the problem of sex:

 

! ! ! = WARNING = ! ! !

worldserviceworld is for seekers after methods to world service by "everyday people" for everyday "livingry" application. This knowledge developed into wisdom is only to be read, absorbed and applied for the betterment of the world.

If you are seeking self-aggrandisement, CEASE NOW ! ! !

The Call
"Go to Prepare for the Time After the End." The call is for sane and normal men, women and children who can comprehend the situation, face what must be done, and then give their daily lives to expressing for the world the qualities of the citizens of the kingdom of Souls: love, knowledge to wisdom for the one human race, non-critical of another, non-separativeness and freedom from hatreds and partisan, creedal beliefs.

When such m-w-c can be gathered together in large numbers on the mental/conscious thought & astral/desire/emotional planes (and they are gathering/activating rapidly) we shall have the fulfilment of "On earth peace, good will toward men[-women-children].

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Sex Data 2.3

As these fundamental facts are grasped, and man begins to appreciate his/her position as Creator, the entire aspect of the sex question will also change; and emphasis will be laid upon the laws of mental creation, on the formulation of thought-forms in a scientific manner, and the dense physical aspect of creation will be in abeyance. When this is so, then will man be coming into his/her divine right, and the human kingdom be fulfilling its legitimate function. The sex aspect_ as at present expressing itself_ and the whole process of reproduction is one which man shares with the animal kingdom, and is based upon his/her animal instincts, and his/her dense physical nature, which is not a principle. When he/she is totally emancipated from the animal kingdom, and the third and fourth kingdoms stand distinct from each other, then the sex nature, and the organs of reproduction will be viewed by the average man in a very different manner than at present. Creation will eventually be the result of thought impulses and not desire impulses; the process will be then (once the initial impulse on the mental plane has been given), as normal, as safe, and as unconscious as the act of breathing is now. When this is so (and the time is a long way ahead), physical reproduction will still continue, but the physical form will be spoken of in terms of concretion and of energy, and the emphasis will be laid upon that which is to be embodied. This stage will be entered upon when the functions of the etheric body are scientifically grasped and understood and the laws of creative thought are a matter of public knowledge and discussion; it will coincide with a period wherein the animal kingdom will again be under manasic impression, and individualisation will again be permitted.

It will be generally recognised at that time that Spirit-matter are two aspects of the one Unity, and the present terminology of Spirit, and material substance, will have given place to the broader concept of negative and positive energy as the two aspects of the One Energy. All phenomena will then be expressed in force terms, and the sex question_ or the union of the male and female, the negative and the positive, on the physical plane_ will be redeemed and purified.

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Sex Data 2.4

Let the disciple/noo transfer the fire from the lower triangle to the higher, and preserve that which is created through the fire of the midway point.

This means, literally, the control by the initiate of the sex impulse, as usually understood, and the transference of the fire which now normally vitalises the generative organs to the throat centre, thus leading to creation upon the mental plane through the agency of mind. That which is to be created must then be nourished and sustained by the love energy of nature issuing from the heart centre.

The lower triangle referred to is:_

1. The solar plexus.
2. The base of the spine.
3. The generative organs.


Whilst the higher one is, as pointed out:_

1. The head.
2. The throat
3. The heart.


This might be interpreted by the superficial reader as an injunction to the celibate life, and the pledging of the applicant to abstain from all physical manifestation of the sex impulse. This is not so. Many initiates have attained their objective when duly and wisely participating in the marriage relation. An initiate cultivates a peculiar attitude of mind, wherein there is a recognition that all forms of manifestation are divine, and that the physical plane is as much a form of divine expression as any of the higher planes. He/She realises that the lowest manifestation of divinity must be under the conscious control of that indwelling divinity, and that all acts of every kind should be regulated by the endeavour to fulfil every duty and obligation, to control every action and deed, and to utilise the physical vehicle so that the group may be thereby benefited and aided in its spiritual progress, and the law perfectly fulfilled.

That it may be advisable, at certain stages, for a man to perfect control along any particular line through a temporary abstention is not to be denied, but that is a means to an end, and will be succeeded by stages when_ the control having been gained_ the man demonstrates perfectly through the medium of the physical body, the attributes of divinity, and every centre will be normally and wisely used, and, thus race purposes furthered.

Initiates and Masters, in many cases marry, and normally perform their duties as husbands, wives, and householders, but all is controlled and regulated by purpose and intention, and none is carried away by passion or desire. In the perfect man upon the physical plane, all the centres are under complete control, and their energy is legitimately used; the spiritual will of the divine inner God is the main factor, and there will be a unity of effort shown on all the planes through all the centres for the greatest good of the greatest number.

This point has been touched upon because so many students go astray upon these matters, and cultivate either an attitude of mind which results in the complete atrophying of the entire normal physical nature, or indulge in an orgy of license under the specious plea of "stimulating the centres," and thus furthering astral development. The true initiate should be known by his/her wise and sanctified normality, by his/her steady conformity to that which is best for the group as emphasised by the group laws of the land, by his/her control and his/her refraining from excess of any kind, and by the example he/she sets to his/her environing associates of spiritual living and moral rectitude, coupled with the discipline of his/her life.

Sex emotions, covering a very large range of feeling, ranging from the suppressed sex emotion which is now beginning to be studied by our psychologists to the unclean criminal emotion that finds its expression in violent orgies and license.

Under all these heads many points may be gathered, but we write not letters on healing, but letters on meditation, so we must not further enlarge.

In the forms used in these three cases attention will be paid to the cause of the trouble, to the plane on which it originates, and to the effects on the lower bodies or body. In apportioning forms different aims will be in view. Where, for instance, the trouble is based on suppressed emotion, the effect of the form (when rightly followed) will be to transmute the emotion and turn it upward. When, by right use, the emotional body is cleared of the emotional congestion, the life-giving forces of the Ego, and of the pranic life everywhere available, will be set free. They can then circulate with facility, tuning up the entire system and cleansing all organs that were suffering from the inner congestion.

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Sex Data 2.5

Freedom from attachment is brought about as the fires of desire are overcome, and though the sacral centre is depicted as having specific relation to the sex nature, yet that sex nature (as it expresses itself on the physical plane) is symbolic of any attachment between the soul and any object of desire other than the spirit.

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Sex Data 2.6

It has been interesting to note the spread of hyperthyroidism at this time, and various troubles connected with the thyroid gland. May not these conditions be a substantiation of the Oriental theory? Many people from force of circumstances and strained economic conditions are leading an abnormal sex life, and are celibate. Others, from what may be a mistaken idea of spiritual demands, reject the normal marriage state, and pledge themselves to a life of celibacy. Owing to these conditions the force is raised to the centre which is its goal, and reaches the throat. The whole condition being abnormal and the man being as yet emotionally centred, and the mental equipment (so necessary in true creative work) being relatively mediocre, there is no ability to use this creative power, and there ensues an over-stimulation of the thyroid gland. Several such cases have been noted by us and seem to substantiate this position. This is one direction in which investigation and use of the scientific method of massing evidence to prove or disprove an hypothesis would appear to be capable of application. In the aggregate of cases and of testimony, light on this matter may appear. When the transfer is normal and not premature the outcome is along the line of recognised creative work, literature, the drama, music and the arts in general.

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Sex Data 2.7

As these fundamental facts are grasped, and man begins to appreciate his/her position as Creator, the entire aspect of the sex question will also change; and emphasis will be laid upon the laws of mental creation, on the formulation of thought-forms in a scientific manner, and the dense physical aspect of creation will be in abeyance. When this is so, then will man be coming into his/her divine right, and the human kingdom be fulfilling its legitimate function. The sex aspect_ as at present expressing itself_ and the whole process of reproduction is one which man shares with the animal kingdom, and is based upon his/her animal instincts, and his/her dense physical nature, which is not a principle. When he/she is totally emancipated from the animal kingdom, and the third and fourth kingdoms stand distinct from each other, then the sex nature, and the organs of reproduction will be viewed by the average man in a very different manner than at present. Creation will eventually be the result of thought impulses and not desire impulses; the process will be then (once the initial impulse on the mental plane has been given), as normal, as safe, and as unconscious as the act of breathing is now. When this is so (and the time is a long way ahead), physical reproduction will still continue, but the physical form will be spoken of in terms of concretion and of energy, and the emphasis will be laid upon that which is to be embodied. This stage will be entered upon when the functions of the etheric body are scientifically grasped and understood and the laws of creative thought are a matter of public knowledge and discussion; it will coincide with a period wherein the animal kingdom will again be under manasic impression, and individualisation will again be permitted.

It will be generally recognised at that time that Spirit-matter are two aspects of the one Unity, and the present terminology of Spirit, and material substance, will have given place to the broader concept of negative and positive energy as the two aspects of the One Energy. All phenomena will then be expressed in force terms, and the sex question_ or the union of the male and female, the negative and the positive, on the physical plane_ will be redeemed and purified.

