Alice Bailey - The Soul and its Mechanism - VI

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The Soul and its Mechanism - The Seven Centers of Force

He quotes Mrs. Besant also in the following paragraph:

"The 'navel' represents the solar plexus, perhaps the most important plexus of the sympathetic system; it controls the digestive tract, and sends its branches to liver, spleen, stomach, as well as to the alimentary canal and generative organs. Nor is it unconnected with the lungs and heart. It may be regarded as the brain of the sympathetic system, and responds with dangerous facility to thought; concentration on it, often rashly undertaken, is apt to result in a peculiarly intractable form of nervous disease. Emotions set up in it violent disturbances, and the feeling of a nausea, which often follows an emotional shock, is due to its excited action."
- Das, Bhagavan, The Science of the Sacred Word, Vol. 1, p. 83.

Man functions today through the medium of these three centers for the most part. The forces of the body serve to feed and stimulate the sex life through the gonads, they create the urge to combat and to evolve through the adrenal glands, the glands of combat, and of struggle; they govern the psychic instinctual life through the solar plexus. Thus the personal man is mobilized and becomes a conscious sentient human being. As his evolution proceeds, the self or soul becomes more and more [124] active and dominant in man and in his corporeal existence, and little by little all parts of the etheric structure become vitally awake. Gradually the higher centers come into increased activity, and the emphasis of the force pouring through the body shifts to the centers above the diaphragm. The throat center awakens and becomes the organ of creative work; the heart center is vivified and the man becomes aware of his soul relationships, his group responsibilities and the inclusiveness of the life-soul. Finally the head centers awaken and another range of perceptions enters into his consciousness. He becomes aware of himself as a soul, integrated as a personality, and later still he becomes aware of the world of spirit, of divine life, of the unseen world of spirits, and of that "cloud of witnesses" who testify to the reality of the soul life.

One of the objectives of human evolution is to accomplish this. The center at the base of the spine, the heart and head centers, must come into full functioning activity and thus, through a blending of the energy latent in matter itself and stored up in the center at the base of the spine, of the energy of the soul, which has its seat in the heart, and of the energy of the spirit, centered in the head, bring the human being to the highest point of perfection. Through this fusion of energies he becomes an active expression of God, - spirit, soul, body, blended and united so that the body is indeed the vehicle for the soul, and that soul is indeed the expression of the will and purpose of the spirit. [125]

What did Christ say when on earth? "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." (John XIV, 9.) He said also, "He that believeth on Me, the works that I do shall he do also; and greater works than these shall he do; because I go unto My Father" (John XIV, 12.) He was the Soul incarnate in the body, revealing the Father, the Spirit, and through the mechanism of the body, demonstrating the powers of the soul, which, the Hindus claim, follow upon the awakening of the centers, and which they list as follows:

Anima - the power to penetrate all bodies, and to bring the dead to life. Christ could pass unseen into rooms, and could raise the dead. (See Luke XXIV, 36, Mark XVI, 14, John XX, 19, John XI).

Mahima - the power to include or make oneself large or to comprehend the universe. Christ knew all things. (Matt. XII, 25, John II, 24, John VI, 64.)

Laghima - the power to make oneself light so that one could float in the air or walk on the water. Christ walked on the water (Matt. XIV, 25, 26, Mark VI, 48).

Garima - the power to make oneself heavy. There is no record in the Christian Scripture of Christ exercising this power.
Prapti - the predicting of events (Christ foretold his crucifixion Matt., XXVI, 2; Luke XXIV,7.) and of the power to cure diseases (Christ healed hundreds, Matt., XII, 15; XIV,15.), and of clairvoyance [126] and clairaudience. (Christ was both clairvoyant, John I, 48, and clairaudient, John XII, 29.)
Prakamega - the power to preserve the body. Christ reappeared to His disciples after death with the same body, apparently, that they knew. (John XX, 20-27).
Visitvan - the power of self control, the power to control animals, and people. All these Christ demonstrated, even to the control of the demon-possessed persons, and of the hogs who ran down a steep place into the sea (Matt., VIII, Mark V, Mark IX).
Ishatvan - the power of universal dominion. This is everywhere claimed for Christ, and is indicated by his being seated on the right hand of God.

And is the possession of these powers and the fulfilment of Christ's prophecy that we shall do these greater things, so contrary to what the West calls common sense? In the radio, we broadcast waves of sound and we time and amplify them, but after all we merely reinforce the sound waves which in their original subtle form, are pouring in upon us. What more natural than this, that man, who has constructed mechanical reinforcements, should himself become so sensitive as to pick up the sound waves unaided, and thus be termed clairaudient? And is not thought transference (which even the most skeptical must recognize) none other than a special kind of broadcasting? And so with other "miracles," is not the material world [127] controlled by subtler forces and powers, and may not man learn in time to operate in the subtler field and thereby acquire dominance over the merely physical and material?

Such is the agelong belief of India - that through the development of the soul and spirit, through the awakening of all the centers, man comes to his maturity and his glory. [128]

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