The Way of Man by Henry T. Laurency
17. THE PLANETARY GOVERNMENT
17. THE PLANETARY GOVERNMENT
1The planetary government distinguishes between three different, successively higher kinds of governments: planetary government, solar systemic government, and seven-system government. The planetary government supervises all processes of manifestation within the planet. The solar systemic government is a superior authority to the planetary governments of the solar system with their various functions. The seven-system government has, as its name indicates, seven connected solar systems under it. No other information is given about this government than the fact that it exists.
2It is the governments which by the aid of cosmic energies direct, and carry the ultimate responsibility for, the exact implementation of all the processes of manifestation.
3Since the monads (primordial atoms) are the only indestructible things in the universe and all the material forms they make up are only temporary and are brought into existence for the monads' consciousness development, it is seen that no forms whatsoever are by any means so important to higher kingdoms as they are to men. The monads are clothed in constantly new, more expedient forms. Men fear the destruction of the form. That fear is unknown where the knowledge of reality has been acquired. Consciousness development requires constantly new forms. The old ones are rapidly worn out.
1The planetary government consists of individuals who have concluded their evolution within the solar system with perfected 43-consciousness and henceforth acquire ever higher kinds of cosmic consciousness from 42-consciousness up. The "planetary government" is the common term of those cosmic selves.
2Not all 42-selves join the planetary government but only those who have chosen to participate in the planetary processes of manifestation. Often they previously collect experience in the other planets of our solar system as well as in other solar systems. They are given a thorough training before they are considered fully capable of taking important posts in the government. Acquiring a higher kind of consciousness you do not become an expert just like that, even though your potentials for study and understanding increase enormously.
3The planetary government consists exclusively of cosmic selves. But 43-selves are "co-opted members" and as such they have unrestricted admission to the government. They are always consulted in matters concerning changes in the supply of energies (ideas) to the planet for various purposes and different departments.
4Cosmic selves cannot incarnate in organisms. But they can form temporary or permanent aggregate envelopes of atomic matter for themselves in whichever world, even in the physical.
5The members of the planetary government are ranged in different degrees from 42-selves up. The simplest graduation is of course the international, mathematical nomenclature. The terms used hitherto do not indicate status attained and appear meaningless.
6The members of the government make up three groups: 36-selves to 42-selves, 29-selves to 35-selves, 22-selves to 28-selves. The highest group consists of seven individuals, of whom one is the president, the planetary ruler, three are so-called exoteric or "active" and three "esoteric" members.
7There is no information about how many individuals enter into the government of our planet.
8Into the planetary government enter representatives of seven different hierarchies corresponding to the seven parallel paths of development of which we do not know much more than that they exist, except the two evolutions that pass through the human kingdom and the deva kingdom.
9In the planetary government, there are cosmic representatives of the three aspects of reality, leaders of all the processes of manifestation occurring in the planet of which we as yet know very little and probably would understand very little but of which we nevertheless fantasize, as usual. (Whence comes this predilection for inevitably false assumptions with erroneous conclusions and often fatal consequences?)
10The cosmic beings that have joined the planetary government abstain from further consciousness expansion in order to ensure the formation of the solar system and the supervision of its processes of manifestation, the involvation of the monads down into physical matter, for it is only in this, the densest of all kinds of matter that the monad can learn to distinguish between inner and outer, consciousness and matter, self and not-self; the condition of the acquisition of self-identity. We all receive help for our consciousness development, and we have to pay that debt (everything has its price) by helping others in the same respect. But so perverse in life has mankind been that it has persecuted and murdered all those who have wanted to help it.
11Our planetary government can, with the effect of natural law, switch on cosmic energies as well as prevent them from entering our planet. Of course, this is not done without consultation with the solar systemic government and other governments.
