CHAPTER VI.

Love, Beauty, and Wisdom.
The love of beauty is instinctive in mankind. Beauty inspires love and elevates the soul to a higher plane of feeling. Flowers, changing clouds, lofty mountains, far-stretching landscapes, night's starry vault, white-crested ocean waves are all impressive and inspiring preachers. They teach one lesson, they have one gospel ; there is no controversy among them ; all express Love^ all show forth Beauty and witness to the Wisdom that created them. Through the appeal to the eye, thought is aroused and mere external beauty dis- appears in contemplation of the beautiful adapta- tion and adjustment of every part to every other in the order that makes the whole. Soon the soul catches the strains of harmony in the etheric vibration that underlies all nature's effects, through the purifying influence of this harmony in nature all unconsciously we grow in virtue and beauty.
If God be Wisdom, he must be wise in his
acts, for they are his children. Every act of
God, man, or beast creates conditions, or makes
laws (synonymous terms), which act and react
64
LovCy Beauty^ and Wisdom, 65
throughout the aeons of eternity, lending their in- fluence to control events and to mould and fashion all things. God has not ceased creating, nor will he cease throughout eternity.
" The Kingdom of Heaven is within you," said Jesus to the unregenerate Jews, and ** except a man be born again he cannot see the kingdom of God." That kingdom is the realm of the soul — of Beauty, Love and Wisdom. Who does not ad- mire himself } Who so worthless as to be willing to be somebody else } We may desire to change places and conditions with some one more fortu- nately placed, but no one would willingly exchange egos with another. Love does not belong to the surface of things nor does Beauty nor Wisdom. External beauty is mainly decorative. God loves and decorates everything ; even the meanest ob- jects glitter in fascinating colors and lights. They are object lessons in beauty, pleasing the eye by the external to attract the mind to the contempla- tion of that immortal beauty which is in the soul that sees, rather than in the object decorated. Beauty is truly in the eye of the beholder rather than in the object which appeals to it, and the beautiful soul finds beauty in all things. Appre- ciation of beauty is not excited by the external only, for mental beauty far surpasses the physical, and soul beauty, combining the two, appears in those lovely traits of character which constitute the
66 Regeneration,
wisdom of the soul. Love makes all persons lovely in the eyes of lovers, who see beauty and fitness even in what to others is ugliness. The soul of the wise controls the senses ; the reason sees beauty and wisdom that are concealed from merely physical sight.
Beauty has a voice which calls us out of our lesser selves, moving us to forget our meanness and littleness and inspiring admiration. We wor- ship that which we love, and Love is God. Thus God is born in us ; conceived through the eye as an object and decorated like an idol ; but the mind discovering the transitory nature of the external discerns the interior loveliness which is more per- manent, and passing to a higher plane of activity senses at last the immortal beauty of the soul. Worship stirs the depths of the soul because the soul is Love and is moved when approached by that which is kindred. The soul is moved by the love of the mind, which is admiration ; the ex- pansion caused by its motion makes room for God.
This is the path of Regeneration, for God growing within our nature is as a child in the womb, and when gestation is complete He is born, the perfect human.
The large soul is the feeling soul : it feels an- other's woe and weeps. Submerged in the water of tears, it feels God in itself. As Wisdom passes out of the water into light the soul discovers such
Love^ Beauty^ and Wisdom. 67
beauty as the physical man may not discern. Be- ing thus born of Love and of Water is to be de- livered from pain and sorrow, disease and death.
Grief is the water of sympathy which the soul sheds out of blind eyes when, for lack of wisdom, she cannot discover the Providence which begets the circumstances — that Providence which is only another form of the Beauty, Love, and Wisdom of God.
To him who sees with the spiritual eye, there is nothing repulsive ; there is nothing evil to him whose thought is as God's thought. The ecstasy of love destroys pain. To him who truly lives there is no death.
