Life is wonderfully simple. One efficient energy or spirit permeates all that exists. A few universal laws characterise this energy in all phases of its infinitely varied manifestation. To feel this spirit as a living reality within, to understand these simple laws and adapt life to wise obedience to them - this it is to possess the greatest peace, happiness, and power of doing good. The entire secret could be told in a few words...

Perfect Whole

Perfect Whole -Horatio Dresser

When we turn our attention to the subject of elemental Intelligences or Nature-Spirits, we are confronted by this immediate difficulty, that we are led at the very beginning beyond and behind the world which we know through the channels of the senses. Sense perception does not help us at all in our study of that mysterious realm of life which constitutes the invisible background of physical manifestation. Madame Blavatsky warned us long ago that to describe Nature-Spirits or Elementals as having definite and corporeal form was likely to lead into great error. She said that those mysterious beings named Salamanders, Sylphs, Undines and Gnomes by Varacelsus and other Western Occultists; Bliutas, Devas, Ghandharvas by Eastern wisdom; Daemons by the Alexandrian School, and so on, were possessed of neither form nor consciousness at all as we understand those terms, and that to imagine otherwise would lead into a psychic materialism far more obstructive to real occult progress than the theories of modern scientific thought which would deny the existence of any such spirits.

nature spirits and the spitits of the elements

Nature Spirits & the Spirit of the Elements

A supreme power and wisdom govern the universe. The supreme mind is measureless and pervades endless space. The supreme wisdom, power, and intelligence are in everything that exists from the atom to the planet. The supreme power and wisdom are more than in everything. The supreme mind is everything. The supreme mind is every atom of the mountain, the sea, the tree, the bird, the animal, the man, the woman. The supreme wisdom cannot be understood by man or by beings superior to man, but man will gladly receive the supreme thought and its wisdom, and let it work for happiness through him, caring not to fathom its mystery. The supreme power has us in its charge, as it has the suns and endless systems of worlds in space.

As we grow more to recognize this sublime and exhaustless wisdom, we shall learn more and more to demand that wisdom, draw it to ourselves, make it a part of ourselves, and thereby be ever making ourselves newer and newer. This means ever perfecting health, greater and greater power to enjoy all that exists, gradual transition into a higher state of being and the development of powers which we do not now realize as belonging to us.

the_gift_of_the_spirit

Prentice Mulford - The Gift of the Spirit

I rather anticipate that superficial critics who do not like the argument of this essay will accuse it of pessimism, a charge which perhaps means little more than that they do not like it. Nevertheless, it may be worth while to point out, first, that pessimism is not a logical objection to a contention of which the truth cannot otherwise be questioned; and second, that though the argument of Tantalus may be said generally to corroborate that of Daedalus and Icarus, yet its conclusion is much less pessimistic than theirs, because, third, it makes it very plain that the evils which threaten the future of mankind are in no case unavoidable. If it is called "pessimism" to point out the methods by which men may escape destruction, because men do not care to adopt them, I suppose it must be "optimism" to rush violently and open-eyed down a precipice, and to expect to be saved by a miracle. Certainly such would appear to be the belief upon which human affairs are at present conducted.

tantalus or the future of man

Tantalus or the Future of Man F.C.S. Schiller

With all the authority obtained at the cost of numberless sacrifices, firm in his belief, justified by six years' experience, Bolivar expresses once more the same fundamental ideas of the Manifesto of Cartagena and the Kingston Letter. 

This is a decisive moment for the fate of the young nation. Was there to be a repetition of those errors springing from a generous spirit which had already proved to be incapable of protecting and fostering the onward march of the revolution, or was the new era of regular government to rely on the wealth of experience gained through contrast, sacrifice, and failure? It would have been an unpardonable mistake to fall a prey to the same disappointing illusions of the republic's first legislators. 