12What the envelopes are to man the planet is to the planetary ruler and the other members of the planetary government. Their material envelopes are — except that atom in their atomic chain where their monad is — also the worlds of the planet, since they have in respect of consciousness identified themselves with the collective consciousness of the pertaining worlds. Speaking about the planetary ruler a gnostic saying may be used: "In him we live, move and have our being"; we live (the consciousness aspect), we move (the motion aspect), we have our being (the matter aspect). His enormous "aura" (produced by the cosmic vibrations of the monad) embraces the planet.
13It was on the initiative of the planetary government that the esoteric knowledge orders were instituted by the planetary hierarchy after the catastrophe in Atlantis. It was by the permission of the planetary government that the esoteric knowledge was allowed to be exoteric again in 1875.
14Ever since Atlantis, mankind has had to take care of itself during twelve thousand years. Our so-called world history (largely a parody of history, if you by history mean an exact knowledge of the past, during three or four thousand years) should have clarified mankind's inability to take care of itself. If mankind, in its boundless madness, will not destroy itself, it must call the hierarchy back. When mankind has once accepted the leadership of the hierarchy, there is a prospect that finally even the planetary government appears and the planetary ruler (with many names: The Ancient of Days, Sanat Kumara, Melchizedek, etc.) will be recognized as the true ruler of our planet, which he has been in fact for more than 18 million years.
1Even the individuals of the planetary government are beings that are incessantly developing to the ever higher dimensions, time conception (progress of the processes of manifestation), consciousness, energies of ever higher worlds and kingdoms. This development of theirs is important to the general evolution in all the lower kingdoms of the planet. It drags them along, as it were, so that the individuals at the different developmental stages attain ever higher consciousness capacities, although they keep the distances between them. Thus an individual who presently is at the stage of barbarism, for instance, has incomparably greater prospects of understanding life than a barbarian had several million years ago. This is an important factor to consider when trying to judge general evolution. Of course this presupposes that the individual has acquired a knowledge of reality and has assimilated the reality ideas of the causal world. At the present stage of science and philosophy, those ideas are still not understood, impossible even to perceive. Besides, this is true of everything "esoteric", the knowledge we have received from the planetary hierarchy through its disciples.
2There are so many reality ideas that cannot as yet be communicated to men, since they generally lack three prerequisites of correct conception and use of these ideas. The first prerequisite is to use the knowledge received exclusively in the service of evolution, mankind, and unity. The second prerequisite is to have accepted hylozoics, at least as a working hypothesis. The third prerequisite is to refrain from all speculations, which cannot add one single new fact, just idiotize the little true knowledge mankind has received hitherto. Immensely much must remain esoteric on these three grounds. When men have learnt to let "this be this" and not something else, then an enormous treasure of knowledge will be at their disposal. Before then it would be meaningless, like "casting pearls", just stimulating credulity in those who willingly receive facts without being able to put them into their correct contexts. No one regrets the necessary reserve more than the planetary hierarchy.
1"The ancients" (initiates of the esoteric knowledge orders) called the planetary collective being the "planetary logos"; and the solar systemic collective being, the "solar logos". These terms should not be confused with the terms "planetary ruler" and "solar ruler", because the individuals referred to hold their offices temporarily, until they leave them to those next in succession, when they themselves move on to higher kingdoms. Those rulers are able to completely identify themselves with the collective beings they represent, since they have the highest kind of consciousness in those collectives. The planetary ruler as well as the solar ruler have each as their lowest envelope a material envelope of physical atomic matter, which envelope thus contains all the 49 kinds of atomic matters. A planetary ruler must have activated at least atomic kind number 36 in his atomic chain (thus be at least a 36-self); and a solar ruler, at least atomic kind number 29, as a rule still higher, since, beside their other functions, they go on with the self-activation of the higher atomic kinds in their atomic chain.
2Even if a 35-self is fully competent to take over the management of a planet as a planetary ruler, those who become planetary rulers usually have reached higher. They can, if they want to, remain until they have acquired 22-consciousness.
