INTRODUCTION
In the beginning, I am going to make an inaccurate statement. I am going to say that the reading of this book may open a new life for you. Now let me explain why this statement is inaccurate.
In the first place, it is inaccurate because this is not the start of your life. That took place millions of years ago—more millions of years than I care to mention here.
So your life did not start with the reading of these words.—Now as to the use of the word "new." This, also is inaccurate. To you, the ideas expressed here may seem novel and new. But they are not new in the sense that they have just been created, or even that I have created them. They were implicit in the formation of the first molecule of protoplasm that came into existence on this planet. They are, therefore, as old as life.
The pattern which you may, or may not follow, was laid down in the first molecule of protoplasm which appeared on this planet, as the Law of Growth.
However, there is no law which requires that one species on this planet, or even all combined species, the total life spectrum here, shall survive to grow to full stature. The possibility of growth is implicit in every form of life; it is latent, and capable of development, in every species. However, the species that fails to take advantage of the opportunity thus offered, if it fails to develop its potential, must inevitably give earth room to the species which is developing. In their day, the dinosaurs ruled the planet. They had their chance, but they failed to develop.
Where, now, are the dinosaurs?
The Law is—Grow or Die. THIS LAW ALSO APPLIES TO MAN.
This book may be regarded as a primer, a starting point of your adventure into the coming development of man. It is the first text book that you will receive. It is the beginning of the way.
How much progress you make upon the way, how well you master the law of growth, is, in large measure, up to you. You will receive assistance, sometimes without your knowledge, but it will not be the kind of assistance that will retard or weaken your development. The new people will not be helped—too much! Strength is required of them and strength is only achieved by overcoming obstacles.
The next upward step that the race takes—if it survives its own self-destructive impulses—will be of such a nature as to require the utmost in strength and courage from those who participate in it.
This step, it is fair to state, is in the direction of a higher development of consciousness.
Good luck—and God go with you.
Jal Jonner
The Big Sur
July 1971
Written in 1971, the book was now 49 years old, Zen decided after a rapid calculation. The war had started in 2009. The time was now 2020.
Eagerly, he turned to the first chapter. It seemed to him that his life was just beginning, that everything that had ever happened to him and all that he had ever done was in preparation for this moment, when life would begin.
After reading two pages, he reached the conclusion that, if this was a primer, the text that was to follow must be difficult indeed. The book started with mathematics that was twice as difficult as calculus. Trying to concentrate, he found the symbols blurring before his eyes. Then, as fatigue finally overwhelmed him, the whole page blurred and was gone. He was asleep.
But he wasn't really asleep. The body slept. But he was not the body. He was the consciousness that animated the body. This never slept.
He awakened at the touch of a hand on his shoulder.
[IX]
Coming back to conscious awareness, Kurt Zen simultaneously realized that something which he had been experiencing, and which had been very important, faded out of his memory like a gray ghost sliding silently away into a pearl-colored mist.
Nedra was shaking him by the shoulder and was smiling down at him. "Wake up, sleepy head. You've been snoozing for eighteen hours. That ought to be enough even for a growing boy like you."