you to meditate upon the advantage that you now have of contacting the incoming of the Holy Spirit, which will be the first awakening of your heritage. It will not bring you the ultimate gift that is to be yours, but it will be like the king sending for the son, recognizing Jrhim as his son and telling him. "Now that you are acquainted with the fact of your heritage and are enjoying some of my power and some of my blessings, the rest remains in your hands, and you are now on the Path, or on the Way, to that time when all will be yours." Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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We have no direct statements made by Jesús: all His words, works and deeds were recorded by His followers.

^1 Mystics and heads of the orthodox churches differ in their interpretations of the Christian Bible. Many lives have needlessly been lost because of differences of opinion conceming the translated Scriptures. The promises that Jesús made were intended for all generations. __

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•I Jesús indicated that He was the culmination of the development of many great mys tics of the past, and referred to His development in mystery schools. t|j The divine heritage, materialistically interpreted by the Church as apostolic succession, metaphysically signifies the heritage of God’s powers given to man through His Avatars. Meditate upon the advantage of contacting the incoming of the Holy Spirit.



Eleventh Degree Monograph Thirty-five

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-five

The matter contained herein is officially ¡ssued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O R C under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the printed, enaraved, typewritten, and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copynghted monographs, dissertations. scientific postulations, philosophical discourses academic sfudies diagrams, il ustrations. and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A. M. O. R. C. (The above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confídential to the member receiving, and are imparted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of the legal title, and the right of possession to this monograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M . O. R. C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive Information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate ali rights of th* member and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A. M O. R. C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and íymbols, and the Imperator has solé right to gront the use of them to other allied orqanizations or movements.


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^ Amenhotep IV, Pharaoh of Egypt at the time of ¿ff

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Moses, was the first to establish monotheistic religión. After changing to the worship of the one God A ton, he jchanged his ñame to Akhnaton in honor of that God. This following Hymn of Praise is a magnificent tribute to that one living God:

Thou risest gloriously, O Thou Living A ton, Lord of Eternity! Thou art radiant, beautiful and strong. Thy love is mighty and great; Thy light, of divers colours, leadeth all faces captive. Thou fillest the T wo Lands with Thy love, O Thou self'Created God,

M a\er of every land and of whatsoever there is upon it, Men and cattle, beast of every sort, and trees of every k.ind that grow. Thou art the mother and father of all that Thou hast made; their eyes, when Thou risest, turn and gaze upon Thee; their hearts beat high at the sight of Thee, for Thou risest as their Lord; their hands are lifted up in adoration of Thy person. Thou quic\enest hearts with Thy beneficent acts which are life. Thou sendest forth Thy beams, all the creatures Thou hast made leap toward Thee, and there is jubilee in every land. Thy honoured son rejoiceth, his heart is glad, O Thou living A ton, who appearest in heaven. I am Thy son, satisfying Thee and exalting Thy ñame. Thy strength and Thy power are established in my heart. Eternity is Thine emamtion. Thou Thyself art alone, but there are millions of powers of life in Thee to mal{e Thy creatures live. Buds burst into flower, the plants that grow on waste lands send up shoots at Thy rising.

— A K H N A T O N (AMENHOTEP IV), reigned about 13754358 B.C.


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B e lo v e d Members, G r e e tin g s !

This week we continué our study of the nature of the Holy Spirit and what it means to those who are infused with it, I would cali your attention to several other passages in sacred writings which intimate that the Holy Spirit is a power that comes only to a few, yet is really îvailable to all. You will recall that before Jesús was born, the entire Jewish na* tion was anticipating a Messiah. The word Messiah means in the Hebrew language the same as the word Christ in the Christian language. It means the Anointed One or an Anointed One. The anointment does not refer to any material anointment but to some spiritual anointment or spiritual power that has bathed and enveloped and infused the body of some puré and noble character. Thus the Jews were looking for a Messiah. The fact that they were looking for one among their own race or who was a descendant of Abraham or of their early people, does not mean anything, because each race of people in various times of the past had expected an anointed one of their own race. History shows that they were justified in this, for there had appeared at various times in each and every race and in each country, a Messenger of God, who demonstrated that he had been especially anointed by the Holy Ghost to serve his people at the time in which he was living. The only mistake that the Jewish people made was in visualizing and anticipating a certain character of a certain quality and nature to be the Messiah. They had made up their minds that the anticipated Mes siah would be of just the kind they expected, and this blinded them to the possibility of any other kind of Messiah. It is much like the attitude of those today who ask the Cosmic to help them out of their problems and before asking the Cosmic, they visualize the means by which their problem can be solved and the manner in which the Cosmic can assist. Then, after asking the Cosmic for help, they seek for and await just the kind of help that they had visualized and anticipated, ignoring any other kind of help that might come their way or that might be cióse at hand, because it does not conform to their anticipations. Nearly all of us neglect wonderful opportunities that the Cos mic daily presents just because we anticipate other things and do not realize that what we are anticipating may be entirely different from what the Cosmic has planned and, therefore, we are waiting vainly and ^rill never see our realizations. It is doubtful if we can ever tell exactly what the Jewish people were anticipating, because they left no record of their wishes or desires. It is more than likely that in the various synagogues, and among the various sects of the Jews, there was a difference of opinion as to the kind of Messiah that should come to them. Then again, the individuáis themselves may have variously in terpreted what the learned Rabbis said to them in their holy


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convocations. Therefore, it is more than likely that if we were to take a census of the opinions held by the Jewish people as to the kind of Messiah that was expected, we should find a very complex char acter, indeed; a nature, character, and individual so complex that the Cosmic could never have satisfied all of them. Perhaps another great diff iculty was that the Jewish people had be$, come bound by traditions. This is another serious matter that affects all of us. Most of the present-day religions or denominations of reli gions are bound by traditions. The fact that some great incident in religious history occurred at a certain time and in a certain strange manner has made the leaders of religión inclined to think that the occurrence would repeat itself in the same way. They have adopted the traditional story of the first occurrence as typical of a law or method for the recurrence of the same thing. If the incident does not repeat itself in accordance with the traditions, it is rejected as unreal or untrue. We hear the Church talking much these days about the second coming of Jesús, based upon the statement that he would come to the world again and would be with us always. The Church has accepted the method of his first coming as a traditional foundation or law regarding the coming of a Christ or Jesús, and we find the Christian people today anticipating a second Jesús coming in the same manner as would the first one, or the same Jesús coming a second time in precisely the same manner and with the same setting of the worldly stage. If tomorrow the Cosmic were to send us a Jesús of a different character, and in a different manner than that recorded in the Bible regarding the coming of the first Jesús, it is more than likely that a majority of the Christian people would reject the second Jesús as spurious. They would expect the coming of the second Jesús to be through immaculate conception, and Virgin birth, and that he be born in a very poor and primitive household, and of a type and physical appearance like the first Jesús. They would expect him to go about in the same sort of robes and live precisely as the first Jesús did. They forget that the first Jesús, born in Jerusalem, was in his time as much of an opposite to what was expected as any Messiah could be, and that his birth, his lowly parentage, his manner of speech, his general appearance and dress, were something new and entirely different from what had been expected, and that was why the majority of the people did not accept him at all. Jesús often had to argüe this point and make it plain that he had not come to conform with all of the ancient tra-^ ditions and beliefs but to reveal the new religión to them based upon the fundamentáis of the oíd and yet bringing new light. He was a modernist in every sense of the word, and his modernism was in keeping with the Progressive changes that had been made by the Progressive people of the world. He was an advanced character, a leader, and not a follower, and one who was many paces ahead of civilization in its march of development. For this reason we should expect that any new Messiah that would come to the world today


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or tomorrow would not be anything like the ones that have come, but would be of a very modern nature and in fact a few paces ahead of modern civi lization in its Progressive evolution so that he could lead us instead of being one with us or one who followed us. Therefore, we might expect him to be born in any sort of family, even that of a high and wealthy position. We might expect him to dress in any sort of manner and use any sort of language and methods to demónstrate what he had come to teach. Yet tradition is so infused in the heart and mind of the average person that he or she cannot conceive of such a modern Christ or Messiah as being a true one. However, the Jewish people anticipated a new Messiah because they were well acquainted with the fact that in their own race and in the lands in which their previous generations had dwelt there had been various messengers of God from time to time, each one coming when the world needed one badly. Of course, the Christian Bible states very little about the other Messiahs or Messengers of God that preceded Jesús. In fact, if we read the Christian Bible exclusively, we are very likely to have the opinion that before the coming of Jesús most of the world was very sinful, and that there never had been any great re ligious luminary that had come to earth to save mankind. Even such an outstanding character as Amenhotep IV, who undoubtedly did as much for his people in his time as any messenger from God could do, is not referred to in the Christian Bible, although a great deal is said of Egypt and the various religions of those times. In fact, the Oíd Testament of the Christian Bible could have said very much about Amenhotep IV because he established the first monotheistic religión and was really the founder of the Jewish religión. Any stu dent of the Jewish religión who traces its beliefs and religious de velopment back to the origin finds that these tribes of Israel were living as slaves in Egypt and were almost pagans in their beliefs, if not totally ignorant of any definite belief at all. Then gradually they carne in contact with the pagan and heathen beliefs of the pagan priesthood of Egypt and might have become one hundred per cent pagans had it not been for Moses coming in contact with the mystical teach ings of the Secret Brotherhood of Egypt, and learning of Amenhotep's new revelations of the existence of a "Solé Living God." Then began the difficult work of Moses to try to convert the people from their pagan practices to this new belief in the existence of one God instead of many. From the time he began to take his people out of Egypt into the Land of Canaan his whole life was spent in showing them the power of this Solé God; and yet, whenever he was away from them for any length of time for meditation, a majority of the people slipped back to the pagan religión and built statues of the pagan gods and worshipped these idols. The whole history of Moses' great work to convert his people from paganism to the worship of a "Solé Living God" is


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told interestingly in the Oíd Testament and yet that very complete record has been wilfully mutilated to eliminate the idea that Amenhotep was the first one to teach that religión. One would gather the impression from the Christian Bible that Moses was the first to discover the existence of such a God. We know, of course, that many wonderful books of sacred writings were not included among those selected for the Oíd Testament and that much true light on this subject has been eliminated from the Christian Bible for various reasons. But when we study the subject of religión separately from the Christian Bible and study oíd writings and records, we find that there were various Messiahs or Messengers of God who had been filled with the Holy Ghost in various periods of time. I think we can all agree that none of them was as great as Jesús, probably because previous demand or need for the revelations of religious thought was not so great, and because man was not prepared for any greater light until Jesús carne. Each one of these preceding messengers gave to the world exactly what it could take and understand. We see in the case of Amenhotep that with all his kingly power, with all the wealth and all the facilities he had whereby he might have forced the entire race of Egyptian people to accept the new religión, he was able to promúlgate these new ideas and this correct understanding of God to only a few, and those few composed the Secret Brotherhood of advanced thinkers who were ready for a new revelation. So it was with other messengers, going back to Rama, the first one, and coming up the line to John the Baptist, who preceded Jesús. All in their own ways, in their own time, and as the people were ready and evolved for what they had and what was to be revealed, gave new light and new understanding. Each one added to what the previous one had revealed and carried the spiritual development of mankind a step further. Each one laid a foundation for the next one until when Jesús came a large portion of the world was ready for his message. The Christian Bible limits the explanation of the work of Jesús almost exclusively to what he did in the Holy Land. We do know, however, that his Disciples went to foreign lands and we know, for instance, that the first Christian churches were established in Egypt and still remain there. But little is said in the Christian Bible of the fact that messengers carried their work on in India, Persia, and other places, and that these others were ready for such new light to a cer tain degree. The question is often asked: Why has there been no other follower of Jesús to carry the work still further? Persons who ask this ques tion forget that now that the world is so vastly populated and civilization has reached so many lands, that one Messiah, one leader living in one country, could hardly carry the message to all parts of the world as efficiently as if the Cosmic selected a group of individuáis living in different parts of the world and divided the great work among these. According to some ancient records,



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it is claimed that after the year 1000 A. D. when great changes were anticipated, the Cosmic Consciousness and the Cosmic power of the Holy Spirit divided itself so that it might spread itself into the beings of many persons and let each of these spread a little of the great light along distinct lines. One was to spread the light among artists, another among musicians, another among the scientists ; others were to spread the light among the wealthy in a very careful way. One was to spread the light among royalty and nobility, another among the seekers for purely spiritual principies, another among those seeking practical ways of living more perfectly, another among those who were seeking self-development, and another among those who had no faith in any de velopment at all. Thus the work of one great Messiah might be at the present time divided among a number, or a host, of inspired workers, not one of whom might be as great as Jesús in any sense, but the combination of whose powers and works concentrated into one would be greater even than the work accomplished by Jesús. Here is something for all of you to think about, and it shows the possibility of there being many divinely appointed Messiahs in the world today who are carrying on the Cosmic work in their individual ways under divine appointment, and thus bringing to earth again the Christ Consciousness in a divided form instead of a concentrated form. The interesting point to note is that the Holy Ghost or Holy Spirit is not limited to one individual, ñor was it focalized only in the life of Jesús and never to return again. Another point to bear in mind is that we can attain a degree of this Holy Spirit and bring ourselves right into its great beam of light and be bathed with it through our own efforts. It is not necessary for us to live merely a passive, spiritual life, and then wait prayerfully, hoping that some day the Cosmic may think that we are good enough to be infused with the Holy Ghost and serve some great purpose. We can wilfully and determinedly bring ourselves into this spiritual condition by developing ourselves along certain lines and in certain manners, and attaining and earning the incoming of the Holy Ghost until we have raised our selves to that position and are worthy of it and actually receive it. This is the position in which each one of you is at the present time. You may think that this would result in a host of highly de veloped persons, and that all of them could not receive the Holy Ghost and become lights among men, or there would be more than the world had ever had before. But you must remember that the population of the world has enormously increased and that if every person now upon the Path of spiritual development through any school or system in any part of the world was ultimately to receive the Holy Spirit, it would only mean a million or two of such persons being illuminated. A million or two among many hundreds of millions is a small fraction, indeed, and is no larger percentage than that in the lifetime of Jesús — one great Leader among the peoples of the world in his day with his Disciples helping him and carrying the message to all lands.

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PAGE SIX

With these thoughts to meditate upon during the coming week, I am sure that you will find many points between the lines that may reveal to you what the Rosicrucian organization is carrying on under the auspices and direction of the Great White Brotherhood. I am also sure that there may dawn upon your consciousness the realization of the true position that you may occupy very soon in relation to God's great work among men. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER

SELF-EXAMINATION AND ANALYSIS The following suggestions are for helping your personal analysis. DO NOT send your answers to the Grand Lodge. 1. Does the idea of a modern Messiah appeal to you? If so, ask yourself, "Do I expect to be flooded with the spiritual light of another?" Your answer will de termine whether you are thinking passively or actively. 2. Your realization of such divinity should be an ac tive process of inner growth— that is, an intuitive synthesis of many positive reactions on your part. How could you contribute inwardly for the coming of a Messiah?


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete monograph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory. {jl Many persons neglect opportunities because of their anticipation of things other than those wiiled by the Cosmic. *1 The Messiah was not recognized by many during His stay on earth because He differed from their preconceived ideas. The Christian Bible omits many signifícant facts conceming former Avatars in vari ous countries. There have been Avatars who brought enlightenment to various peopies at various times of great stress; Jesús was the greatest of these. C| Each Avatar gave to the world exactly what it could take and understand; each one carried spiritual development a step further. ÍJ Amenhotep IV established the first monotheistic religión, which later influenced the teachings of Moses. Moses' contact with the Secret Brotherhood and the revelations of Amenhotep in Egypt influenced his guidance of the Israelites. The descent of the Holy Spirit is not limited to one person or one age. ÍJ Through our own eflforts we can attain this Holy Spirit.





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This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receíving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-six

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-six


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*1 The students of this Degree have been evolving to a higher work, developing a greater understanding of the Cosmic principies of the Universe, and seeking an awak' ening of the Cosmic consciousness as the result of self" mastery. Of this self'mastery, Plato, the great Greek Philosopher of the fourth century before Christ, has given us words of wisdom in his exposition of idealism:

Then shall we not be ma\ing a reasonably good defence if we say that the natural tendency of the real lover of \nowledge is to strain every nerve to reach real existence; and far from resting at those multitudinous par' ticular phenomena which are the objects of opinion, he presses on undis' couraged, and desists not from his passion till he has apprehended the nature of each thing as it really is, with that part of his soul whose property it is to lay hold of such objects in virtue of itsaffinity to them; and that having, by means of this, verily approached and held intercourse with that which verily exists, he begets wisdom and truth, so that then, and not till then, he \nows, enjoys true life, receives true nourishment, and is at length released from his travail'pangs. For surely he who has his thoughts truly set on the things that really exist cannot even spare time to loo\ down upon the occupations of men, and by disputing with them, catch the infection of malice and hostility. On the contrary, he devotes all his time to the contemplaron of certain objects orderly and uniform; and beholding how they are all obedient to order and in harmony with reason, he studies to imítate and resemble them as closely as he can.

— PLATO, 427(?)'347 B.C.

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! The reports that I have had in the last two weeks from most of the members in this class are very encouraging, indeed. I do not be lieve that any of you can realize the joy that comes to my heart when I almost forcé myself to understand that at last after so many years of labor and effort, there are those who have finally reached this great borderline of regeneration through the work of the organization under my direction. How well I remember the days of our early Degrees in New York, in the first lodge that was established. By the time the members in the class that I was personally instructing in the temple had reached the Fourth Degree, we had established a few other lodges, such as those in Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, and Boston. All the members began to think that those in the Fourth Degree in New York had reached considerable heights and were making good advancement on the Path. I think there were twenty-five or thirty in that first class which I offered to conduct personally from the First Degree on to the higher ones. I did this not because I wanted to show any preference to the earliest group of members who joined our organization, but because I, too, had much to learn; and even though every one of those lessons was as thoroughly fixed in my mind as though I had invented them wholly and completely, I knew from previous experience in teaching along other and similar lines that a teacher always gains a great deal from in structing a class and listening to the questions, answers, and discussions. As a matter of fact this did help me greatly throughout the first two or three years when I had a class every Thursday evening and occasionally visited other classes in other Degrees. Finally, however, my Fourth Degree members had their ambitions satisfied and they reached the Ninth Degree. You know how new members are. They are always anxious to get from one Degree to the next, thinking that their true advancement is in accordance with the De grees. You will remember at about the time you were in the Sixth or Seventh Degree that each of you wanted to go back to review the early work in order to get the many points which you realized you had missed. Above the Sixth Degree the members are not so anxious to ad vance, but below that the one thing with which every group master has to contend is to keep moving along as rapidly as possible in order that members may not become discouraged. Why, the class even used to vote to have lectures throughout the summer holiday season and I was able to get away only two or three Thursday nights throughout the sum mer, and they would meet even if the Thursday night happened to fall on Christmas Eve, or New Year's Eve ! However, the class reached the Ninth Degree before we moved from New York to San Francisco in 1919. I was certainly puzzled as to what to do with these members. The work of the Tenth and higher Degrees had not been released to me, because in jurisdictions of other countries

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they have class meetings only once a month instead of once a week and it had been f igured that none of the members in New York or any other lodge in this jurisdiction would reach the Ninth Degree until the years of 1923 or 1924. It was not until 1922 that I had all of the Tenth De gree work completely in my own possession and was able to polish off many of the rough points in my own progress and understanding, for I had worked personally under special instruction and special lessons by mail in brief form. But always my ambition was to reach that day when members studying under me or studying in our North American jurisdic tion would advance above the Tenth and reach that high goal at the borderline of new life. I was as anxious about it as a mother is to have her son grow up to manhood, reach his twenty-first birthday and be able to face the world as a man. How well I remember the statement of many of my intimate associates: "When many of your members reach that high point they will be equal to yourself in progress and development, or at least in mastership of the lessons, and then what will you be able to do with them? They will feel that they have as much right to direct and control the organization as you have and will want to be individual leaders in all their communities." That never seemed to make any impression on me whatsoever. I could not think that any living being would reach a point in the de velopment and mastership of the principies and yet have such an idea of wrecking or disrupting the work of the organization by a personal desire to be an independent leader and to disassociate himself from the organization that had helped him to reach that point. All I seemed to care about was that members would reach the high goal, even higher than I had reached, and give me the joy and satisfaction of knowing that whatever their attainment was and however great it might be, it was a result of the work I had undertaken. I had no feeling of jealousy or envy, ñor any desire to want to hold students back from becoming far greater than I in my development or psychic attainment. But think of it! Those members who went into the Ninth Degree in New York in 1919 had to wait until 1926 before the first of them could enter into the Tenth Degree work, and some of them did not reach into the Tenth De gree until 1927 and 1928. In the meantime they reviewed their les sons, helped others, meditated, and did everything they could to maintain their attainment and reach forward just a little bit more through constant practice and self-help. But after the Tenth Degree mono graphs were thoroughly revised by me, arranged in the form that would comply with the ancient standards, and gradually released to the mem bers who were ready for them, I began to feel the keen satisfaction of having accomplished what I had set out to do in 1909. Today I have the satisfaction of knowing that many hun dreds have gone from the Ninth Degree into the Tenth Degree, and although they will keep this fact confidential and secret

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they are accomplishing a great deal for others and meeting all of the requirements of the organization. You who are in the Eleventh Degree represent those members who have made me so happy through their successful progress. And now here I am talking to you about the very highest point in our teachings ; in fact, the highest principies that are known to any of the great mystics or spiritual advisors anywhere in the world. I look upon each one of you as my equal in progress and development as well as my equal in the fatherhood of God. I believe that every single one of you in the Eleventh Degree should be able to do all of the things I have done as Imperator of this organization. I know that each of you, on the other hand, is humble and sensible enough to know that because you have reached the same point in your development as I have reached— or because you understand most of the principies as I understand them— not one of you would think of assuming that the Great White Brotherhood has picked you to be Imperator, or a great Master, or anything of the kind. I know that if you were called upon to serve in this capacity you would gladly accept the obligations and responsibilities, and that in some way the Cosmic would help you to do your best. I know that you know all this, and yet I know that your ambitions are not of a personal and selfish nature which make you think there is nothing more for you to gain through your studies. I am still studying the work, and I cannot see how I will ever get through studying, for the more I study of the teachings the more I realize what there is to know. Each time I delve into the Rosicrucian manuscripts to prepare some more material for this Eleventh Degree, I am just as keenly interested as a student in the early Degrees, or as you are when waiting for another Eleventh Degree monograph to come. Each new line, each new thought, makes me feel that there is so much yet that is not understood, so much yet to be revealed, that what we have attained seems like the kindergarten work. Because of this I want to feel that each one of you is on the path toward becoming a greater mystic and a more highly developed student than I am. Why should I not feel this way? Was it not my duty to spread this light, and is it not a part of that duty to see that those who can do so attain the greatest heights possible regard less of my own development? I must think of myself last and be willing to make any kind of sacrifices in connection with my own personal development that will help others to reach the same point. And now you have reached the high point where all of us progress individually according to our own individual requirements. There is nothing that anyone can do for you at this point, or from this time onward, except to reveal principies and suggestions that may be helpful to you. I know that as this Eleventh Degree progresses, we are going to become so closely attuned, so closely united in our thinking and doing, that we will realize

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the full spirit of the brotherhood relationship and fatherhood relationship that exists between all of us, beoause it is of a divine na ture and cannot be other than food to our spiritual selves. This is all that I want to say to you this week because it is like a little interval in between some of the heavier lessons and revelations, like a recess or rest period in a college or a sohool when all of the pupils become better acquainted and realize what obstacles or problems are facing everyone in the group. I wonder how many of you realize that those of us who have reached the highest Degrees of our teachings are those who were probabiy advanced in the work in a previous incarnation, and that by some Cosmic law we were urged to go into it again in this incarnation and have now reached a point a little higher than we reached previously? Has this not occurred to you as you have read the lessons and noted how closely attuned all of us are becoming? Why, I have letters from many of the members in this class in which they say that they often feel me or sense me dictating one of these Eleventh Degree monographs, and that they almost know in advance what is going to be contained in it. On the other hand, very often I sense what some of you are writing, and a few days later when the letter reaches my desk, I am not a bit surprised to find your expressed thoughts much like those that I had sensed. Naturally, I am anticipating a continuance of the develop ment of this attunement and I am looking forward to the day when all of us will be so closely attuned that we can carry on some wonderful experiments. In the meantime, let us get so closely related that all of us in the Eleventh Degree will be thinking alike, and living alike in regard to the Rosicrucian ideáis, and then we will have established the firmest possible foundation for the future existence of this glorious work. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recaÜ as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

C Each member is striving for a higher degree of psychic attainment and personal de velopment. All are making progress according to their own individual requirement. As the members progress, they become more closely attuned and united in their thinking. Those who have reached the highest Degrees of these teachings were no doubt ad vanced in this work in a previous incarnation. The fact that one may have reached the highest Degrees in this study is not reason enough to think that one is ordained by the Great White Brotherhood to become a Master or Imperator of an organization. ÍJ The high Degrees are only like kindergarten work, to the student who has gained sufficient understanding to realize how much still remains to be revealed to the sin cere seeker.