3There is nothing to prevent our planetary ruler from continuing, with an anchorage in our planet, his cosmic consciousness expansion in the fourth cosmic kingdom (22—28) and still higher kingdoms. We do not know what made our planetary ruler choose to remain in our planet after he would have been able to assume the rulership of a solar system or even a group of solar systems. Speculation on such matters is left to those who find pleasure in fantasizing. The esoterician is content with the facts he receives from the planetary hierarchy. He sees that all speculation is meaningless and leaves that to such first selves who construct their universes in the emotional world. Illusoriness seems to have a fascinating effect on those who eagerly fantasize about everything they cannot possibly know.
4Before the year 1925, at the hierarchy's acknowledgement of his attained status of casual self, the disciple could behold the planetary ruler for the first time. This is nowadays vouchsafed only to 45-selves.
5The best proof that not even the planetary ruler wants to be regarded as a god is his designation as "the one who knows the will of god". He receives his orders from the solar systemic ruler who in his turn receives them from still higher authorities.
1When the planetary ruler decided to take over the management of our planet, this implied that he renounced further cosmic expansion. That is why he in esoteric history is called "the great sacrifice". He did it because he could not do otherwise. He had to apply all his powers to assist consciousness development in the planet, particularly in the lowest natural kingdoms. He chose to involvate into a physical atomic form, the lowest possible for him. It is known for certain that his atomic consciousness embraces the atomic worlds 29—49. How far he has reached within the third cosmic kingdom, 22—28, is known only to him.
2The sacrifice he made was not unique. It is what everyone must make who wants to go higher. Development is achieved only through sacrifice (renunciation of one's own development to help those in lower worlds). "Love", the will to unity, compels. Therefore, the indispensable condition for man, the first self that wants to become a second a self, is to "forget himself in service"; forget himself so that he becomes a non-entity, without claims of recognition, expectations, unable to "be somebody", unable to be "assailable" in any way (invulnerable, helping his enemies, able to love everybody, etc.). All of this is of course impossible at lower stages. The fact that you are able demonstrates that you have reached higher.
3The fifth and sixth natural kingdoms work anonymously for mankind. Not even the Augoeides, their own souls, are known to men. They do not demand any gratitude for their care about men's development (a concept that only our time begins to grasp). Their life is sacrifice, a natural sacrifice and one that fills them with joy for the opportunity to contribute to the realization of unity. Disciples receive much for nothing, which they do not know. To give, only to give, is the motto of higher kingdoms. There are some people at the higher human stages who understand that this is the way, according to the law: anyone who gives receives and a greater compensation for the fact that he gives, a compensation that he alone can understand who gives because he cannot do otherwise.
1God (the deity) is actually a collective. Or, if you like it, the planetary ruler at the head of the planetary government, or the solar ruler at the head of the solar systemic government. The ruler is the president and sums up the concerted opinion of all. The discussion goes on until perfect unanimity has been reached; otherwise they appeal to a higher authority, possibly a cosmic one.
2People's prayers to god go to Augoeides, who may be regarded as the deputy of the deity until the mental self gets in touch with the planetary hierarchy and becomes a disciple.
3The divine kingdom proper begins with world 42 outside the solar system. The highest kingdom of the solar system has of old been called the lowest divine kingdom because the 43-selves have unrestricted access to the planetary government and directly receive instructions from it. But it is improper to call the 43-selves "gods", even though they may appear as such to men. Gods are cosmic beings. Indubitably it is the most correct to call worlds 43 and 44 the "manifestal kingdom" and reserve the term "divine" for cosmic kingdoms outside the solar system. Then it is another matter if you want to call the solar systems the "lowest cosmic kingdom", as many do. They are constructed on the basis of the lowest (cosmic) atomic kinds (43—49).