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Sex Data 2.8

The present ideas anent sex must be transmuted and raised from the existing lower connotation to its true significance. Sex_ in the three worlds_ has to do with the work of the lunar Pitris and the solar Lords. It signifies essentially the form-building work in substance, and its energising by the spiritual aspect. It signifies the elevation of the material aspect through the influence of Spirit as the two together perform their legitimate function in co-operation and thus_ by their mutual union and blending_ produce the Son in all His glory. This method of interpreting it is equally true of all the Existences manifesting on any plane, systemic and cosmic. Certain factors enter into the thought of sex which might be enumerated as follows:

a. Mutual attraction,
b. Complementary suitability,
c. Instinctual appeal,
d. Approach, and recognised co-operation,
e. Union,
f. The next stage is the temporary importance of the material aspect, that of the Mother, the feminine aspect,
g. The withdrawal into a temporary retirement of the Father,
h. The work of creating the Son,
i. The evolution and growth of the Son, both materially and in consciousness,
j. Emancipation of the Son from his \ her Mother [/matter], or / the liberation of the soul at maturity from matter,
k. Recognition by the Son of the Father and his \ her return to that Father,

The final result of all these successive stages being that all the three aspects have performed their functions (their dharma) on the physical plane and all three have demonstrated certain types of energy.

The Father aspect manifests in giving the initial impulse or the positive electrical demonstration which is the germ of the created Son, and Whose Life is embodied in the Son. The psyientific significance of the words of the Christ in answer to the cry "Lord, show us the Father " is little appreciated. "He that has seen Me has seen the Father, for I and my Father are One," He said.

The Mother [/matter], or the negative aspect, builds and nourishes, guards and cherishes the Son through the ante-natal, and the infant stages, and stands around Him during later stages, giving of the energy of Her own body and activity in ministry to His need.

The Son, the combined energy of Father and of Mother [/matter], embodies both types and all the dual sets of qualities, but has a character all His Own, an essence which is His peculiar nature, and an energy which leads Him to fulfil His Own ends and projects, and which will eventually cause Him to repeat the process of producing,_

1. Conception,
2. Creation,
3. Conscious growth,


as did His Father.

When we reach the mystery of Fire, we are concerned with that mysterious extra-systemic energy which is the basis of both the activity of Mother [/matter] and the Life of the Son. The Son in very deed "becomes His Mother [/matter]'s husband [group-thinking, positive pole. wsw]," as say the ancient Scriptures. This is but an enigmatical phrase unless interpreted in terms of the combination of energy. Only when the Son has reached maturity and knows Himself as essentially the same as the Father can He consciously perform His Father’s function, and produce and perpetuate that which is needed for the sustaining of cosmic generation.

The electricity of substance, the electricity of form, and the electricity of Life itself must blend and meet before the true Man (whether Logos, or human being) realises him/herself as creator. Man at this stage knows somewhat of the electricity of substance, and is coming to the belief as to the electricity of form (even though as yet he/she calls it magnetism) but as yet he/she knows nought of the electrical reality of life itself. Only when the "jewel in the Lotus" is about to be revealed, or the third circle of petals is about to open up, does the initiate begin to have a realisation of the true meaning of the word "life" or spirit. The consciousness has to be fully awakened before he/she can ever understand that great energising something of which the other types of energy are but expressions.

There are only two more points to be considered in connection with the petals and initiation.

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Sex Data 2.9

In the mystery of the sea and the secret of its psyientific "drying up" or absorption, will be revealed eventually the significance underlying:
a. The sex impulse, macrocosmically and microcosmically interpreted.
b. The cessation of desire.
c. The direction of fire to the throat centre instead of to the generative organs.
d. Pralaya and obscuration.
e. The meaning of the words "There shall be no more sea" found in the Christian Bible.

When meditating upon these thoughts, students will find it well to bear in mind the fact that Neptune is one of the major or synthesising planets, that it is an "absorbing" or "abstracting" planet, and that it is connected with the process whereby eventual perfection is demonstrated. The Son is made perfect, and the cosmic incarnation is brought to a close.

There is again a very close esoteric connection between the fact lying behind the Biblical words "the Spirit of God moved upon the face of the waters," and the ordered lawful activity of the Great Mother [Beloved of the Father] as She performs Her work of body-building under the impulse of desire. The true relation between the astral plane and the physical plane will only become apparent as students carefully bear in mind that the astral plane of the solar system is the sixth subplane of the cosmic physical plane, and constitutes the sumtotal of the liquid substance of the logoic physical body. When this is realised, the work of the deva essence takes due place; the factor of desire, or of astral motion, and its reflex action upon the physical body via the sixth subplane will become apparent, and the Great Mother will be seen actively engaged, under the influence of desire, in the work of building, nourishing, and producing that warmth and moisture which make manifestation possible. The Mother is the greatest of the devas, and closely linked with the devas of the waters, for moisture of some kind or another is an essential to all life.

The sixth principle, therefore, or the love aspect (the Christ principle), and the sixth plane, are connected; there is an interplay of energy between the fourth cosmic ether, or buddhic energy, and the sixth plane, or astral energy. The devas on both these planes belong essentially to groups over which Neptunian influence presides, hence the astral plane can, and eventually will, directly reflect the buddhic.

The greater building devas on the second plane of the solar system, the monadic plane or the second cosmic ether, direct the energies of the manipulating devas of the fourth cosmic ether, the buddhic plane.

The manipulating devas of the fourth cosmic ether will, in due course of evolution, work out the plan in objective perfection through the medium of the living substance of the lesser devas of the liquid or astral plane. When they have done this two results will be seen: first, the astral plane will perfectly reflect the buddhic plane and, secondly, the result of that will be that the physical plane will produce the exact vehicle needed for microcosmic or macrocosmic expression through the force of water, or desire.

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Sex 3.0.

The Law of Sex.

This is the term applied to the force which brings about the physical merging of the two poles in connection with the animal kingdom, and of man, viewing him/her as responsive to the call of his/her animal nature. It concerns itself with the due guarding of the form in this particular cycle and its perpetuation. It is only powerful during the period of the duality of the sexes and their separation and, in the case of man, will be offset by a higher expression of the law when man is again androgynous. It is the law of marriage, and finds some aspects of its manifestation not only in marriage of man and animals in the physical sense, but in the "psyientific marriage" of

a. The Soul and the Spirit.
b. The Son with his/her Mother (or the Soul with the physical substance).
c. The negative [receptive pole, wsw] planetary lives with the positive ones earlier pointed out.
d. The systemic marriage, or the merging of the two final planetary schemes after their absorption of the other forces.
e. The cosmic marriage, or the merging of our solar system with its opposite cosmic pole, another constellation. The cosmic marriage of stars and Systems is the cause of the occasional irregular flaring-up or intensification of suns and their increased luminosity which is sometimes seen, and which has frequently been the subject of discussion.

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Sex 4.0.

The problem of magnetism is closely connected with the problem of sex. In the psyientific study of the dissemination of the seed life and the germs of the vegetable kingdom, and in the understanding of the part played therein by those miraculously developed organisms,_ the ants and bees_ and later in the investigation of the work of the etheric builders, the elves and fairies, by those with awakened vision will come a new light upon sex and upon the function it serves in the interrelation of lives and the creation of forms. With this aspect of this deeply esoteric truth we cannot here deal, for it is the effect of activity in the solar lives of the solar system, and with these we cannot concern ourselves. It is not possible to handle the subject in such a way as to make it of constructive value to the average reader. What is not of immediate esoteric value at this time of world urgency may well be relegated to a later time.

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Sex 5.0.

The Problem of Sex

We have stated that the incoming seventh ray plays through the planetary sacral centre, and then through the sacral centre of every human being. Because of this, we can look for the anticipated developments in that human function which we designate the sex function. We shall see consequent changes in the attitude of man towards this most difficult problem. In speaking on the subject of sex, and in outlining what it is possible to say at this time, we seek to be as simple as we can, and to express our thoughts in such a way that something constructive may eventuate, and a note may be struck which will sound forth clearly in the present welter of discordant sounds, of conflicting views, and of varying ideas.

It is obvious that the matter is a difficult one to approach. So why is it so difficult? In the last analysis, we shall find that the difficulty is based on the prejudices in men's minds, and upon their inner assurance that their particular point of view is necessarily the right one because they themselves live and act in accordance with it, and it suffices for them; it is based on the fact that sex is one of the fundamental primeval urges, one of the substantial instincts, and is consequently the dominating factor in the animal side of man's nature; it is based upon the excessive intimacy of the subject,_ an intimacy which was transmuted into an indecent secret during the periods wherein the race succumbed to an excessive puritanism and prostituted a natural function into a prurient mystery. This intimacy relating to the subject of sex caused it to be regarded as an unmentionable episode, and as a topic to be shunned by decent people, instead of being regarded as an instinctual and natural process,_ as instinctual and as necessary as the functions of eating and drinking. It is a function, however, which has not been reduced to rhythm in the daily life and regarded as one to be followed and satisfied only when need arises and right demands. Herein lies a great distinction and a clue is offered to the problem.