THE INSTITUTION BEHIND THE ROSICRUCIAN ORGANIZATION Rosicrucian Parle, San José, California, U. S. A.


MASTER MONOGRAPH $

ROSICRUCIAN ORDER

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This monograph always remains the property of the Supremo Granel Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-seven

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-seven

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The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O. R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, enaraved, typewritten, and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses, academic studles diagrams, illustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A . M, O . R. C. (Tne above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are ítrictly confidential to the member receiving, and are im parted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the riqht of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M . O . R . C . is the only organiiation authorized to use the Registered ñame and íymbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movement».


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Some persons believe that because of their studies in metaphysics, they immediately should demónstrate great powers both in occultism and mysticism. That this power is demonstrated only when the person has a need for it, and according to the person’s own efforts, is shown in the Enneads of Plotinus, Egyptian philosopher and mystic of the third century after Christ:

As the actors of our stages get their mas\s and eostumes, robes o f state or rags, so a Soul is allotted its fortunes, not at haphazard but always under a Reason; it adapts itself to the fortunes assigned to it, ranges itself rightly to the drama; then it speaks out its business exhibiting at the same time all that a Soul can express of its own quality, as a singer in a song. Just so the Soul, entering this drama of the Universe, bringing to its acting its personal excellence or defect and accepting from the A uthor its entire role, receives in the end its punishment and reward. But these actors, Souls, hold a peculiar dignity: They act in a vaster place than any stage: the Author has made them masters of all this world; they themselves determine the honour or discredit in which they are agents, since their place and part are in \eeping with their quality. W e may perhaps thin\ of actors having the right to add something to the poet's words: the drama as it stands is not perfectly filled in, and they are to supply where the Author has left blan\ spaces here and there; the actors are to be something else as well; they become parts of the poet, who on his side has a fore\nowledge o f the word they will add, and so is able to bind into one story what the actors bring in and what is to follow. — PLOTINUS, 205(?)'270(?) A.D.


N U M B E R THIRTY-SEVEN

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! There are a few important points that I think should be explained to you at this stage of your development and growth in the work, because there are likely to be problems presenting themselves which you may have difficulty in solving, or there may be theoretical problems ®which you may not be able to analyze unless a few hints are given to you. Many years ago, when I first became interested in so-called psychical research and was elected president of the largest of such bodies of men and women in New York, I read the various reports of other research bodies working along similar lines in Cañada, England, France, and Germany. Being of a mystical turn of mind and keenly realizing the spiritual side of all psychic matters, I was continuously provoked as I read the reports of these research bodies and the comments of the scientists who were at the head of such bodies, because they seemed to fail to understand the nature of the matter that they were investigating. Such men as Sir Oliver Lodge, for instance, and many more like him in America and other countries, were the principal investigators and the principal inquisitors at all of the test demonstrations that were made of phychic power. Sir Oliver Lodge was an eminent physicist, or in other words, a man deeply steeped in the material laws of nature, and so were nearly all of these other scientists. In fact, in those days the most eminent and most advanced scientist who wanted to gain recognition as a scientist seemed to feel that he had to take the stand or the position that there was no such thing as a supernatural power in the world. Of course, he did not daré discuss spiritual laws, spiritual powers, or anything of a religious nature, for that would have immediately condemned him in the eyes of the public as not being a real scientist. But even if they had inclined toward such interests and were more or less spiritually developed in a religious sense, they seemed to have no belief that the work of psychic médiums who conducted demonstrations for them might have had anything to do with spiritual laws. They constantly sought • for material forces and energies. Naturally, they were continuously disappointed and they attributed their disappointment to the cleverness of the médium, and always suspected that the person giving the demonstrations was using some kind of trickery. The thing that surprised and provoked me the most was the fact these scientists, in trying to measure the psychic power that radiated from the hands or finger tips of some of these médiums, would use instruments and devices that are used exclusively for testing or measuring material or worldly energies, and when these instruments failed to register any power or energy in the médiums* hands or around their bodies, the scientists would claim at once that the médiums did not possess any power such as they claimed. You can understand how ridiculous this was because

• that



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now with your knowledge you can see how foolish were their methods. It is just as though we would try to measure the light, or aura, that we see around a human body, with a machine that registers the amount of light given off by an electric light bulb. Or, can you imagine trying to find the amount of healing power in a person's hand by attaching a large electric light meter to the finger tips and waiting for the dial or the clock in the meter to register the amount of voltage, wattage, or amperage passing through the meter? Such a meter may measure the electric current in an electric wire, and it may even be so fine an instrument as to measure the smallest amount of electricity in the smallest battery, but that does not prove that such an instru ment could measure the energy of a person who is giving a healing treatment• Of course, Sir Oliver Lodge and some of these scientists discovered their error later in life, and finally had to admit that there were other energies in the world beyond the physical energies. Sir Oliver Lodge wrote a book on this subject entitled Beyond Physics. However, a majority of the persons in the world today, who think they are smart and capable of investigating mystical, spiritual, and psy chic subjects, take the same attitude as these scientists used to do. They try to judge spiritual valúes or Cosmic valúes from the viewpoint of our material education. Of course, it cannot be done. We cannot comprehend the spiritual world except from the spiritual point of view. Neither can we estimate the nature of any of the spiritual qualities with which we have to deal unless we attune ourselves with these qualities and interpret them from an entirely different angle than we interpret things of the material world. These scientists who were attempting to investigate Cosmic forces working through a human being, and through the human mind, soon discovered that they had to approach the subject with a spiritual atti tude, and they soon found this important law: "The spiritual and Cosmic laws do not submit themselves to the challenge of manfs mind or lend themselves to the gratification of his curiosity." You will naturally agree with that important statement. We can not imagine the Cosmic laws ready at any moment to give us a demonstration just for the sake of proving that they exist, or that they can do certain things, or for the sake of satisfying our curiosity. Even these scientists themselves would not lend themselves to demon strations for the sake of curiosity on the part of the public. Go to any great scientific laboratory today, such as the experimental laboratories of the Bell Telephone Company in New Jersey or of the General Electric Company in New York State. Ask to be admitted to the presence of some of their great scientists and when you meet them, ask one of them if he will produce


NUMBER THIRTY-SEVEN

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some lightning for you, or prove to you, or demónstrate to you, that the chemical and physical things they write about are true. You will find each one of them taking the attitude that what they have said in their reports and records, or discussed among themselves or with other scientists in their private and exclusive sessions, is to be accepted by the common people because of the integrity of the men who make the demonstrations and because of the honesty of the purpose. Any one of these scientists would feel insulted if you said to him, "You may have the brains and the power to produce certain results in a test tube but I don't believe it until you show me." They would ask you what right you had to challenge their statements, and then tell you that they had something to do other than spend their time in giving demonstrations to every layman who would flaunt such a challenge to them. Yet, these same scientists challenge the Cosmic and the spiritual world to give them demonstrations in certain places, under certain conditions, and at certain times, to suit their own fancy. Imagine saying to the Cosmic something like this: "Some persons claim that you can produce life where there is no life, and that you have the power to create living matter out of nonliving matter. Well, you may do this with small cells of protoplasm or germ plasma, or you may do it with other cells of matter under the ground or in plants or in other places where we can't see what is going on, but I wonrt believe any of it until you perform such creation in conditions that I establish. There fore, instead of creating life in your ordinary way and in such natural conditions as you have been using, I want you to do it right here in this glass dish on my laboratory table and if you do not do it, I won't believe that you can do it." You may smile at such a statement as that, but Dr. Loeb, the famous scientist, actually took such an attitude for years. The Cosmic may say that in order to produce life, it must have a certain degree of warmth of the earth*s magnetism and a certain amount of purified air, and moisture around it, and certain other conditions that it can create andmaintain; the Cosmic may say that it cannot produce life in a dirty dish that has been washed in dirty water into which foul air is passing every moment and where there are not the proper temperature, magnetism, and other conditions; but the scientist would only laugh at all this and continué to demand that the Cosmic demónstrate its power in the way he wants it or not at all. Now, we have persons who are taking that same attitude in regard to their spiritual and psychic development. They expect that the spiritual development going on within them should constantly burst forth with some sort of outward, material manif estation. They expect that as this psychic and Cosmic power develops in them, their wrinkles should disappear from their faces, and their jowls should shrink up, and oíd age should leave their bodies, and a bright color come to their cheeks, and their gray hair turn



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dapk, and their aching bones become younger, and complete physical rejuvenation set in, and continué to increase until everybody around them would notice that they were getting younger instead of older, and soon they would be like flippant young children wanting to run and jump fenees, and play with skipping rope, or roller skates. And, that is not all. They want the Cosmic power to be so strong in them that if they should happen to point a finger at a person while talking to * him, the energy shooting off the end of that finger would stun anybody that was near them. They want the psychic and Cosmic power to be so strong that they do not need to eat any more than a little orange juice and a few vegetables, and yet grow strong and healthy, and even that is not all. They do not want the least ache or pain ever to come to their bodies, regardless of how many natural laws they viólate. They think that if they have become spiritualized, they should be able to stick their fingers in a fíame of fire and feel no pain. They read that some of the saints were forced to walk on hot coals or burning cinders, and were not burned, and they wonder why they cannot so demónstrate spiritual prowess to themselves, or to some incredulous neighbor who doesn't believe in spiritual power but who might become convinced if he saw such a demonstration. And even that is not all. They expect the Cosmic to keep their pocket books filled with money, or at least they expect the letter carrier to bring them unexpected letters from unknown persons containing surprising checks, or actual cash from some good-natured person whom the Cosmic used as a channel to bring them wealth. They think that as long as they are being spiritualized, they should be able to spend what money they have freely and never think of saving a penny because tomorrow the Cosmic will repay them double for every do llar that they have spent, whether they spend it foolishly, selfishly, humanely, or how. All this they expect as proof from the Cosmic ; otherwise they will not believe that they are making any spiritual progress, It never dawns upon these persons that spiritual and psychic de velopment may be going on within them to such an extent that no out ward manif estation of any kind is made, and no outward demonstration is possible, unless the Cosmic sees fit to use them as a channel for some special purpose. It is true that a musician who is developing and practicing reveáis some of his progress through the improvement in his technique, but I daré say that you would never be able to tell how truly the voice of anyone has developed, or how truly their minds and hands have developed in playing an instrument, if you judged entirely C by what you heard them doing in their practice hours. But perhaps some day when there was a need for them to perform before an audience you would be surprised to see what their development had brought about. Now, all that I have said in the foregoing statements is preliminary to what I want to tell you now. Recently I had an interview with one of the members of this Degree, who


NUMBER TH IRTY-SEVEN

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has been waiting and watching for some peculiar, physical, or worldly manifestation of the development that has been going on with in him. He is a practicing physician of the medical school, a regu lar M. D. It is only natural that he should feel that the increasing spiritual power within him should manifest itself some way. He wrote to me not long ago, just after he started in the Eleventh De gree, that while his health had become better and he was happier, more peaceful and more contented, and while he enjoyed the lessons immensely, and was ready at any time to do anything to help any man or woman on earth because of his appreciation of the great work of AMORC, still he felt disappointed because there did not seem to be any outward sign that would prove to others or even to himself that he was increasing in any power or becoming more psychically developed. He said that it might be that he only believed that he was developing, that this belief on his part made him happier and more contented, and that, after all, it was only a delusion that he had made any real progress. Still, he did not lose faith in the principies and each week and each month saw him becoming busier with his profession, with a little better income, and generally more contentment in life. As long as that continued, he felt that he was getting a great deal out of the work, and certainly having some Cosmic blessings. Still, where was there any sign of a personal power developing in him? What good was the new and increasing spiritual development going to be to him and to others if he could not see it, or use it, or demónstrate it? Thus he reasoned for many weeks and months. Then one day he carne to see me in great excitement and this is the story he told: "For some months I have had a little patient, a girl about sixteen years of age, who started to go blind from some peculiar disease when she was five years oíd. At first, only one of her eyes became clouded and many doctors examined her eyes for cataracts, but could find nothing. After the left eye became almost useless, the right eye gradually started to become dark in its impressions. Then the parents, who are poor, became worried and went from one eye clinic to another; finally some well-known specialists became interested in her case because it was unique and it afforded them an opportunity to study a new eye condition that they had never dealt with before. All the while, the parents kept bringing the girl to me to have her health watched and to gradually build up her strength and energy to help improve her eyesight. Fortunately, none of the eye specialists suggested any operations on the eyes, for really there was nothing that they could see that could be done in the way of surgery. So her eyes were not injured in any way by any operations. "In the last year her eyesight had become so bad that she could hardly see anything but the brightest lights moving cióse to her eyes. A few weeks ago, some eye specialist said there was nothing more to be done except to put the child in an institution for the blind where she could be taught to read the Braille



— C— PAGE SIX

system, by which the blind people read from raised dots on paper, and where she could also be taught how to guide and guard herself in going around in her dark world. It takes quite a few months for a person who once had sight to become accustomed to the very fine impressions and sensations upon which he has to depend when he does not have his sight. The only way such persons can be trained is by being placed in an institution among other blind persons, and where there are competent teachers. "In order that this little girl might be placed in a state institution for the blind, her parents, because they were poor, found it necessary to have me sign certain papers recommending that the child needed such help in such an institution. Last week, the child stood in my office with both parents crying bitterly because their little girl was to be taken away that day to the institution. There were also present my two nurses and a representative from the institution, who was going to accompany the girl to their offices and buildings. I was just about to sign the papers which would have forever placed the girl in a world of darkness, for it would have brought to an end all further study of her case, and all further attempts to cure her. "Thinking of the seriousness of the paper I was signing and that I, as a Rosicrucian, should be the last one to sign a paper saying that there is no further help for such a child, I asked the parents if I might take the girl into my adjoining office and give her eyes one more test. They consented, and together the two of us went into my little treatment room. I asked the girl to be seated in front of me, and while she was sitting there, I raised my hands to the high heavens and I whispered a prayer, and I implored the Cosmic and the great unseen Masters to let me be a channel in just this one case, and let the spiritual development that was going on within me make this one demonstration, not because I doubted, not as a challenge, but wholly and purely for the purpose of helping this poor girl. The tears rolled down from my eyes as I spoke, and the girl began to cry, but kept silent. I felt my whole body trembling from some energy or power within me, and I felt as though my worldly clothing and my worldly body had become transparent or penetrated in some way so that I was just a mass of energy without form and without shape, or nothing more than a spiritual body standing in front of her. Then, I placed the tips of my right thumb and my right forefinger over her eyes, which were closed, and I said, 'Now let light come.' "The moment I took my fingers off her eyes, she opened her eyelids and screamed aloud for joy, for she could see me and see everything in the room, and she started to dash out of the office and started to go in the wrong direction, and I turned her around and pointed to the door that led to my reception room. Her parents were al ready rushing toward the door for they heard her scream. The brighter lights in the reception room dazzled her for a few


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moments and she had to cover her eyes. We pulled the shades down slightly and yet in that softened light she could see everybody and everything, and the man from the institution opened a large magazine on the table and pointed to certain lines and figures, which the girl could not read intelligently because of a neglected education, but she was able to cali out each letter of the alphabet in even the small type, and each color that she announced was absolutely correct. I gave her a pair of yellow glasses that I had used in automobile driving and allowed her to wear these temporarily until her eyes became accustomed to light and I want to tell you that a happy family and a surprised group of persons left my offices. But to me the most remarkable demonstration of all was the fact that the Cosmic makes its manifestations and demonstrations in its own way in the proper time. I know that I might have pleaded in vain for hours for the Cosmic to have given me some demonstration, while sitting in my sanctum, solely for the purpose of removing my doubt and satisfying my curiosity. But here was an opportunity for my spiritual power and development to be used by the Cosmic in a practical way, and it came in answer to my faith and in answer to the girl's tears. "After the demonstration was over, my peculiar condition changed to a normal one. Newspaper reporters called on me later in the afternoon and wanted to write a remarkable story about my causing a blind person to see. I refused to allow them to say that I had done any thing and I refused to tell them what happened in my little office. I simply said that God had made the cure and no one else, and that I had done nothing. One of the newspaper men said to me. fWe can't talk about God making a cure because that wouldn't be news. God is not news in any newspaper. 1 And so this is my story and I hope that all of the members in the Eleventh Degree will realize, as I do now, that we may be developing a power and a strength we little realize, but when the right time comes, and when the right moment is at hand and the Cosmic is ready to use us, then the power will be made manifest." I think the Frater's story makes the finest lesson we could have at this point in our work. However, there are many other points in connection with this subject which I want to discuss with you, but I want to leave this story and my introduction to it with you now as fit subjects for you to meditate upon this week.

See how many important lessons you can get out of this one week's talk. See if you can find all of the wonderful laws and principies that ^ a r e contained in this message now in your hands. All of us should be happy that one member of this class has already been selected by the Cosmic to perform such miracles as only the Christ consciousness in each of us can possibly perform. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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fj Spiritual valúes cannot be judged ñor measured by mechanical, material means. Some formerly material-minded scientists are now recognizing energies in the world which are beyond physical energies. The spiritual and Cosmic laws do not submit themselves to the challenge of man’s mind ñor lend themselves to the gratification of his curiosity. No outward demonstration of spiritual development is possible unless the time and need arises as determined by the Cosmic. *| The experience of a frater who is a doctor is contained in this lesson: it reports the miraculous cure of a blind girl through the doctor’s faith in the Cosmic, and his knowledge in the application of mystical principies.


This monograph always remain* the properfy of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

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*1 In several places in the Christian Bible, Christ tells his followers regarding the miracle he performed, that these and greater powers are obtainable unto them. From the Coptic Apocrypha, the Repose of Saint John, the evangelist and apostle, we are told of John’s explanation of this power of Christ Jesús:

Tôw on the first day of the week. the hrethren were gathered together, and John began to speak, to them, saying, ‘My brethren, my fellow heirs, and my partners in the Christ Jesús, our Lord, know ye that unto you hath the Lord given from His hand power, and that He hath wrought for you very many mighty works, and miracles, and acts of grace. . . . He hath never made Himself )nanifest unto you through the eyes of the body, neither have ye hear\ened unto Him through the ears of the body, but He hath made Himself visible unto you through the integrity of your heart, and by visions, and by works which are holy. Strengthen ye yourselves, then, in Him, and ye shall remember Him at all times; moreover, ye shall also re' member the mystery and the associations which hath come unto you, and which our Lord hath fulfilled. ’ — JOHN the APOSTLE

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N U M B E R THIRTY-EIGHT

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! Before we continué the thought outlined in last week's monograph, I want to say that from other members have come letters showing the sudden and unexpected influx of power never anticipated in any way and hardly believed to be possible. It is extremely doubtful whether Jesús realized in the early part of his missionary work that he had such healing power developed within him as he was able to demónstrate. Remember that the healing power which Jesús demonstrated was only one of the remarkable powers used by him. However, he had seen healing work performed by the Great Masters in the schools and had heard of the demonstrations made by those who preceded him. It was only natural for him to expect that some day such powers would be developed within him since he was devoting his life to Cosmic work and had offered himself as a channel for whatever the Cosmic might desire him to do. But we cannot conceive of Jesús sitting alone somewhere and wondering whether he had such powers and experimenting solely for the purpose of testing these powers. The whole picture would be inconsistent if we thought of Jesús sitting on a rock somewhere in the wilderness, or in the shaded nook of some valley, and there alone trying to turn the rock into something else or to cause the rock to give forth water. Ñor can we think of him going to his home and filling a vessel full of water and standing by it try ing to see if he could change the water into wine merely to test one of the Divine laws. Jesús must have known that whenever it was neces sary for any miracle to be performed then would be the time to put his trust and faith in the divine principies being fulfilled. We know that Jesús did not always depend upon miracles to serve his purposes, for he must have realized that most of his miracles were exceptions to the common laws of nature. He must have known that only in extraordinary circumstances when none of the ordinary common laws of nature would serve could he expect a miracle to be performed. Even though he might have believed that if the necessity aróse, he could have been moved through space rapidly without walking on the ground and could have made an awesome demonstration, he did not attempt to use this method every time he was before the public. We find that he walked until he was tired just like every other human being. We find that he searched for water to drink when he was thirsty, although he may have known that under some circumstances a definite law could have been invoked to have instantly relieved his thirst. We know that he suffered physical fatigue, for even when he carried his cross he was subject to all of the ordinary laws that affect every human being, and he did not attempt, even then, to invoke any spiritual or divine law that would have lightened the weight of the cross or given him greater strength. He did not attempt to ease his own pain when he was on the cross because, realizing that the Cosmic had some motive in permitting him to be crucified, it was his duty to accept


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whatever was connected with the crucifixión. Even after he had found that he could walk upon the surface of the water, he did not make such a demonstration every time he was at the side of the Jordán River or the Sea of Galilee, or other streams in Palestine and Syria. It is doubtful whether Jesús even realized when he told a servant to return to his home and tell the sick man to have faith and that he would get well, that by his very words, the man would rise from his sickbed perfectly cured. I can understand how surprised Jesús could have been many times when he saw the results that he was producing. Many of them must have been wholly unexpected, especially in the form in which they occurred. Probably he was as much astounded as was the woman when she touched the hem of his garment and was instantly cured, and he looked at her and said that her faith had made her whole. I think that his words to her on that occasion were an attempt to explain to her and to himself the surprising thing that had occurred. He was not aware that she was going to touch his garment, for the purpose of being cured, and did not know what she was doing until she actually had touched the gar ment. The sudden change in his aura, which he felt through her con tact, and the sudden change in her condition must have surprised him greatly, and his instantaneous thought was that her faith had harmonized and attuned her with him, and his divine power, and thus brought the power of his great Christhood flowing into her being through that contact. Certainly her faith was the key which made the attunement possible and, therefore, her faith did save her and heal her. Take, for instance, the miracle of the loaves of bread and the feeding of the multitudes, and the changing of the water into wine. These were not demonstrations that were planned ahead of time or anticipated. They were spontaneous and occurred suddenly in an unex pected emergency when common natural law would not have helped, and I am sure that Jesús was just as pleased inwardly, and just as surprised in his mind, at what occurred as were his Disciples. But his attitude was different from theirs. He had been led to believe that such things when they occurred were not supernatural but divinely natural, and though they were surprising, he did not stand aghast and demand some explanation, some scientific outline of what had occurred, or some plausible theory to account for it. He accepted them as facts, demonstrated before him, and he could do nothing else but accept them, because he knew that "With the Father all things are possible." This should impress us with the fact that the modern attempt to analyze all of the miracles of the Bible and all of the miracles of today, and reduce them to a common scientific understanding is a waste of time. We hear many persons argüe against the Biblical account of the immaculate conception. Learned scientists tell us that such a thing could not have happened since God has ordained that all conceptions should take place in a certain manner and that all human beings are born according to certain laws.



