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The Third Lesson: The Expansion of the Self.523
teaching at this point would be to use space which is needed for the lesson
before us.)
And yet, while the “I” is not God, the Absolute, it is infinitely greater than
we have imagined it to be before the light dawned upon us. It extends
itself far beyond what we had conceived to be its limits. It touches the
Universe, at all its points, and is in the closest union with all of Life. It is in the
closest touch with all that has emanated from the Absolute—all the world
of Relativity. And while it faces the Relative Universe, it has its roots in the
Absolute, and draws nourishment therefrom, just as does the babe in the
womb obtain nourishment from the mother. It is verily a manifestation of
God, and God’s very essence is in it. Surely this is almost as “high” a statement
as the “I Am God” of the teachers just mentioned,—and yet how different.
Let us consider the teaching in detail in this lesson, and in portions of others
to follow.
Let us begin with a consideration of the instruments of the Ego, and the
material with which and through which the Ego works. Let us realize that the
physical body of man is identical in substance with all other forms of matter,
and that its atoms are continually changing and being replaced, the material
being drawn from the great storehouse of matter, and that there is a Oneness
of matter underlying all apparent differences of form and substance. And
then let us realize that the vital energy or Prana that man uses in his life work
is but a portion of that great universal energy which permeates everything
and everywhere, the portion being used by us at any particular moment
being drawn from the universal supply, and again passing out from us into
the great ocean of force or energy. And then let us realize that even the
mind, which is so close to the real Self that it is often mistaken for it—even
that wonderful thing Thought—is but a portion of the Universal Mind, the
highest emanation of the Absolute beneath the plane of Spirit, and that
the Mind-substance or Chitta that we are using this moment, is not ours
separately and distinctly, but is simply a portion from the great universal
supply, which is constant and unchangeable. Let us then realize that even