Again, the difficulty of the problem can be found in the widely diverse attitudes of men's minds to the subject. These attitudes range all the way from an ill-regulated promiscuity to a monogamy which has worked out into a cruel imposition and restraint upon women, and an unbridled license on the part of men. Attendant upon these difficulties, and growing out of these wrong attitudes, the legalities and the illegalities, the license and the restraints, have produced points of infection (if we may so call them) in our civilisation. Because of them, we find a lax morality which is based on bewilderment, [world] red light" districts which are but an unhappy compromise with vicious tendencies and unsatisfied desires, divorce courts which devastate the life of the family and in time undermine the national life (of which each family unit should be a wholesome part), and the steady growth of disease as the result of the prevalent promiscuity and the many illicit relations. There is also a psychological factor to be found, of real importance. This fact is the militancy expressed by the many groups of people who are seeking to impose their own ideas and their peculiar solution of the problem upon their fellowmen.

Behind all these results of an age-long wrong attitude to the sex function lie two major evils, or rather two major effects of man's actions, mental and physical. These are of dire significance. There is, first of all, the development within man's consciousness of those complexes, those psychoses and psychological disruptions and inhibitions, which have so seriously undermined the health and the serenity of hundreds and thousands of men. There is, secondly, the threatening of the very life of humanity itself, as it is embodied in the family unit and family life. On the one hand, you have promiscuity and over-indulgence in sex relations, which are resulting (and have always resulted) in over-population and an over-production of human beings. On the other hand, you have an enforced sterility which_ though in many ways the lesser of the two evils_ is eventually dangerous. This sterility is rapidly on the increase. It leads finally to physical conditions which are undesirable. Nevertheless, at this time, it is the lesser of the two evils. Two points might incidentally be noted here. Out of the first of these evils, and as a result of over-production, we have brought about an economic situation of such a drastic and serious nature that the very peace and stability of the world are threatened; out of the second, we should have a gradual disappearance of humanity itself, if enforced sterility should become a universal practice. This would lead to the consequent dominance of the animal world and an immense increase of animal life, and we should have a period of retrogression and not of progress.

In dealing with this subject of sex we shall have to generalise, and the exceptions to the rules laid down and to the suggested classifications will, of course, be many. We are dealing with the subject as a whole, and our topic therefore is the menace of the present attitude, the need for a fuller understanding, and the importance of a re-arrangement of men's ideas on this vital matter. The attitude of the unthinking savage to the sex life, and the attitude of the mentally polarised and spiritually oriented initiate to the same subject, may seem so widely dissimilar that on the surface there may appear no point of resemblance; yet basically both of these attitudes are nearer to each other and to the reality than is that of the average man today. The one is controlled by the rhythm of his/her animal nature, and knows no more of the evil side and of the vile promiscuity of the civilised man than does the animal in its wild state; the other lives his/her life in a controlled fashion, governing through the power of the mind, and animated by desire for the good of humanity. In between these two approaching extremes, we have the many points of view, the many dissimilar ideas, the many customs, the many types of relation (legitimate and illegitimate), the many animal and psychological reactions, the many forms of marriage, and the many perversions of a natural process which distinguish moder

It is therefore obvious_ is it not?_ that it is no part of our service to the readers of this book to enter into a detailed analysis of the marriage customs of the ages, past and present. It is not our work to enlarge in detail upon the mistakes, the evil consequences, the many types of perversion, and the sadistic cruelties which have grown out of man's misuse of the natural processes and of his/her mate, nor to elucidate his/her foolish misunderstanding of the s of Attraction and Repulsion. It would serve no useful purpose if we put forth, in this brief discussion of an immense subject, any of the theories which men have formulated in their search for a solution. Their name is legion. All have in them a measure of the truth. Most of them express the depths of man's ignorance, and they can be studied at any time by any student who has the time to read, the intelligence to see clearly and without prejudice, and the money to purchase the needed literature.in all parts of the world. These again vary in the different civilisations and under the influence of the differing climatic conditions.

We cannot and we will not touch upon the medical and physiological aspect of vice, whether it be the vice of promiscuity or the vice of an unhappy marriage. We can best serve you at this time by pointing out the laws which should govern the life of man, particularly where sex is concerned, and by indicating_ as far as we can and dare_ why and how the present peculiar and unique conditions have been brought about. We may also be able to make certain suggestions which, when duly considered, may help to clear from the mind those false and illusory views which prevent man from seeing truly, and we may thus help him/her to find the golden thread of light which will lead him/her to his/her solution in due time.

One thing we will say, sad though it may seem to you to be. There is no immediate solution of the problem of sex with which we are at this time confronted. For ages men have misused and wrongly employed a God-given function; they have prostituted their birthright, and through their laxity and license, and through their lack of control, they have inaugurated an era of disease, both mental and physical, of wrong attitudes and illusory relations which it will take several centuries to eradicate; they have also brought too rapidly into incarnation myriads of human beings who were not yet ready for the experience of this incarnation, and who needed longer interludes between births wherein to assimilate experience. Those souls who are unevolved come into incarnation with rapidity; but older souls need longer periods wherein to garner the fruits of experience. They are however open to the magnetic attractive power of those who are alive on the physical plane, and it is these souls who can be brought prematurely into incarnation. The process is under law, but the unevolved progress under group law as do the animals, whilst the more evolved are susceptible to the pull of human units, and the evolved come into incarnation under the Law of Service, and through the deliberate choice of their conscious souls.

We shall divide what we have to say into four parts, for the sake of clarity and rapid reference:

1. Definitions of sex, of virtue and of vice.
2. Sex in the [k]New Age.
3. Some suggestions for the present moment.
4. Sex and the life of disciple/nooship.


We deal not with history nor with the details of raycial evolution. These are necessarily all connected with the problem of sex, but are too vast in their implications for our present purposes. As we said before, we deal not with the physiological aspects of sex, nor with the diseases incident upon the misuse of the function, nor shall we deal with the subject of sterility, except as it enters into our consideration of modern man. We cannot touch upon the quarrels of the various schools of thought, for we are not writing from any specific angle, such as that of religion or of morality or of partisanship. The whole question is wider and bigger than any religious view or the moral affirmations of the little minds. What is morality in one country or in one specific relation can be quite the reverse in another. What is deemed legal in one part of the world is found illegal in another. What constitutes a difficult problem under one climatic condition presents totally different possibilities under another. Polygamy, promiscuity and monogamy have been and are cyclically dominant in different parts of the world, down through the ages, and are to be found functioning simultaneously on the earth today. Each has been, or is, in turn right, legal and suitable, or wrong, illegal and unsuitable. Each of these forms of interpreting the sex relation has been the subject of attack or defence, of virtuous horror or of specious argument; each has been the common custom and the rightful method, according to the location, the tradition, training and attitude of the men who practiced it. In one part of the world, one woman may have many husbands; in another, one husband is legally entitled to four wives, if so he/she choose, and in the harem, compound, and the kraal such conditions are always to be found. In the West, a man has legally one wife, but through his promiscuity and his so-called "romantic" adventures, he really has as many as an African chieftain [STILL with slaves/concubines? wsw]; and today, women are little better.

We have enumerated the above conditions with no thought of criticism in our mind, but simply as a statement of fact, and in order to awaken in the average reader a realisation of a world-wide condition which is probably quite different to their ordinary surmise. We write not for the specialists, but for the average intelligent student who needs a world-wide picture of existing conditions.

It is divinely true that the trend of men's thoughts and desires is towards an established monogamy, but as yet this has never been universally achieved. If one faces this issue with courage and with truth, one will be forced to the conclusion that down the ages men have never been monogamists. Women have been more so in the past than men, but are perhaps less so now, as modern knowledge is inculcating modern methods of protection from the risk and pain of childbirth. Up till now, the act of bearing children has been regarded as deterrent and as a penalty for legal or illegal sex relations. Think of the horror unfolded in those words! Women, practicing the ancient trade of promiscuity, have of course always existed, but we are referring here to women in the home.

Will you believe us if we tell you that the world situation today where sex is concerned, is so critical and so serious that there is not a thinker to be found who can yet see the solution, or who can find_ no matter how clear his/her brain or erudite his/her mind_ the way out of the present impasse? The traditions of customs and of practices, with their inevitable consequences and long established tenure, serve to bewilder the clearest minds. The physical results alone of sexual intercourse, carried on within or without the legalised marriage relation, have produced not only the world of every-day human life, but much of the disease, the insanity, the evil tendencies, and the perverted impulses which today fill our hospitals, our homes for neurotics, our sanatoriums, our prisons and our lunatic asylums.