The golden sun, the silver stars and planets call our souls to admiration and worship, in awe and wonder of the inconceivable wisdom, the match- less harmony, the fadeless beauty, the awful power evidenced by these immortal things. I %?cj power advisedly. We rush to the unknown from the known, from the appearance to that which is hid- den. All motion is due to Will ; it is the motive power of every conscious and unconscious act. The worm crawls from danger, the bird flies from its presence. Fear or desire influences the Will to move the dead weight of the body. Na- ture generates some things she sets fast rooted in the earth ; the roots of others are left freer that they may provide for themselves. In this free-
68 Regeneration.
dom is the first manifestation of Will, and Will is always in the thing that has conscious movement. Unconscious machinery is moved by an outside will, but even in this case the motor is in the machine. We infer, therefore, that suns and worlds are self-conscious living beings held in space and moving in their orbits by the inherent power of Will. Is this Will any less God because it is in a sun or planet, a worm or a human being }
The bird poised in air is held aloft by its own volition. We see the bird, but we cannot see or feel its thought. Judging from our own thought and activities, we infer that it sinks and soars in obedience to its own will.
There is nothing silent or motionless, although we cannot always perceive either sound or motion, or, perceiving, we take no account of it. The earth groans and protests with shaking and trem- bling and violent breathing at the boring and tun- neling of its fair frame and the destruction of its beautiful forests. The tree cries aloud at the violence of the woodman's axe, and the sawmills resound with shrieks of the forests' fair children, nor will these cries of anguish cease until the wood returns to dust.
The earth breathes and we say the wind blows ; her heart beats and we note the ebb and flow of the ocean tides ; her blood rushes white and limpid in streams and rivers on her surface and hidden
LovCy Beauty, and Wisdom, 69
in the darkness of her internal structure. There is order and system in all her motions, and wisdom and beauty in all her products of air, earth, and seas. Her changeless intelligence surpasses the boasted wisdom of man; his years are fast-fleeting seconds beside her ages of duration. Her admoni- tion impressed on every atom, nerve, tissue, and fiber of being is : " Depend upon yourself ! Work! Move! Infinite fields of plenty, of use, of beauty encircle you on every hand. Stand erect ! Be yourself y free, self-supporting, as I am ! Fly, if you are winged ; think, if you have mind ; paint pictures if you have genius, for lo, I furnish pat- terns and colors. You cannot surpass me, but \try ! ''
The earth is self-poised, self-sustaining, individ- ualy containing within herself the seeds of Infinity. By reason of her individualized Self, the Cosmos, the Universal Self, the All Containing, impinges on her as a center or focus of power. The Uni- versal Mind is in her ; the Oversoul, imprisoned in her in miniature, is her soul ; the EgOy which is evolving in mineral, vegetable, animal, and in man. In man, mind is evolved, which could not be if it were not in the grass he treads upon, the forests he beholds, and in the air he breathes. That the earth is a conscious entity, having thought, volition, and feeling, is evident to the thoughtful observer. Is Intelligence and Wisdom limited to the things
70 Regeneration,
on the surface of the earth, and do they find their highest and fullest expression in the stumbling biped called man ?
The regenerated soul contains the universe with- in itself. It has no limits, no boundaries ; the beyond, the above and the below, cease to exist in the boundless. To the earth's consciousness, what are man's terms of above and below t Are they not equal ? If so, they balance each other and the expanse within is as great as the expanse without ; the inherent power is equal to that de- rived from other sources. Consequently, she is independent of all other worlds. They are in fact herself in essence. The eye of the soul discovers no difference between the within and the without. In looking within, one sees all that can be seen. As the world, so is the regenerated human being.
It may be asked. What is to be regenerated t Is it body, mind, or soul } The answer is, the whole man. That which is generated must be re- generated. It is now corruptible because all things are in a ferment of motion. The acid and the alkali, the good and evil in motion, is generation.
The body is generated in utter helplessness, de- void of thinking power and without the instinct of the animal. The babe has a soul or the capacity for emotion, which is the protoplasm from which mind is developed ; a mirror in which the things of the soul are reflected to the perceptions. The ex-
LovCy Beatityy and Wisdom. 71
periences of previous incarnations color the grow- ing life, tinging it with peculiarities which form an attractive point for elemental life, as the fire of passion is generated and the growing being be- comes animal.