1There is talk of disciples of the planetary government, thus of relations between first selves (47) and cosmic selves (above 43), since all members of the government have acquired cosmic consciousness (starting with 42). Such cases can only be instances of personal relations that were formed before the teacher moved from the planetary hierarchy to the planetary government. The Buddha, who is a member of the planetary government, still has disciples in the planetary hierarchy (second and third selves), but none in mankind (first selves). In the latter case, these would be disciples of disciples of the Buddha but therefore not disciples of the Buddha.
2It is nevertheless improper to call a man a disciple of the planetary government for the reason that his teacher has moved from the planetary hierarchy to the planetary government and the teacher still regards the once accepted disciple as his own.
3The Buddha, who joined the planetary government as a 42-self, has two disciples (essential selves), who are assigned to reform Buddhism and unite its two branches, Mahayana and Hinayana, as soon as the political conditions in India and elsewhere permit.
1If a special capacity is needed because evolution within a planet has taken an unexpected turn that needs to be balanced, the planetary government may call in an avatar from a higher cosmic kingdom to assist the government for some time. This is also the case if the planetary government considers that evolution needs to be speeded up when mankind (as so often happens on our planet) has counteracted development.
2All avatars are called in by the planetary government to perform tasks that lie beyond "regular" government functions which are quite sufficient for them. In higher kingdoms, everybody does his utmost. Extra tasks must be performed by "external" specialists.
3The term "avatar" has later also been given to individuals of lower rank, and that is why cosmic, systemic, and planetary avatars can be distinguished. Uneducated people misuse words the meaning of which they do not know, a phenomenon that certainly will result in the degradation even of these designations. Symptoms have not been lacking.
4In actual fact, there is a constant exchange of higher selves between planets and solar systems. In such actions, however, care is taken so that no one loses by the exchange but everybody gains.
5Avatars seldom involvate to lower worlds than the causal. No 42-self or higher self can incarnate in an organism. In rare cases they clothe themselves in an envelope of physical atomic matter, but usually their lowest envelope of involvation is the causal. Their vibrations are too strong for lower material kinds, and to scale them down would unnecessarily lessen their efficiency, the purpose of their involvation.
6The purpose of the changes that they bring about and that can also appear in physical events is beyond human understanding. First selves comprehend nothing of this.
7What happens in higher kingdoms is, besides, something that mankind and, in particular, the uninitiated and the esoterically ignorant, cannot understand. Regrettably, the names of some members of the planetary hierarchy have become publicly known. This has disturbed them in their work.
1The cosmos is formed in order to actualize and activate the potential consciousness of the atoms of the primordial manifestation. Those primordial atoms as well as the primordial matter they originate from are unconscious.
2The whole cosmos can be regarded as a gigantic process of manifestation, divided into an enormous number of lesser processes. Thus there is no standstill. Everything in the cosmos is subject to the law of change. The cosmic final goal is that all primordial atoms (monads) acquire cosmic omniscience and omnipotence. That is why the innumerable cosmoi are made, are developed, and are dismantled when the goal has been reached.
3In the great cosmic process of involvation, the primordial atoms (monads) are involved to form 48 ever more composite atomic kinds all the way to the physical atom (49). In the great cosmic process of evolution (comprising an enormous number of processes), the monads evolve from atomic kind 49 to atomic kind 1, are successively liberated from their lower atomic kinds.
4This description is a metaphor more than anything else, to represent the process graphically. Besides, only through such metaphors is it possible to obtain a "vision" of the cosmos and the processes of manifestation.
5The purpose of the solar system is to develop consciousness in the monads so that they subsequently can function in the cosmos. This will be possible for the monads when they have become 42-selves.
6There are three kinds of solar systems. In a solar system of the first degree, the matter aspect is developed; in one of the second degree, the consciousness aspect; and in one of the third degree, the will aspect for the involved monads. The processes of manifestation within the solar system occur in planets. Those processes are led by cosmic selves. The system in its entirety is managed by solar systemic government; the planets, by planetary governments.
7All in higher kingdoms are collaborators in some one of the countless processes, everyone according to his limited ability.