Our youth [12-29], especially the idealistic types and the clear-thinking boys and girls, find themselves faced with a situation which defies their best efforts. They do not know what to think or what to believe. They look into, or form part of, homes which are sanctified by legal marriage, and find (on a large scale) nothing but unhappiness, legalised prostitution, ill-health, the seeking of illicit relations outside the home, neglected and unwanted children, the friction produced by wrong mating, divorce, and no answer to their many intelligent questions. They look then elsewhere, into the lives of those who have avoided the responsibility of marriage, and find naught but discontent, frequently a secret and hidden sex life, ill-health as a result of the frustration of the natural instincts, psychological conditions of the worst kind, sometimes illegitimate children, sexual perversions, and a growing tendency towards what is called homosexuality. They are overwhelmed by complete bewilderment and the failure to find an answer to their questions. They ask the worldly-minded for a solution and for help, and get no clear reply, no sound philosophy and no fundamental instruction. They may be offered sound common sense, and the injunction to avoid excesses and those conditions which would impair their health or lay on them the burden of straitened economic conditions. The moralities of the past may be pointed out to them, and they may be warned of the results which inevitably follow when the laws of nature are broken and the physical body is prostituted to ill-regulated desire. They may have the virtues of "straight living" eulogised to them, and even the fact that they are sons of God may be emphasized to them. All this is good and right and useful. But no true solution is offered, and no light is thrown upon their problem, and their confusion remains unrelieved. They may perhaps turn to the religiously minded people and seek out the orthodox churchman. They may be told to be good; the example of the saints may be cited to them; they may find themselves deluged in a flood of puritanical injunctions, in righteous platitudes, and with unsatisfying explanations, based often on personal prejudice and predilection. But seldom is a clear note sounded, and seldom is it possible to do more than enunciate the great Mosaic law, "Thou shalt not..." To the bulk of the young and seeking enquirers of the present generation the fact that God says thus and so, or the Bible ordains this, that or the other, does not satisfy their longing to know the reason why. The hope of an ultimate heaven, where self-discipline, self-control and sexual abstinence will receive a just reward, seems too far away to offset the temptations of the outer environing world and the insistent urges arising within the man him/herself.

That many do withstand the "temptations of the flesh" is indeed wonderfully true. That there are men and women everywhere who pass through life clean and uncontaminated is equally and wonderfully a fact. That there are advanced souls whose life is divorced from the animal nature and whose minds control their daily acts is the glory of humanity. But many of them, living in another world of thought and interest, are not tempted as are the more animally inclined of the sons/daughters of men. There are, again, of course, those who refrain from wrong doing because they fear the results, either today in the physical body or hereafter in the other world of penalty. But which of all these people, even the most good and saintly, can speak with real wisdom and understanding of this universal problem? Which of them can see the way out for humanity at present? Which of them understands the reason for all the distress, sin and wickedness which have grown up around the sex relation? Which of them really comprehends the true significance of the sex life, its place in the great scheme of things, and the reason for the relation between the sexes? Which of them can say with true vision what the next evolutionary step will be, whither we are going, and what will be the next development?

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Sex 5.1

Definitions of Sex, of Virtue and of Vice

Cosmically speaking,

• Sex is essentially an expression of duality, and of the separation of a unity into two aspects or halves. These we can call spirit and matter, male and female, positive and negative; and they are in the nature of a stage upon the evolutionary ladder towards a final unity or homo-sexuality which has no relation to that perversion which is, today and inaccurately, called "homosexuality". This latter manifestation is rampant at this time in a mental and modern conception of the phenomenon, but it is rare indeed to find a person who truly combines within him/herself the two sexes, and is,_ physiologically and mentally_ entirely "self-satisfying, self-sustaining and self-propagating". Down the ages, here and there, we find the true homo-sexual emerging as a guarantee of a distant raycial and evolutionary achievement, when the world cycle will have been run and the two separated halves will again be merged in their essential unity. In the above phraseology we do not refer to any doctrine of twin souls, or to any perversion of reality, as ordinarily understood today. We refer to the divine Hermaphrodite, to the true androgynous man, and to the perfected human being. But the word has been distorted from its true significance and applies in nine cases out of ten (nay, in ninety-nine cases out of one hundred) to a type of mental perversion, to a distorted attitude of mind which results often in physical practices and reactions which are_ in their manifestation_ so old that their very antiquity gives the lie to the idea that this attitude marks a step forward on the path of progress. It marks indeed a point of retrogression, the swinging back into an ancient rhythm, and the resumption of ancient practices.
  
  These perversions are ever found when a civilisation is crumbling and the old order is changing into a new. Why should this be? It is due to the fact that the newer impulses pouring into the old, and the impact of the new forces upon humanity, awaken in man a desire for that which is, for him/her, a new and untried field of expression, and for that which is unusual and oft abnormal. Weak minds then succumb to the impulse, or strong experimenting souls fall victim to their own lower natures, and investigate in unlawful directions. You have, then, under these new energies, a definite progress forward into new and untried spiritual realms, but at the same time, you find an experimenting in the realm of physical desire which is not for humanity the line of progress.
  
  As the world of forms responds cyclically to the inflow of the higher energies, their effect is to stimulate all parts and aspects of the form life, and this stimulation will produce results that are bad as well as good. Evil will temporarily emerge as well as lasting righteousness. If the effect of the impact of these energies is to produce material reactions, and if man then lays the emphasis of his/her interest upon that which is material, then the form nature becomes dominant, and not the divine. If energy is prostituted to material ends, such as the expression of physical plane sexual relations for purely commercial objectives, then evil is the result. But it must be remembered that the same divine energy, when working in the realm of brotherly/sisterly love, for instance, would produce naught but good. Let us illustrate our point in two ways, both of which account for the present orgy of sexual expression and for the widespread interest in the subject.
  
  We live today in a period of the world's history wherein three events of major importance are taking place, mostly unrealised and unobserved by the majority of people.
  
  The seventh Ray of Law and Order is coming into manifestation; we are transitting into a new sign of the zodiac, and the "coming of Christ is imminent. These three great happenings are the cause of much of the present upheaval and chaos; at the same time they are responsible for the universal turning to spiritual realities which all true workers at this time recognise, and for the growth of understanding, of welfare movements and of the tendency to cooperation, of religious unity and of internationalism. Types of energy which have hitherto been latent are now becoming potent. The consequent world reaction is, in the initial stages, material in its manifestation; in its final stages, divine qualities will manifest and change history and civilisation. The interest being shown today in the so-called cosmic rays indicates a scientific recognition of the new incoming seventh ray energies. These rays, pouring through the sacral centre of the planetary etheric body, have necessarily an effect upon the sacral centres of humanity, and hence the sex life of mankind is temporarily over-stimulated, and hence also the present over-emphasis upon sex. But hence also (and this must be remembered) the keen impetus now being mentally expressed which will eventually result in man's thinking through to a solution of this problem of sex.
  
  The coming in of the Aquarian age also stimulates in man a spirit of universality and a tendency towards fusion. This can be seen working out in the present trend towards synthesis in business, in religion and in politics. It produces an urge towards union, and among other unions, towards religious understanding and tolerance. But these influences, playing upon the sensitive bodies of the undeveloped and the over-psychic, lead to a morbid tendency towards unions, legitimate and illegitimate; they produce an extreme aptitude to sexual intercourse in many directions, and to relations and fusions which are not along the intended or the evolutionary line, and which outrage oft the very laws of nature itself. Energy is an impersonal thing, and is dual in its effect,_ the effect varying according to the type of substance upon which it plays.
  
  The incoming seventh ray expresses the power to organise, the ability to integrate and to bring into synthetic relation the great pairs of opposites, and thus produce the new forms of spiritual manifestation. But it will also produce the new forms of what, from the standpoint of spirit, may be regarded as material evil. It is the great impulse which will bring into the light of day all that is to be found clothed with matter, and will thus eventually lead to the revelation of spirit and of the hidden glory, when that which has been revealed of the material form has been purified and sanctified. This it was to which Christ referred when He prophesied that, at the end of the age, the hidden things would be made plain, and secrets be shouted from the housetops.
  
  By means of this process of revelation, within the human family as well as elsewhere in nature, we shall have the development of the power of thought. This will come about through the development of the faculty of discrimination, which will offer choices to man, and thus develop a truer sense of values. False and true standards will emerge in man's consciousness and those choices will be made which will lay the foundation of the new order, which will inaugurate the new race, with its new laws and novel approaches, and so usher in the new religion of love and brother-sisterhood, and that period wherein the group and group-good will be the dominant note. Then separateness and hatreds will fade out and man will be merged in a true unity.
  
  The third factor under consideration, the coming of the Christ as it is called, must also be noted. Everywhere we find the spirit of expectancy, and the demand for a manifestation and a symbolic happening which we call by various names but which is usually referred to as the advent of Christ. This, as you know, may be an actual physical coming, as before in Palestine, or it may connote a definite overshadowing of His noos and lovers by the Great Lord of Life. This overshadowing will call forth a response from all those who are in any way spiritually awakened. Or again, the coming may take the form of a tremendous inflow of the Christ principle, the Christ life and love, working out through the human family. Perhaps all three possibilities may be found simultaneously on our planet very shortly. It is not for us to say. It is for us to be ready, and for us to work at preparing the world for that significant series of events. The immediate future will show. The point we seek to make, however, is that this inflow of the Christ spirit of love (whether it comes through a Person in bodily form or through His felt and realised Presence) will again be twofold in its effect.
  
