To deal with _kama loka_ compels us to deal also with the fourth
principle in the classification of man’s constitution, and arouses
a conflict with modern ideas and education on the subject of the
desires and passions. It is generally supposed that the desires and
passions are inherent tendencies in the individual, and they have
an altogether unreal and misty appearance for the ordinary student.
But in this system of philosophy they are not merely inherent in the
individual nor are they due to the body _per se_. While the man is
living in the world the desires and passions—the principle _kama_—have
no separate life apart from the astral and inner man, being, so to
say, diffused throughout his being. But as they coalesce with the
astral body after death and thus form an entity with its own term of
life, though without soul, very important questions arise. During
mortal life the desires and passions are guided by the mind and soul;
after death they work without guidance from the former master; while
we live we are responsible for them and their effects, and when we
have left this life we are still responsible, although they go on
working and making effects on others while they last as the sort of
entity I have described, and without our direct guidance. In this is
seen the continuance of responsibility. They are a portion of the
_skandhas_—well known in eastern philosophy—which are the aggregates
that make up the man. The body includes one set of the _skandhas_, the
astral man another, the _kama_ principle is another set, and still
others pertain to other parts. In _kama_ are the really active and
important ones which control rebirths and lead to all the varieties of
life and circumstance upon each rebirth. They are being made from day
to day under the law that every thought combines instantly with one of
the elemental forces of nature, becoming to that extent an entity which
will endure in accordance with the strength of the thought as it leaves
the brain, and all of these are inseparably connected with the being
who evolved them. There is no way of escaping; all we can do is to have
thoughts of good quality, for the highest of the Masters themselves are
not exempt from this law, but they “people their current in space”
with entities powerful for good alone.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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