A Textbook of TheosophyLeadbeater, C. W. (Charles Webster)
Religion
A Textbook of Theosophy
Leadbeater, C. W. (Charles Webster)
Theosophy
The evolution lying before us is both of the life and of the form; for in
future rounds, while the egos will be steadily growing in power, wisdom and
love, the physical forms also will be more beautiful and more perfect than
they have ever yet been. We have in this world at the present time men at
widely differing stages of evolution, and it is clear that there are vast
hosts of savages who are far behind the great civilized races of the
world--so far behind that it is quite impossible that they can overtake
them. Later on in the course of our evolution a point will be reached at
which it is no longer possible for those undeveloped souls to advance side
by side with the others, so that it will be necessary that a division
should be made.
The proceeding is exactly analogous to the sorting out by a schoolmaster of
the boys in his class. During the school year he has to prepare his boys
for a certain examination, and by perhaps the middle of that school year he
knows quite well which of them will pass it. If he should have in his class
some who are hopelessly behind the rest, he might reasonably say to them
when the middle period was reached:
"It is quite useless for you to continue with your fellows, for the more
difficult lessons which I shall now have to give will be entirely
unintelligible to you. It is impossible that you can learn enough in the
time to pass the examination, so that the effort would only be a useless
strain for you, and meantime you would be a hindrance to the rest of the
class. It is therefore far better for you to give up striving after the
impossible, and to take up again the work of the lower class which you did
not do perfectly, and then to offer yourselves for this examination along
with next year's class, for what is now impossible for you will then be
easy."
This is in effect exactly what is said at a certain stage in our future
evolution, to the most backward egos. They drop out of this year's class
and come along with the next one. This is the "æonian condemnation" to
which reference was made a little while ago. It is computed that about
two-fifths of humanity will drop out of the class in this way, leaving the
remaining three-fifths to go on with far greater rapidity to the glorious
destinies which lie before them.
Chapter X
THE RESULT OF THEOSOPHICAL STUDY
"Members of the Theosophical Society study these truths and Theosophists
endeavour to live them." What manner of man then is the true Theosophist in
consequence of his knowledge? What is the result in his daily life of all
this study?
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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