



Produced by V. L. Simpson, S.D., and the Online Distributed
Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This book was
produced from scanned images of public domain material
from the Google Print project.)









     ELEMENTARY THEOSOPHY


         L. W. ROGERS


         LOS ANGELES
  THEOSOPHICAL BOOK CONCERN
            1917


          Copyright
             By
        L. W. Rogers
            1917




PREFACE


To comprehend the significance of great world changes, before Time has
fully done his work, is difficult. While mighty events are still in
their formative period the future is obscure. But our inability to
outline the future cannot blind us to the unmistakable trend of the
evolutionary forces at work. One thing that is clear is that our boasted
Christian civilization is the theater in which has been staged the most
un-Christian war of recorded history and in which human atrocity has
reached a point that leaves us vaguely groping for a rational
explanation of it. Another obvious fact is that the more than twenty
nations involved have been forced into measures and methods before
unknown and which wholly transform the recognized function and powers of
governments. With these startling facts of religious and political
significance before us thoughtful people are beginning to ask if we are
not upon the threshold of a complete breaking down of modern
civilization and the birth of a new order of things, in which direct
government by the people throughout the entire world will be coincident
with the rise of a universal religion based on the brotherhood of man.

In such a time any contribution to current literature that will help to
clear the ground of misconceptions and to bring to the attention of
those interested in such things, that set of fundamental natural truths
known as theosophy, may perhaps be helpful. Whether or not the world is
about to recast its ethical code there can at least be no doubt that it
is eagerly seeking reliable evidence that we live after bodily death and
that it will welcome a hypothesis of immortality that is inherently
reasonable and therefore satisfies the intellect as well as the heart.
Those who are dissatisfied with the old answers to the riddle of
existence and demand that Faith and Reason shall walk hand in hand, may
find in the following pages some explanation of the puzzling things in
life--an explanation that disregards neither the intuitions of religion
nor the facts of science.

Of course no pretension is made of fully covering the ground. The book
is a student's presentation of some of the phases of theosophy as he
understands them. They are presented with no authority whatever, and are
merely an attempt to discuss in simple language some of the fundamental
truths about the human being. No claim is made to originality but it is
hoped that by putting the old truths in a somewhat different way, with
new illustrations and arguments, they may perhaps be seen from a new
viewpoint. The intention has been to present elementary theosophy simply
and clearly and in the language familiar to the ordinary newspaper
reader. All technical terms and expressions have been avoided and the
reader will not find a single foreign word in the book.

L. W. R.




CONTENTS


  I.    THEOSOPHY                            9

  II.   THE IMMANENCE OF GOD                15

  III.  THE EVOLUTION OF THE SOUL           23

  IV.   LIFE AFTER BODILY DEATH             29

  V.    THE EVOLUTIONARY FIELD              43

  VI.   THE MECHANISM OF CONSCIOUSNESS      49

  VII.  DEATH                               59

  VIII. THE ASTRAL WORLD                    69

  IX.   REBIRTH: ITS REASONABLENESS        103

  X.    REBIRTH: ITS JUSTICE               135

  XI.   REBIRTH: ITS NECESSITY             153

  XII.  WHY WE DO NOT REMEMBER             167

  XIII. VICARIOUS ATONEMENT                181

  XIV.  THE FORCES WE GENERATE             187

  XV.   SUPERPHYSICAL EVOLUTION            205




CHAPTER I.

THEOSOPHY


Rediscovery is one of the methods of progress. Very much that we believe
to be original with us at the time of its discovery or invention proves
in time to have been known to earlier civilizations. The elevator, or
lift, is a very modern invention and we supposed it to be a natural
development of our civilization, with its intensive characteristics,
until an antiquarian startled us with the announcement that it was used
in Rome over two thousand years ago; not, of course, as we use it, but
for the same purpose, and involving the same principles. A half century
ago our scientific men were enthusiastic over the truths of evolution
that were being discovered and placed before western civilization. But
as we learn more and more of the thought and intellectual life of the
Orient it becomes clear that the idea of evolution permeated that part
of the world centuries ago. Even the most recent and startling
scientific discoveries occasionally serve to prove that what we supposed
to be the fantastic beliefs of the ancients were really truths of nature
that we were not yet able to comprehend! The transmutation of metals is
an example. We have already gone far enough in that direction to show
that the alchemists of old were not the foolish and superstitious people
we supposed them to be. We have given far too little credit to past
civilizations and we are coming to understand now that we have rated
them too low. Our modesty must necessarily increase as it becomes
clearer that much of our supposed contribution to the world's progress
is not invention but rediscovery. We are beginning to see that it is not
safe to put aside without careful examination an idea or a belief that
was current in the world thousands of years ago. Like the supposed folly
of the alchemists it may contain profound truths of nature that have
thus far been foreign to our modes of thinking.

Theosophy is both very old and very new--very old because the principles
it contains were known and taught in the oldest civilizations, and very
new because it includes the latest investigations of the present day. It
is sometimes said by those who desire to speak lightly of it that it is
a philosophy borrowed from