  This is a hard saying for the unthinking and the illogical. Both the good and the evil m-w-c will be stimulated; both material desire and spiritual aspiration will be awakened and fostered. Facts prove the truth of the saying that a heavily fertilised garden and a carefully tended and watered plot of ground will produce its crop of weeds as well as flowers. Yet in this fact you have two reactions to the same sun, the same water, the same fertilising agency and the same care. The difference exists in the seeds found in the ground upon which these factors play. The inflow of love therefore will stimulate earthly love and earthly desire and animal lust; it will foster the urge to possess in the material sense, with all the evil consequent upon this attitude, and the resulting growth of sexual reactions, and the many expressions of an ill-regulated mechanism, responding to an impersonal force. But it will also produce the growth of brother/sisterly love and foster the development and the expression of group consciousness, of universal understanding; it will produce a new and powerful tendency to fusion, to at-one-ment and to synthesis. All this will be brought about through the medium of humanity and the Christ spirit. Steadily the love of Christ will be shed abroad in the earth, and its influence will grow stronger during the coming centuries, until at the end of the Aquarian age, and through the work of the seventh ray (bringing the pairs of opposites into closer cooperation), we can look for the "raising of Lazarus from the dead," and the emergence of humanity out of the tomb of matter. The hidden divinity will be revealed. Steadily all forms will be brought under the influence of the Christ spirit, and the consummation of love will be brought about.
  
  Owing to these three causes we have at this time a worldwide interest in sex, leading as a natural consequence to two things:
  
  First, to an outburst throughout the entire world, and primarily in our large centres of population, of an increase in sexual relations, but distinguished at this time by no corresponding increase in population. This is due to the modern understanding of birth control methods and secondly to the increased mental focussing or polarisation of the race, which leads to sterility or to a reduction in the size of the families raised.
  
  Second, to a reorganisation of the raycial ideas on marriage and on sexual relations. This is due to the breakdown of our present economic situation, to the widespread interest in medical hygiene (an interest hitherto confined to the specialists), to the general recognition of the varied marriage customs of the nations in the East and in the West, which has led to a general questioning, and also to the failure of the legal machine to safeguard the family unit and to interpret human relations in a satisfactory manner.
  
  Out of this universal interest and discussion we shall work towards a solution and an objective which exist as yet on purely abstract mental levels and in the world of ideas. Even the foremost thinkers of the race sense only vaguely and nebulously what these hidden ideals may be.
  
  The question at issue is not primarily a religious one, except in so far as social relations are basically divine relations. It is fundamental in its connotation, and when it is solved we shall see the establishment of equality between the sexes, the removal of those barriers which at present exist between men and women, and the safe-guarding of the family unit. This will involve therefore the protection of the child, so that he/she may be given those essentials to right physical growth and that true education which will lead to emotional unfoldment along sound lines, and a mental development which will enable him/her to serve his/her race, his/her time and his/her group to the best possible advantage. This has always been an ideal, but it has never yet been satisfactorily accomplished. The solving of the sexual problem will release the minds of men from an inhibition and an undue concern, and so produce a mental freedom which will admit of the inflow of new ideas and concepts. We shall discover that vice and virtue have no real reference to ability and inability to conform to man-made laws, but to man's attitude to him/herself and to his/her social relation with God and his/her fellowmen. Virtue is the manifestation in man of the spirit of cooperation with his/her brother/sisters, necessitating unselfishness, understanding and complete self-forgetfulness. Vice is the negation of this attitude. These two words signify in reality simply perfection and imperfection, conformity to a divine standard of brother-sisterhood or a failure to achieve that standard. Standards are shifting things and change with man's growth towards divinity. They vary also according to man's destiny as it is affected by his/her time and age, his/her nature and surroundings. They alter also according to the point of evolutionary development. The standard for attainment is not today what it was one thousand years ago, nor a thousand years hence will it be what it is today.
  
  Yet all periods of the world's history have not been as critical as today, for_ apart from the great cyclic opportunity to which we have earlier referred_ we have in humanity itself a unique attainment. For the first time in raycial history, we have the expression of a true human being, of man as he/she essentially is. We have the personality, integrated and functioning as a unit, and we have the mind and the emotional nature fused and blended, on the one hand with the physical body, and on the other with the soul. Also, the shift of emphasis is today away from the physical life to the mental life, and in an increasing number of cases to the spiritual life. There is therefore little real cause for depression, if what we have here noted is true. There is today, on a wide scale, a true "lifting up of the heart unto the Lord," and a steady turning of the eyes towards the world of spiritual values. Hence the present upheaval.
  
  Apart from the coming in of the new age, apart therefore from the inflow of the Christ spirit, with its transforming power and regenerating force, and apart from the cyclic return of the seventh ray energies, we have mankind in a condition where the response to the deeper spiritual energies and to the new opportunities is, for the first time, adequate and synthetic. Hence the increasing problem. Hence the great day of opportunity. Hence the wonder of the dawn which can be seen brightening in the east.
  
  We should like here to approach the problem of sex from another angle and point out that it is a basic symbol. A symbol, as we well know, is an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual reality. What is this inward reality? First of all, the reality of relationship. It is a relationship existing between the basic pairs of opposites, Father-Mother, spirit-matter; between positive and negative; between life and form, and between the great dualities which_ when brought together in the cosmic sense_ produce the manifested son of God, the cosmic Christ, the conscious sentient universe. Of this relation the Gospel story is a dramatic symbol, and the historical Christ is the guarantee of its truth and reality. Christ guarantees for us the reality of the inner significance and the true spiritual basis of all that is and ever shall be. Out of the relation of light and dark that which is invisible emerges into visibility, and we can see and know. Christ, as the light of the world, revealed that reality. Out of the darkness of time God spoke, and the Fatherhood of Deity was revealed.
  
  The drama of creation and the story of revelation are depicted for us, if we could but see truly and interpret our facts with spiritual exactitude, in the relation of the two sexes and in the fact of their intercourse with each other. When this relation is no longer purely physical but is a union of the two separated halves on all three planes,_ physical, emotional and mental_ then we shall see the solution of the sex problem and the restitution of the marriage relation to its intended position in the Mind of God. Today it is the marriage of two physical bodies. Sometimes it is the marriage also of the emotional natures of the two people concerned. Rarely indeed is it a marriage of minds as well. Sometimes it is the union of the physical body of one party, with the physical body of the other party left cold and uninterested and uninvolved, but with the emotional body attracted and participating. Sometimes the mental body is involved with the physical body, and the emotional nature left out. Seldom, very seldom, do we find the coordinated, cooperating fusion of all the three parts of the personality concerned in both parties to the union. When this is indeed found, then you have a true union, a real marriage, and a blending of the two in one.
  
  It is here that some of the schools of esoteric teaching have gone sadly astray. The false idea has crept into their presentation of truth that marriage of this kind is essential for spiritual liberation and that without it the soul remains in prison. They teach that through the marriage act, at-one-ment with the soul is brought about, and that there is no spiritual deliverance without this marriage. At-one-ment with the soul is an individual interior experience, resulting in an expansion of consciousness, so that the individual and specific becomes at-one with the general and universal. Behind the erroneous interpretation, however, lies truth.
  
  Where this true marriage and these ideal sexual relations on all three planes are found, the right conditions exist in which souls can be provided with the needed forms in which to incarnate. Sons of God can find forms in which to manifest on earth. According to the scope of the marriage contact (if so unusual a form of words can be used in this connection), so will be the type of human being attracted into incarnation. Where the parents are purely physical and emotional, so will be the nature of the child. Thus is the general average determined. Today we have a world of men which is rapidly reaching a high stage of development. We have therefore a dissatisfaction with the present views on marriage, preparatory to the enunciation of certain hidden principles which will eventually govern the relations between the sexes, and provide, as a consequence, the opportunity to men and women to furnish, through the creative act, the needed bodies for noos and initiates.
  
  Under the symbol of sex, you have also the reality of love itself expressing itself. Love in reality connotes a relation, but the word "love" (like the word "sex") is used with little thought and with no attention to its true meaning. Basically, love and sex are one and the same thing, for both express the meaning of the Law of Attraction. Love is sex, and sex is love, for in those two words the relation, the interplay and the union between God and His universe, between man and God, between a man and his/her own soul, and between men and women are equally depicted. The motive and the relation are emphasized. But the impelling result of that relation is creation and the manifestation of form through which divinity can express itself and come to be. Spirit and matter met together, and the manifested universe came into being. Love is ever productive, and the Law of Attraction is fruitful in results. Man and God came together under the same great Law, and the Christ was born,_ the guarantee of the divinity of humanity and the demonstration of the fact. Individual man and his/her soul are also attempting to come together, and when that event is consummated the Christ is born in the cave of the heart, and Christ is seen in the daily life with increasing power. Man therefore dies daily in order that Christ may be seen in all His glory. Of all these wonders, sex is the symbol.
  