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They say that God could have made no except ion to any of His laws and that, therefore, the story of the immaculate conception is untrue and purely mythological or symbolical. Such an argument is unsound because it starts with the very assumption that all of the laws which God has ordained for ordinary human beings and for the ordinary processes of civilization are likewise binding upon Him and upon His Divine Representatives. There is no reason for such an assumption except our lack of understanding of God's purposes. Furthermore, the assumption that God can make no exception to any of His laws is foolish, inasmuch as this assumption is based upon another assumption; namely, that God has made no laws except those which relate to the physical, mundane world. How do we know that when God established these physical, mundane laws that are to apply to all earthly conditions, He did not establish at the same time another law whereby certain things could be done in a spiritual and divine manner wholly differently than they are performed through Nature's princi pies? Certainly, if God had the power to create the physical man, or to create all living things out of the chaos of nonexistence of any thing, God has the power to create anything today or at any time with out being subject to any of the physical laws of matter. If the con sciousness of God is Creative, I cannot see why a conception in the mind and consciousness of God cannot penetrate into physical matter and cause matter to form a replica, or a resemblance, or an image of that divine conception. At any rate, it is foolish for any of us with our finite under standing and our limited comprehension of divine laws, let alone our limited understanding of many of Nature's laws, to decide among our selves that God could do this or that, or could not do this or that. Miracles are being performed every day that are beyond human compre hension. Every time we, here in California, sense a very slight trembling of the earth— just enough perhaps to cause a windowpane to vibrate slightly— we are reminded of the few earthquakes that have occurred here in California and the many that have occurred in recent years throughout every part of the world. Occasionally, one of these has been very destructive, as we view it from our human point of view. On the other hand, we have come to see that in many instances the earthquake and the resulting changes in the topography of the land are a part of an evolutionary process of change for the better. We must either feel that the earth has a consciousness of its own, and occa sionally decides purely arbitrarily to shake itself and changes its form somewhat, or we must believe that a Divine mind and intelligence is still molding and forming the earth's surface. So, we find in our study and analysis of the powers of God that these may be partially given to man, but that this gift is not given to the unworthy or the unprepared, ñor is it to be used experimentally and casually as though it were a common



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thing and unworthy of sacred appreciation. In each of us who strives to become more closely attuned with the Cosmic there is developing a greater and more wonderful degree of these divine powers, and the re sult is that we seldom appreciate how much of such power is resident within us and ready for the great demonstration that may be necessary at some crucial time. That it does not reveal itself daily or hourly, or clothe us with some unusual appearance, or make us less subject to natural laws is no proof or indication that this great Cosmic power is not within us. We should not doubt, ñor should we question its existence if we are worthy, and we should feel that when the time comes, and in the manner that is most appropriate, we will be used as a channel for the expression of this power, and then our blessing will be in the form of serving as an instrument. Think these things over during the coming week and meditate upon them; examine yourself to see whether you have not been questioning your progress and your development by attempting to gauge it by what miracles have occurred in your life. Change your attitude to one of confidence and complete faith, and you will find that even this will increase the power within you and bring you a sense of safety, a sense of oneness with God, a sense of protection and guidance that will help you as greatly in the mastering of your personal problems as any special power might ever help you in any circumstance. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograpt. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

Jesús considered the miracles he performed as facts, demonstrating that “with the Father all things are possible.” He never used supematural powers to shirk his personal obligations. Finite understanding cannot judge right ly divine laws. If the consciousness of God is Creative, then divine conception is not impossible.

Powers of God may be bestowed upon man if he be found worthy and prepared to use such powers unselfishly and sincerely. The divine power within each becomes apparent when need for such arises. If you change your attitude of doubt to one of complete faith and confidence, you increase the power within you and sense a oneness with God.

THE INSTITUTION BEHIND THE ROSICRUCIAN ORGANIZATION Rosicrucian Parle, San José, California, U. S. A.


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Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-nine

Eleventh Degree Monograph T hirty-nine

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O . R. C. under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the "printed, engraved, typewritten, and photographic copies of officially prescribed and copyrighted monograpns, dissertations, scientific postulations, philosophical discourses. academic stuaies, diagram s, illustrations, and charts" as author¡2ed by the Imperator or A . M . O . R. C. (The above emblem and ñamo of the O rder are also registered ¡n countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the m em ber receiving, and are im parted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the right of posjession to this monograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M . O . R . C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all rights of the member, and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M . O . R . C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and svmbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant tiie use of them to other allied organizations or movements.


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9 That the inner consciousness is never stationary but is ever evolving, ever adding to it a greater knowledge, has been leamed in the various studies throughout the Degrees. This evolution of the inner consciousness is Alustrated by the following analogies of the French Philosopher, Henri Bergson:

This inner life may be compared to the unrolling of a coil, for there is no living being who does not feel himself coming gradually to the end of his role; and to live is to grow oíd. But it may just as well be compared to a continual rolling up, liJ{e that of a thread on a ball, for our past follows us, it swells incessantly with the present that it pic\s up on its way, and consciousness means memory. But actually it is neither an unrolling ñor a rolling up, for these two símiles evo\e the idea o f lines and surfaces whose parts are homogeneous and superposable on one another. Tôw, there are no two identical moments in the life o f the same conscious being. . . . Use as a comparison the myriad'tinted spectrum, with its insensible gra* dations leading from one shade to another. A current o f feeling which passed along the spectrum, assuming in turn the tint o f each o f its shades would experience a series of gradual changes, each of which would announce the one to follow and would sum up those which preceded it. . . . Imagine an infinitely small elastic body, contracted, if it were possible, to a mathematical point. Let this be drawn out gradually in such a manner that from the point comes a constantly lengthening line. . . . Let us bear in mind that this action in spite of its duration, is indivisible if accomplished without stopping, that if a stopping'point is inserted, we have two actions instead of one, that each of these separate actions is then the indivisible operation of which we spea\, and that it is not the moving action itself which is divisible, but rather the stationary line it leaves behind it as its trac\ in space. —HENRI BERGSON, 18594941

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B e lo v e d M embers, G r e e tin g s !

As we continué the thoughts contained in the last lesson, it is time for me to cali your attention to another intensely interesting point. You remember that in some of the early Neophyte monographs we referred to the fact that the objective consciousness of the human mind could be concentrated or centered at various points within the body by the use of will power. You will recall one special exercise in this connection which included the concentration of the mind and will upon the feet, and then moving this center of consciousness upward through the limbs and into the body, and finally to the head. You will recall that as the consciousness, or center of concentration, moved to different parts of the body those parts became enlivened or quickened, or more charged with a sense of consciousness. Now we are at a point in our work where we have been dealing with the psychic consciousness as something almost separate from the purely objective consciousness. Our objective consciousness is something that belongs to our brain and to the physical part of ourselves. It is this objective conscious ness that we sense when we are sitting or standing in an uncomfortable position, or when some part of our clothing pinches us too tightly, or when the skin is cut or injured, or a bone is broken, or we have a toothache. When we are attempting to relax, and to subdue and nullify, or make dormant, this objective consciousness, but some bright light is shining in our eyes and keeping us annoyed, our objective consciousness will center around our eyesight and bother us. If we are sitting in an uncomfortable chair so that some part of the body is ill at ease, we feel that uncomfortable condition and it keeps us from completely relaxing. If the room is too warm or too coid, or there is some noise, we are annoyed in that way. It is only when none of the objective faculties is active that we really feel relaxed and truly unconscious in an objective sense. All the while, however, we may be entirely unconscious of the inner self. In other words, the inner consciousness may be highly active and yet because of some outer con sciousness that annoys us or keeps us from being relaxed, we do not feel the inner consciousness whatsoever. It is only when we become thoroughly relaxed outwardly and the outer consciousness is completely subdued that we begin to sense the inner consciousness. Now, this inner consciousness is a consciousness that not only filis every part of the inner self but it also can move the center of its existence from one part of the body to another just as we move the center of our objective consciousness from our hand to our foot or to our neck, or anywhere through the ability to concéntrate our thoughts. The inner consciousness can be moved in the same way. Many of our psychic experiments were intended for

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the purpose of centering the inner psychic consciousness around the heart or around the emotional centers, or around the so-called psychic centers such as the pituitary or pineal glands, or upon even the solar plexus. What I want to speak about now is not the movement of this inner consciousness in its relation to physical parts of ourselves, but in relation to the soul within us. Man's inner consciousness moves or develops and centers itself in accordance with man's evolution. It is the movement and development of this inner consciousness that constitutes his evolution, his growth, his development. When we speak of the psychic consciousness growing or developing, we do not mean that every part of it changes. We mean that a part of the conscious ness remains just as it was, but more is added to it and thus the oíd consciousness remains with the new being added to it, making a perfect continuity. As a simple analogy let us take a rubber band, like that used to slip around packages. Let us say that this rubber band is only two inches long but we want to put it around a package that is four inches long. In order to do this, we must stretch the rubber band. Now in stretching it, we make the rubber band longer and it may be roughly said that we are developing the rubber band or making it grow by stretching it. In truth, however, we do not add anything to the rub ber band by this method of enlarging it. As we stretch it in length we make it thinner in diameter but the same amount of element or mat ter remains. We may have a longer rubber band, but we do not have any more rubber than when we started. This is not the way the psychic consciousness within us grows. It grows by adding to itself and be coming larger in that sense. It is just as though we would take the two-inch rubber band and add another two inches of rubber to it in order to make it four inches long instead of stretching the origi nal two inches. Thus the psychic consciousness adds to itself, and expands by reaching out further into new contacts and the quickening of new functions, while the original elementary consciousness with which we were born remains just as it always was. Man grows and evolves into adulthood, leaving his childhood behind him, as he thinks. But the truth is that his development has been a continued addition to his child nature and not a changing of his child nature. There is, in every adult, a small degree of the elementary child still remaining, and in the normally developed and perfectly balanced adult the childlike nature is easily made evident in times of relaxation or when the true nature of the individual is allowed to express itself. All of the recent lessons in the Eleventh Degree have been carrying on what was started in the earlier Degrees of our work. The purpose has been to expand and add to the consciousness of the inner self but not by stretching it out

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into greater areas, for this would be a process of gradual attenuation, and there would be a limit to such growth or development. In fact, nothing would be gained thereby. When the mystic finds that his consciousness of higher things is developing, for instance, a con sciousness of spiritual valúes, or, more specifically, a consciousness of the higher colors and their higher rates of vibrations, it does not mean that the original consciousness which he had has been expanded to include the functioning of psychic colors, but it means that he has awakened and quickened some new consciousness within him that senses colors and adds this new capacity to his original capacities. There fore, we see that evolution of the psychic self is not a process of expanding the original consciousness, but a process of real growth resulting from the formation of new psychic functionings and new ca pacities. I am going to take this subject up at greater length in the next monograph, but before doing so I want to cali your attention this week to the point originally touched upon at the beginning of this monograph — namely, that the center of this inner consciousness can move from point to point, not only within the body but also outside the body. We may say that as a child grows toward adulthood, his center of objective consciousness shifts or moves to different points outside himself. The little child lying in the bassinet has its center of consciousness directed toward bright objects, and for many weeks and months only the brightest and most colorful things attract its atten tion and it becomes highly conscious of these. Then gradually it begins to appreciate the difference in sounds and, first of all, recognizes the voice of the one nearest and most tender to it, which is usually the mother. Thereafter, its consciousness is partly divided between sounds and sights, and at certain periods of the day and night its whole consciousness is centered on sounds. You will notice that the little child that awakens during the night and cries for atten tion is keenly alive to the least little movement within the home that indicates that its cries are being answered. Very often the moment the mother awakens and makes the first move toward getting out of bed to go to the child, it will stop crying in anticipation of the mother*s coming to it. Often it has been noticed that the child's sense of sound and noise is very keen at such times, and this is due to the fact that since the child is usually in a darkened room and cannot see things, its whole consciousness is centered on sound. There are periods during the day when the child's consciousness is centered in the peculiar sensation it has of hunger, and nothing but a satisfac tion of that sense will cause it to be comfortable and relaxed. Now, when the child gets older and is able to play about, its con sciousness shifts in many ways. First of all, its attention is directed toward certain kinds of toys or play. Later on, its attention is attracted toward the bright uniforms of the policeman, the fireman, the soldier, and these hold the center


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of the attention for a long time, Later on, its consciousness is directed toward certain games of risk and daring, showing the awakening of the sense of adventure, which is a primitive part of the objective con sciousness of man. As years go by the sex consciousness is brought into action by a centering of the consciousness in a sense of sex relationships. Then the emotions hold the center of consciousness, and finally consciousness is centered on the ability to work and earn money and to achieve. From then on, the center of consciousness in man moves according to man's education, his environment, and the things he believes. We find one man whose objective consciousness is centered almost wholly in music, another man centers it in art, another, in the gathering of antique objects, and another, in the achievements of busi ness. The love of controlling a large number of people, or the mak ing of money, or travel, or one or more of the thousands of things may constitute centers of consciousness for the average human of to day. As man's center of consciousness changes, so he becomes affected outwardly and inwardly, and changes his life. Now the inner consciousness can move its center in the same man ner. Man can suddenly awaken the capacity to sense psychic colors and for a long time the inner consciousness will be centered in this new capacity until this capacity evolves by growth and becomes an addition to his original inner consciousness. Then it will shift to other psychic manifestations, or to the health, or to the desire for more knowledge or for perfect attunement. Gradually, the psychic conscious ness centers itself in spiritual valúes and spiritual attunement and then it makes its greatest growth because its capacity for this is unlimited, and the field of expansión is unlimited. It is this great growth then that constitutes the first stages of man's regeneration. I will stop at this point now because I believe you have something very serious and important to think about in connection with what I have said, and that a week spent in the analysis of your outer con sciousness and its centers of attraction, and, of the inner conscious ness and its center of attention, will bring to light many changes that have taken place in your life in the last ten years and especially in the last two or three years. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER

Summary of This Monograph x -«

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The objective consciousness belongs to the physical part of us. fl The inner consciousness filis every part of the inner self. It can move its center of existence from one part of the body to another within or without the body. Man’s inner consciousness develops and centers itself in accordance with man’s evolution. The evolution of the psychic self is a process of real growth resulting from the formation of new psychic functions and new capacities added to oíd ones. ÍJ As man’s center of consciousness changes, so he becomes affected outwardly and inwardly, thus changing his life. «I The psychic consciousness makes its greatest growth in the unlimited field of ex pansión found in spiritual attunement.


"C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedicated to every R osicru cian"

H»H IT'I i

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This m onograph always remains the property of the Suprem e G rand Lodge of A . M . O. R. C . It ís not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

CÔ $

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty

R E G I S T E R E D IN U . ■ . P A T E N T O F F I C E « A L IO RCOISTKMKO THROUOHOUT TH E WOHLO> FU IN TEO IN U . t . A .

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A M . O. R C . under the emblem above, which was registered in the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the ’printed, engraved, typewriften, and photographic copies of officially prescnbed and copyrighted monographs, dissertations, scientific postulatíons, philosophical discourses academ ic studies diagrams, ¡llustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A . M . O. R .C . (The above emblem and ñame of the O rder are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving. and are im parted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of, the legal title, and the riaht of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M. O. R. C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, terminate all rights of the member. and is a violation of the Statutes of this Order. A. M. O. R. C. is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movements.


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The evolution of the personality brings with it charac' ter building in its noblest sense. Many of the features necessary to the building of a more powerful personality and more stalwart character are brought out in the follow' ing selection from the Texts of Taoism, a treatise written by an unknown Chínese author during the Sing dynasty in the eleventh century: He will not tread in devious by'ways; he will not impose on himself in any secret apartment. He will amass virtue and accumulate deeds o f merit. He will feel \indly towards all creatures. He will be loyal, filial, loving to his younger brothers, and submissive to his eider. He will ma\e himself correct and so transform others. He will pity orphans, and compassionate widows; he will respect the oíd and cherish the young. Even the insect tribes, grass, and trees he should not hurt. He ought to pity the malignant tendencies of others; to rejoice over their excellences; to help them in their straits; to rescue them from their perils; to regard their gains as if they were his own, and their losses in the same way; not to publish their shortcomings; not to vaunt his own superiorities; to put a stop to what is evil, and exalt and display what is good; to yiéld much, and ta\e little for himself; to receive insult without resenting it, and honour with an appearance of apprehension; to bestow favours without see\ing for a retum, and give to others without any subsequent regret:— this is what is called a good man. All other men respect him; Heaven. in its course protects him; happiness and emolument follow him; all evil things \eep far from him; the spiritual Intelligences defend him; what he does is sure to succeed; he may hope to become immaterial and immortal. —T E X T S OF TAOISM , llth Century

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! As we continué the discussion of the evolution of personality and consciousness, I want to remind you again that we are now dealing with transcendentalism in its highest terms, and with truly esoteric prin^piples. The personality of man is as mysterious as the soul itself; în fact, the one is a reflection of the other, and there is no way in which we can distinguish the one from the other except in terms. Some ancient mystics referred to the personality as the child of the soul, while others called soul the parent of personality, but the only manner in which such relationship can be pictured is to think of it as in the case of the unborn child in the womb of the mother. In terms of outer consciousness we may distinguish the unborn child as separate from the natural and vital forces of the mother, but in terms of vital life, the two are inseparable. However, the one is being molded by the other and one will survive the other in degrees of separation without ever losing the fundamental relationship. The personality of each individual is always to be considered as a unit or a unity. It is ever the accumulation or combination of various elements working harmoniously and united in one grand cooperative manifestation. The attempt to illustrate or outline the component parts of a human personality would be like the attempt to make a map of the human brain with the various areas in which are located the múltiple functionings of brain activity. The brain*s areas are so many and minute, and so overlapping and impinging upon one another that the most carefully arranged map of the brain cannot reveal in concise, pictorial representation the related areas. Furthermore, new areas are constantly being developed in each human brain, or rather inactive areas or portions of areas are being awakened and quickened into functioning through the experiences of life, the knowledge obtained and the facts registered in the memory. The acquirement of a new language, or even the acquirement of a few hundred words of a different language, opens up a new area in the mind related to the mastership and control of the expression of thought with words. The acquirement of ability to play any musical instrument gradu ally awakens or quickens another area of the brain and establishes a new functioning. Unique experiences which establish a definite cultural i ? ontrol of our normal selves constitute a new area of the brain. Also the gradual development of habits and mastership of undesirable mental traits modifies the functioning of certain areas of the brain. We may say, therefore, that a map of the brain would be like a map of the world, upon which many states or countries are definitely outlined and labeled but with much space undefined, unlabeled and awaiting the re sults of scientific exploration, each exploration resulting in another small area being definitely outlined and named.


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The personality of man is much like the brain in this regard, inasmuch as it is never fully developed, but is always in the process of de veloping. At birth, very few of the potential possibilities of the per sonality are developed. If we could look upon the personality of man in the same manner as we look upon the map of the areas of the brain, we would see that at birth a few of these areas or sections of areas have been par-^ tially established by our inheritance of character from our parents o r ^ forebears, and that a few other areas have been established to come into active functioning through our experiences in a previous incarnation. Some of these inherited areas or pre-established areas may be important enough to constitute dominating elements in the entireunity of the per sonality, whereas others may be of minor importance and seldom reveal their valué or even their existence except under stress. The important point for us to keep in mind is the fact that the unity of the personality is not something that is pre-established or exists as a controlling factor, and gathers to it other qualities or functions which will coordinate with it. The unity of personality is entirely an automatic or natural result of the nature of all of the parts that compose it. Therefore, as each change is made in any of the units composing the personality, or as different and new units are added to the personality, the unity of the personality changes. It is just as though we should take a checkerboard and cali it a potential personality. Each one of the squares in it would represent a potential possibility of per sonality. Until a checker is placed upon one of these squares making the square active and functioning, it is dormant and contributes nothing to the unity of the personality. If we have put three checkers upon the checkerboard, the unity of personality is no greater than the three checkers which compose it. The rest of the personality is dormant, inactive and inexpressive. The unity of the personality is composed of the three checkers. At birth we may find such a checkerboard having three, four, or five of these squares active through inheritance or past experi ences, and they constitute our personality at birth. As we progress through life, we add other checkers to the squares and increase the func tioning of the personality. We continué to have a unity that is repre sentativo of the number of checkers upon the board. Personality does not evolve or grow through any method of stretch ing the elements of itself but by increasing the number of elements. It is real growth and not mere expansión. We cannot, for instance, take four or five of the checkers from the checkerboard and flatten them out so that they will cover the entire checkerboard, and cali this a growth ^ of personality. We would still have just the same elements in our per sonality and nothing more. The growth and evolution of personality, therefore, is due to the increasing activity of the potential powers of personality. Adding more checkers to the checkerboard until practically every one of its squares is covered would be an approach to the perfect evolution of our personalities.


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We must keep in mind, however, that whereas the checkerboard is limited and has only a definite number of squares which can be covered, the personality of an individual is not limited in its potential f ield and we have no way of determining where or under what circumstances the limit of the growth of personality may be reached. It is just as if the person ality within us were an unlimited world-wide checkerboard with an unknown amount of millions of squares to be covered. Delving into the po tential possibilities of personality is like delving into the heavens above us and trying to discover how many stars there may be in the heavens and how far the heavens may reach. The building up of character is closely related to the evolution of personality, but we must remember that character is merely the outer representativo of the silent and deeply-seated personality. The char acter that is outwardly manif ested by men and women is never a true index to the personality within. While it is true that the personality practically begins with a new slate or a new checkerboard in each incarnation and carries over only a few of the functionings of a previous life, nevertheless it is not a vacillating thing during each incarnation but remains more or less fixed in its fundamentáis and is modified only by the continued additions made through the experiences of life. Undoubtedly, some of the functionings of personality are little suspected by most of us and we have little idea of the tremendous power that resides in some of these functionings. We are learning, however, that it is only by the awakening of the dormant areas or parts of our per sonality that we attain real power and mastership, and approach a truly spiritual life where we rise above and beyond the limitations of a ma terial existence. The spiritual areas of personality are numerous. It is impossible to think of such a unit of a spiritual nature, suchas the personality is, and think of it as having a majority of its parts more material than spiritual. The fact that any part of it survives the limits of material existence indicates that a majority of the potential possiblities of personality are related to psychic or spiritual powers and functionings. Man has risen above the material and primitive ideas of existence, and has risen above the gross and beastly desires and joys of life by the gradual evolution of his personality; and, as this evolves, he finds greater joy and peace, happiness and power, in things that transcend the grossly material and are of a purely spiritual or psychic nature. Undoubtedly you have met, as I have, those persons who find greater joy at any hour of the day or night in listening to a beautiful piece of music or in studying a beautiful painting than they would find in any of the pleasures of the flesh, in sensuality, or in worldly indulgences. We know that there are persons who will travel around the world to see a wonderful or beautiful piece of architecture. Thousands upon thousands of persons have journeyed far


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out of their way at tremendous cost in money, and with risk of physical and mental safety, just to visit and see the famous building in India known as the Taj Mahal. Truly, some have gone there out of curiosity, but, even so, the fact that the curiosity to see such a thing can tempt them to spend so much time and money in preference to something of a more worldly nature, is significant; on the other hand, many who have seen pictures of the place or heard of it have dreamed for years of going to it, and have made great sacrif ices to view it, and ever after the experience has lived with them as one grand and beautiful blessing. Compare this with the person who will spend money and time, and risk business interests, to go away from business and from home life for a month and journey to a place like Havana or some cities in México, or some foreign cities, in order to indulge in the liberties of alchoholic drinking, gambling, and general debauchery with women. In my travels I have met on ocean steamers and in trains both men and women who frankly admitted that their solé purpose in making the trip was to go to some city or some place and indulge in riotous living or in the pleasures of the flesh. Those persons who can find great happiness anda great thrill in something that is beautiful, inspiring, ennobling, and entirely free from sensuality are those who have developed some important spiritual functionings of their personality. Undoubtedly, as we evolve these spiritual parts of our personalities, we lift ourselves up and above the commonplace, sordid, inconsequential and worldly things of this existence. We begin to appreciate the true spiritual valúes and begin to feed the personality and soul of ourselves with that stimulation, that encouragement, that mental food, and that power which it needs. Each day of such development widens the horizon of life and expands our consciousness by increasing its growth. This, in itself, would lead to regeneration, inasmuch as immortality is dependent upon the continuity of spiritual life and not of material life. Since it is the spiritual part of ourselves that can be reborn and con tinué to live year after year, century after century, and eon after eon, it follows that by strengthening, evolving, and increasing the growth and evolution of the spiritual part of ourselves, we are increasing the spiritual existence of the soul and personality within us. I trust that you will meditate upon these things and make an occasional analysis of what it is that holds the greatest interest in life for you, and what things are truly j oys to your soul. In my next talk with you I am going to speak about the restraint and suppression of natural instincts in an attempt to build the spiritual nature. But at the present time I want you to think of what elements of your personality you may not have awakened, or enlarged, or brought into active functioning. Try to discover what beauti ful and ennobling things of human existence you have not indulged in or experienced; tabúlate these and try to find an


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opportunity to quicken them in your consciousness. Do you enjoy music and are you capable of expressing yourself in music? Do you enjoy art and can you express yourself through this médium? Do you enjoy beautiful thoughts in printed words and spiritual ideas? Think of the thousands of things that can bring joy to the spiritual part of yourself, which you may not have quickened into realization or put into functioning as part of your consciousness in the past. As you develop these things and make them a part of yourself, you will be adding to the regeneration of your spirit ual existence and your personality. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER


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The personality of man is the reflection of his soul. Mystics referred to personality as the “child of the soul.” The personality, like the brain, is always in the process of developing— actually growing, not merely expanding itself. Although the personality is considered a unit, it has many complex component parts, and it changes as new units are added to it. fj The personality is unlimited in its potential field. At birth, a few units of the personality are pre-established by our forebears; others are accrued from past incarnations. ÍJ Character building is closely related to the evolution of the personality. Character is the outer representative of the silent, deeply-seated personality, but never its true index. C| By awakening the dormant areas of our personality, we attain real power and mastership, and approach a truly spiritual life. The spiritual areas of the personality are numerous. As man evolves, transcending the material ideas of existence, he ñnds greater joy, happiness, and power in the purely spiritual things. Through the evolution of the spiritual part of purselves, we are increasing the spirit ual existence of the soul and personality within us.