8In the absolute sense, only the highest cosmic selves are able to fully exploit the potential of matter, since they are able to handle the primordial atoms contained in the atomic kinds.
9"Imperfection in nature" depends on the difficulties even cosmic selves have in "coping with" the composition of matter in the physical world (the etheric world included). It is one thing to involve higher atomic kinds into lower ones; it is quite another to make the involved monads, which in the processes of involution have acquired a repulsive basic tendency, adapt to the inevitable constant relations of the material compositions. On certain planets consciousness development goes on without friction. On our planet it has reached the greatest possible resistance.
10Consciousness development is an uninterrupted process towards ever richer experience in ever more respects with ever greater prospects for the self to benefit from the insights of higher selves.
1The cosmos is divided into seven ever higher cosmic kingdoms (43—49, 36—42, 29—35, 22—28, 15—21, 8—14, 1—7). The solar systems with their seven atomic worlds (43—49) constitute the lowest cosmic kingdom. In order to prevent the usual confusion in the matter of all esoteric concepts it would be advisable to restrict the term "cosmic kingdoms" to the six higher ones and reserve the term solar system for the lowest kingdom. The table below affords an overview.
2
Cosmic worlds Atomic kinds Cosmic kingdoms The cosmic total consciousness common to all, in percentages 1—7 the sixth 100 (in world 1) 8—14 the fifth 85 (in world 8) 15—21 the fourth 70 (in world 15) 22—28 the third 56 (in world 22) 29—35 the second 42 (in world 29) 36—42 the first 28 (in world 36) 43—49 (the solar system) 14 (in world 43)
3Nothing must be said of the individuals in the three highest cosmic kingdoms (1—7, 8—14, 15—21). That would be a good rule for all kinds of cosmic consciousness, since unbridled human imagination can only spoil everything.
1Each atomic kind has its collective atomic memory, and so there are 49 kinds of atomic memories in the cosmos. They are part of the cosmic total consciousness.
2The cosmic total consciousness is a unity of the involutionary consciousness of the 49 atomic kinds and is passive in nature. It can be activated (collectively or individually) by the individuals of the highest cosmic kingdom. Their function is to supervise the cosmic processes of manifestation, ever more differentiated in lower kingdoms due to the increasing primordial atomic density in each lower atomic kind and the consequential increasing difficulties of the continuously decreasing number of dimensions.
3In all material compositions, however, it is a question of the consciousness of primordial atoms. That is the basis of all consciousness. The various kinds of not self-activated consciousness in the atomic kinds are collective and not passive.
1The usual talk of "cosmic consciousness" demonstrates that they (as usual) do not know what they are speaking about. Those who believe they possess cosmic consciousness are clairvoyants having emotional objective consciousness. They can believe to be anyone whatsoever, even god himself. Known instances of such misled people are Swedenborg, Ramakrishna, Steiner, Martinus. Indian raja yogis are of this category. No one of these is able even to become a causal self.
2Cosmic consciousness consists of 42 ever higher kinds beginning with atomic kind 42 outside the worlds of the solar system, 43—49. Cosmic consciousness thus cannot be acquired within the seven atomic worlds of the solar system.
3In order to acquire cosmic consciousness you must first have acquired self-consciousness in the seven lowest atomic kinds (43—49). Essential selves (46-selves) can acquire atomic consciousness in the three lowest atomic kinds (47—49); 45-selves, in 46—49; and 43-selves, in 43—49. The next higher atomic kind is 42, and there begins cosmic consciousness.
4Cosmic consciousness in atomic kind 42 can be acquired by individuals of the sixth natural kingdom, 43-selves, the highest self within the solar system. The only possibility for 43-selves to succeed in this is to get in contact with the planetary government and be received as auditors in it.