  Again, in man him/herself the great drama of sex is enacted, and twice over in his/her body, within his/her personality, the process of union and fusion takes place. Let us briefly refer here to these two symbolic happenings, for the use of esoteric students, so that the great story of sex may be comprehended in its spiritual sense.
  
  Man, as you know, is the expression of energies. These energies galvanise the physical man into activity through the medium of certain force centres in the etheric body. These, for our immediate purposes, can be divided into three centres below the diaphragm and four above.
  
  These are:
  
  I. Below the diaphragm:
  1. The base of the spine.
  2. The sacral centre.
  3. The solar plexus.
  
  
  II. Above the diaphragm:
  1. The heart centre.
  2. The throat centre.
  3. The centre between the eyebrows.
  4. The head centre.
  
  
  We know that two fusions have to take place and, in these two we have two enactments of the symbolic sex process, and two symbolic events that externalise a spiritual happening and picture forth to man his/her spiritual goal and God's great objective in the evolutionary process.
  
  First, the energies below the diaphragm have to be lifted up and blended with those above the diaphragm. With the process and rules for so doing we cannot here deal, except in one case,_ the raising of the sacral energy to the throat centre, or the transmutation of the process of physical reproduction and of physical creation into that of the creativeness of the artist in some field of creative expression. Through the union of the energies of these two centres we shall come to that stage in our development wherein we shall produce the children of our skill and minds. Where, in other words, there is a true union of the higher and the lower energies, you will have the emergence of beauty in form, the enshrining of some aspect of truth in appropriate expression, and thus the enriching of the world. Where there is this synthesis, the true creative artist begins to function. The throat, the organ of the Word, expresses the life and manifests the glory and the reality behind. Such is the symbolism lying behind the teaching of the fusion of the lower energies with the higher, and of this, physical plane sex is a symbol. Mankind today is rapidly becoming more creative, for the transfusion of the energies is going on under the new impulses. As we develop the sense of purity in man, as the growth of the sense of responsibility is fostered, and as his/her love of beauty, of colour and of ideas proceeds, we shall have a rapid increase in the raising of the lower into union with the higher, and thereby the beautifying of the Temple of the Lord will be tremendously accelerated.
  
  In the coming Aquarian age this will go rapidly forward. The majority of people today live below the diaphragm, and their energies are turned outward into the material world and prostituted to material ends. In the coming centuries this will be corrected; their energies will be transmuted and purified, and man will begin to live above the diaphragm. They will then express the potencies of the loving heart, of the creative throat, and of the divinely ordered will of the head. Of this relation between the lower and the higher, physical plane sex is the symbol.
  
  But in the head of man him/herself is also to be found a marvelous symbolic happening. In that living organism is enacted that drama whereby the purely human being merges him/herself in divinity. The great final drama of the mystical union between God and man, and between the soul and the personality is there enacted.
  
  According to the Eastern philosophy, there are in the head of man two great energy centres. One of them, the centre between the eyebrows, blends and fuses the five types of energy which are transmitted to it and blended with it,_ the energy of the three centres below the diaphragm and of the throat and heart centres. The other, the head centre, is awakened through meditation, service and aspiration, and it is through this centre that the soul makes its contact with the personality. This head centre is the symbol of the spirit or positive masculine aspect, just as the centre between the eyebrows is the symbol of matter, of the negative feminine aspect. Connected with these force vortices are two physical plane organs, the pituitary body and the pineal gland. The first is negative and the second is positive. These two organs are the higher correspondences of the male and female organs of physical reproduction. As the soul becomes increasingly potent in the mental and emotional life of the aspirant, it pours in with greater power into the head centre. As the man works with his/her personality, purifying it and bending it to the service of the spiritual will, he/she automatically raises the energies of the centres in the body up to the centre between the eyebrows. Eventually the influence of each of the two centres increases and becomes wider and wider, until they make a contact with each other's vibratory or magnetic field, and instantly the light flashes out. Father-spirit and mother-matter unite and are at-one and the Christ [/ Will-to-Good] is born. "Except a man [-w-c] be born again, he/she cannot see the kingdom of God," said the Christ. This is the second birth, and from that moment vision comes with increasing power.
  
  This is again the great drama of sex, re-enacted in man. Thus in his/her personal life he/she three times knows the meaning of union, of sex:
  
  1. In the physical plane sex, or his relation to his opposite, the woman, resulting in the reproduction of the species.
  
  2. In the union of the lower energies with the higher, resulting in the creative work.
  
  3. In the union within the head of the energies of the personality with those of the soul, resulting in the birth of the Christ.
  
  Great is the glory of man and wonderful are the divine functions which he/she embodies. Through the passage of time, the race has been brought to the point where man is beginning to raise the lower energies into the higher centres, and it is this transition which is causing much of the trouble in the world today. Many men everywhere are becoming politically, religiously, scientifically, or artistically creative, and the impact of their mental energy and of their plans and ideas is making itself felt competitively. Until the idea of brother-sisterhood dominates the race, we shall see these powers prostituted to personal ends and ambitions, and to consequent disaster, just as we have seen the power of sex prostituted to personal satisfaction and selfishness and consequent disaster. Some few, however, are raising their energies higher still and translating them into terms of the heavenly world. The Christ is being born today in many a human being, and increasingly will the sons / daughters of God appear in their true nature to take over the guidance of humanity in the New Age.
  
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  Sex 5.2
  
  Sex in the New Age
  
  Prophecy is ever a dangerous thing, but a forecast, a drawing out of present general tendencies, is often possible.
  
  During the next two hundred years the old influences under which we have been living will gradually die out, and the new potencies will make their presence felt. Three things we are told will characterise the coming Aquarian age, and they will be made possible through the influence of the three planets governing the three decanates of this sign. First, we shall have the activity of Saturn, producing a dividing of the ways and a proffering of opportunity to those who can avail themselves of it. We shall have, therefore, a period of discipline and a cycle wherein choices will be made, and through these discriminating decisions humanity will enter into its birthright. This influence is now being strongly felt.
  
  Then, later, we shall have, through the influence of Mercury in the second decanate, the pouring in of light, of mental and spiritual illumination, and a truer interpretation of the teaching of the Lodge of Messengers. The work of the first decanate will enable many to make those choices and efforts which will enable them to raise the lower energies into the higher centres, and to transfer the focus of their attention from below to above the diaphragm. The work of the second decanate will enable those who are thus ready to fuse the personality and the soul, and thus, as we earlier pointed out, the light will shine forth and Christ will be born within them.
  
  During the third decanate we shall see the rule of Brotherhood inaugurated, and Venus controlling by intelligent love; the group and not the individual will be the important unit, and unselfishness and cooperation will steadily take the place of separativeness and competition.
  
  In no department of life will these coming great changes show more potently than in the attitude of man towards sex, and in the readjustment of the marriage relationship. This new attitude will gradually come about as the slowly developing science of psychology comes into its own. As man comes to understand his/her own threefold nature, and as the nature of consciousness and the depth of his/her own subconscious life are more truly grasped, there will take place, gradually and automatically, a change in the attitude of men towards women and of women towards their destiny. This needed change will not be the result of legal measures, or of decisions by the people's representatives to meet the disasters of the hour; these changes will come slowly, as the result of the intelligent interest of the next three generations. The young people now coming into incarnation, and those who will come during the next century, will prove themselves well equipped to handle this problem of sex, because they can see more clearly than the older generation, and will think in wider and larger terms than is common today. They will be more group-conscious and less individualistic and selfish; they will be more interested in new ideas than in the ancient theologies, and will be freer from prejudice and less intolerant than are the bulk of the well-meaning people of today. Psychology is only just come into its own, and only now is its function beginning to be understood; in one hundred years time, however, it will be the dominating science; and the newer educational systems, based on scientific psychology, will have completely superseded our modern methods. The emphasis in the future will be laid upon the determining of a man's life purpose. This will be brought about through an understanding of his/her ray, through an analysis of his/her equipment (and of this, vocational psychology is the faint first beginning), through a study of his/her horoscope, and through giving him/her a sound grounding in mind control, as well as training his/her memory to the impartation of information. The processes by which he/she can integrate his/her personality and raise and purify his/her living qualities will receive careful attention, and all to the end of making him/her group-conscious and useful to his/her group. This is the factor of importance. Synthesis, physical purity, decentralisation and group good will be the keynotes of the teaching imparted. Emotional control and right-thinking will be inculcated, and where these are present a knowledge of spiritual realities will be automatically acquired and the life subordinated to the group purpose. Man's relations to others will then be intelligently directed, and his/her relation to the other sex will be guided not only by love and desire, but by an ordered intellectual appreciation of the true significance of marriage. The above applies to the intelligent, well-intentioned majority whose standards will have developed as the decades pass, so that they will embody the dreams and ideals of the most advanced visionaries of today. The unthinking, the idle and the stupid will still be found, but evolution proceeds apace and order is on its way.
  