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TTiís monograph always remaíns the property of the Supreme Granel Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-one

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-one

This Week’s Consideration of a Famous Opinión

t¡ Each of us must experience certain things in life if we are to evolve to a higher plañe. These experiences cannot be obtained by suppressing the natural desires, but they can be acquired by indulging freely in the things that God and Nature have to offer. One who has become Cosmically attuned needs have no fear of the grosser things of life. He may mingle with the world, understand its temptations and weaknesses and yet never suc' cumb to them. Such a one was the Indian saint and mystic of the past century, Sri Ra* makrishna. His favorite form of instruction to his disciples was that of very plain^spoken parables, such as may be seen in the following one which was passed on to the world by one of his devoted followers:

Flies sit at times on the sweetmeats Jêpt exposed for sale in the shop of the confectioner; but no sooner does a sweeper pass by with a bas\et full of filth than the flies ¡cave the sweetmeats and sit upon the filth'basket. But the honey'bee never sits on filth y objects, and al way s drin\s honey from the flowers. The worldly men are liJ{e flies. A t times they get a momentary taste of Divine sweetness, but their natural tendency for filth soon brings them bac\ to the dwíghill of the world. The good man, on the other hand, is always absorbed in the beatific contemplaron of Divine Beauty. 7<[.B. The worldly man is li\e a filthy worm that always lives and dies in filth, and has no idea of higher things; the good man o f the world is li\e the fly that sits now on the filth and now on the sweet; while the free soul of the T ogin is li\e the bee that always drin\s the honey of God's holy presence, and nothing else. — SRI RAMAKRISHNA, 18334886


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Beloved Members, Greetings! I wonder how many times each one of you has thought of the attempts you have made in your life to suppress certain natural instincts and tendencies, or, let us say, certain urges that arise withAin you. The early Christians tried to promúlgate an oíd heathen idea ^that it was the devil within us tempting us to do something wrong whenever we had an inner urge to do something which later turned out to be unfortunate or evil, or disastrous to ourselves or others. The peculiar viewpoint of their philosophy was that they could determine the evil of the urge by the result of its action. It is much as though we would determine the illegality of any of our present-day acts by whether or not we got caught in the act and were arrested. On that basis I could steal someone*s money, and if I were not caught, it would not be illegal; but if I were caught, then my urge would have been an illegal one or a devilish one. As one may suppose, many of the heathen urges from within were considered perfectly proper, even though we, today, would look upon them as wrong. This is because in the ancient times the results of their acts were not always looked upon as wrong. In a normal sense these ancient people used to submit to any urge from within or any urge of the flesh, let us say, and if the result was not a form of complication that aroused the iré of any other person or brought sorrow or grief, disease, or pain to anyone, then the urge was considered to have been perfectly all right. But, if the result of the urge happened to be unpleasant, then it was sure to be attributed to the devil's temptation. As people became diseased from causes they did not understand, they would attribute them to things they had recently done. For instance, if in exploring part of a new country they would come upon some kind of fruit and the urge of hunger or curiosity tempted them to eat of the fruit and later on they became ill, probably from any cause at all, they would attribute the illness to the fruit they had just eaten, and then blame the devil for having tempted them to eat the devil's fruit. From this idea developed the belief that a devil could take possession of us and get into our nature some way and re main there. One manifestation of devilish temptation resulting in pain or sorrow, or grief, was sure to convince the heathen that he had ^become possessed by an evil spirit and that he must have this evil spirit removed before he could be happy or healthy again. As mentioned previously, the Christian leaders, after the passing of Jesús, took advantage of and encouraged many of these beliefs. They found support for this action in the symbolical language of Jesús, where he referred to the fact that the evil spirit in some persons caused them to do evil. Jesús, of course, was not referring to any entity that took actual possession



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of persons, but to an evil way of thinking, a spirit or idea of evil that had been adopted by people as their guide in life. However, to come back to our original point about suppression, we find that all through the development of civilization, man has attempted to correct his way of living by following what might be called the negative line of development. This has been the elimination of 0 undesirable elements rather than the development of strong ones that were good. It never seemed to occur to the early mind of man and woman in the process of evolution that the development of good tendencies would naturally make less room for the evil tendencies. Time and prayer, and much sacrifice and effort, were spent in trying to elimin ate imaginary devils within, in the belief that if these were eliminated the individual would be good automatically, or as an automatic result of the elimination of evil. In this process of eliminating undesirable elements, a wide margin existed for the determination of what is good and what is evil. I cannot help thinking that we have made very little advancement in that regard even today, for we find many narrow, bigoted, and intolerant persons who are just as ready to proclaim that certain things which you and I consider good are truly evil and should be eliminated or suppressed. There are scores of cults and movements in the world today which look upon all sex matters as highly sinful and most cer tainly to be suppressed. Among such cults and movements we find no attempt at marriage, or no attempt to regúlate sex relations, but a very definite and unsuccessful attempt to eliminate any consciousness of sex. Now this is typical of the wrong method of building up the personality and evolving the character of a human being. Of course, it is due to a misunderstanding of what is natural and what is unnatural, or perhaps it is better to say that it is due to a misunderstanding of the relative places of certain emotions and conditions in our lives. Once we come to understand that sex and all sex distinotions are purely of the physical, material part of our beings, and have naught to do with the spiritual or the psychic, we are able to understand the natural sex instincts and control them rather than make an attempt to suppress them. Looking at all sex matters as of the flesh and of the material part of the world, we see that the sex urge, the sex instinct, the sex impulse is a perfectly natural thing on behalf of the material part of ourselves. We note, first of all, that the distinction in sex and the functioning of sex is a part of the universal process of repro-A duction, and that every department of nature has its analogous process. We find among plants, for instance, the male and female ones each producing their highly susceptible and magnetic seeds which are brought together by the winds, and as a result of this uniting of the op posite polarities, reproduction is started. It is a natural process and man would certainly be battling against the strongest forces in the universe if he attempted to prevent plants and



PAGE THREE

flowers from reproducing their own kind in a natural way. When we come to animal life, we find the sex instinct so highly developed and so automatic that it really represents the highest form of consciousness in lower animals. Consider how the salmón will fight its way upstream and bruise its body at dangerous fails in attempting to return to certain spawning places. This is a self-sacrificing process to which the fish yields unhesitatingly with every element of its being. The urge with these animals and with all species, in fact, is as strong as the instinct or urge of self-preservation, as that of feeding when hungry. Only among human be ings of a certain so-called cultured place in evolution do we find sex looked upon as unconventional, impolite, obscene, vulgar, or perhaps unnecessary. Those who do much touring are always astonished in certain lands when they see the complete absence of sex conscious ness. To find thousands of men and women of certain tribes associating daily and hourly with one another absolutely nude and with absolute unconsciousness of any unmoral or unconventional condition is sure to teach a person of the Western world a great lesson. We have come to believe, in the Western world, that in order to regú late or control or maintain a natural attitude about sex, we must assume, first of all, that all sex matters are impolite, unconventional, and unmoral, if not perhaps, immoral. Therefore, we do not want children to talk about them, we do not want the naked body to be seen, and we do not want intimate knowledge of sex to be taught to young minds. We be lieve in this way that we are controlling the sex impulse and sex in stinct; yet I think we are beginning to realize, nowadays, that we have had no such result from our Western attitude. On the other hand, there is less promiscuousness and immorality, and less violation of the natural sex laws among the uncivilized peoples than is found here in the Western world, notwithstanding the fact that everything pertaining to sex and the sex distinctions of human bodies is there uncovered, unveiled, and unassociated with any mystery. We attempt to suppress our natural impulses, assuming them to be temptations of the devil. Also, we follow the custom of the land, and especially the custom of the narrow, ignorant reformers that generally lead us in our suppression movements. We try to eliminate from our phys ical selves and our physical emotions that which nature has put there, and at the same time we think that by dethroning some element of the phys ical body we are going to raise the consciousness of the spiritual self. We also try to suppress our desires in regard to eating or drinking, smok ing, indulging in various pleasures, and so forth. We adopt a code of ethics and a code of living that is as unnatural as it can be, and then try to make it natural. Today, the people of the Western world are very much interested in the subject of dietetics. To our knowledge, there are almost thirty very definite and distinctly different dietetic systems being promulgated in the United States for each of which



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the claim is made that the diet will gradually eliminate all inharmony in the body, all disease, and all unnatural characteristics, suchas ex treme thinness or extreme overweight. To the people of the Eastern world such a fanciful study as dietetics must seem amusing. In the first place, they would tell us that if we lived naturally and obeyed nature*s im pulses, in a natural way, we would not have to study dietetics. They would probably point out to us the fact that our highly developed civili zation and our extreme prosperity has enabled us to invent a great number of artificial foods which the poor people of the Eastern world never even see, let alone enjoy at a meal. From this artificial diet we derive much illness and proceed at once to eliminate the cause of illness by dieting. The most successful dietetic system on the market today does not recommend any of these special foods ñor does it recommend any special prepa ration of common foods, but recommends our return to a natural diet. We make a fetish out of this system of dieting, whereas to the people of the Orient, or those who are living naturally, our fetish and our fancy diet is nothing but their common diet, which they have used and understood for many centuries. However, in our love to suppress something, we feel that we must eliminate the foods we enjoy and feed ourselves upon those that we don't enjoy. After all, character and personality are built not through the success of suppressions but through the development we attain by drinking out of the cup of life and learning the lessons that result therefrom. Individually, each one of us must experience certain things in life if we are going to evolve and grow as a result of our existence here on the earth plañe. Suppressing a desire or suppressing a practice that may or may not be wrong is going to do very little in the way of helping us to improve ourselves. Suppressing will teachus nothing. Indulging freely with reason and saneness in what God and Nature have provided and regulating our indulgences as we have learned lessons from experience is the only method by which we can properly evolve and become wise in the natural laws. We do not have to yield to every natural instinct, for common sense will tell us that certain conditions around us may cause us to have an unnatural desire for certain things at certain times. It behooves us as common-sense people to regúlate our affairs in accordance with such understanding. I hope now that each one of you will take to heart the point that I am trying to impress upon you; namely, that of holding fast to the principies which are natural and good, and which injure no one, and indulging freely in those things which are constructive and good. We most certainly must beware of the false processes of suppression, for we gain nothing by this and only throw ourselves out of complete harmony with the universe. Look back over your own life and see what elements of char acter and what expressions of your personality you have wilfully suppressed and subdued in false understanding of their impor-



PAGE FIVE

tance. Character and personality are formed out of the original elements, and each one of us is slightly different in this regard, and should be different, If we all were to follow the same code and would attempt to mold ourselves by this code, we would be attempting to cut out our own character as from a sheet of paper by means of a pattern, and in this way we would all be exactly alike, and life would be monotonous. Those indulgences which are injurious to the health in overindulging or wrongly indulging, or those which are purely of the f lesh, giving the flesh too much pleasure and too much power by the granting of them, or those which injure others or create unhappiness for others are to be regulated, controlled, or set aside entirely. In this way we can build our characters, build our personalities to express the real qualities of which they are composed. In the first place, if we have any desires that are evil, they are a result not of any evil spirit within us but of our own wrong understand ing and wrong attunement with conditions around us. The more we attune ourselves with the higher and beautiful things of life, the less appeal will be made by the sordid or unbeautiful things of life. Temptations to yield to the grosser things of life will not come to the one who is highly attuned, and he will not have to attempt to suppress the desire. If you find there are urges or tendencies within your personality that are truly undesirable from a Cosmic point of view, do not attempt to suppress them, for that is merely like hanging a blanket up against the window in order to keep out the light. As long as you attempt to suppress the light you may not have any of it, but you do not affect the light one iota by shielding yourself from it, for it never diminishes in quality or strength by being screened in that manner. Rather than suppressing un desirable tendencies, give no thought to them at all. Do not yield to them but neither fight them. Simply center your mind upon the more desirable things in life and let them grow so strong and great that they will keep you occupied and hold the center of your attention. Now analyze your present-day self and see wherein there are little traits of character, little traits of personality, that you are sup pressing. Take them out of the trunk in which you have tried to keep them prisoners and air them well, and look them over; and then instead of putting them back into the trunk of suppression, send them on their own way out of your life, just as you would do with any intruder who came to your home. If you found your home suddenly occupied by some undesirable persons who appeared to be evil tendencies in your midst, you would not think of locking them up in a closet and trying to sup press their activities while you went on with your affairs, but you would try to find out why these tendencies or these characters had came into your home, and then after acquainting yourself with them, and perhaps making it plain that they were undesirable, y 7/ you would have them dismissed from your presence and sent on V their way.


NUMBER FORTY-ONE

—C PAGE SIX

I think that by following this method the coming week could be spent to excellent advantage by each one of you. Fraternally YOUR CLASS MASTER SELF-EXAMINATION AND ANALYSIS The following suggestions are for your personal consideration, thought, and analysis. It is not necessary that you write them down on paper, unless writing helps you to think. 1. Meditate upon the progress of civilization from ancient days to the modern time— the ways of living, thinking, traveling, communicating, etc. 2. Can you think of anything in our modern living that seems wrong and yet is legal? or that is not legal and yet seems right? Can you visualize some actions or activities that may someday bring changes into existence that will rectify such conditions that do not now appear logical?


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete monograph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory. The early Christian leaders instilled into their followers the pagan belief that the devil was the cause of all unfortunate events. Any evil desires within us are the results of our wrong understanding, or wrong at tunement of conditions around us. The suppression of natural impulses does not raise the consciousness of the spiritual self. Our existence here upon the earth is for the purpose of leaming through experience. With civilization has come an ever-increasing suppression of the natural functions of living. fl You may indulge freely in those things which are constructive and good, and injurious to none. . fj The more we attune ourselves to the high and beautiful, the less appeal will be made by the sordid. Instead of suppressing undesirable tendencies, give no thought to them, but center your mind upon the more desirable things of life. tj Take stock of your undesirable traits of character, see why they are there, then dismiss them from your life.





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MASTER MONOGRAPH


Eleventh Degree Monograph Fort y-two

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-two


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The ethics and moráis of the student of esotericism come from a natural goodness and beauty from within: the knowledge that the real person is the Divinity as reflected from within, and that there can be no false moral principie. This natural goodness and beauty, a part of the moráis of a true mystic, is very aptly described in the following excerpt from the Buddhist book, The Milinda Panha, or the Questions of King Milinda:

Just as a íotiw flower of glorious, puré, and high descent is glossy, sweet' smelling, longeá'for, loved, untamished by the mud, graced with tiny petáis and filaments and pericarps, and resort of many bees, a child of the clear coid stream, just so is the disciple of the Noble Ones. His heart is full of affectionate and tender love, evil is cast out from within him, pride and self'righteousness; stable, strong and undeviating is his faith, he enters into the enjoyment of the heart's refreshment, the highly desirable peace of the ecstasies of contemplation, he exhales the most excel' lent and sweet savour of righteousness of life; near is he and dear to men and gods ali\e, gods and men delight to honour him; rich is he in the best of wealth, the wealth that is the fruit of the Path; unalterable in character, excellent in conduct, he has passed beyond all perplexity, his mind is set upon complete emancipation, he has seen the truth, the sure and steadfast place of refuge from all fear has he gained.

MILINDA PANHA, about Third Century B. C.

ELEVENTH DEGREE


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N U M B E R FORTY-TWO

PAGE ONE

Beloved Members, Greetings ! The reports I have received from the members of this class indicate to me that nearly everyone is now ready for some exercises which will help in the present stage of development. I came very near to using the word experiments instead of exercises in the above paragraph. In the lower Degrees we used to cali many of the exercises experiments. Most of them were experiments but a great many were not, and even those that were experiments were also exercises. Many of our new members or younger members were misled by the word experiment because they thought it meant something that would lead to a definite demonstration right at the very moment that the exercise was performed. The result was that they would write to us that they had carefully followed the instructions and had done exactly what we told them to do, but no outward results could be noticed. They did not seem to realize that such exercises as experiments might produce inner results even though they did not produce any outer results. After all, most of those exer cises were for the purpose of developing or aiding in developing some one of the psychic centers, and this development would go on whether or not the student had any outer manifestations of the experiment or exercise. Now in this case, I am calling them exercises and saying nothing at all about them as experiments. In fact, we who are on this Higher Path should not experiment at all. It is ethically wrong in higher mysticism, or in the esoteric work with which we are dealing, ever to perform an experiment for the sake of experimenting. In fact, none of the laws should be even called upon or used, or applied, except in a serious and necessary instance where some good can be done, and when there is a need for it that is not purely experimental. I am sure that each one of you realizes just what I mean. Certainly, no esoteric student ever will allow himself to be called upon by any individual to sit and concéntrate on a candle fíame and change the aura around it merely for experiment1s sake, or simply to prove to some student that it can be done. If one of us is conducting a class in a lodge, or instructing a group of students, and we are dealing with a lesson that pertains to the changing of vibrations, then we may make a demonstration before the group of members at that point of our work where it would demónstrate logically the prin cipie we are teaching. To do it at any other time or for any other pur pose is simply to play with the higher laws and to stoop to childishness in connection with matters that are very serious. The Cosmic considers this unethical. It certainly should not be done. There are many rules in the Order that prohibit such demonstrations for the sake of entertaining persons or proving to them what can be done. For instance, the law of the organization allows the Imperator of each jurisdiction to demónstrate the principies of transmutation only once during his entire tenure of office. I gave mine in New York between 1916 and 1918, before more than one



PAGE T W O

hundred members and interested spectators, including newspapermen. At this time we were dealing with vibrations and the principies of transmutation in a broad way. The demonstration was successfully performed; all the evidence was placed on record. Since then I have never attempted to duplicate it. I proved to myself that it could be done, and I demonstrated to over one hundred that it could be done, and that demon stration is on definite record, attested by indisputable witnesses. Therefore, so far as proof is concerned, there is sufficient proof. So far as conviction to myself is concerned, there is also sufficient con viction. So far as benefit to our members is concerned, the fact that it was done is sufficient for them. Any more or any further demonstrations could not possibly add to the conviction. The real students of our esoteric work know that transmutation is possible, because even some departments of our government and some of the departments of metallurgy of the large universities throughout the world have also demonstrated that transmutation of metáis is possible. Therefore, we have no reason to doubt it, and, what is more important, further demonstrations would have no direct effect upon our studies. We are far more concerned with the transmutation of our natures and the changing of them into puré gold than we are in trying to change a little piece of zinc into a small amount of gold that would be absolutely worthless so far as any practical use is concerned. Even if you could sell it, you would not get more than a few dollars for the small amount. It would cost in materials and time ten times what it was worth. A transmutation of just one of our individual baser elements will be of far more valué to each of us than the transmutation of pounds of gold. The point is, however, that in all esoteric things we must remember that ethics is very important, and far more rigid than any of the rules and regulations of life that man has invented. I am sure that some of you must smile at times at man's peculiar moral and ethical code. Think how the ethics and moráis of civilized countries have changed since the First World War! Before the war, polite society (whatever that is) and man's ethical standards did not permit the recognition of a woman who had given herself to a man without even the excuse of a passing emotion of love, and who had given birth to a child that was not only nameless but loveless. Yet, during the war, such ideas were absolutely cast aside and lust was freely advocated; the church even went so far as to baptize and give invented ñames to these thousands of children that were born out of wedlock. Also, since the war, many subjects, many ideas that were only whispered in the privacy of one's home, have become publicly discussed; the human figure has become more bared to public sight, and many practices that were not tolerated by parents a few years ago and which were highly condemned by "polite society" are accepted now as the standards of the day. There is no need for me to illústrate what I mean, for anyone can stand on any Street or public place and see evidences of what I mean on all sides.



PAGE THREE

Now, just how could a war affect real ethical standards? Of course, the answer is that the standards were not real and were not truly ethi cal. They were hypocritical, false, and superficial. We had coated our lives with a veneer of culture and moráis that the first bullet shot in the World War punctured and finally riddled until the veneer was like a sieve. Then again, think of such ethics as is circumstantial or geographical. Think of a man who refused to have liquor in his home or to allow himself to be seen drinking any liquor anywhere in the United States during prohibition, but who thought nothing of going to México, Cañada, Havana, or Europe, at that period, and there, outside the limits of the United States, indulge in such drinking as he would not think of doing at home. We see at once that his reason for not drinking at home was not an ethical one, but a purely fictitious, formal one, associated with geographical and political conditions and circumstances. We understand what Bulwer-Lytton meant when he said in the introduction to his book Zanoni that the moráis, habits, and code of living of the Rosicrucians were more exacting than those of the strictest monastic order or brotherhood. Perhaps this is not appreciated until one travels through Europe and visits some of the monasteries, especially in Palestino, where many of the monks and members of monastic orders are in charge of certain sacred Christian shrines and act as guides to show these places to visitors. Some of these persons cer tainly discredit the monastic orders to which they belong, for they are often sacrilegious in their remarks about some of the shrines. They often joke in a shocking manner about some very serious and sacred place, and do other things which show that their brown, black, or gray robe covers a multitude of discrepancies. The esoteric student who is absolutely sincere is probably like the ideal monk, so far as his life is concerned. He would not think of doing in the privacy of his own home any unethical or immoral things that he would be ashamed to do to the knowledge of the public ; in other words, behind closed doors he is just as sincere as he is when under public observation. Whatever ethical, moral, religious, scientific, or other principies he adopts, he adhe res to with absolute sincerity and honesty, and neither geography ñor circumstances can alter them. If they are ever altered at all, they are completely abandoned, and not worn on the sleeve on some occasions and discarded on others. For this reason, the true esoteric student does not have a lot of foolish ethical and moral principies that man has invented or says he has invented. He knows that some of these, if not most of them, are only for show, and for insincero practice in certain circumstances or at certain places and times, and not for universal and continuous practice. Since he cannot be hypocritical but must be true to himself, he does not adopt them at all. This has often led others to think that an esoteric stu dent is somewhat Bohemian. One severe critic of the esoteric students throughout Europe said that if they were not immoral they were at least unmoral, and did not seem to adhere to any



PAGE FOUR

of the features of the standard moral codes. I would like to have asked such a person what the standards of the standard moral code really are. For example, the great decalogue, the Ten Commandments which Moses presented to the people of his time, is repeated parrot-like in the Christian churches today. First, there is the one that says: "Thou shalt not kill." It is not qualified in any way and, therefore, most certainly applies to destroying the life of any living thing. How sin cere are the average Christians in this regard, or the Jewish people, for that matter? Do the Christians hesitate to kill cattle to eat? Do they hesitate to kill a burglar or an intruder? Do they hesitate or refuse to go to war and kill persons who have never caused them the slightest harm, or even insulted them with a casual remark? Why, they do not even know the ñame or identity of most of the persons they help to kill. What kind of moral or ethical standard is that? Turn your mind, however, to ward the Buddhist who is absolutely sincere. I do not mean the pagan Buddhist who, in some countries, merely worships at a statue of Buddha, and burns some incense that blackens the gold face of the horrible looking creature they cali Buddha, but I mean the true student of the Bud dhist religión or Buddhist ethical laws, one who really lives the life. There is a law in his teachings which forbids the destruction of life. and you will find that he will not even kill a fly or an insect that bothers him, will not tolerate the killing of animals for food, and will not participate in any battles, or any discussions, or any af fairs where any form of life is destroyed. It is not a religious creed with him but an ethical creed or law and, as an esoteric student, he is absolutely sincere and logical in his following of this law. Another of the Ten Commandments says: "Thou shalt not steal." This is not qualified in any way, and does not refer to somebody's pocketbook, or cash register, or large sums of money in a bank. According to the law courts of man, it would seem that this law applies only to loaves of bread stolen by a hungry man for his starving chil dren, or to a poor man who steals something under stress of a terrible temptation, but it can never apply to bank presidents, cashiers, Corpor ation lawyers, officers, or Wall Street operators. There are thousands of dyed-in-the-wool, true, sincere, and devoted Christians who think nothing of dabbling in Wall Street, yet the Wall Street practices are unquestionably wrong, and constitute a game of stealing, cheating, and of taking advantage of the other fellow. From the esoteric, mystical point of view, Wall Street is just as damnable as any cheating game known to man, and the fellow who puts in a few dollars and comes out with more than he puts in is stealing and cheating, from the mystical, eso teric, ethical viewpoint, and you cannot get around it. The mystic knows that in every game of gambling, what one person wins, another loses, and that there is no such thing as everyone winning, and nobody losing. The mystic also knows that to obtain that which one has not earned and which has not been freely given by someone, willingly and with joyous happiness, is to have something



PAGE FIVE

to which we are not entitled, and which will add to our Karmic obligation. Therefore, gambling is unethical to the esoteric student, If he indulges in it as a pastime or entertainment and repays what he wins by giving back something else such as refreshments, pleasure, entertain ment, or a gift in exchange for it, and thereby balances the obligation, it is a different matter. But to gamble in a serious way and to put in little or nothing, and take away a great deal, and in no way repay those who have lost or contributed, is against the ethical code. You will see at once that it would be almost impossible to write out a set of rules of what should be done and what should not be done in gambling, and that it is a matter of individual understanding through a knowledge of the higher laws. The esoteric student, through his knowledge, is capable of deciding when he may gamble as a pastime in a game at home or among friends, and when he must not gamble. To those who are not esoteric students, this sort of thing looks like each one becoming a law unto himself, and therefore typically Bohemian, as they say. The truth is that Bohemianism used to mean complete disregard of all conventions, all ethics, all moráis, and all consideration for anyone else. Certainly, such a term cannot apply to the esoteric stu dent. But to those who do not know the esoteric principies, many of the actions of the mystical student seem Bohemian. Of course, the mystical student does not care whether or not he is called Bohemian. except that he will not do things that will constantly attract that term toward him, because after all, a mystical student is not anxious to have a reputation that is not pleasant to all persons. Taking the moral principies involved in the Ten Commandments, we find that those who are the strictest supporters of the Ten Command ments as a religious code are often free and frank in their breaking of the code in an ethical sense. The Commandment against adultery has such a vague and indef inite interpretation that even the highest courts of our land seldom agree about it, and every lawyer has to consult many books to find out what the different judges or Supreme Courts have decided as to what constitutes adultery. On the other hand, the same Christians, or others, who subscribe to the Ten Commandments and pledge their allegiance to them every Sunday morning are very likely to break them to smithereens on Monday. The moment that a judge who is a Christian divorces a man and wife and permits the wife to marry some other man, he is condoning and supporting a form of adultery according to the viewpoint of many of the highest authorities. On the other hand, these men will argüe that what is adultery in one case is not adultery in another; what is adultery under one set of circumstances is not so in another set of circumstances. When the Christian churches of Europe agreed to baptize and ñame the fatherless children whose fathers could not even be located, and whose ñames were not even known to the unmarried mothers, they put the stamp of approval on adultery, and yet on the same day that the baptizing was done, the Ten Commandments were once more repeated and given allegiance.