1"Omniscience" is a concept which the esoterician has to elucidate, of which the uninformed have innumerable kinds of notions and about which the learned can dispute however much. The concept can be taken absolutely and relatively. The domain of knowledge referred to can be however large or little. The esoterician usually means omniscience of the past and what has been explored within a certain atomic world or, more exactly, the possibility of "intuitional" (instantaneous and total) perception of something sought for.
2Absolute omniscience of even physical matter is obtained only in the highest cosmic world, since physical matter is composed of 49 atomic kinds and appears different in the different perception of reality of the 49 worlds.
3The whole reality with the primordial atomic compositions of all its atomic worlds appears so immensely complicated that the knowledge of cosmic reality is infallible only in the highest cosmic kingdom. With each higher kingdom you approach it one step, the knowledge becomes ever more correct. This seems to inhere in the very concept of development, striving towards the final goal and the absolute knowledge, omniscience and omnipotence. That is an idea which makes man humble before the task.
4When not even the planetary hierarchy can be said to be omniscient in an absolute sense, they you realize how grotesque is that spurious human wisdom, which twaddles about god's will and purpose and many other things of which no man can know anything whatsoever.
5There are many sayings, which are attributed to Christos and which he cannot have uttered because he could not have known the things referred to. What the planetary hierarchy is given to know concerns the current eon and the plans for the current zodiacal epoch in particular. It has appeared, however, that even those plans must be remade because of changes of the view of life and attitudes of unforeseeable mankind. The law of freedom makes absolute prevision impossible.
1All cosmic energies affecting the solar system come directly from or indirectly via the twelve zodiacal constellations. They always belong to any one of the seven departments.
2All cosmic, systemic, or planetary energies are cyclic. The law of periodicity is a universal law.
3In order to have an impact, cosmic vibrations must be scaled down to the dimensions of lower worlds. Thus atomic kind 42, of dimension 8, must be scaled down to dimension 7 to function in atomic kind 43. These energies from the cosmos reach the worlds of the solar system and the planets via the sun.
4Those worlds ("envelopes") of the planet which constitute the planet absorb "their" kinds of matter.
5The seven departmental energies of our planet function differently in the different worlds and according to consultation with the solar systemic government.
6It is by and large true that the energies of the first department are always active in the highest world (43) and in different periods in the lower worlds, the shorter the lower the world.
7The energies of the second department are always active in the two highest worlds (43 and 44); and those of the third department, in the three highest worlds (43—45).
8For the time being, departments 2, 3, 5, 6, and 7 are active within the physical world of our planet.
9The energies of the fifth department were switched on in 1775, and it is these mental energies that have enabled the great scientific discoveries and technological inventions. Since mankind has demonstrated that it does not want to use these energies in the right way but abuses them to the detriment of life and its own advantage instead of letting them benefit all, they were switched off in the year 1950. It will take some 50 years before these mental vibrations have lost their efficiency whereupon mankind will have to be content with the discoveries and inventions which the disciples of the planetary hierarchy are permitted to give out.
10The energies of the sixth department (coinciding with the Piscean zodiacal epoch) become ever fainter and will have ceased functioning in the worlds of man a few hundred years hence.
11The energies of the seventh department have reached down to the physical world and will, if nothing unforeseen happens, be active the next 2500 years.
12The energies of the first department have begun penetrating the mental world, will be noticeable in the emotional world in about 100 years and fully active in the physical world about 2000 years hence.
13The energies of the fourth department reach the physical world around the year 2025. In that connection the clans belonging to that department will begin a new series of incarnations. (Monads do not incarnate after the energies of their causal envelope department have ceased in the causal and lower worlds.)
14The energies of the fifth department further science; those of the sixth department, idiologies; and those of the seventh department, new kinds of civilizations.
15History, true history, is the science of consciousness development during the various zodiacal epochs and under the influence of the different departmental energies.