In Regeneration is the animal nature left behind, the mind outgrown, the sexual nature made inop- erative ?
God has made nothing in vain. He derives pleasure from being a Providence to the weak. Without sin, no salvation ; without weakness, no strength ; without ignorance, no intelligence ; with- out folly, no wisdom. If we outgrow our folly in Regeneration, wherefore shall we be wise.^ Strength without action becomes weakness, and wisdom without conduct degenerates into folly. Thus it is evident that the two exist from neces- sity, but the One from whom they emanate, or of whom they are the equivalent, is the center.
If the object of Regeneration be the return of dual man to unity, — to the Universal Spirit, — it is evident he must return stripped of all attributes.
To return to unity, or to become One, is to cease to be many. Man is compounded of animals, reptiles, fowls, and other forms of life, which, co- alescing toward oneness, have created passions, appetites, attributes. These are dual in their na- ture and are Man, In other words, they are what the ego has clothed itself with in varying propor-
72 Regeneration.
tions, to create individuality in expression, or out- ward manifestation ; for the Self is the same in worm and in angel and in all the grades of life be- tween. Individuality is of externals, the fruit of generation, and he who lives in externals is living the generative life. As well think of regenerating a horse as of regenerating some men, for until the life of externals becomes of secondary importance the man will not seek the interior life.
The declaration of Jesus to Nicodemus was made to him only. " Except ye be born again, ye can- not see the kingdom of God." Jesus saw in Nico- demus an honest, capable man, an earnest, sincere inquirer, but one who still living in externals valued his standing in the world above all else. He looked on truth from the standpoint of the literal materialist, regarding it as an intellectual, rather than a spiritual attainment. Jesus seeing that he must be reincarnated before he could reach the point of evolution required to discern spiritual things, made the declaration to him and to his like.
The kingdom of God is within, but only those whose spiritual vision is open can see its glories. It requires unnumbered incarnations to reach the plane where Nicodemus stood, for only one more rebirth was required before he should be born of "water and the spirit." The gestating of spirit- ual life is governed by the same laws as the ges- tating of the physical. By experiences of pain
Love^ Beauty^ and Wisdom, 73
and pleasure, we are forced to think and to act ; the mind at its utmost tension discharges its thought seed into the soul, to meet there the ovum of sympathy. Mind is masculine. Soul is femi- nine. In the soul, ideas take form and are clothed in matter. Regeneration is a renewing process add- ing new elements, or building new brain cells into the old when they are fully ripened for the change.
When Regeneration is complete, the body, like an evergreen tree, which does not shed its foliage perceptibly, will not waste nor show signs of de- cay. The discordant elements in man's constitu- tion are the cause of sorrow, pain, and death. When the duality which runs through all his or- gans, causing antagonism — the male and female energies in the collision of action and reaction — when this duality is merged into unity — the lion and the lamb will lie down together and the only true harmony of being will be established. Nev- ertheless, God loves the discord as he does the harmony, for he has made it ; and being like him- self perfecty it is petfect discord^ whatever may be its influence on myself or others.
Man could not be man without the elements of change in his structure ; in Regeneration he leaves nothing, loses nothing, that belongs to human nature. Nothing can be destroyed; there is change, but not destruction. We modify the evils of existence, as we rise above them, or, in
74 Regeneration,
other words, as our point of view changes, we see good in place of evil, and instead of suffering we enjoy. In our infinite and eternal journey, polari- ties are sometimes reversed, but who remembers a previous condition in its fulness ? Life some- times appears like a half-forgotten dream, or like a path passed over long, long ago which, being re- traced, seems familiar, half pain, half pleasure, like an old sorrow.
