Every true intuition is in fact a “working with the philosopher's stone,” because each genuine intuition calls directly upon those powers which act [pg 354] from out the supersensible world, into the world of the senses.
As the occult student climbs the path leading to cognition of the higher worlds, he becomes aware at a particular point that the cohesion of the powers of his own personality is assuming a different form from that which it possesses in the world of the physical senses. In the latter the ego brings about a uniform co-operation of the powers of the soul—primarily of thought, feeling and will. These three soul powers are actually, under normal conditions of human life, in perpetual relation one with another. For instance, we see a particular object in the external world, and it is pleasing or is displeasing to the soul; that is to say, the perception of the thing will be followed by a sense of either pleasure or displeasure. Possibly we may desire the object, or may have the impulse to alter it in some way or other; that is to say, desire and will associate themselves with perception and feeling. Now this association is due to the fact that the ego co-ordinates presentment (thinking), feeling, and willing, and in this way introduces order among the forces of the personality. This healthy arrangement would be interrupted should the ego prove itself powerless in this respect: if, for instance, the will went a different way from the feeling or thinking. No man would be in a healthy condition of mind who, while thinking this or that to be right, nevertheless wished to do something which he did not consider right.
The same would hold good if a person desired, not the thing that pleased him, but that which displeased him. Now the person progressing toward higher cognition becomes aware that feeling, thinking, and willing do actually assume a certain independence; that, for example, a particular thought no longer urges him, as though of itself, to a certain condition of feeling and willing. The matter resolves itself thus: We may comprehend something correctly by means of thinking, but in order to arrive at a feeling or impulse of the will on the subject, we need a further independent impetus, coming from within ourselves. Thinking, feeling and willing no longer remain three forces, radiating from the ego as their common centre, but become, as it were, independent entities, just as though they were three separate personalities. For this reason, therefore, a person's own ego must be strengthened, for not only must it introduce order among three powers, but the leadership and guidance of three entities have devolved upon it.
And this is what is known to occult science as the cleavage of the personality. Here is once more clearly revealed how important it is to add to the exercises for higher training others for giving fixity and firmness to the judgment, and to the life of feeling and will. For if certainty and firmness are not brought into the higher world, it will at once be seen how weak the ego proves to be, and how it can be no fitting ruler over the powers of thought, feeling and will. In the presence of this weakness, [pg 356] the soul would be dragged by three different personalities in as many directions, and its inner individual separateness would cease. But should the development of the occult student proceed on the right lines, this multiplication of himself, so to speak, will prove to be a real step forward, and he will nevertheless continue, as a new ego, to be the strong ruler over the independent entities which now make up his soul.
In the subsequent course of development this division or cleavage is carried further; thought, now functioning independently, arouses the activities of a fourth distinct psycho-spiritual being; one that may be described as a direct influx into the individual, of currents which bear a resemblance to thoughts. The entire world then appears as thought-structure, confronting man just like the plant and animal worlds in the realm of the physical senses. In the same manner feeling and will, which have become independent, stimulate two other powers within the soul to work in it as separate entities. And yet a seventh power and entity must be added, which resembles the ego itself. Thus man, on reaching a particular stage of development, finds himself to be composed of seven entities, all of which he has to guide and control.
The whole of this experience becomes associated with a further one. Before entering the supersensible world, thinking, feeling, and willing were known to man merely as inner soul-experiences. But as soon as he enters the supersensible world he becomes [pg 357] aware of things which do not express physical sense realities, but psycho-spiritual realities. Behind the characteristics of the new world of which he has become aware, he now perceives spiritual beings. These now present themselves to him as an external world, just as stones, plants and animals in the physical sense world, have impressed his senses. Now the occult student is able to observe an important difference between the spiritual world unfolding itself before him and the world he has hitherto been accustomed to recognize by means of his physical senses. A plant of the sense-world remains what it is, whatever man's soul may think or feel about it. This is not the case, however, with the images of the psycho-spiritual world, for these change according to man's own thoughts and feelings. Man stamps upon them an impression which is the result of his own being.
Let us imagine a particular picture presenting itself to man in the imaginative world. As long as he maintains indifference toward it, it will continue to show a particular form. As soon, however, as he is moved by feelings of like or dislike with regard to it, its form will change. Pictures, therefore, at first present not only something independent and external to man, but they reflect also what man himself is. These pictures are permeated through and through with man's own being. This falls like a veil over the other beings. In this case man, even if confronted by a real being, does not see this, but sees what he himself has created. Thus he may [pg 358] have something true before him, and yet see what is false. Indeed, this is not only the case in respect to what man has observed concerning his own being, but everything that is in him impresses itself upon the spiritual world.
If, for example, a person has secret inclinations, which owing to education and character are precluded from revealing themselves in life, those inclinations will, nevertheless, take effect in the psycho-spiritual world, which is thus colored in a peculiar way, due to that person's being, quite irrespective of how much he may or may not know of his own being. And in order to be able to advance beyond this stage of development, it becomes necessary that man should learn to distinguish between himself and the spiritual world around him. It is necessary that he should learn to eliminate all the effects produced by his own nature upon the surrounding psycho-spiritual world. This can be done only by acquiring a knowledge of what we ourselves take with us into this new world. It is therefore primarily a question of self-knowledge, in order that we may become able to perceive clearly the surrounding psycho-spiritual world. It is true that certain facts of human development entail such self-knowledge as must naturally be acquired when one enters higher worlds. In the ordinary world of the physical senses man develops his ego, his self-consciousness, and this ego then acts as a point of attraction for all that appertains to man. All personal propensities, sympathies, antipathies, passions, opinions, etc., possessed [pg 359] by a person, group themselves, as it were, around this ego, and it is this ego likewise to which human Karma is attached. Were we able to see this ego unveiled, it would also be possible to see just what blows of fate it must yet endure in this and future incarnations, as a result of its life in previous incarnations and the qualities acquired. Encumbered as it is with all this, the ego must be the first picture that presents itself to the human soul, when ascending into the psycho-spiritual world. This double of the human being, in accordance with a law of the spiritual world, is bound to be his first impression in that world. It is easy to explain this fundamental law to ourselves, if we consider the following. In the life of the physical senses man is cognizant of himself only so far as he is inwardly conscious of himself in his thinking, feeling, and willing. This cognition is an inner one; it does not present itself to him externally, as do stones, plants and animals; but even through inner experiences, man learns to know himself only partially, for he has within him something that prevents deep self-knowledge, namely, the impulse to immediately transform this quality, when through self-cognition he is forced to admit its presence and concerning which he is unwilling to deceive himself.
If he did not yield to this impulse, but simply turned his attention away from himself—remaining as he is—he would naturally deprive himself of even the possibility of knowing himself in regard to that particular matter. Yet should he “explore” [pg 360] himself, facing his characteristics without self-deception, he would either be able to improve them, or in his present condition of life he would be unable to do so. In the latter case a feeling would steal over his soul which we must designate a feeling of shame. Indeed, this is the way in which man's sound nature acts; it experiences through self-knowledge various feelings of shame. Even in ordinary life this feeling has a certain definite effect. A healthy-minded person will take care that that which fills him with this feeling does not express itself outwardly or manifest itself in deeds. Thus the sense of shame is a force urging man to conceal something within himself, not allowing it to be outwardly apparent.