1There are too few facts extant for us to form a clear conception of the cosmic organization. We know that all kingdoms from the fifth up cooperate in the processes of manifestation (the sum total of innumerable processes of involvation, involution, evolution, and expansion). There are manifold divisions according to the three aspects of reality: the matter aspect, the consciousness aspect, and the motion aspect in the different natural kingdoms, the seven departments, and the seven parallel evolutions. Common to them all is an all-pervading lawfulness that precludes arbitrariness but of course allows the requisite scope for necessary experiments in which the responsibility for their successful outcome rests with the initiators. They must see to it that the experiment is brought to a successful close without causing undeserved suffering to anyone. Thus the experiments are carefully planned from the beginning to the intended conclusion. Suffering of any kind is either self-caused or self-assumed. Nobody can be caused suffering against his will (and the lawful consequences of the expressions of will).
2The section of the cosmic organization occupied with the contribution of the monads to the processes of manifestation follows the way of the monad through all the natural kingdoms. The causes of effects occasioned by the monad extend far into future forms of life with discernible outlines that are filled in more and more. Not only the monad's own consciousness expressions determine this but also the effect resulting from its contribution to its interaction with other monads.
3Highly developed individuals can see not only their past forms of life but also their future ones, although the latter are not yet formed in detail such as they will be when they are lived. These phenomena have been ignorantly interpreted as instances of predestination, which is a mistake. We shape our future destiny ourselves but in a way which is understood only by those who in higher kingdoms are able to follow the causal connections in their stupendous ramifications. The computers of our time may provide us with some faint conception of possibilities of calculation inconceivable to us.
4The causes of past events extend into the future, making certain probability calculations possible that in some cases are surprisingly exact. In higher kingdoms we shape ourselves into the cogs which are needed in the machinery of the cosmic processes of manifestation and which the supervisors of the processes must be able to foresee according to the law of development and the law of destiny.
1Members of higher kingdoms are no isolated individuals but make up collectives with a common consciousness; collectives which eventually grow in extent as they join ever higher kingdoms. Consciousness of unity has the effect that the collectives can be regarded as "beings". In the esoteric literature, those beings have received a number of names.
2Each primordial atom has its potential individual character, which can be important as to its tendency to positivity or negativity. There is nothing to be done about this. What a cosmic collective of the highest kind (worlds 1—7) can do is to try to form a new, possibly better cosmos, using the knowledge it has acquired of everything in its old cosmos, making the best possible of the primordial atoms brought into the growing cosmos from chaos.
3Sooner or later the primordial atoms produced in primordial matter are drawn into a cosmos. Going through a cosmos is the only way for the primordial atoms to dissolve and merge into homogeneous primordial matter.
1It is a mistake to believe, as yoga philosophers (Vivekananda and others) do, that individuals who have reached the highest world must incarnate sooner or later. No one who has entered the cosmos (world 42) can do so, for no organism will stand the vibrations of a 42-self. If they return to the physical world, they do so as physical atomic beings (49:1), and this is quite sufficient in order to serve. There are more functions in the cosmos than forming solar systems and guiding that development.
2Of the hints given about individuals in cosmic kingdoms it would seem as if they, beside their normal functions, could amuse themselves by devising new experiments for evolution in the solar systems they will have the opportunity to form some time. Individual character is unlosable and always asserts itself in some way within the framework of the possibilities of the Law, above all the law of unity. Evolution is a cosmic process, and even in the highest kingdoms there seems to exist unlimited possibilities to have new experiences. Perhaps the processes of manifestations in the future solar systems will also become ever more purposeful. One thing we know for certain, that at least where the planetary hierarchy is concerned, its new members joining it as the 43-selves acquire cosmic consciousness and move to cosmic kingdoms know more and are more competent than their predecessors when they first joined.
1The monad—primordial atom has as a 43-self concluded its consciousness expansion within the worlds of the solar system. Thereupon begins the cosmic expansion.