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Is not all of this a fine tangle and mess of conditions? How, then, can anyone say that the esoteric student is Bohemian or unmoral? If it is ethically, morally, religiously, and socially proper for a young woman to show 99.4 percent of her limbs bare on the beach, and about 88 percent of the torso of her body bare at the same time, why is it immoral, unmoral, or unethical for her to show the same amount of nudity on the streets of a busy city, or at a social at home, or in any other public place? The esoteric student will say that from a Cosmic point of view, there is nothing against showing the entire body nude, but since man has generally agreed that out of respect to manhood and womanhood cer tain forms of clothing should be adopted, then that form should maintain itself consistently everywhere and under all circumstances. In other words, it becomes an ethical principie with him which he interprets properly. He does not say that it is a religious sin or a sin against God to be nude at any time, or to show the nude body, but he does say that it is ethically a violation of good taste and of good sense and, there fore, some consistent ruling law should be adopted. The esoteric student wants to see everything in a clean way. He knows very definitely what constitutes a sin against God, a sin against nature, a sin against the human body, and a sin against the progress and development of the soul within. His studies are constantly revealing these laws and principies to him and he does not need a church, or a court, or a lawyer, or a theologian to explain these things to him. In speaking of sins, I can plainly point out that walking on the beach nude is not nearly as great a sin against the social ethics of society as is the sin of filling the body with regular doses of alcoholic liquor. Such a thing is a sin against the body, a sin against nature, and a sin against individual progress and character development. In fact, in the long run, it will have more effect upon society and upon future generations than running around in the woods or on the beach nude, yet all of society and a great horde of hypocrites immediately would demand the arrest of the man or woman caught nude in the woods, while the persons who drink alcoholic liquor, or injurious drinks of any kind to excess, have the approval of polite society at most social functions. To the esoteric student, the commission of any act that is an ethi cal sin is a serious thing indeed. To do anything that would bring a blot of Karma on the character or soul-personality of the self is just as much a sin as is a crime committed against another, regardless of whether or not the public will excuse it. A man who organizes a new company to start a business, and who is fearful that it will be unsuccessful, who is afraid to put much of his own money into it, because he feels shaky about its ever being successful, and who has serious doubts inside himself as to whether the thing will ever pay any dividends, but who goes out and lawfully and legally solicits money from others as an investment, tries out his new business and fails in it, and then tells everyone that he is sorry that the thing has



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failed and their money is gone, has committed just as much a sin and has added to his Karma just as greatly as though he had broken into someone's home and stolen the money. Ethically, he had no right to take anyone's money for something that he could not feel reasonably sure and safe about. And, ethically, he is responsible for the money he took from the people, and must return it or repay it in some way some day. Yet, according to law, such a man is not a criminal, and the courts would say that if he incorporated a company and sold shares of stock, and did everything according to the code of law of man, he is not guilty of any sin or any crime. To the esoteric student, such a ruling and decisión as that is absurd. I see that I have gotten away from the subject of the exercises and have started on the subject of ethics, but I feel that before the exer cises can be given to you, you should know something about the ethical principies involved in these exercises and that is why I have changed my subject slightly. However, next week I will tell you some more about the ethics of the new exercises and then give you some of them. In the meantime, you may prepare for this by trying to examine your own view point of life to see whether or not you have broadened in your ethical views of conditions in life. If you still find yourself wholly in support of man-made moral laws and cannot see that any of them are wrong or foolish, then you probably have not yet reached a full understanding of esoteric ethics. If you find that the moral and ethical principies which guide your life are held by you because they seem to be a set of religious laws, then you will probably realize that you are still bound by man-made principies instead of Cosmic principies. These must be changed, because the Cosmic principies must always supersede and be above other laws in your consciousness. A little self-analysis along this line will be very helpful to you in preparation for the next lesson, Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER

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ffl No psychic law should be applied except when necessary and beneficial; it should never be used merely as an experiment. Experiments in transmutation have been performed successfully and recorded by the late Imperator, Dr. H. Spencer Lewis, proving its possibility. The Cosmic considers it unethical to use the principie of transmutation merely to entertain, or to experi ment without an eamest reason. t]J The organization is more concemed with the transmutation of personal nature into gold, than in changing material substances for material gain. Many man-made laws are selfish, hypocritical, superficial, and false. The interpre tation of the Ten Commandments is stretched to “cover a multitude of sins.” The sincere esoteric student is not hypocritical in his interpretation of ethics. He knows what constitutes a sin against God and man. He needs no extraneous interpretations of ethical rules. q Anything which would harm one’s own soul-personality is as much a sin as is a crime committed against another. Examine yourself to see if you are developing a full understanding of esoteric ethics.




Eleventh D egree Monograph Forty-three

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-three


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When the Light is allowed to move in a circle, all the powers of Heaven and Earth, of the Light and the Dark, are crystallized. That is what is descrihed as seedli\e, or purification of the power, or purification of the concept. When one begins to apply this magic, it is as if, in the middle of ones being, there were a non'being. When in the course of time the work is finished, and beyond the body there is another body, it is as if, in the t •

middle of the non'being, there were a being. Only after a completed work of a hundred days will the Light be real, then only will it become spirit'fire. After a hundred days, there develops by itself in the middle of the Light, a point of the true Light'pole. Suddenly there develops the seed pearl. It is as if man and woman embraced and a conceptioyi took place. Then one must be quite still in order to await it. The circulation of the Light is the epoch of fvre.

— LA O TSE, 6 0 4 (?)'5 1 7 (?) B.C.

ELEVENTH DEGREE


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! In connection with the stage of development which the average member in this class has reached, and in keeping with the progress that each and every one has made, regardless of his own judgment about the matter, I find it is now necessary to give each of you a particular ex ercise to carry on for a certain length of time. I have just said that, regardless of your own Judgment in this matter, I know that each one of you is ready for this exercise. I know that if each of you were to be asked whether you had made all the progress you would like to have made, up to the present time, that not one of you would feel ready to take any forward step. That is but natu ral. It is not only the true modesty of the real mystic but it is also a sign of the conscientious and sincere. Yet, we must admit that we may be the least competent to render such a judgment concerning ourselves. In things mystical, esoteric, and pertaining to the higher elements of life, we never find either the student or the master entirely satisfied. Among those whose lives are devoted to esthetic things, as well as to esoteric things, we find the same conscientious and continued desire to advance beyond the present point. Have you ever seen an artist who was satisfied with his own work, or even with a masterpiece that he has released from his possession? He never considers a painting or a piece of work as finished, for he really believes that if he lived one hundred years, he could still con tinué to improve what ever he is making, and when the time comes that he must release it, or sell it, or place it on exhibition where it was intended to be, he does so with reluctance, feeling that if he could work on it another month or another year, he could improve it. The same is true of a musician as to any piece of music he is composing, or with any other producer of the higher and better things in life. How, then, could a mystic feel that at any point in his career he had attained the fullness of development that he anticipated or that was expected? As I have just said, each of us probably is the least competent to judge of his own attainment or development of abilities. On the other hand, it is not well that anyone else should pass judgment upon us, and I would be the last one to say that any one of you had acquired all of the development that you should have acquired, or to say that you had made poor progress. The in dividual mission in life, and the ultimate Path in life that the Cosmic has assigned for each one of us, makes our degrees and stages of develop ment unequal, and it is impossible for me, or anyone else, to know just how far you should be developed at the present time and how much more de velopment lies before you in this incarnation. There must be taken into consideration the factor of previous attainment and the element of Karma. Certainly, whatever degree of development the Cosmic has decreed for each of us in this incarnation, that degree will serve us better than any



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other. Some aspiring mystics say that they would like to have the de gree of spiritual development that was attained by St. Francis of Assisi. After studying his work and the position in life that he occupied after his illumination, I readily see that few men in various parts of the world could fill such a mission in life as he filled, and would, there fore, require the particular degree of development that he had. Likewise, the nature of his mission and the nature of his develop ment were intended for a particular period of worldly conditions for a certain locality in order to meet certain conditions on the part of the public. I do not know whether in the world today there is any country, or any group of people, or any locality, that requires just such a man as he. On the other hand, there are men who require other phases of development for the sake of special work that they have to do. Such a man as Walt Whitman is an instance. What he accomplished through his development was never quite equalled by any other before him, and he certainly contributed as much good to the esthetic and spiritual de velopment of certain types of persons as any great mystic who preced ed him. Therefore, our development is a matter of preparing us for the special position in life, the special work, and the special occasion of our efforts in the future. Neither the individual himself ñor his guiding instructor can foresee or foretell precisely what that will be. Now, during the next four months, or approximately sixteen to eighteen weeks, you are to do a certain exercise that is unique and distinct to the Rosicrucian methods, and although simple to do, it is very efficient and significant. During those sixteen or eighteen weeks, you will be passing through a certain number of phases of the moon. There will be at least four full-moon periods and four new-moon periods in that time when certain psychic conditions will be strongly affected by the exercise that you are to do. I do not mean by this that the exercise is to be done only at these moon periods, for, as a matter of fact, the ex ercise is to be performed every morning and every night, or at least every night upon retiring. But the accumulative effect of this exer cise will be augmented or strengthened each full-moon and new-moon pe riod throughout the sixteen to eighteen weeks. During those weeks you will receive from me brief lessons containing some interesting matter that will be inspiring and encouraging as well as informative, but there will be no other exercises given to you in addition to this one, and during these sixteen to eighteen weeks you will not do any of the other previous exercises given in the Tenth or Eleventh Degree work. Certain breathing exercises that have helped your health may be continued if you wish, and any regulation of your diet that you have established and found helpful may be continued, but only if it is a form of diet that you have found helpful and convenient. The reading matter that will be sent to you during these weeks will give you subjects upon which to meditate, and will be


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preparing you intellectually for future phases of the Eleventh Degree, but the exercise is designed primarily to occupy your attention as the most important thing at the present time. This is because it has a very definite connection with the processes of regeneration and rejuvenation as well as with spiritual development and attunement. Now, here is the exercise: Each night upon retiring and, if possible, each morning upon awakening and before you have arisen from the bed, you are to lie fíat on your back and relax for a few minutes until you are thoroughly comfortable and at ease with no lights bothering you, except the natural light that may be in the room from the light coming in the windows. When you become relaxed after two or three minutes* rest, place the hands and arms at the sides of your body either under the covers or over the covers so that they are ex tended down along the sides of your body with the palms upward. This should bring the hands somewhere near the waist or the hips. The arms and hands should lie perfectly relaxed. The limbs should be extended straight, and the heels nearly touching each other or just separated by an inch with the feet slightly turned outward and perfectly relaxed. Both shoulders should be lying fíat against the bed and the head should be lying on the pillow with the face turned squarely upward. Then cióse your eyes and begin to concéntrate your mind and all of your consciousness upon the abdomen in the región of the solar plexus or, let us say, around the región of the waistline. The area should be about a foot in diameter so as to cover the whole of the solar plexus, and all of the región around it. But you are not to give any thought particularly to the solar plexus, for this exercise has no direct connection with that plexus. There are certain other glands and nerve centers in the abdomen or torso of the body that have much to do with physical regeneration and rejuvenation and with the functioning of certain glandular secretions, which help to tone and tune the body in a physical, chemical, and nerve sense. But more impor tant than all this is the fact that in this región there are certain psy chic centers lying between the abdomen and the chest which have to do with psychic development. No one of them is to be emphasized in particular and, therefore, no thought is to be given to any individual organ or gland. After concentrating the mind and consciousness on this part of the body for about three minutes, you should feel the organs or parts of the body and be conscious of the existence of that part of your body; you should then begin to visualize a forcé or energy leaving your abdomen and rising upward in a spiral motion. In other words, try to visualize an en ergy coming out of the center of your abdomen like a large región of power and starting to twist itself as it rises in a circular motion forming a circle and then another circle a little larger, and another circle a lit tle larger, until as it rises the spiral would be eight or ten feet in diameter toward the ceiling and coming to a narrow point in the center of the abdomen. It would be like pictures you have seen of a cyclone or water spout arising from the ocean and going

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up in spiral form from you. This should be visualized for about five min utes or until you begin to feel the warmth of the focal point of the spiral. You should think of this spiral continuing to rise and getting larger in diameter, after it goes up into space beyond your room and your home, until it becomes miles in diameter in the atmosphere above and is almost embracing the entire universe as it reaches into Cosmic space. After the first two or three times of this visualizing, you will find it easy to repeat the performance, with your eyes open or closed. It may be that in the dark room at night, after the first week or two, you will be gin to see a luminosity arising from you, or at least you will feel the vibrations and the pulsations in your body and above your body as though bathing you in a magnetic f ield. At each new-moon and full-moon period, you will find this power stronger or slightly different in some sense, but you cannot judge the full effect of the important moon periods by any outer manif estation or any purely physical manif estation, for the great effect of the moon periods will be purely psychic within you. This exercise attunes your psychic centers with the Cosmic vibrations which come down from the Cosmic into your body in the reverse motion of the spiral. In other words, as the energy or power of the spiral rises, there is an energy and power coming downward through the center of the spiral toward you. This exercise should be done each evening when retiring, whether early or very late, or even in the morning. If it is possible to do it just before arising in the morning at any hour, it will be that much more helpful. Drinking a glass of coid water before retiring at night and be fore doing this exercise will be very helpful. After five minutes of the concentration upon the spiral, you may bring it to a cióse by turning on either the left or the right side and making yourself comfortable while you send out any thoughts, give any treatments, offer any prayers, or do any other thing that is customary or required for the evening, and then go to sleep. During the night you undoubtedly will sense that something of a similar condition is continuing; each morning will find a very great change in your strength and vitality. As I have mentioned, this exercise is to be started at once upon receipt of this lesson. It should be continued for the next sixteen or eighteen weeks or until you are advised, in your monograph, to do some thing different. In the meantime, each weekly lecture will bring you some other information of an interesting nature. Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Whatever degree of development the Cosmic has decreed for each individual in this incarnation is the degree which will best serve his needs. {'•■ 7

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ÍJ Our development is a matter of preparing us for a special place in life. fl For the next sixteen or eighteen weeks you are to perform the spiral exercise, and fol low it by sending out thoughts, giving mental treatments, or offering prayers. Care fully comply with these instructions, and if possible perform the spiral exercise each evening upon retiring and each morning before arising. A greater psychic power will be sensed at each new-moon and each full-moon period.




"C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedicated to every Rosicrucian'

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This monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Granel Lodge of A. M. O. R. C . It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-four

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-four

R E G I S T E R E D IN U . S . P A T E N T O P P IC S ( A U O R lfl lI T C R E O THROOOHOUT TH E W O RLO ) M I N T I O IN U . S . A *

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€| The students of this Degree have been evolving to a higher work, a greater understanding of the Cosmic principies of the Universe, and toward an awakening of the Cosmic Consciousness. This gradual spiritual awaken' ing has been described by the Scotch poet William Sharp in the following poem selected from Dual Image:

So mused a traveler on the earthly plañe Being in himself a type of all man\ind. For aspirations dim at first possessed Him only, rising vaguely in his dreams, Till in ripe years his early musings changed T o inspiration and the light of soul. Then visión came, and in the light he saw W hat he had hoped now openly revealed; And much besides— the inmost soul of things, And ‘beauty’ as the crown of life itself, Ineffable, transcending mortal form; For robed in. light, no longer fantasy, Before his gaze the true ‘ideal' stood, Sublimeiy fair, beyond conception, clothed In beauty and divinest symmetry. W ILLIAM SHARP, 1855(7)4905

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! As stated in the last monograph, we are now at a point where I want to introduce to you the words of another person, and this time it will be the words of a very eminent Rosicrucian who was really a ^^reat mystic. I refer to Dr. Franz Hartmann. Little is known about his private life except that he was a physician and very early in life became illuminated. He not only followed the Rosicrucian studies very closely until he mastered much of them, but he also delved deeply into all of the Oriental philosophies and sciences. He was a truly learned man. It was he who went to Basle, Switzerland, to study at the oíd Rosicrucian University, where many years previously Paracelsus had been a student, then a professor, and later a great master. While in Basle, Dr. Hartmann had the opportunity of being the personal physi cian to Mme. Blavatsky, who was hidden away in this wonderful, alluring, beautiful city on the banks of the Rhine River near the Alps. Many times I have been in this city and have been in the same hotel and same oíd house in which Mme. Blavatsky stayed for a time, and where she and Dr. Hartmann had so many consultations over the manuscripts she was preparing to give to the world. Each time I have felt the vibrations of this mystic city. All who were with us on a trip to this city agreed that there was no more fascinating place we had visited than this oldfashioned town, which has become a very active center of many Inter national affairs. Many eminent Rosicrucians in the past had made this town their hideaway while preparing manuscripts and Consulting the marvelous library at the university. It was here, too, that the great masters first carne to Mme. Blavatsky and helped her in establishing her plans for the foundation of the Theosophical Society. Dr. Hartmann no doubt helped in this also, because he always he Id a very warm place in his heart for Mme. Blavatsky1s work. Now, this story which is to be given to you in small and easily digested partióles is one of Dr. Hartmann's rarest books. It was originally called An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians. and he gave as author of it "A Student of Occultism" in order to hide his identity, although he had the book copyrighted in his own ñame in the year 1887. In this story Dr. Hartmann reveáis in allegorical form and with sym^ bolical language many principies which will be helpful to you at the ^present stage of your progress. In presenting his story we have changed only a few words here and there, or possibly a part of a phrase, and have left out only a few paragraphs that were explanatory of some references he makes, and not at all important to the mystical part of his work. We do not claim any originality or ownership, or anything else for this story, and it is being given freely to you as a helpful contribution at this particular point of your journey on the Path.



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Please remember that you are to keep up the exercise given to you in the last monograph and continué it for the next sixteen or seventeen weeks, or until I have reason to believe that sufficient results have been obtained, at which time I will direct your attention along other lines. The story will come to you in small segments each week, broken up at points arbitrarily selected by me, regardless of the num ber of chapters in the story. Each segment each week will contain ^ sufficient veiled and symbolical information to warrant your careful reading and study. I feel that it would be well for you to analyze and read over each segment each week several times. Herewith begins the first section of the story: AMONG THE ROSICRUCIANS Chapter I The Excursión I am penning these lines in a little village in the Alpine mountains in Southern Bavaria, and only a short distance from the Austrian frontier. The impressions I received yesterday are still fresh in my mind; the experiences which caused them were as real to me as any other experience caused by the events of every-day life; nevertheless, they were of such an extraordinary character that I cannot persuade myself that they were more than a dream. Having finished the long and tedious labor of investigating the history of the Rosicrucians, and studying oíd worm-eaten books, mouldy manuscripts hardly legible from age, passing days and parts of nights in convent libraries and antiquary shops, collecting and copying everything that seemed to be of any valué for my object in view, and having at last finished my task, I made up my mind to grant to myself a few holidays, and to spend them among the sublime sceneries of the Tyrolian Alps. The mountains were not yet free from snow, although the spring had advanced; but I was anxious to escape the turmoil and noise of the city, to breathe once more the puré and exhilarating air of the mountain heights, to see the shining glaciers glistening like vast mirrors in theí light of the rising sun, and to share the feeling of Byron, the poet, when he wrote the following verses: He who ascends to mountain tops shall find The loftiest peaks most wrapp'd in clouds and snow; He who surpasses or subdues mankind Must look down on the hate of those below;

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Though high above the sun of glory glow, And far beneath the earth and ocean spread, Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow Contending tempests on his naked head, And thus reward the toils which to these summits led. Boarding the train at K., I soon arrived at S. Thence I wandered on foot, highly enjoying the change from the smoky atmosphere of the crowded streets to the fresh air of the country, pregnant with the odor of the pines and the daisies, the latter of which were appearing in places from which the snow was gone. The road led up through the valley of the river, and, as I advanced, the valley grew more narrow and the sides of the mountain more steep. Here and there were clusters of farmhouses, and some rustic cottages clinging to the projecting rocks of the mountains as if seeking protection against the storms which often blow through these valleys. The sun was sinking down below the western horizon, and gilded the snowy peaks of the mountains and the brazen cross on the top of the spire of the little village church, from which tolled the curfew, or, as it is here called, the Ave María, when I arrived at 0., which was the place selected as a starting-point for my excursions into the mountains. Finding a hospitable reception in the village inn, I soon retired to rest, and awoke early in the morning, having been aroused from my sleep by the tinkling of little bells hanging around the necks of the goats, which were sent out to their pasturage. I aróse and stepped to the window. The shadows of night were fleeing before the approach of the coming sun; the dawn had begun, and before me in sublime array stood the grand oíd peaks of the mountains, reminding me of Edwin Arnold's description of the view to be had from the windows of Prince Siddartha1s palace, Vishramvan. There the grand mountains stood,— Ranged in white ranks against the blue-untrod Infinite, wonderful— whose uplands vast, And lifted universe of crest and crag, Shoulder and shelf, green slope and icy hora, Riven ravine and splintered precipice, Led climbing thought higher and higher, until It seemed to stand in heaven and speak with gods. Soon I was on the way, and wandered farther up through the valley along the river-bed; but the river was here merely a small stream, rushing and dancing wildly over the rocks, while farther down, where it had grown big, it flowed in tranquil majesty through the plains. The valley through which I wandered seemed to cut through long ranges of mountains, and other valleys opened into this. Some of these valleys were known to me, for I had roamed through them and explored their mysterious recesses, caves, and forests some twenty years ago ; but there was one mysterious valley