Man may be likened to the apex of a pyramid whose base and structure are composed of mineral, vegetable, and animal life, and which coming to the apex in the animal life produces man, the flower of all beneath him. He is the seed in which is potentially the whole pyramid, as the oak is con- tained in the acorn. In the new order, the door to which is Regeneration, he requires all that is below him for the attainment of the perfect whole. God himself would not be perfect if the smallest fragment were lost, since he is All.
The Magi say: "The above is as the below," and the world of spirits contains the same ele- ments as does the earth. There are myriads of people on the plane of spirit life where the social nature is as much required as it is on earth, and these elements of man's nature are the outgrowth of the gregarious animal life incorporated into his being here in the earth life.
Generation is the opposite of oneness. It is as
Lovcy Beauty^ and Wisdom, 75
if God in creation forces himself with violence to become many, and, turning their faces away from himself, thus holds the many as individual entities, not permitting them to turn and look him in the face, lest they cease to be. He has made a minia- ture kingdom in each human being wherein, as a dual entity, he creates from the violence of his own nature all the discords of Generation to war upon and devour each other.
If man creates his environment in Love and Wisdom, his kingdom will be of peace, joy, and plenty. Creation is merely changing forms that appear into those that disappear. The lack of wisdom permits hell to run riot in the nature ; sorrow, pain, and death make this Garden of the Lord a howling wilderness. Man comes into this world ignorant, deficient in intelligence and void of moral quality. He has only the instinct to cry and to feed without the power to help himself. He is to be cultivated as a garden, to be planted with trees and flowers, and decorated with walks and arbors ; a lawn through which sing and dance the murmuring streams, the "still waters" for the refreshment of other wearied souls. This he will do himself ; the thing so weak, helpless, and igno- rant, out of his own soul, will generate in wisdom or in folly all the furniture, the garniture, the frui- tion of life. The universe impinges on the newly- born infant and broods, shelters, feeds, warms, and
76 Regeneration,
educates the tiny creature. All the experience of the past is turned on it as sunlight to call forth thought energy, which shall be as the tree of life in the midst of the garden.
Regeneration is by thought, but Generation goes before, producing the old crop of weeds, the old jungle of noisome, slimy monsters, crawling and hissing serpents and the slimy creatures that breed in the swamps and fens of human nature where the still waters should gather and flow. These unsightly growths are habits generated in the past, an accumulation which we lump together under the name of "heredity." The aggregate of these same habits is again our wisdom, for past habits constitute present intelligence. If there were no habits there would be no need of Re- generation. We are lost in these habits of our ancestry, which produce themselves in us, and we, being void of the active thought-energy which re- generates, generate other habits kindred to those inherited, which abide in us until we become a bundle of habits thrown together without order — a fruit of Generation, without reason or purpose. Wisdom manifests in system and order with use as its object. We live chiefly because we have to: it is a habit — sometimes a bad habit — with no object other than the generation of our food and our kind. We do not intend to generate worms in our flesh or monsters in our souls, nor
Love^ Beauty y and Wisdom. yy
have we any desire or intention to destroy either worms or monsters. The great God is All Pres- ent and we may not be lost from his all-seeing eye, but we are lost to ourselves in our habits, be- wildered, confused in the maze of our own creation, in a hell of our own contriving ; we are lost without chart or compass, if we have only the thought or principles which have come into our lives from some other life habit, lost in our own conscious- ness, when only the still small voice upbraids us with tales of what we might have been.
From Generation come those habits which have their fibers woven closest about the soul, the sexual habits. The soul is a creator, and its every effort is generation. Like God it is free and without limitation, but being less than Infinite, through the violence of personality, or imprisonment in the hardness of itself, it proceeds to soften and make malleable its prison walls by corrupting them.
Ignorance is the prison of the soul, " the flesh." It is the outermost of being ; the waters in which the fires of life are submerged. These waters are made foul and corrupt by incessant activity of the inner fire of life that generates to destroy that which opposes its freedom.
The soul is a miniature universe and the ego is God of it, but he is uncrowned and dethroned by the circumstances of his own creation, which re- turn upon him as the rising sun returns to waken a sleeping world.