Eight years of strenuous life in the midst of the hardships of a war, which did not tolerate indifference nor remissness, had definitely enlisted in political and social activities the classes constituting the majority of the population of Venezuela. They had to be accepted with their good qualities, their defects, their potential energies, their natural limitations. The idea was to establish a republic, not philosophic and abstract, but a concrete democracy whose subjects and direct agents stood out clearly and precisely in that midst. This is the wide difference existing between the exalted Congress of Angostura and the exalted Congress of 1811.

an address of bolivar at the conference of angostura

An Address of Bolivar at the Congress of Angostura (February 15, 1819)

"To those in whose hands this book finds it way, I wish to convey my greetings, and to assure you that it has been a great pleasure to me to be spared, and able to write the only authentic history that has ever been written by a member of the noted, or as some might express it, 'notorious' James Brothers gang, whose operations extended over a time, beginning with the outrages which were perpetrated on the family of the parents of Jesse and Frank James, by the Quantral band, which will be narrated in the pages which are to follow, and going through the different operations of the Jesse and Frank James gang of outlaws, ending with his death, which occurred at Wayton, Newton county, Arkansas, on the 14th day of February, 1926."

This history was written by Frank James himself, at odd times, during his latter years and was, two years before his death, entrusted to his daughter, Mrs. Sarah E. Snow, of Wayton, Ark., with his request that it be kept a secret until after he had passed away, after which it was his desire that it be published to the world, and his identity disclosed, in order that the world might learn some of the true facts concerning the whys and wherefores leading up to and the causes which forced these two brothers into outlawry.

the_only_true_history_of_the_life_of_frank_james

The Only True History of the Life of Frank James As Written by Himself

You never saw a tree. 

You have seen some particular kind of tree. 

No - you have not seen that, even. All you have seen is some individual tree - the tall nut tree, let us say, that grew in the pasture, when you were a boy, and near the edge of the swamp where the frogs peeped in April.

That tall nut tree was a miraculous tree. (All trees are miraculous.) We know practically nothing about the essential element in trees, the life in them - the souls in them that make them what they are.

the tree folk

The Tree Folk by Henry Turner Bailey

The investigator who seeks to develop exact and careful conception of realities in a realm as temperamental as the occult faces from the beginning unsuspected difficulties. Every defining term as well as every accepted teaching and doctrine is variously interpreted by the different groups of students. Here is a field in which the most sincere teachers are swept into narrow prejudice by the sheer fire of their enthusiasm and so seem universally to emphasize their differences one from the other when they could as well build upon a meeting ground of common understanding.

Occultism, occult science, and occult philosophy in modern usage loosely refer to all forms of mysticism or magic and to all esoteric or theosophical philosophy and research. With metaphysics which is used in an equally broad but less particular sense, they are the general terms for the field. Theosophy is seldom employed except when capitalized in reference to a particular group of societies.

This lack of generally accepted authority demands in critical analysis a preliminary examination and outline of premises. What is occult philosophy? Is it a science? Philosophy itself is not faith nor dogma but rather search and aspiration for wisdom and knowledge. Science rests upon the accumulation and verification of facts, and this is a process which induces wisdom and creates knowledge. Philosophy may properly be considered a department of science. Yet, the term "occult science" sometimes applied to modern metaphysics is hardly proper in the present state of superphysical teaching under claim of authority and revelation especially when belief in the revelation as well as acceptance of the authority must be yielded by the investigator without that intellectual reservation which marks the scientist.

key truths of occult philosophy

Key Truths of Occult Philosophy - An Introduction to the Codex Occultus

Join Liquid Bloom, PERE, and famed mycologist Paul Stametson for a meditative dive into the prehistoric world with 'The Mycelium is Listening.’

Generating a fertile soundscape of soft and prismatic effects, Liquid Bloom and PERE build upon their deep roots in the psychedelic music world with the aid of Stamets’ ongoing story of fungi and mycelium’s inherited role as Earth’s grand caretaker. 

We are reminded that our time on this planet is temporary... Long after we are gone, this sweeping and interwoven life form will remain, carrying the imprint of our existence onward for future generations

The Only True History of the Life of Frank James As Written by Himself

Russell Stamets