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which had not yet been explored by me, and which led towards a high, bifurcated mountain peak, whose summit was said to be inaccessible, and upon which the foot of no mortal had ever trod. Towards this valley I seemed to be attracted by some invisible but irresistible power. I felt as if, in its unexplored depths, at the foot of this inacces sible mountain, the secret and undefined longings of my heart were to be satisfied; as if there a mystery was to be revealed to me, whose solution would not be found in books. The sun had not yet risen above the horizon, and the dark woods to the right and left were of a uniform color. As I entered the narrow, mysterious valley, the path rose gradually, leading through a dark f orest along the side of a mountain. Slowly and almost imperceptibly it ascended; at first it was near the rushing stream, but as I progressed the roar of the torrent sounded more and more distant; the foaming stream itself seemed to sink farther down. At last the forest became thinner and the dark woods were now far below me ; but before me and above the intervening trees rose the naked cliffs of the inacces sible mountain. Still the path led up higher. Soon the distant noise of a waterfall was heard, and I approached again the bed of the moun tain stream, which, however, now seemed to be a mass of rocks, split into pieces by some giant power, lying about in wild confusion, while the white foam of the water danced between the cliffs. Here and there were little islands of soil covered with green vegetation. They stood like isolated tables in the midst of the wilderness ; for the combined action of water and air had decomposed and eaten away a great part of their foundations, and they looked like plates of soil resting upon small pedestals ; hard as they are, their final tumble is merely a question of time, for their foundations are slowly crumbling away. My path led me upwards, sometimos nearing the river-bed, some timos receding from it, leading sometimos over steep rocks, and again descending to the bottom of ravines formed by the melting snows. Thus I entered deep into the mysterious valley, when the first signs of sunrise appeared upon the cliffs above my head. One of these towering peaks was crowned with a halo of light, while beyond it the full sunlight streamed into the valley below. A mild breeze swept through the tops of the trees, and the foliage of the birch-trees, with which the pine forest was sprinkled, trembled in the breeze of the morning. No sound could now be heard, except occasionally the note of a titmouse, and more rarely the cry of a hawk who rose in long-drawn, spiral motions high up into the air to begin its work of the day. Now the ash-gray walls and cliffs began silvery hue, while in the rents and crags of blue shade seemed to resist the influence of ing backwards, I saw how the valley widened,

to assume a palé the rock the dark the light. Look and, far down,


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the stream could be seen as it wandered towards the plains. Obtaining more room as it advanced, it spread, and formed ponds and tanks and little lakes among the meadows. On the opposite side of the valley rose the tops of high mountains far into the sky, and between the interstices of the summits, still more summits aróse, The foot of the range was covered with a dark vegetation, but the mountain sides exhibited a great variety of colors, from the almost black appearance of the rocks below to the ethereal white of the farthest peaks, whose delicate hues seemed to blend with the palé blue sky. Here and there the surface was already covered with spots of light from the rising sun, falling through the rents of the rocks and through the branches of trees, foreboding the near arrival of the orb of day. Thus the higher peaks enjoyed the warm light of the sun long before it shone into the valley below; but while it shone in its full brightness upon the mountain tops, the dark shadows in the deep valley became thinner and began to disappear. At last the solemn moment arrived, and the sun rose in his sub lime majesty over the tops of the mountains, becoming visible to all. The shadows fled, and a flood of light penetrated into the valley, lightening up the dark forest of pines and illuminating the caves of the rocks. Shining upon the fields of snow and the glaciers, its light was reflected as in a mirror and produced a blinding effect, but upon the rocky surface it became softened, and made them appear in a thousand various hues. The road turned around a projecting part of the mountain, and suddenly I stood in full view of the inaccessible mountain. Between the place where I stood and the base of the mountain there was an al most treeless plain, and the soil was almost without any vegetation. Everywhere the ground was covered with stones and pieces of rocks, many of which seemed to have fallen down from the mysterious mountain and to have been broken in the fail. Here and there was a small spot covered with moss or small vegetation, sending fantastically shaped branches of green upwards along the sides of the inaccessible mountain toward the bare gray walls of the summit, where giant sentinels of a forbidding mien stood eternally and immovable, and seemed to defend their strongholds against the aggressive vegetation, crowding the lat ter back into the valley. Thus the eternal combat which had been raging for untold ages still continued to rage ; but the front lines of the contending armies changed from year to year, Everlasting, like the eternal truths, stand the bare gray rocks upon the summits; here and there the vegetation invades their kingdom, like illusions approaching the realm of the real; death is victorious ; the green spots are buried each year under the descending rocks ; but again life is the victor, for those rocks decay, and a new life appears upon their withered faces. (to be continued) Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory. '

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This week begins a series of excerpts from the book entitled, An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians, written by the eminent mystic Rosicrucian, Franz Hartmann. > Franz Hartmann studied in the oíd Rosicrucian University at Basle, Switzerland, where previously Paracelsus had been a student, later a professor, and then a great master. Here Hartmann and Mme. Blavatsky had many consultations over her manu scripts. '// .1 " ¡ *: ^ In the chapter entitled, “Excursión,” Dr. Hartmann, having finished investigating the history of the Rosicrucians, takes an excursión into the Tyrolian Alps. After spending the night in a mountain village inn, he wanders through the valley along a river bed. He is attracted toward one particular valley at the foot of the inaccessible mountain.

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Thís monograph always remains the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

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Eleventh Degree Monograph Fort y-five

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-five


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Many questions conceming the soul life, found in all manifestations of Nature, are answered and a vivid de' i scription of the incoming of the Holy Spirit is given in X X J r > v the following fragmentary passage from the discourse on Beauty. It was written in the third century by Plotinus, [ the father of Western mysticism:

W hat is this rapturous joy that thrills through our being, this exaltation upward, this yeaming to escape the body aná live in the Divine Spirit? This is the reaction that Beauty must ever induce, wonderment and a delicious aching, longing and love and a trembling that is all delight. . . . T o attain It is for those who will enter the upward path, who will put off all that they have ta\en on in their mortal descent. For the initiate here, as for those who approach the celebration of the sacred Mysteries, there is required purification, and the laying aside o f the garments worn before, and entry in na\edness. Then, having left by the way all that is other than God, each in the self’s seclusion will \now the Aloneness of Being, the A part, the Undivided, the Puré, will \now That from which all things issue, towards which all incline, the Source of Life and Spirit and Being___ The Fatherland is There whence the soul has come, and There is the Father. — PLOTINUS, 205(?)'270(?) A.D. t


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B elov ed Members, G re e tin g s !

We now continué the story of An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians by Dr. Franz Hartmann, beginning at a point where we discontinued last week: In the limestone formation of the Alpine mountains, the rocks decomposed by wind and rain assume the most fantastic shapes, which often suggest the ñames which are given to the mountains. Very little power of imagination is required to behold in the shape of the summits of the Wilden Kaiser Mountain the figure of the Emperor Barbarossa, with his long red beard, with crown and sceptre, lying in state, unaffected by the coid of the winter or the summer's heat, waiting to be resurrected; or we may see in the shape of the Hochvogel the form of an eagle spreading its wings ; in the Widderhorn, the shape of the horns of a ram; etc. At the base of the mountains and in the valleys the soil is covered with small loose rocks and piles of sand, in the midst of which the coltsfoot plant (Tussilago farfara) spreads its large green leaves, and the blue bell-shaped flowers of the monkshood (Aconitum napellus) wave their heads. In some secluded spots grows the celebrated edelweiss (Gnaphalium leontopodium). resembling in size those which grow on the Popocatepetl in México, and on the Cordilleras of South America. There may also be found the mountain gentian, the Alpine rose, the mandrake, Arnica montana, mysterious hypericon, and other curious plants full of healing powers and mysterious virtues. Wherever a sufficient quantity of soil has accumulated to enable a tree to grow, a larger kind of vegetation appears; but the little crust of earth is not deep enough to afford a solid footing to large trees. They may grow to a certain height, but some day a storm will arise and sweep down the mountain-sides, and then the work of destruction begins. Grand oíd tree-corpses, whose roots have been torn from the soil, are lying about, their barkless, bleached branches like so many skeleton arms stretched up towards heaven, as if they had been calling for help in the hour of their death, but no help had arrived. Smaller growths of dwarf-trees surround them and cover the ground or feed like parasites upon the substance of the dead. The spring had advanced; but among these mountains the seasons are interlaced with each other. The red and yellow leaves painted by autumn were seen among the green foliage of the stunted pines. The moss clinging to the steep precipices shows the reddish color obtained in the fall, and in many clifts and caverns linger the snow and ice of the past winter; but above the red and green and the puré white snow the gray masses of the summits rise in a succession of pillars and points, with domes and spires and pinnacles, like a city built by the gods ; while in the background spreads the gray or blue canopy of heaven. Thin streams of water run down from these heights over the precipices, and as they splash over the projecting rocks they are reduced to vapor before reaching the ground


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below. The rocks themselves have been hollowed out, forming large caves, and indicating how powerful those veins of water may become, if swelled by the floods from the melting snows of the summits. After enjoying for a few minutes the sublimity of this scenery, I continued my way and approached a little stream coming from a waterfall in the distance. I wandered along its border, and the water was so clear that even the smallest pebble could be distinctly seen at the bottom. Sometimes it appeared as motionless as if it were liquid crystal penetrated by the rays of the sun; and again, meeting with obstacles in its way, it foamed in its rocky bed as if in a sudden fit of rage, while in other places it tumbled in little cascades over pretty pebbles and stones, forming miniature cataracts which exhibited manifold colors. In these solitudes there is nothing to remind one of the exist ence of man, except occasionally the sawed-off trunk of a tree, showing the destructivo influence of human activity. In some oíd, rotten, and hollow trunks rain-water has collected, sparkling in the sun like little mirrors, such as may be used by water-nymphs, and around their edges little mushrooms are growing, which our imagination transforms into chairs, tables, and baldachinos for fairies and elves. Where I now stood, the ground was covered with moss, and occasion ally there was to be seen a great white thistle, whose sharp-pointed leaves sparkled in the sunlight. At a short distance I saw a small grove of pines, looking like islands in the desert, and to that grove I directed my steps. There I resolved to rest and enjoy the beauty of nature. I laid myself down upon the moss in a place which was overshadowed by a mighty pine. The music of the mountain stream was heard at a distance and opposite to the place where I rested there was to be seen a waterfall, spreading into a vapor as it fell over the rocks, and in the vapor appeared the colors of the rainbow. The mist fell into a basin formed of rock, and from a rent in this basin, overgrown with moss, the water foamed and rushed, hastening down toward the valley, to become united with the main body of the river. For a long time I watched the play of the water, and the longer I watched the more did it become alive with forms of the most singular shapes. Supermundane beings of great beauty seemed to dance in the spray, shaking their heads in the sunshine and throwing showers of liquid silver from their streaming curls and waving locks. Their laughter sounded like that of the falls of Minnehaha. and from the crevices of the rocks peeped the ugly faces of gnomes and kobolds watching slyly the dance of the fairies. Above the fall the current seemed to hesitate before throwing itself down over the precipice ; but below, where it left the basin, it appeared to be irritated by the impediments in its way and impatient to leave its home ; while far down in the valley, where it became united


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to its brother the river, it sounded as if the latter was welcoming it back to its bosom, and as if both were exulting over their final unión in a glad jubilee. What is the reason that we imagine such things? Why do we endow É "dead things" with human consciousness and with sensation? Why are we 9 in our moments of happiness not satisfied to feel that we live in a body, but our consciousness craves to go out of its prison house and mix with the universal life? Is our consciousness merely a product of the organic activity of our physical body, or is it a function of the Universal Life, concentrated— so to say— in a focus within the physi cal body? Is our personal consciousness dependent for its existence on the existence of the physical body, and does it die with the lat ter; or is there a special consciousness, belonging to a higher, immortal and invisible self of man, which is temporarily connected with the physical organism, but which may exist independent of the latter? If such is the case, if our physical organism is merely an instrument through which our consciousness acts, then this instrument is not our real self. If this is true, then our real self is there, where our consciousness exists, and may exist independently of the latter. If we mentally float along the curves of the mountain tops, sinking gradually downwards, rising suddenly upwards, and examining in our imagination the things upon their surface, why do we feel such a sense of exhilaration and joy, as if we were really there, but had to leave our material body behind, because it is too heavy to accompany the spirit to the top of the inaccessible mountain? It is true, a part of our life and consciousness must remain with the physical form, to enable it to continué to live during our absence and to attend to the functions of life; but we have read of somnambules and persons in an ecstatic condition, whose inner spiritual self, with all its powers of consciousness, sensation, and perception, was absent from their apparently dead forms, and visited distant places, going and returning with the velocity of thought, and bringing descriptions of such places which were afterwards verified and found to be true. Why do we find life in all things, even in those who are considered "dead," if we merely put ourselves in a condition in which we can perceive that they are living? Can there be any dead matter in the universe? Is not even a stone held together by the "cohesion" of its partióles, and attracted to the earth by "gravitation"? But what I else is this "cohesion" and "gravitation" but energy. and what is " "energy" but the Soul, an interior principie called forcé, which pro duces an outward manifestation called matter; but which must ultimately be indentical with forcé or substance, or by what ever ñame we may cali a thing of which we have no conception. If this view is correct, then all things possess life, all things possess soul, and there may be soul-beings, whose outward forms are not so gross as ours, and who are therefore invisible to our physical senses, but which may be perceived by our own soul.


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In the silence of nature thoughts grow to be waking dreams, and dreams become visions. I imagined how in this solemn solitude I might remain all the rest of my life, perhaps sharing my habitation with a few congenial friends. I imagined how, united by common interests and having identical objects in view, we might be happy and obtain knowl edge together. Here, far away from the superficiality and shallowness of common life, a far greater clearness of mental perception, a much deeper concentration of thought, a much higher conception of the truth regarding the mysteries of nature and man might be obtained. How much would our senses be sharpened for the perception of external and internal things ; how much would our knowledge of self increase ! What would we care about the tomfooleries of what is called "society" ; what would we care to know what is going on in that great insane asylum called the "world"? Here we could live undisturbed within our own selves, unpestered by the necromanic practices of "society," which daily and hourly forcé us to go out from within our own selves, to appear where we do not desire to be, to act as we do not desire to act, to bow down before the goddess of fashion, whom we despise in our hearts. Would such a life be useful for us and useful for others? If it is true that the world and we ourselves are made up of ideas, then it is just in such solitudes where the best conditions might be found to grasp and remodel ideas. Thoughts and ideas cannot be merely illusions ; they must have a real existence, as real and perhaps more lasting than the objective things of this world; for we know that ideas outlive the death of the forms in which they are represented; we know that ideas, like other fruits, are born and become mature, and whenever an idea is mature it appears on the mental horizon of the world, and is often grasped at the same time by some receptive minds. A man who is able to grasp and remodel exalted ideas, and give them material expression, may do much more for the benefit of the world by living alone and in solitude, than by living among the world where his work is continually impeded by affairs of minor importance. The ideas which he shapes will not die with his body. They will be thrown upon the great mirror, the Astral Light, and be preserved in the memory of the world, to be grasped and utilized by others. What is that being we cali man, after all? What is this living animal organism of flesh, blood, and bones, which lives for a while and then dies, and which the great majority of people esteem so high ly, as if it were their own immortal self, and for the comfort of which they often sacrifice their self-respect, their dignity, honor, and virtue? Is it anything else than an animal in whom an intellec tual activity of a higher order than in other animals predominates? Can this intellectual activity be the product of the mechanical, chemical, and physiological activity of dead matter? If not, what is the cause of this activity, and can this cause exist independently of the form? What is a man without any


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intelligence? If intelligence, as it necessarily must be, is an attribute of the spirit, what is a man without any spirit and without spiritual intelligence? While I was meditating about this question, a stupid laughter sounded cióse by my side. I had been so much engaged with my own thoughts that I had not noticed the approach of the stranger; but looking up I saw cióse by my side one of those half-idiotic human beings whom they cali cretins, and who are often found in the mountainous countries of Switzerland and Savoy. I was somewhat surprised and startled, and not a little annoyed at the unwelcome interruption, and I asked him rather abruptly, "What do you want?" A broad grin passed over the face of the dwarf, for such he certainly was, as he answered, "Master says I should guide you to his house." I was somewhat astonished by his reply, but remembering that the dwarf was an idiot, and that no intelligent answer was to be ex pected from him, I asked, "Who is your master?" His answer was, "Imperator" ; and as he spoke that word a spark of intelligence seemed to shine in his eyes, and the tone of his voice seemed to indicate that this Imperator, whoever he might be, was undoubtedly somebody to whom the cretin rendered implicit obedience. I attempted to ask the dwarf more questions, and to find out who his Imperator was, or where he lived, but all my efforts to obtain information from one who was evidently an idiot were unavailing, and he merely grinned and repeated the words which he had already said before. I therefore at last made up my mind to go with him and see how the adventure would end. The cretin walked ahead and I followed him; he led me towards the base of the inaccessible mountain. While we were walking on and the idiot often turned back to see whether I was following him, I had a good opportunity to study his dress and his features. He was not over three feet high, and evidently a hunchback. His clothing consisted of a brown gown, to which a hood was attached, which made him appear like a Capuchin monk of the order of St. Augustine. An immense big head and comparatively large body rested upon very thin and small legs, while his feet seemed again to be extraordinarily large. Perhaps on account of his small size and the healthy color of his face, he appeared to be almost a child; but this opinion was contradicted by a gray beard of considerable length which adorned his face. In his hand he carried a staff made of a dead limb of a tree, which he had evi dently picked up on his way. (to be continued) Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this su m m a ry during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

In this monograph the story of Dr. Hartmann’s An Adventure Among the Rosicru cians continúes:

t ] J The Adventurer, after following the clear mountain stream, stops to rest near a waterfall. He muses: All nature seems to be alive. Why does the consciousness desire to go out of the physical body and mix with the Universal Life? Our real self is where our consciousness exists. Our material body is too heavy to accompany the spirit to the inaccessible mountain. In the ecstatic state, part of our consciousness must remain with the physical form. The inner spiritual self may visit distant places with the rapidity of thought. There is no dead matter in the universe. I Cf Here in solitude, he enjoys the freedom from the superficialities of “society.”

More

can be accomplished in solitude than in “society,” he thinks. Thoughts and ideas are not mere illusions; surely. they must have real existence. While thus musing, a dwarf appears and leads him to the base of the inaccessible mountain; there he is to meet the Imperator.


ROSICRUCIAN ORDER

*

This m onograph always remains fhe property of the Suprem e G rand Lod ge o f A . M . O . R. C .

It Is not

purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-six

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-six


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Many great and inspired works of literature make ref erence to the fact that the “Will called the world into existence.” One of the oldest of such references is found in the Perfect Sermón, attributed to Hermes Trismegistus. There still remains an Oíd Latin versión of the Perfect Sermón, although the Greek versión is extant. This Greek versión is thought to have come from Egypt.

So, then, these three, Fate, Necessity, Order, are most immediately ef' fected by G od’s W ill, who rules the Cosmos by His Law and by His Holy Reason. From these, accordingly, all willing or not'willing is altogether foreign, according to God’s Will. They are not moved by wrath ñor swayed by favour, but are the instru' ments o f the Etemal Reason s self'compulsion, which is (the reason) of Eternity, that never can be tumed aside, or changed, or be destroyed. —HERMES TRISM EG ISTU S


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! We here continué the story of An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians by Dr. Franz Hartmann: * * * * * * * Chapter I I The Monastery I followed my weird companion,and soon we regained the path running along the bed of the creek, which flowed tranquilly over a bottom covered with white pebbles, and the shallowness of the water seemed to indicate that we were not far from its source. As we approached the mysterious mountain, the stone walls appeared to rise perpendicularly before us, and there was no place visible where any other being but a bird could have ascended; but as we came still nearer, I noticed a rent or break in the side of the wall, opening like a cave or a tunnel. This tunnel we entered, and I saw that it penetrated the giant wall and led into another valley beyond. A few steps brought us to the other end of the tunnel, and an exclamation of joy and surprise escaped my lips as I beheld the beautiful sight which was presented before my eyes. Before me was a valley surrounded by mountains of evidently inac cessible height, and in this valley nature and art seemed to have combined to endow it with an almost superterrestrial beauty. Like a vast ocean bay it opened before my sight, closing at the distance with a kind of natural amphitheatre. It was covered with short grass and planted with maple-trees, and on all sides there were forests and groves, small lakes and lovely creeks. Immediately in front of me, but still at a considerable distance, rose the vault of a sublime mountain peak high into the blue ether of space, presenting a cavity with overhanging rocks, looking like the hollow space under a gigantic wave, having been petrified by some magic spell. The sides of the mountain sank in energetically drawn lines towards a lower declivity, and then again rose abruptly to an imposing height. In the presence of so much sublimity I became dumfounded. My com panion seemed to comprehend my feeling; for he, too, stood still and laughed, as if he were pleased to see how full of admiration I was. The stillness which surrounded us would have been complete if it had not been for the noise of a cataract at a distance to the left, falling over a steep precipice and appearing like a string of fluid silver backed by the dark gray rock. The monotonous rush of that fail in contradistinction to the surrounding stillness seemed to me like the rush of the river of time in the realm of eternity; another world than the one to which I had been accustomed


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seemed to have descended upon me; the air seemed more puré, the light more ethereal, the grass more green than on the other side of the tunnel; here seemed to be the valley of peace, the paradise of happiness and content. Looking towards the high peak in the distance, I noticed what seemed to be a palace, a fortress, or a monastery of some kind, and as A I came nearer, I saw it was a massive building of stone. Its high walls rose above the tops of the surrounding trees, and a dome, as if of a temple, crowned the top of the building. Its exterior appearance indicated the solidity of the walls. It was built in rectangular form, but its architecture was not of a regular style ; it presented many projecting windows, turrets, balconies, and verandas. On the other side of the valley nature was not less sublime and inspiring. Gray giant cliffs, standing out prominently against the steel-blue background of the sky, rose up to an extraordinary height. Below the highest peaks long strips of white clouds had settled around the mountain, and seemed to separate the top of the latter from its main body. The part below the cloud was partly covered by the shadow and partly illuminated by a palé ghostly light, producing a glamour. There, where the masses of clouds rested against the bulk of the mountain, it seemed to me that I was looking into a world of destruction. It was as if the entrails of the mountain had been torn up, and the uniformity of the desoíate jumble of rocks was only interrupted by a few remnants of snow situated in the caverns and crags of the mountain. As we advanced we came into a broad avenue leading to the build ing, and I beheld a man of noble and imposing appearance approaching. He was ciad in a yellow robe, his head covered with black flowing hair, and he walked with an elastic step. When the cretin saw this man he hurried towards him, prostrated himself before him, and vanished. I was struck with astonishment by this extraordinary occurrence, but I had no time to reflect, for the stranger approached me and bid me welcome. He appeared to be a man of about thirty-five years of age, of tall and commanding stature, and his mind and benevolent look seemed to penetrate my whole being and to read my innermost thoughts. "Surely," I thought, "this man is an Adept!" "Yes," answered the stranger, as if he had been reading my thought, ^ "you have fallen into the hands of the Adepts, of whom you have thought so much and whose acquaintance you often desired to make, and I will introduce you into our temple and make you acquainted with some of our Brothers of the Golden and Rosy Cross." I scanned his face, and now it seemed to me as if this man were not a stranger. There was something so familiar about


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him as if I had known him for years, and yet I could not find a place for him in my memory. In vain I tortured my brain to find out when or where I had met this man, or at least some other one resembling him in appearance. But again the Imperator of this Rosicrucian Society, for such he proved to be, answered my unspoken thought by saying: "You are right; we are not strangers, for I have often been in your presence and stood by your side, although you did not see me. I have directed the flow of ideas which streamed into your brain, while you elaborated them and put them down in writing. Moreover, this place has often been visited by you while your animal body was sleeping, and you have conversed with me and with the brothers ; but when your soul returned to its house of flesh and blood, it could not impress the memory of the latter with the recollection of the events through which it had passed, and you could remember none of your transcendental experiences when you awoke. The memory of the animal form retains only the impressions which are made upon it by the avenues of the external senses ; the memory of the spirit awakens when we are in the spiritual state." I told the Imperator that I considered this day the happiest one in my life, and only regretted that I would not be permitted to remain here forever, as I felt that I was not yet worthy to remain in the society of beings so far exalted above my own state. "We shall not permit you to go away very soon," answered the Mas ter. "You will have ampie time to see how we live. But as to your permanently remaining here, this is at present an impossibility. There are still too many of the lower and animal elements adhering to your constitution and forming a part of yourself. They could not resist long the destructive influence of the puré and spiritual air of this place ; and as you have not yet a sufficient amount of truly spiritual elements in your organism to render it firm and strong, you would, by remaining here, soon become weak and waste away like a person in a state of consumption; you would become miserable instead of being happy, and you would die." "Master," I said, "then I may at least hope to learn, while I am here, the mystery of those great spiritual powers which you possess ; by which you are said to be able to transform one thing into another, and transmute base metáis into gold?" "There is nothing mysterious or wonderful about it, my friend," said the Imperator. "Such things are not more wonderful than the ordinary phenomena of nature which we see every day. They are only mys terious to those whose own prejudices and misconceptions hinder them to see the truth. We need not be surprised about them any more than about seeing the moon revolve around the earth, or watching the growth of a tree. It is all merely the effect of that one primordial power which is called the Will, and which called the world into existence. It may manifest itself in various


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ways, and on the seven different planes of existence, as mechanical forcé or as a spiritual power, but it is always the same divine pri mordial power of Will, acting through the instrumentality of the organism of man, who directs it by his intelligence." "Then," I said, "the principal requirement would be to learn how to strengthen the Will?" "Not so," said the Imperator. "The Will is a universal power; it holds together the worlds in space and causes the revolution of planets: it pervades and penetrates everything, and does not require your strengthening it, for it is already strong enough to accomplish every thing possible. You are only an instrument through which this universal power may act and manifest itself, and you may experience the fullest extent of its strength if you do not attempt to oppose it. But if you imagine that you have a will of your own, whose mode of action is dif ferent from the universal Will, you merely pervert an insignificant part of the latter and oppose it to the great original power. The more you imagine to have such a will of your own, the more you will come into conflict with the original Will-power of the universe ; and as you are only an insignif icant part of the latter, you will be overwhelmed and bring on your own destruction. Your will can only act powerfully if it remains identical with the Will of the Universal Spirit. Your will is strongest if you have no will of your own, but remain in all things obedient to the Law." "Then," I said, "how can we accomplish anything at all? If we can do nothing through the power of our own will, we may as well never at tempt to do anything, but wait until Nature performs her work without our aid." "We can accomplish nothing useful," answered the Master, "by attempting to employ any will of our own; but we may employ our Reason and Intelligence to guide and conduct the already existing universal Will-power in Nature, and thus we may accomplish in a few moments cer tain things which it would require unconscious Nature much longer pe riods of time to accomplish without our aid. The miller who employs the water of a river to set his mili in motion does not create water, ñor does he attempt to make the river run upwards towards its source ; he merely leads the stream into certain channels and uses the already existing current in an intelligent manner to accomplish his purpose. In the same manner acts the Adept. He guides the existing power by his intelligence, and thereby causes it to accomplish certain things in accordance with the Law of Nature. Man's Intelligence is perhaps the only thing which he may properly cali his own; and the highest intelligence to which he may possibly aspire is the perception and understanding of the Universal Truth."