2When the monad leaves the third triad in world 43:4, it continues its development in its 43-atom (containing 42 ever higher kinds of atoms). This 43-atom becomes that atomic ladder of ever higher atomic kinds which the monad is to climb through the 42 ever higher atomic worlds. It transits in order from the 43-atom to the 42-atom (in which process it becomes a 42-self, the lowest cosmic self), and from 42 to 41, from there to the 40-atom, etc. During evolvation through atoms 42—36, 35—29, 28—22, etc., the monad shares in the collective consciousness of those cosmic kingdoms. When it has reached the highest atomic kind but one (the 2-atom in its atomic chain), it concludes its consciousness expansion by becoming what it has been all the time, a primordial atom. In world 1, the monad is free from involvation into matter and finds itself as the ultimate self with total cosmic omniscience and omnipotence acquired.
3The fact that 43-selves in many cases leave our planet to continue their consciousness expansion in the cosmos does not in the least imply any "loss". Their functions are filled by individuals from other planets or solar systems who have chosen to have the experiences offered by our planet and to develop the special qualities that those experiences make possible. There is a constant exchange of individuals in the planetary government and in the planetary hierarchy. Every planet and every solar system is something unique, which fact is exploited for all-round development. The planetary government carefully considers who are to leave the planet and who are to fill the vacancies. The gain of the exchange is evident, since the arrivals provide the planet with individuals having new, valuable abilities, other kinds of experience resulting in greater all-roundness. Everybody benefits from this. As the individual becomes ever more proficient in his speciality corresponding to his original individual character he also becomes ever more all-round. Those who finally reach the highest cosmic kingdom have had experiences in all solar systems and kingdoms, have assimilated the omniscience offered by the cosmos. For the individual it has been a rich and exciting adventure with infinite opportunities to serve and infinite powers to do so.
4Even in cosmic kingdoms, consciousness expansion occurs gradually with acquisition of ever higher kinds of atomic consciousness. It becomes increasingly difficult to acquire the faculty of a new dimension with everything that involves as for a total change of the way in which the three aspects are apprehended and dynamis is handled in new modes of relations. Without the assistance of other higher monads (atomic beings), not even they could reach a higher "degree" within a reasonable number of eons. The law of self-realization is a universal law of life. Everything the individual can do he must do himself to reach a higher kind of consciousness. The method how it is to be done can be given to him for nothing, but he must do it himself, and there is always in addition the individual adaptation of the method.
5This is a description of the normal conditions in our solar system. In normal cases, most 43-selves who through the agency of the planetary government have become 42-selves leave our solar system for consciousness expansion in some solar system of the third degree (ours is of the second degree). However, in mankind's present emergency (being in a position to annihilate itself), the perfected 43-selves of our planet remain in the planetary government. In any case it is required to have a permission by the planetary ruler to transit to the cosmos. He decides who are needed under various circumstances.
1Symbolically, the planetary government is the "great cosmic sacrifice", or "spirit crucified in matter". The symbol of the cross and the crucifixion on the four spokes of the wheel of incarnation has been particularly associated with 43-self Christos—Maitreya, the head of the second department, and this distorted the meaning of the symbol. We are all crucified. It is a sacrifice, however, when those who do not any longer need to incarnate for their consciousness development do it in order to help men.
2The planetary government is also called the "centre where the will of god is known". This intimates the existence of higher kingdoms as well as the knowledge of the processes of manifestation and the plans which the solar systemic government has made in concert with the planetary governments for the immediate future. It should be evident from this information that the theologians' chatter about knowing the "will of god" is absurd, as usual. They know nothing about the design for the making of a solar system and the processes of manifestation planned for the involvation and involution of unconscious monads. The purpose of those processes is the actualization of potential monad consciousness in involvation, its activation in involution, and self-activation in evolution, processes that in all take hundreds of eons (of 4320 million years each) to complete.
The above text constitutes the essay The Planetary Government by Henry T. Laurency. The essay is part of the book The Way of Man by Henry T. Laurency. Copyright © 1999 by the Henry T. Laurency Publishing Foundation.