  What laws will be enacted for the control of the people on this difficult subject of sex we cannot say; what the marriage laws will be it is no part of our purpose to foretell; how the legislatures of the nations will deal with the problem remains to be seen. We are not interested in speculation.
  
  But we can and we shall put down for you here the basic premises which will underlie the best thought of the future on the subject of sex and marriage. These premises are three in number; when they are understood and grasped, and when they are integrated into the thought of the period, forming the basis of all recognised standards and consistent living, then the details as to how and where and when will take care of themselves.
  
  1. The relation of the sexes and their approach to the marriage relation will be regarded as a part of the group life and as serving the group good; this will not be the result of laws regulating marriage, but a result of education in group relations, service and the law of love, as understood practically and not just sentimentally. Men-Women-Children will know themselves as cells in a vital organism, and their activities and outlook will be coloured by this realisation. It will be regarded as a fact in nature and as a product of past evolutionary cycles, and not be looked upon as a theory and a hope, as is the case today. What is best for the group, and what is needed to promote the efficiency of a unit in the group, will be the points considered. Men-Women-Children will increasingly live in the world of thought and understanding, and not so much in the world of ill-regulated desire and of animal instinct; the love of men for women and of women for men will be more truly present than is now the case, for it will not be so purely emotional, and it will be based also on intelligence.
  
  As the creative urge is turned upwards from the sacral centre to the throat, man will live less potently in his/her physical sexual urges, and more consistently in his/her creative expression. His/Her physical plane life will proceed along normal lines, but it is necessary for men to realise that the manner in which man today satisfies his/her sexual nature is abnormal and unregulated, and that we are on our way to a wise normality. The craving for selfish pleasure and for the satisfaction of an animal urge, which is instinctually right when regulated and devastatingly wrong when prostituted purely to enjoyment, will give place to a mutual decision by both of the parties concerned. The decision will meet a natural need in a right and suitable and regulated manner. Today one party or other is usually sacrificed, either to an undue abstinence or to an unseemly profligacy.
  
  2. The second rule is based upon the point of evolution, and for its right fulfillment necessitates the true integration of the personality. This rule might be expressed as follows: True marriage and right sexual relation should involve the marriage of all three aspects of man's nature; there should be a meeting on all three levels of consciousness at once_ the physical, the emotional and the mental. A man and a woman, to be truly and happily married, must be complements to each other in all the three departments of their nature, and there should be a simultaneous union of all three. How seldom is this the case, and how rare it is to find! There is no need for us to elaborate in this direction, for this truth is obvious and has oft been voiced. Later, but not for a long while yet, we shall see marriages which will be based upon the point of development of the integrated personality and only those will meet each other in the sacred marriage ritual who have reached the same point in the work of transmuting the lower into the higher centres; a marriage will be regarded as undesirable and the parties ill-mated where one is living the life of the purified personality above the diaphragm, and the other the life of the intelligent animal below the diaphragm. Finally some few will choose their mates from amongst those in whom the Christ [/ will-to-good] group consciousness has been born again, and who are giving expression to the Christ life. But the time is not yet, except for the rare and the few.
  
  3. The third governing principle will be the desire to provide good and fair and healthy bodies for incoming egos. This is not possible today, under our ill-regulated system of co-habitation. The majority of the children who are born now have come accidentally into being or are not wanted. Some few, of course, are desired, but even in these cases, that desire is usually based on reasons of heredity, property to be passed on, an old name to be perpetuated, an unfulfilled ambition to be satisfied; yet the day of ordained and desired births is drawing nearer, and when it comes it will make possible the more rapid incarnation of noos and initiates. Right preparation will take place prior to any fulfillment of the sex urge, and souls will be attracted to their parents by the urgency of those parents' desire, the purity of their motives and the power of their preparatory work.
  
  When these three motives are carefully studied, and when men and women mould their physical plane relationship to each other upon their group responsibilities, upon their union with each other on all three planes simultaneously, and upon the offering of opportunity for incoming souls, then we shall indeed see a restoration of the spiritual aspect of marriage.
  
  We shall see the coming in of that era when goodwill will be the outstanding characteristic, and wherein selfish purpose and animal instinct will fade into the background.
  
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  Sex 6.0
  
  Some Suggestions for the Present Cycle
  
  We have been occupied with indicating a situation which at present exists, and in pointing out an ideal one which lies ahead, but which is not as yet possible. This is valuable, but it leaves a gap in our thought which requires filling. The question now arises which is capable of formulation in the following terms: given the accuracy of our presentation of the present appalling conditions, given the possibility of an ultimate approximation to the presented ideal in a distant future, is it possible at this time to take steps which will eventually lead to the necessary adjustments in the department of sex? It most certainly is, and our answer takes the following form.
  
  When certain basic postulates, four in number, have been presented and kept before the mind of the public, they will finally lead to such an education of public opinion that the needed activities will follow. But the first step is the education of the public, and their grasp of the four essential laws. Any correction of present conditions will come as a growth from within humanity itself, and not as the imposition of a ruling from without. The training of the public consciousness must therefore go steadily forward, and thus we shall lay the foundation for the later changes.
  
  We should like here to remind you that the coming three generations (in which we include the present one of boys and girls) will bring into incarnation a group of people who will be well equipped to lead humanity out of the present impasse. This fact warrants remembrance, and is often forgotten. There are always those at every epoch in human history who are able to solve the problems which arise, and who are sent in for that very purpose. This sex problem, in the last analysis, is a temporary one, little as you may think it today, and it grows out of a basic mistake, _out of the prostitution of man's God-given faculties to selfish physical ends, instead of their consecration to divine purposes. Man has been swept and carried off his/her feet by his/her instinctual animal nature, and only a clear and clean mental understanding of the real nature of his/her problem will be strong enough to carry him/her forward into the New Age and into the world of right motive and right action. Man has to learn and deeply grasp the fact that the main purpose of sex is not the satisfaction of the appetites, but the providing of physical bodies through which [spiritually evolving] life may express itself. He/She has to understand the nature of the symbolism underlying the sexual relation, and by its means grasp the scope of the spiritual realities. The Law of Sex is the law of those relations whereby life and form are brought together in order that divine purpose may be seen. This is a fundamental law of creation, and it is true, whether one is dealing with the informing Life of a solar system, with the birth of an animal, or with the appearance of a plant from a seed. "Sex" is the word we use to cover the relation which exists between that energy we call "life" and the aggregate of force units through which that energy expresses itself and builds a form. It covers the activity which takes place when the pairs of opposites are brought together, and by means of which they become at-one and produce a third reality. That third reality or result bears witness to their relation, and another life in form is seen. You have always, therefore, relation, at-one-ment and birth. These three words deal with the true significance of sex.
  
  But man has prostituted the truth, and the real significance has been lost. Sex now means the satisfaction of the male desire for sensuous pleasure, and the assuaging of a physical appetite through the prostitution of the feminine aspect to that desire and appetite. This relation leads to no result as intended, but to a momentary second of satisfaction, and all of it is confined to the animal nature and the physical plane. We are largely generalising and would remind you that there are exceptions to all generalisations. We should also like to add that no one must here think that we hold the masculine aspect as responsible for our present problem when we say that man uses woman for his pleasure. How can we mean this, when we know that every human being is cyclically either a man or a woman; that the men of today have been women and the women have been men in previous lives? There is no sex, as we understand it, where souls are concerned; it is only in the form life that sex exists. Only in the process of differentiation for the purposes of experimentation does the incarnating spiritual man occupy first a male body and then a feminine, thus rounding out the negative and positive aspects of the form life. All the race is equally guilty, and all must be equally active in the process of creating the correct conditions, and in bringing order out of the present chaos.
  
  Therefore, the first postulate which must be laid down, and to which the general public must be educated, is that all souls incarnate and re-incarnate under the Law of Rebirth. Hence each life is not only a recapitulation of life experience, but an assuming of ancient obligations, a recovery of old relations, an opportunity for the paying of old indebtedness, a chance to make restitution and progress, an awakening of deep-seated qualities, the recognition of old friends and enemies, the solution of revolting injustices, and the explanation of that which conditions the man and makes him/her what he/she is. Such is the law which is crying now for universal recognition, and which, when understood by thinking people, will do much to solve the problems of sex and marriage.
  
  Why will this be so? Because when this law is admitted as a governing intellectual principle, all men will tread more carefully the path of life, and will proceed with greater caution to fulfill their family and group obligations. They will know full well that "whatsoever a man-w-c soweth, that will he/she also reap," and that he/she will reap it here and now, and not in some mystical and mythical heaven or hell; he/she will have to make his/her adjustments in the life of every day upon earth, which provides an adequate heaven and a more than adequate hell. The spreading of this doctrine of rebirth, its scientific recognition and proving, is fast going forward, and during the next ten years it will be the subject of much attention.
  