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"Do you see yonder cloud which has settled below the top of the mountain?" continued the Adept. "It will remain there until some current of air blows it away, or until a change of temperature causes it to rise or to fail. If we disperse it by causing the universal forces of nature to act upon the dense masses, we do not act against the Law of Nature, but guide it by our Intelligence." While the Master spoke these words, he extended his hands toward the mountain, below whose top the clouds had collected, and immediately it seemed as if life had been infused into the dense mass. It began to whirl and to dance, and finally it rose like a column of smoke up to the top of the mountain, ascending from there high up into the air giving the mountain the appearance of a volcano. At last it collected again far above the top, in the air, forming a little silvery cloud, through which the sunshine was streaming. I wondered at this manifestation of life in a cloud; but the Adept, reading my thoughts, said: "Life is universal and everywhere ; it is identical with the Will. It is not a product of man, ñor can it be monopolized by him. He receives a certain amount of it at the time when he enters the world; Nature supplies him with it and lends it to him; and he must return it to her again when he makes his exit from the world. Only he who has succeeded in f ixing a certain amount of the Life Principie within his permanent inner self may cali that life his own, and retain it after the death of the form." During this conversation we had slowly approached the building, and I had now an opportunity to examine its exterior in all its details. It was only two stories high, but the rooms seemed to be lofty. It was built in a quadrangular form, and surrounded by oaks and maple trees, and a large garden or park. Seven steps of white marble led up to the main portal, which was protected by two massive pillars of granite, and over the door appeared in golden letters an inscription, saying: You. who enter frere, leave all evil thoughts behind. (to be continued) Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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The story An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians continúes: The dwarf leads the adventurer to his master, the Imperator of the Rosicrucian So ciety. Here the Imperator introduces him into the temple where he is to stay temporarily. Finding that he remembered none of the transcendental experience of having formerly met the Imperator through projection, the adventurer discovers that the mem ory awakens when one is in a spiritual state. ^jf The Imperator explains the following esoteric principies: The Will called the world into existence. It manifests on seven planes. Man, the instrument of the Will, directs it by his Intelligence. Individual will can act powerfully if it remains identical with the Will of the Universal Spirit. The highest in telligence to which man can aspire is perception and understanding of the Universal Truth. Life is universal and everywhere; ¡t is identical with the Will, which is lent to man when he enters the world, and retumed to its source when he leaves the world. The Life Principie alone is retained after death of the form.

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Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-seven

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-seven R E G I S T E R E D IN U . S . P A T K N T O F F I C E (A L S O R I O I I T tR K D THUOOOMOUT TH E WORLD> FRINTKD IN U . •« A .


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<1 The members of the monastery referred to this week were spiritually enlightened people who were seeking con" ditions and activities for further development. Such must have been the idea back of the message given by Jesús the Christ in his reference to the forsaking of all, to take up the cross and follow him. This passage is found in the Codex Brucianus, a papyrus written in Greek characters, in Egyptian dialect, which was found in Upper Egypt in the year 1769, by a Scotchman named Bruce. Experts say that these are Gnos' tic works dating possibly from the early part of the second century:

Him who says: ‘He who hath forsaên father and mother, brother and sister, wife and child, and possessions, and will ta\e up his cross and follow Me, he will receive the promises which I have vowed to him; and I will give such the mystery of the hidden Father, for they have loved what is His So He gave them Glory, Joy, Jubilation, Gladness, Peace, Hope, Faith, Love, and Truth imperishable. This is the ninefoíd which is given unto them who have fled from matter. And they have become blessed and per' fect and have recognized the True God, and \nown the mystery which is given to the man. — CODEX BRUCIANUS, Gnostic works of the second century.


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! We now continué the story of An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians by Dr. Franz Hartmann, beginning at a point where we discontinued last week: Chapter II The Monastery We entered through the portal into a large vestibule paved with flagstones. In the midst of this room was a statue of Gautama Buddha on a pedestal, and the walls were ornamented with golden inscriptions representing some of the most important doctrines of the ancient sages. To the right and left, doors opened into long corridors leading to the various apartments of the Brothers ; but the door opposite the entrance led into a beautiful garden, where I beheld many plants and trees such as usually are only to be found in tropical dimes. The back of this garden was formed by a building of white marble, surrounded by the dome which I had seen from the distance, after entering through the tunnel, and on the top of the dome was a silver dragón resting on a golden globe. "This," said the Imperator, "is the sanctuary of our temple; in this you cannot enter. If you were to attempt it, the immediate death of your personality would be the consequence; ñor would it serve you even if you were able to enter and live, for in that sanctuary everything is dark to all who do not bring with them their own spiritual light, the unextinguishable lamp of divine intelligence to illuminate the darkness." We walked into one of the corridors. On our left there were numerous doors leading into the cells or apartments of the Brothers, but to the right was a wall, occasionally opening into the tropical gar den, and the interstices between these openings were filled out with beautifully painted landscapes. One of these landscapes represented Indian scenery, with the white snow-covered Himalaya Mountains in the background, while the fore-part of the picture represented what ap peared to be a Chinese pagoda, with a small lake and wooded hills at a distance. "These pictures," the Master explained, "represent the various monasteries or lamaseries of our order. The one before you is situated near a lake in the interior of Tibet, and is occupied by some of the highest Adepts of our order. Each of these pictures shows also a part of the country in which the monastery is located, so as to give a correct idea of the general character of the locality. But these pictures have an occult quality which will become apparent to you if you concéntrate your mind upon some part of the picture."


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I did as directed, and concentrated my attention upon the grand portal of the lamasery, and to my astonishment the door opened, and the tall form of an Indian, dressed in shining white robes, with a turban of palé yellow silk upon his head, stepped out of that door. I immediately recognized him to be one of the Tibetan Adepts whom I had seen in my waking dreams. He, too, seemed to recognize me, and smilingly nodded his head, while I bowed reverentially before him. A finelooking horse was brought forward by some attendent, which he mounted and rodé away. I was speechless from astonishment, but the Imperator smiled and drew me away, quoting a passage from Shakespeare, with a little modification; for he said, "There are many things in Heaven and Earth which are not understood by your philosophers." We passed on to another picture, representing Egyptian scenery, with a convent in the foreground and pyramids at a distance ; it was of a more gloomy character than the former, probably on account of the desert places by which it seemed to be surrounded. The next picture represented a similar building, situated in a tropical and mountainous country, and the Adept told me it was one located somewhere in the Cordilleras of South America. Another one showed a Mohammedan temple, with minarets and the half-moon upon their tops. I expressed my surprise to see all the various religious systems in the world represented in these Rosicrucian orders; for I had always believed that the Rosicru cians were an eminently Christian order. "Then," I said, "a spiritually enlightened man may become a mem ber of your order, even if he did not believe in any of the so-called Christian dogmas?" To this the Imperator answered: "No man can become a member of our exalted order whose knowledge is merely based upon dogmas, be liefs, creeds, or opinions which have been taught to him by somebody, or which he has accepted from hearsay or from the reading of books. Such imaginary knowledge is no real knowledge ; we can know nothing ex cept that which we ourselves know, because we feel. see, and understand it. That which is usually called knowledge is merely a matter of mem ory. We may store our memory with innumerable things, and they may be true or false; but even if they are true, they do not convey real knowl edge. Real knowledge cannot be imparted by one man to another; a man can only be guided to the place where he may obtain it; but he must himself grasp the truth, not merely intellectually with his brain, but also intuitionally with his heart. "To obtain real knowledge we must feel the truth of a thing, and understand that it is true, and know the reason why it cannot be otherwise. To believe in the truth of anything without having real knowledge of its truth is merely a super-


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stition; and therefore all your scientific, philosophical, and theological speculations are based upon superstition and not upon real knowledge. The science and knowledge of your modern philosophers and theologians is continually in danger of being overthrown by some new discovery, which will not amalgamate with their artificial systems, because the latter are built upon sensual perceptions and upon logical argumentation. The truth cannot be overthrown; it needs no argumentation, and if it is once perceived by the spiritual power of perception and understood by the spiritual intelligence of man, it conveys real knowledge to the latter, and cannot be disrupted away. "Our order has, therefore, nothing to do with creeds, or beliefs, or opinions of any kind. We care nothing for them; we only want real knowledge. If we were all sufficiently perfect to recognize all truths by direct perception, we should not need any books or instruments; we should not need to use logic or make any experiments. But if we were in such a state of perfection, we should not be here; we should be in Nirvana. As it is, we are still men, although far above the intellec tual animal which is usually called man and has not been regenerated. We still use our books and have a library, and study the opinions of thinkers ; but we never accept such books or opinions, even if they came from Buddha himself, as our infallible guides, unless they receive the seal from our reason and understanding. We venerate them and make use of them; they serve us, but we do not serve them." During this conversation we walked into the library, where thou sands of books were standing upon a great number of shelves. I noticed many ancient books of which I had heard, but which I had never seen. There were the sybilline books, which are said to have been destroyed by firé ; the books of Hermes Trismegistus. of which only one is be lieved to be in existence ; and many others of priceless valué for the antiquary or the student of hermetic philosophy. While I wondered how these brothers came into possession of such treasures, the Imperator said: "Well may you be surprised how we came into possession of books which do not exist; but the secret of this is, that everything, and consequently every book which ever existed, leaves its imperishable impression in the Astral Light, and that by certain occult means these impressions may be reproduced from that universal storehouse in the memory of nature, and be put in a visible, tangible, and material J shape. Some of our brothers are to a great extent engaged in making such reproductions, and thus we have without any financial expenses obtained these treasures, which no amount of money could have procured." I rejoiced to hear these words, because they confirmed my opinion that life in a solitude was not necessarily a life of uselessness, and that ideas are real things, which may be seen and grasped far more easily in a tranquil place than


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while we are surrounded by the turmoil and the petty cares of life in "society," In answer to this thought, the Imperator said: "Our monastery has been founded by spiritually enlightened people who had the same thought which I read in your mind. They therefore selected this spot in a secluded valley, whose existence is known to only few, and by making use of certain elementary forces of nature, which are as yet unknown to you, they created an illusion which renders this place safe against all unwelcome intruders. Here those in whom the germ of divinity, be ing latent or dormant in the heart of every man, has awakened into life and activity, may find the conditions required for the further develop ment of that germ. Here we live in peace, separated by a barrier from the outer world, which the latter cannot surmount; for even if the existence of our retreat were known, it would be an easy matter for us to create other illusions, which would prevent the intrusión of those who attempted to enter it. We are, however, not excluded from that outer world, although we never enter it with our physical forms. By the exercise of our clairvoyant and clairaudient powers, we may at any moment know what is going on in that world; and if we desire to come into personal contact with it, we leave our physical forms and go out in our astral bodies. We visit whomsoever we want, and witness everything without our presence being perceived. We visit the statesman, the minister, the philosopher, and discourser; we infuse thoughts in their minds which are useful, and they do not know from whence those thoughts come. If their prejudices and predilections are very strong, they may reject those thoughts; but if they are reasonable people and know how to discrimínate, they will follow the silent advice and profit by it. It is true, that by setting a great amount of willpower into motion we might handle mankind as if they were merely automatons, and we could cause them to do what we please, while they would still imagine that they were following their own inclination. But to do so would be against the rules of our order and against the great Law, for the latter decides that each man shall be the creater of his own Karma. We are permitted to advise the people, but we are not permitted to interfere with their freedom. "We accept," the Adept continued, "in our circle everyone who has the necessary qualifications to enter it, no matter to what religious belief he may have adhered before he obtained true knowledge ; but you will perceive that these qualifications are not in everybody's posses sion; they cannot be conferred by favor, and it is a well-known saying, even among the lowest grades of occultists, that the Adept cannot be made, but that he must grow to become one." (to be continued) Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Within the monastery, the adventurer leams the following facts about the Brother hood of the Rose Cross: Membership is not limited to those of any one Christian sect, but includes all peopies whose religión is of the heart. The monasteries of this brotherhood are throughout the world, including Tibet and cordillera (or mountainous axis) as of South America, or Western North America. Real truth cannot be overthrown, or disputed; when understood by the spiritual in telligence, it conveys real knowledge. C[f Many rare, ancient esoteric books, to be found in the libraries of the monasteries, are obtained through the storehouse in the memory of Nature. Brothers within the monastery are the spiritually enlightened, regenerated ones, seek ing conditions and activities for further development of the germ of divinity which is within each. Here illusions may be created as barriers to those attempting to intrude. The brothers visit the outside world in their astral bodies only. f5 It is against the rules of the Order to interfere with Karmic obligations. t]I An Adept cannot be made but must grow to become one.


"C o n se c ra te d to truth and dedícated to every R osicrucian"


This monograph always rematas the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-eight

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-eight


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Cfl Much of the original spiritual intent of theology has been lost through the ages. Materiality has completely hidden the esoteric meanings contained in religious texts. This same opinion was shared with the great mystic phi' losopher of the sixteenth century, Paracelsus. That theo" logical training did not impart to any man divine wisdom is plainly brought out in the following excerpt from his De Fundamento Sapientiae:

The \nowledge which our clergymen possess is not obtained {rom the Father, but they leam it from each other. They are not certain of the truth o f what they teach. . . . They fall into error and vanity, and mistare their own opinions for the wisdom of God. Hypocrisy is not holiness, conceit is not power, slyness is not wisdom. . . . The power to recognize and follow the truth cannot be conferred by alchemical degrees; it comes only from God. The highest power o f the intellect, if it is not illuminated by love, is only a high grade of animal intellect. — PARACELSUS, 1493(?)4541


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! We now continué the story of An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians, by Dr. Franz Hartmann, beginning at a point where we discontinued last week: Chapter II The Monastery "Master," I said, "would it not be well for those who desire to develop spiritually and to become Adepts, to imitate your example and to select some secluded places where they could reside undisturbed and give their time to interior meditation and concentration of thought? I know that there are at present a great many people in various parts of the world, belonging to various nationalities and having various creeds, who have become convinced of the fact that the conditions under which the majority of the men and women of our pres ent civilization exist and live are not conducive to the quick attainment of a higher spiritual state. They believe that the objects which people usually strive to attain during their comparatively short life upon this globe, such as the gratification of pride and ambition, the hoarding of money, the enjoyment of sexual love, the obtaining of bodily comfort and pleasure, etc., cannot be the true objects of life; but that our present life is only one of the many phases of our eternal existence, and that terrestrial life is only a means to an end— namely, to afford the conditions by which the divine element, germinally contained in every man, may grow and develop, whereby man may attain a higher life like yours, which is not subject to transformation and death, and is therefore of permanent valué." The Adept, who had patiently listened to my outburst of enthusiasm, smiled, and said: "If those people have advanced so far as to be able to bear a life of seclusion, let them enter it; but to do so it would, above all, be necessary that they should possess some real knowledge. Only those who possess such knowledge will be able to live harmoniously together. As long as men move merely on the plañe of be lief s and opinion, each man's opinions and tastes will differ from those of the other to a certain extent, and I am afraid that your proposed harmonial society would prove in the end to be a very unharmonious one, and not at all conducive to that tranquillity necessary for interior concentration. "I have, however, no doubt that even under such unfavorable auspices considerable advantage might be derived from the establishment of theosophical monasteries in secluded places. If you had any colleges, seminarios, schools, or societies where the truth could be taught without all the accompanying rubbish of scientific and theological misconceptions and superstitions, which have accumulated through the ages, great progress would undoubtedly


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be made. As the present civilization now stands, there are two methods adopted for the education of the people. One is by means of what is called Science, the other by means of what is called Religión. As far as Science is concerned, her deductions and speculations are based upon observation and logic. Her logic may be good enough; but her powers of observation, upon which the fundamentáis of her logic rest, are restricted to her very imperfect faculties of sensual perception, and therefore your science is based entirely upon external illusions, and is consequently a superficial and illusive science, knowing noth ing about the inner life, which is far more important than external phenomena. Her doctrines regarding the fundamental laws of nature are wrong, and therefore all her deductions are wrong as soon as she leaves the plañe of illusions. "You must not misunderstand me," he continued, seeing that I did not fully grasp the meaning of his words. "I do not mean to say that your modern science knows nothing about the external appearances of things. She knows what she sees and understands ; but not being able to see anything except external and sensual phenomena, she only knows external effects. She knows little or nothing about the invisible causes which produce such visible effects, and as soon as she attempts to speculate about them, she errs ; because causes are not the consequences of their effects, but the consequences of still more interior and fundamental causes, of which modern science knows absolutely noth ing, and which, therefore, cannot serve her as a basis from which to draw logical conclusions concerning their ultimate effects. She knows a great deal about the little details of existence which are the ulti mate effects of the action of universal Life; but she knows nothing about the Tree of Life, the eternal source from which all these transient phenomena spring. "As far as your modern theology is concerned, it is based upon an entire misconception of terms which were originally intended to signify certain spiritual powers, of which your priests and laymen can have no correct conception because they have not the spiritual power nec essary to conceive of such things. They dispute with each other about the qualities of certain principies, while neither the one ñor the other party knows anything whatever about the object of their disputation. Being narrow-minded, the universal principies and powers which are active within the great workshop of nature have, in their conceptions, become narrowed down to personal and limited beings ; the divine and infinite power which men cali God, which exists everywhere and without which nothing can possibly exist, has been reduced in the minds of the ignorant to an extracosmic deity of some kind, who can be persuaded by mortals to change his will, and who needs substitutes and deputies upon this earth to execute his divine laws. Your re ligión is not the religión of a living God who still lives and who executes his own will; it is the religión of a dead and impotent god who died long ago and left an army of clergymen


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to rule in his stead. Therefore, your modern religions are systems of superstitions from which the truth has been excluded; the infinite God has been deposed from his eternal throne in the hearts of men, and fallible mortal priests have been put in his place. Love has departed, and fear rules mankind; each individual seeks his or her hapApiness, and forgets the existence of others. Each one wants to be ^saved at the expense of another; each one wants to obtain a reward which he has not merited; all think that to live is the object of life, and few realize the fact that manfs life can have only one reasonable object, namely, to benefit humanity, and that only he can hope to live eternally who obtains the power to live, not in his perishable self, but in the spiritual element of humanity. "Your theology should above all be based upon the power to spiritually perceive the truth. But where can you find a clergyman who has any spiritual perceptions, and who dares to trust his intuition more than the dogmas prescribed by his church? If he dared to have an opinion of his own and to assert it, he would cease to be a minister of his church and be considered an heretic. In our 'intellectual* age everything is left to intellectual investigation alone; little is done to develop the intuitivo power of the heart. The consequence is that our present generation are like people looking at everything by means of a telescope ; they see, but they do not feel what they see, and the consequence is an entirely false conception of nature and man. "Man is neither more ñor less than a living organism or instrument through which the Universal One Life acts. In so far he is merely an intellectual animal. But man's organization, especially that of his brain, is far superior to that of inferior animals, and therefore man is enabled to become an instrument for the manifestation of the highest principie in the universe, which is called the Principie of Divine Wisdom. "The instrument, or organism, through which the divine principie acts in man and through man, from within outward, upon the external world, is the organism of the Soul. In this organism the universal and undifferentiated divine Spirit finds the soil to grow in an individualized form; it finds the stimulus for its development and the food from which it may draw its strength. As long as man is unac^quainted with the processes going on in this (to him) invisible organ*ism, he will have little power to guide and control these processes; he will resemble a plant, which is dependent for its existence on the elements which are unconsciously brought to it by the winds and the rains, or which may accidentally be found in its surroundings ; it has neither the power to prevent ñor to promote its own growth. But when man obtains a knowledge of the constitution of his own soul, when he becomes conscious of the processes going on in its organism and learns to guide and control them, he will


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be able to promote his own growth. He will become free to select or to reject the psychic influences which come within his sphere, he will become his own master and attain— so to say— psychic locomotion. He will then be as much superior to a man without such knowledge and power as an animal is superior to a plant; for while an animal may go in search of its food, and select or reject what it pleases, the plant is chained to its place and depends entirely on the conditions which that one place affords. The ignorant depends on the conditions pre pared for him; the knowing one can choose his conditions himself. "For many centuries a superstitious belief was prevailing among the ignorant as well as among the learned. It was believed that man was a finished being, incapable of any further organic improvement. It was, of course, known that during his lifetime his knowledge could grow, and that as he advanced in age he could learn things which he did not know when he was young; but thought and intellectual activity were looked upon as something incomprehensible, as a forcé without matter, as an activity without substance, as a nothing. They did not know where man stored the knowledge which he acquired, ñor what became of it when he died. They did not know whether or not after the death of his body he would have another, or even perhaps a still greater, opportunity to acquire knowledge; and if he could learn something after 'death1 and without having a body, what was the object of his having any physical body at all? None could tell. The scientists discarded such questions as being unworthy of their consideration, and they preferred annihilation rather than to confess that there was something in the wide expanse of nature which they did not already know. The theories advanced by the theologians were not more satis factory than those of the scientists, for they believed— or professed to believe— that man was a complete 'being, having come in a finished state out of the hands of his Creator and, as a punishment for his subsequent bad behavior, having been imprisoned upon this planet. They furthermore were of the opinion that, if a man were leading a pious life, or, after leading a wicked life, obtained the pardon for his sins and the favor of God, he would after his death become a superior being, be ushered into a paradise, and live in a state of never-ending enjoyment. "It will be acknowledged now by every independent thinker, that these theories were not very satisfactory to those who desired to know the truth. But there was nothing either to prove or to contradict such assumptions, and, moreover, the multitude did not think; they paid their doctors to do their thinking for them. "Since the publication of 'Esoteric Buddhism' the opinions of the scientists and those of the theologians have been equally shaken in their foundations. The oíd truth which was known to the ancients, but which had been almost entirely forgotten during our modern age of materialism— that man is not a


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finished being, incapable of any further organic development, but that his body and his mind are continually subject to transformation and change, and that no transformation can exist where no substance exists, because forcé cannot exist without substance— has become almost universally known. It was demonstrated to the scientists that their science extended only over a very small portion of that mysteri ous being called Man; that they only knew his outward appearance, his shell, but nothing of the living power acting within the mask which is called the physical body. It was demonstrated to the presumptuous theologians who believed that man's eternal welfare or damnation de pended on their blessings or curses, that justice cannot be separated from God, and that God alone is immortal. It was made logically comprehensible to the intellect that God is the divine Spiritual element in man, which alone will continué to live after all the lower and imperfect elements are dissolved, and that therefore a man in whom God did not exist in a state of divinity could not, after the death of his body, jump into a higher state for which he was not fit, and which he was not able to attain while alive." (to be continued) Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which you should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of tlie important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians continúes: The Imperator philosophizes: To enter the secluded life of the monastery, it would be necessary to possess real knowledge, so as to be able to live together harmoniously. íjf Modern knowledge is based upon Science and religión. Science is based upon erroneous extemal illusions, knowing nothing about the Tree of Life, the eternal source from which all transient phenomena spring. Modern theology is based upon an entire misconception of terms originally in tended to signify certain spiritual powers, now interpreted purely personally and materially. Love has departed and fear rules mankind. * «I Man is the instrument through which the Universal One Life acts. When man ob tains knowledge of the constitution of his own soul and learns to control its processes, he will be able to promote his own growth; he will become his own master. *1 Man’s body and mind are continually subject to changes. God is the divine Spiritual element in man which alone will continué to live after the lower, imperfect elements are dissolved. Man cannot attain a state of divinity after death for which he was not fit and which he was not able to attain while alive.



