ight on the astral, as in the course of Nature the
powers of sight were developed on the physical plane. And if you
realise that your consciousness is one, building its bodies for its
fuller and more complete expression, that you are here in order to
become masters of matter instead of its slaves, to become lords of
matter, using every organ of matter for knowledge of the world to
which that matter belongs, and not to be blinded by it, as we are for
so long a time in our climb upwards, then you will see that this
natural development of astral powers is inevitable in the course of
evolution, and all that you can do is to quicken it, following the
line which Nature has traced. As Nature slowly will evolve in every
human being the power of using the astral body as freely as you use
the physical body now, so can you quicken the coming of that day for
yourselves by understanding the powers of thought and turning them to
the object you desire to obtain. There are many ways in which this may
be done, and many rules you may learn for your guidance. Those rules
may be summed up under two heads: clear and strenuous thinking,
discipline for the bodies that you are trying to evolve; and also, I
should add, for the body below them in evolution. Those are the two
great laws for the safe evolution of these so-called psychic powers,
what I call the powers of the consciousness on the astral and mental
planes. There must be a discipline for the bodies, for you have to
choose the material which will serve you best in the work you are
doing out of the innumerable combinations of matter with which Nature
presents you. You must choose the combinations that will serve your
purpose, which you can utilise in the building of the organs of sense
on plane after plane. Just as really as the man who is a drunkard will
injure his nervous system by his excesses, and by supplying coarse and
over-active compounds will injure the physical body, so making it a
less useful instrument for the man--as any excess, not only
drunkenness, but gluttony, profligacy, and so on--as these injure the
physical body as an instrument of consciousness, and to have full and
perfect consciousness here we must train, discipline, build up our
body with knowledge and with self-control, so also is that true on the
higher planes. A regimen is necessary when you are dealing with the
organisation of the subtler matter of the astral and mental worlds,
for you cannot build up your ph