  The second basic postulate was enunciated for us by Christ when He told us to "love our neighbor as ourselves." To this we have paid, as yet, but little attention. We have loved ourselves and have sought to love those we like. But to love universally and because our neighbor is a soul as we are, with a nature essentially perfect and an infinite destiny, this has always been regarded as a beautiful dream to be consummated in a future so distant, and in a heaven so far away, that we may well forget it. Two thousand years have gone since the greatest expression of God's love walked on earth and bade us love each other. Yet still we fight and hate and use our powers for selfish ends, our bodies and our appetites for material pleasures, and our efforts at living are, in the mass, primarily directed towards personal selfishness. Have you ever considered what the world would today be if man had listened to the Christ and had sought to obey His command? We should have eliminated much disease (for the diseases originating in the misuse of the sex function underlie a large percentage of our physical ills, and devastate our modern civilisation), we should have made war impossible, we should have reduced crime to a minimum, and our modern life would be an exemplification of a manifesting divinity. But this has not been the case, and hence our modern world conditions.
  
  But the new law must, and will, be enunciated. This law can be summed up in the words: Let a man so live that his/her life is harmless. Then no evil to the group can grow out of his/her thoughts, his/her actions or his/her words. This is not negative harmlessness, but of a difficult and positive activity. If the above practical paraphrase of the words of Christ were universally promulgated and practically applied, we should have order growing out of chaos, group love superseding personal selfishness, religious unity taking the place of fanatical intolerance, and regulated appetites instead of licence.
  
  The two laws we have proclaimed, and the two postulates we have above enunciated, sound like platitudes. But platitudes are the universal and recognised truths, and a truth is a scientific pronouncement. The moulding of the life by these two recognitions (the Law of Rebirth and the Law of Love) would save humanity and rebuild our civilisation. They are probably too simple to evoke an interested recognition. But the power lying behind them is the power of divinity itself, and their recognition is simply a question of time, for evolution will force the recognition at some distant date. The forming of an earlier recognition lies in the hands of the noos and thinkers of the present age.
  
  The third basic law underlying the solution of our modern problems, including that of sex, grows normally out of the other two laws. It is the Law of Group Life. Our group relations must be seen and acknowledged. Not only must a man fulfill in love his/her family and national obligations, but he/she must think in the wider terms of humanity itself, and so bring the Law of Brotherhood into expression.
  
  Brotherhood is a group quality. The young people who are now coming in will come into life equipped with a much deeper sense of the group, and with their group awareness much more fully developed than is now the case. They will solve their problems, including the problem of sex, by asking themselves when situations arise of a difficult nature: Will this action of mine tend to the group good?
  
  Will the group be hurt or suffer if we do thus and so?
  
  Will this benefit the group and produce group progress, group integration, and group unity? Action which fails to measure up to the group requirements will then automatically be discarded. In the deciding of problems, the individual and the unit will slowly learn to subordinate the personal good and the personal pleasure to group conditions and group requirements. You can see, therefore, how the problem of sex will also yield to solution. An understanding of the Law of Rebirth, a good-will towards all men, working out as harmlessness, and a desire for group goodwill will gradually become determining factors in the raycial consciousness, and our civilisation will adjust itself in time to these new conditions.
  
  The final postulate that we seek to emphasize is that the keeping of these three laws will lead necessarily to an urgent desire to keep the law of the land in which a particular soul has incarnated. That these man-made laws are inadequate we well know, and it is needless to point this out. They may be, and are, temporary and insufficient to the need. They may fail in their scope and prove inadequate, but they do, in a measure, safeguard the little feeble ones, and will be regarded therefore as binding upon those who are seeking to help the race. These laws are subject to change as the effect of the three great laws makes itself felt, but until they are wisely altered (and this takes time) they act as a brake on license and on selfishness. They may also work hardship. This none can deny. But the hardships they bring are not so evil in their nature nor so lasting in their effects as would be the result of their removal and the consequent inauguration of a cycle of law-less-ness. Therefore, the server of the race cooperates with the laws of the land in his/her daily life, working at the same time for the removal of the injustices they may produce and for the bettering of the legal impositions upon mankind in his/her country.
  
  In the recognition of these four laws,_ of Rebirth, of Love, of the group. and of the Land,_ we shall see the salvation of the race.
  
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  Sex 6.1
  
  Sex and Noo/Discipleship
  
  We want to write a word on the subject of sex in the life of the disciple/noo. There is much confusion in the minds of aspirants on this matter, and the injunction as to celibacy is assuming the position of a religious doctrine. We are often told by the well-meaning but illogical that if a man-w-c is a disciple he/she cannot marry, and that there is no real spiritual attainment unless a man is celibate. This theory has its roots in two things:
  
  First, there has ever been a mistaken attitude in the East towards women. Secondly, in the West, from the time of Christ, there has been a tendency towards the monastic and conventual conception of spiritual life. These two attitudes embody two mistaken ideas, and lie at the root of much misunderstanding and at the heart of much evil. Man is no better than the woman, nor woman than the man. Yet many thousands regard women as embodying that which is evil and that which is the basis of temptation. … God has from the beginning ordained that men and women should meet each other's needs and act as complements. God has not ordained that men should live herded together, away from women, or women away from men; and both of these great systems have led to much sexual abuse and to much suffering.
  
  The belief that to be a disciple necessitates a celibate life and complete abstinence from all natural functions is neither correct nor desirable. This can be proved by the recognition of two things:
  
  The first is that if divinity is indeed a reality and an expression of omnipotence and omnipresence as well as omniscience, and if man is essentially divine, then there can be no condition possible wherein divinity cannot be supreme There can be no sphere of human activity where man cannot act divinely and wherein all functions cannot be illumined by the light of pure reason and divine intelligence. We deal not here with the specious and devious argument that that which normally and by all right-minded people is regarded as wrong must be right because of man's inherent divinity. That can be but a loose excuse for wrong-doing. We speak of sexual relations of the right kind, within the permit of the spiritual law as well as the law of the land.
  
  Secondly, a life that is not normally rounded out till all the functions of its nature_ animal, human and divine_ (and man is all of these three in one body) are exercised, is frustrated, inhibited, and abnormal. That all cannot marry in these days is true, but that fact does not negate the greater fact that man has been created by God to marry. That all are not in a position where they can today live normal and full lives is equally a consequence of our present abnormal economic conditions; but this in no way negates the fact that the condition is abnormal. But that an enforced celibacy is an indication of a deep spirituality, and a necessary part of all esoteric and spiritual training, is equally false, abnormal and undesirable. There is no better training school for a disciple and an initiate than family life, with its enforced relations, its scope for adjustments and adaptability, its demanded sacrifices and service, and its opportunities for the full expression of every part of man-w-c's nature. There is no greater service to be rendered to the race than the proffering of bodies to incoming souls, and the giving of attention and educational facilities to those souls within the home limits. But the whole condition and problem of the family life and of child-bearing have been distorted and misunderstood; and it will be long before marriage and children assume their rightful place as sacraments, and longer still before the pain and suffering consequent upon our mistakes and on the misuse of the sexual relation have disappeared, and the beauty and consecration of marriage and of the manifestation of souls in form supersede the present wrong grouping of ideas.
  
  The disciple and aspirant upon the Path, and the Initiate upon his/her "Lighted Way," have no better training ground therefore than the marriage relation, rightly used and rightly understood. The bringing of the animal nature under rhythmic discipline, the elevation of the emotional and the instinctual natures upon the altar of sacrifice, and the self-abnegation required in the life of the family are tremendous purificatory and developing potencies. The celibacy required is that of the higher nature to the demands of the lower, and the refusal of the spiritual man to be dominated by the personality and the demands of the flesh. The attitude of an imposed celibacy upon the equipment of many a disciple has led to much prostitution and to many perversions of God-given functions and faculties; and even where there has not been this distressing condition, and where the life has been sane, consecrated and sound, there have frequently been undue suffering and much mental distress and disciplining, before unruly thoughts and tendencies could be controlled.
  
  It is of course true that sometimes a man may be called to some particular life wherein he/she is faced with the problem of celibacy, and is forced to abstain from all physical relations and to live a strictly celibate life, in order to demonstrate to him/herself that he/she can control the animal and instinctual side of his/her nature. But this condition is frequently the result of excess and licence in a previous life, which necessitates stringent measures and abnormal conditions in order to offset and rectify past errors and give the lower nature time to readjust itself. But again it is no indication of spiritual development, rather the reverse. Forget not that here we are dealing with the special case of self-applied celibacy, and not with the present world-wide condition wherein, through economic and other reasons, men are forced to live without a natural and full life expression.
  
  The sex problem must, in the last analysis, be solved in the home and under normal conditions, and it is the advanced people of the world and the noos of all degrees who must thus solve it.
  
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