This monograph always remaíns the property of the Supreme Grand Lodge of A. M. O. R. C. It Is not purchased by, but loaned to, the receiving member.

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-nine

Eleventh Degree Monograph Forty-nine

The matter contained herein is officially issued through the Supreme Council of the A . M . O . R C. under the emblem above, which was registered ¡n the United States Patent Office for the purpose of protecting all the ’printed, engraved, typewritten, and photographic copies of officially pre sen be d and copyrighted monographs, díssertations, scientific postüiations, philosophical discourses academic studies diagram s, illustrations, and charts" as authorized by the Imperator of A . M . O. R. C . (Tne above emblem and ñame of the O rde r are also registered in countries throughout the world.) A ll matters herein contained are strictly confidential to the member receiving. and are im parted only as an incident to membership. The ownership of the legal title, and the right of possession to this m onograph is and shall remain in the Supreme Grand Lodge of A . M. O. R, C . and it shall be returned to it upon its request. The contents herein are loaned to be used for the solé and exclusive Information of the receiving member and not otherwise. A ny other use or attempted use does, ipso facto, termínate all righfs of the member, and is a víolation of the Statutes of this Order. A . M . O . R . C . is the only organization authorized to use the Registered ñame and symbols, and the Imperator has solé right to grant the use of them to other allied organizations or movement*.


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C|| There are many would-be ascetics who think that by withdrawal from the world, along with the performance of superficial rituals and meaningless fasting, they are approaching nearer to God. The absurdity of such artífice is pointed out in the following excerpt from the ancient Hindú epic, the mahabharata:

Those high'souled persons that do not commit sins in word, deed, heart and soul, are said to undergo ascetic austerities, and not they that suffer their bodies to be wasted by fasts and penances.. . . fasts and other penances cannot destroy sins however much they may wea\en and dry up the body that is made of flesh and blood. The man whose heart is without holiness, suffers torture only by undergoing penances in ignorance of their meaning. . . . The fire he worshipped doth not consume his sins. It is in consequence of holiness and virtue alone that men attain to regions of blessedness and fasts and vows become efficacious. . . . They only that are possessed of holiness succeed, by \nowledge and deeds, to conquer disease, decrepitude and death, and acquire a high status. —TH E M AHABHARATA

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Beloved Members, Greetings ! We now continué the story of An Adventure Among the Rosicrucianst by Dr. Franz Hartmann: Chapter II The Monastery "The exposition of the essential constitution of Man, known to the Indian sages, described three hundred years ago by Theophrastus Paracelsus. is calculated to humble the pride of the scientists and the vanity of the priests. When it is once more known and digested, it will prove to the learned how little they know, and it will draw the line for the legitímate activity of the clergyman as an instruc tor in moráis. It proves that man is not already a god, as some had imagined themselves to be. It proves that a man may look like an in tellectual giant, and still be, spiritually considered, only a dwarf. It demonstrates that the law which governs the growth of organisms on the physical plañe is not reversed when it acts within the corresponding organisms on the psychical plañe. It shows that out of nothing nothing can grow; but that wherever there is the germ of something, even if that germ is invisible, that something may grow and develop. "The growth of every germ and of every being, as far as we know it, depends on certain conditions. These conditions may be established either by means of the intellectual activity of the being itself, having the power to surround itself by such, or they may have been established by external causes, over which the being has no control. A plant or an animal cannot grow unless it receives the food and the stimulus which it requires ; the intellect cannot expand unless it is fed with ideas and stimulated by reason to assimilate them; the spirit cannot become strong unless it finds in the lower principies the materials required for the acquisition of strength, and is stimulated by the light of wisdom to absorb that which it requires. "One element necessary for the development of strength is resistance. If we enter one of the vast pine forests of the Alps, or of the Rocky Mountains in the United States, we find ourselves surrounded by towering trees, whose main trunks have very few branches. Upwards they rise like the masts of a ship, covered with a gray bark, naked, and without foliage. Only near the tops, which reach out of the shadows which they throw upon each other, the branches appear and spread up to the utmost tops, which wave their heads in the sunlight. These trees are all top-heavy; their principally or only developed parts are their heads, and all the life which they extract from the ground and the air seems to mount to their heads ; while the trunks, although increasing in size as the tree grows, are left undeveloped and bare. Thus they may stand

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and grow from year to year, and reach a mature age; but some day, sooner or later, some dark clouds collect around the snowy peaks and assume a threatening aspect; the gleam of lightning appears among the swelling masses, the sound of thunder is heard, bolts of liquid light dart from the rents in the clouds, and suddenly the storm sweeps down from the summit into the valley, Then the work of devastation begins. These top-heavy trees, having but little strength in their feet, are mowed down by the wind like so many stems of straw in a f ield of wheat; there they lie, rank after rank, having tumbled over each other by the fall, and their corpses encumber the mountain sides. But at the edge of the timber, and outside of the main body of the forest, looking like outposts or sentinels near the lines of battle, there are still here and there some solitary pines to whom the storm could do no harm. They have, on account of their isolated positions, been exposed to winds all their lives ; they have become used to it and grown strong. They have not been protected and sheltered by their neighbors. They are not top-heavy, for their great strong branches grow out from the trunk a few feet above the soil, continuing up to the tops, and their roots have grown through the crevices of the rocks, holding on to them with an iron grasp. They have met with resistance since the time of their youth, and by resisting have gained their strength. "Thus intellectual man, growing up protected by fashion and friends in a school, college, university, or perhaps within the walls of the convent, finds himself isolated from contrary influences and meets with but little resistance. Crowded together with those who think like him, he lives and thinks like the others. Over their heads waves the banner of some accepted authority, and upon that banner are inscribed certain dogmas in which they believe without ever daring to doubt their veracity. There they grow, throwing upon each other the shadow of their ignorance, and each prevents the others from seeing the sunlight of truth. There they cram their brains with authorized opinions, learning a great many of the details of our illusory life which they mistake for the real existence ; they become top-heavy, for all the energy which they receive from the universal fountain of life goes to supply the brain; the heart is left without supply; the strength of character, of which the heart is the seat, suffers; the intellect is overfed and the spirit is starved. Thus they may grow up and become proud of their knowledge ; but perhaps some day new and strange ideas appear on the mental horizon: a wind begins to blow, and down tumbles the banner upon which their dogmas have been inscribed, and their pride tumbles down with it. "But not only on the physical and the intellectual plañe ; in the realm of the emotions, too, the same law prevails. He who desires to develop strength must not be afraid of resistance; he must obtain strength in his feet. He must be prepared to meet the wind of contrary opinions, and not be overthrown when the storms of passion arise. He should forcé himself to remain in

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contact with that which is not according to his taste, and even to harmonizo with that which appears inimical, for it is really his friend, because it may supply him with strength. He should learn to bear calumny and animosity, envy and opposition; he should learn to endure suffering, and to estimate life at its true valué. The contrary influences to which he may have been exposed will cause a tempest to rage through his heart; but when he has gained the power to command the tempest to cease and to say to the excited waves of his emotions, Be Still ! then will the first gleam of the rising sun appear in his heart, and before its warm glow the coid moonlight thrown out by the calculating and reflecting brain will grow palé; a new and still larger world than the external one will appear before his interior visión, in which he will be contented to live, and where he will find an inexhaustible source of happiness, unknown to those who live a life of the senses. Henceforth he will require no longer to speculate reflectively about the truth, for he will see it olear in his own heart. Hencef orth he will not be required to be exposed to storms, but may seek shelter in a tranquil place; not because he is afraid of the storms, which can do him no harm, but because he wants to employ his energies for the full development of the newly awakened spiritual germ, instead of wasting them uselessly on the outward plañe. "Thus it appears that only after having reached a certain state of maturity, life in a solitude, isolated from contrary influences, becomes desirable and useful, and that those who retire from the world as long as they need the world are attempting to ascend to the kingdom of heaven by beginning at the top of the ladder. Let him who needs the world remain in the world. The greater the temptations are by which he is surrounded, the greater will be his strength if he successfuly resists. Only he who can within his own mental sphere create the con ditions which his spirit requires, is independent of all external con ditions and free. He who cannot evolve a world within his own soul needs the external world to evolve his soul. "Unspiritual men, therefore, who retire from the world because they are afraid of the world, cannot be considered to be heroes who have renounced the world; they deserve rather to be regarded as cowards who have deserted their ranks at the beginning of the battle with life. Such people sometimes retire into convents for the purpose of having a comfortable life, and in addition to that, a ticket to heaven. They imagine to do a service to God by leading a harmless and useless life; for which imaginary service they expect to obtain a reward at the end of life. But the reward which they will receive will also exist mere ly in their imagination. As the sensualist wastes his time in the prosecution of useless pleasures, so the bigot wastes his time in useless ceremonies and prayers. The actions of the former are instigated by a desire for sensual pleasure in this life, those of the latter by the hope for pleasure in another life; both are acting for the purpose of gratifying their own per-

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sonal selves. I am unable to see any essential difference between the motives and moráis of the two. "But with spiritually developed man the case is entirely different. The divine principie in man exists independent of the conditions of relative space and time; it is eternal and self-existent. It cannot be angered by opposition, ñor irritated by contradiction, ñor be thrown into confusion by sophistry. If it has once become conscious of its own power inman, it will not require the stimulus required by the physical organism and afforded by the impressions which come through the avenues of the senses from the outer world; for it is itself that stimulus which creates worlds within its own substance. It is the Lord over all the animal ele mental forces in the soul of man, and their turmoil can neither edúcate it ñor degrade it, for it is Divinity itself in her puré state, being eter nal, unchangeable, and free. "He in whom this divine principie has once awakened, he who has once practically experienced the inner life, who has visited the king dom of heaven within his own soul, he who stands firm upon his feet, will no more need the educating influences of the contending storms of the outer world, to gain strength by resistance; ñor will he experience any desire to return to the pleasures and tomfooleries of the world. He renounced nothing when he retired into the solitude ; for it cannot be looked upon as an act of renunciation if we throw away a thing which is a burden to us. He cannot be called ascetic ; for he does not undergo any discipline or process of hardening; it is no act of self-denial to refuse things which we do rôt want. The true ascetic is he who lives in the world, surrounded by its temptations ; he in whose soul the animal ele ments are still active, craving for the gratification of their desires and possessing the means for their gratif ication, but who by the superior power of his will conquers his animal self. Having attained that state, he may retire from the world and employ his energies for the further ex pansión and the employment of the spiritual power which he possesses. He will be perfectly happy, because that which he desires he can create within his ov/n interior world. He expects no future reward in heaven; for what could heaven offer to him except happiness which he already posses ses? He desires no other good but to create good for the world." (to be continued) Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians continúes: Within the monastery the Imperator continúes his dissertation regarding conventsand the true ascetic: CJ Let those who need the world remain in the world; to retire thus would be attempting to ascend to the kingdom of heaven by beginning at the top of the ladder. The true ascetic is he who, having the divine principie awakened within him, surrounded by temptations, conquers the animal self by superior will power. q He who desires strength must not be afraid of resistance, for after each struggle he will become much stronger. After having withstood the storm of contrary, external influences, he is prepared to employ his energies in solitude for the full development of the newly-awakened spiritual germ, instead of wasting them on the outward plañe.





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Eleventh Degree Monograph Fifty

Eleventh Degree Monograph Fifty


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The studies throughout the various Degrees have been concerned with the knowledge of the fundamental laws of the universe. Since man is the microcosm, self'knowledge and self'mastery is of great importance. On this question of self'mastery and its relationship to what is heavenly, Kwang-tse, Chínese philosopher and follower of LacKse, wrote in the earlier part of the fourth century B. C.:

He who l^nows the Too is sure to be well acquainted with the principies ( that appear in the procedures of things). Acquainted with those principies, he is sure to understand how to regúlate his conduct in all varying circum' stances. Having that understanding, he will not allow things to injure him' self. Fire cannot burn him who is so perfect in virtue, ñor water drown him; neither coid ñor heat can affect him injuriously; neither bird ñor beast can hurt him. This does not mean that he is indifferent to these things; it means that he discrinwiates between where he may safely rest and where he will be in peril; that he is tranquil equally in calamity and happiness; that he is careful what he avoids and what he approaches;— so that nothing can injure him. Henee it is said ‘W hat is heavenly is intemal; what is human is e x t e r n a l T h e virtue of man is in what is Heavenly. If you \now the operation of what is Heavenly and what is Human, you will have your root in wJvxt is Heavenly and your position in virtue. — KW ANG'TSE, Fourth Century B.C.


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Beloved Members, Greetings ! We now continué the story of An Adventure Among the Rosicrucians by Dr. Franz Hartmann, beginning at a point where we discontinued last week: ®

Chapter II THE MONASTERY "If you could establish theosophical monasterios, where intellec tual and spiritual development would go hand in hand, where a new Science could be taught, based upon a true knowledge of the fundamental laws of the universe, and where at the same time man would be taught how to obtain a mastery over himself, you would confer the greatest pos sible benefit upon the world. Such a convent would, however, afford immense advantages for the advancement of intellectual research. The establishment of a number of such places of learning would dot the mental horizon of the world with stars of the first magnitude, from which rays of intellectual light would stream and penetrate the world. Standing upon a far higher plañe than the material scientists of our times, a new and far greater field than that offered to the latter would be laid open for investigation and research. Knowing all the different opinions of the highest accepted authorities, and not being bound by an orthodox scientific creed, having at their service all the results of the investigations of the learned, but not being bound to their systems by a belief in their infallibility, they would be at liberty to think freely. Their convents would become centres of intelligence, illuminating the world; and if their power of self-control would grow in equal proportion with the development of their intellect, they would soon be able to enter adeptship."

The Adept had spoken these words with unusual warmth, as if he intended to appeal to my sympathy and to induce me to use my efforts to establish such convents; there was a look of pity in his eyes, as if he exceedingly regretted the state of poor ignorant humanity, v/ith whose Karma he was not permitted to interfere forcibly, according to the established rules of his Order. I, too, regretted my own inability to establish such monasteries, and for once I wished that I was rich, so as to be able to make at least an attempt with one such establish^ment. But immediately the Imperator saw my thought in my mind, and said:— "You mistake; it is not the want of money which prevents us to execute this idea; it is the impossibility to find the proper kind of people to inhabit the convent after it is established. Indeed, we would be poor Alchemists if we could not produce gold in any desirable quantity, if some real benefit for humanity could be effected thereby— and of this I shall convince you,


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if you desire it. But gold is a curse to mankind, and we do not wish to increase the curse from which humanity suffers. Distribute gold among men, and you will only create a craving for more; give them gold, and you will transform them into devils. No; it is not gold that we need; it is men who thirst after wisdom. There are thousands who desire knowledge, but few who desire wisdom. Intellectual devel opment, sagacity, craftiness, cunning, are today mistaken for spiritual^ development, but this conception is wrong; animal cunning is not intelligence, craftiness is not wisdom, and your most learned men are the last ones who can bear the truth. Even many of your would-be occultists and Rosicrucians have taken up their investigations merely for the purpose of gratifying their idle curiosity, while others de sire to pry into the secrets of nature to obtain knowledge which they intend to employ for the attainment of selfish ends. Give us men or women who desire nothing else but the truth, and we will take care of their needs. How much money will it require to lodge a person who cares nothing for comfort? What will it take to furnish the kitchen for those who have no desire for dainties? What libraries will be required for those who can read in the book of nature? What external pictures will please those who wish to avoid a life of the senses and to retire within their own selves? What terrestrial scenery shall be selected for those who live within the paradise of their souls? What company will please those who converse with their own higher self? How can we amuse those who live in the presence of God?" Here the Adept paused for a moment, and then continued, saying: "Verily, the theosophical monastery of which I dream is even superior to ours. It is located far away from this earth, and yet it can be reached without trouble and without expense. Its monks and nuns have risen above the sphere of self. They have a temple of infinite dimensions, pervaded by the spirit of sanctity, being the common possession of all. There the differentiation of the Universal Soul ceases, and Unification takes place. It is a convent where there exists no dif ference of sex, of taste, of opinion, and desire; where vice cannot enter; where none are born, or marry, or die, but where they live like the angels ; each one constituting the centre of a power for good; each one immersed in an infinite ocean of light; each one able to see all he desires to see, to know all he wants to know, growing in strength and expanding in size, until he embraces the All and is one with it." For a moment it seemed as if the soul of the Adept had gone and visited that blissful state of Nirvana, a state of which we mortals f cannot conceive; but soon the light returned into his eyes, and he smilingly excused himself, saying that he had permitted himself to be carried away by the sublimity of this idea. I ventured to say that probably millions of ages would pass away before mankind would arrive at that state. "Alasí" he answered, "the conditions which our present state of civilization imposes upon its followers are now such


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as to forcé the vast majority of the latter to employ nearly all their time and energy in an outward direction, instead of employing them for their inward growth. Each man has a certain amount of energy which he may cali his own. If he wastes all that energy on the outward plañe, either for the attainment of sensual gratification or in intellectual pursuits, he will have nothing left to develop the divine germ in his heart. If he continually concentrates his mind outwardly, there will be no inward concentration of thought, which is absolutely necessary for the attainment of self-knowledge. The laboring classes, the people of commerce, the scientists, doctors, lawyers, and clergymen are all actively engaged in outward affairs, and find little time for the inward concentration of their powers. The majority are continu ally busy to run after shadows and illusions, which are at best only useful as long as they last, but whose usefulness ceases when the heart ceases to beat. Their time and energy are taken up in procuring what they cali the 'necessities of life, ' and they excuse themselves by saying that it is their misfortune to be so situated as to be forced to procure them. Nature, however, cares nothing for our excuses; the law of cause and effect is blind and inaccessible to argumentation. A man climbing over a mountain top and falling over a precipice is as much in danger of breaking his neck as if he had jumped down voluntarily; a man who is not able to progress will be left as far behind as one who does not desire to progress. But Nature is not so cruel as she appears to be to the superficial observer. That which man requires for the purpose of living is very little indeed, and can usually easily be obtained; for Nature has amply provided for all of her children; and if they cannot all obtain their proper share, then there must be something seriously wrong, either with them individually or with the social organization as a whole. There is undoubtedly a great deal wrong in our social organization, and our philosophers and politicians are continually trying to remedy it. They will succeed in their task when they succeed in making the laws of the human world harmonizo with the laws of Nature, and not before. That event may take place in the far-distant future. We have not the time to wait for it. Let each one attempt to restore harmony in his own individual organism and live according to natural laws, and the harmony of the social or ganism as a whole will be restored. "The great bulk of those things which are said to be the necessities of life are only artificially created necessities. Millions of people lived and attained oíd age long before many of the things which our modern civilization considers as being absolutely necessary had been discovered or invented. The term 'necessity* has a relativo meaning; and to a king a dozen palaces, to a nobleman a carriage with four, may appear as much a necessity as to a beggar a bottle of whiskey, or to a fashionable man a new swallow-tail coat. To get rid at once of all such fancied necessities and the trouble which is imposed upon us to attain them, the shortest and surest way is to rise above such necessities and to consider


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them not to be necessary at all. Then a great amount of our energy would become free, and might be employed for the acquisition of that which is really necessary, because it is eternal and permanent, while that which serves merely temporal purposes ends in time. "There are thousands of people engaged in prying into the details of the constitution of external objects to learn the chemical and physiological processes going on therein, without manifesting the least curiosity to know their own constitution and the processes go ing on within their own organization; although it would seem that a knowledge of the latter is far more important than an investigation of the former. Science says that she wants to know the laws of Nature in all their minute ramifications, and yet she pays no attention whatever to the universal and fundamental law from which all these ramifications spring; and thus she resembles an insect crawling over a fallen leaf and imagining thereby to learn the qualities of the tree. It is surely the prerogative of intellectual man to investigate intellectually all the departments of nature ; but the investigation of external things is only of secondary importance to the attainment of knowledge of our own interior powers. All primary powers act from within; effects are secondary to causes. He who considers the knowl edge of external things to be more important than the knowledge of self, possesses very little wisdom indeed." "These doctrines," I said, "will never be accepted by our schoolmen; they look upon the very term 'Theosophy' with contempt; they believe that a knowledge of external things is the only knowledge attainable, and the only one worth having, and this illusive knowledge they cali exact science." "I pity them for their imperfections," answered the Adept; "nevertheless their views are justifiable from their own standpoint. If they object to the term 1Theosophy* it is because they do not know what the term means; and as it has often been misapplied, they have formed a misconception about it. We can know nothing except what we know theosophically; because theosophical knowledge is the result of feeling, seeing, and understanding a thing. Their sense of seeing and feeling does not penetrate below the external surface of things, and they therefore know theosophically merely the outward appearance, and the internal causes are left to speculations which are often erroneous. The higher sense, by which the Adept is able to penetrate with his consciousness into the interior of things and identify himself for the time being with the object of his observation, share its sensations, to feel as if he were that object, to see the workings of the interior causes, and consequently be able to understand them, is unknown to the scientists of our present civilization." As the Adept finished this sentence, a sound as if produced by the tinkling of small silver bells was heard in the


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air above our heads. I looked up, but nothing was to be seen from which that sound could have proceeded. "This is the signal," said the Adept, "that the members of our order are assembled in the Refectory. Let us go to join their company. Some refreshment will undoubtedly be welcome to you." (to be oontinued) Fraternally, YOUR CLASS MASTER


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Below is a summary of the important principies of this monograph. It contains the essential statements which vou should not forget. After you have carefully read the complete mono graph, try to recall as many as you can of the important points you read. Then read this summary and see if you have forgotten any. Also refer to this summary during the ensuing week to refresh your memory.

fj The Imperator, at the ancient monastery, continúes his discussion of the ideal monas tery, or convent: ÍJ In it would be taught the mastery of self as well as true knowledge of the fundamen tal laws of the universe, unhampered by orthodox teachings. This convent would be peopled by men and women who would be desirous of nothing but truth; their external, material needs would be few. Its nuns and monks would have risen above the sphere of self. Here there would be unification of the Universal Soul. Our present state of civilization demands time and energy expended in outward direction, leaving little to develop the divine germ in the heart. Inward concentration is necessary to the attainment of self-knowledge. The law of cause and effect is inacces sible to argumentation. fj] If each one were to restore harmony in his own organism, that is, live according to natural laws, the harmony of the social organism as a whole would be restored. The investigation of extemal things is of secondary importance to the attainment of knowledge of our own interior powers. All primary powers act from within; effects are secondary to causes. We can know nothing except that which we know theosophically.

AMORC Degree 11 (1-50)

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