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The Rosicrucian Mysteries by Max Heindel

V. LIFE AND DEATH

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_The First Heaven._

In the first heaven, which is located in the higher regions of the Desire World, the panorama of life again unrolls and reveals every scene where we aimed to help or benefit others. They were not felt at the time the spirit was in the lower regions, for higher desires cannot express themselves in the coarse matter composing the lower regions of the Desire World, but when the spirit ascends to the first heaven it reaps from each scene all the good which it expressed in life. It will feel the gratitude poured out by those whom it helped; if it comes to a scene where itself received a favor from others _and was grateful_, it will experience the gratitude anew. The sum of all these feelings is there amalgamated into the spirit to serve in a future life as incentives to good.

Thus, the soul is purged from evil in purgatory, and strengthened in good in the first heaven. In one region the extract of sufferings become _conscience_ to deter us from doing wrong, in the other region the quintessence of good is transmuted to _benevolence_ and altruism which are the basis of all true progress. Moreover, purgatory is far from being a place of _punishment_, it is perhaps the most beneficent realm in nature, for _because of purgation we are born innocent_ life after life. The tendencies to commit the same evil for which we suffered remain with us and temptations to commit the same wrongs will be placed in our path until we have consciously overcome the evil here; temptation is not sin, however, the sin is in yielding.

Among the inhabitants of the invisible world there is one class which lives a particularly painful life, sometimes for a great many years, namely, the suicide who tried to play truant from the school of life. Yet it is not an angry God or a malevolent devil who administers punishment, but an immutable law which proportions the sufferings differently to each individual suicide.

We learned previously, when considering the World of Thought, that each form in this visible world has its archetype there,—a vibrating hollow mold which emits a certain harmonious sound; that sound attracts and forms physical matter into the shape we behold, much in the same manner as when we place a little sand upon a glass plate and rub the edge with a violin bow, the sand is shaped into different geometrical figures which change as the sound changes.

The little atom in the heart is the sample and the center around which the atoms in our body gather. When that is removed at death, the center is lacking, and although the archetype keeps on vibrating until the limit of the life has been reached—as also previously explained,—no matter can be drawn into the hollow shape of the archetype and therefore the suicide feels a dreadful gnawing pain as if he were hollowed out, a torture which can only be likened to the pangs of hunger. In his case, the intense suffering will continue for exactly as many years as he should have lived in the body. At the expiration of that time, the archetype collapses as it does when death comes naturally. Then the pain of the suicide ceases, and he commences his period of purgation as do those who die a natural death. But the memory of sufferings experienced in consequence of the act of suicide will remain with him in future lives and deter him from a similar mistake.

In the first heaven there is a class who have not had any purgatorial existence and who lead a particularly joyous life: the children. Our homes may be saddened almost beyond endurance when the little flower is broken and the sunshine it brought has gone. But could we see the beautiful existence which these little ones lead, and did we understand the great benefits which accrue to a child from its limited stay there, our sorrow would be at least ameliorated in a great measure, and the wound upon our heart would heal more quickly. Besides, as nothing else in the world happens without a cause, so there is also a much deeper cause for infant mortality than we are usually aware of, and as we awake to the facts of the case, we shall be able to avoid in future the sorrow incident to loss of our little ones.