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The High Ideal


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THE HIGH IDEAL

 

Nature loves only those who have high ideals. She calls them her beloved children and knows them by name.

 

Those who have no ideals are not listed in her Book. They are discarded and put into her cellar for the distant future. And so, whenever you feel abandoned by God and Living Nature, as if no one is paying attention to you, you should know it is your fault: you lack a high ideal. It is a Law. Everyone can organize their lives getting free of the adversities and sufferings and coming out of the long forgotten cellar of Nature. Setting a high ideal, even the most forsaken person, who is at the bottom of Nature’s cellar, will begin to crawl up like a snail and before long will come up to the surface enjoying the Sun shining upon him. Then Nature will say about him, “Behold one of my children who has risen from the dead.”

 

What is death and what is resurrection? Death is related to the children forgotten in the cellar of Nature, in other words, to those who lack high ideals. Resurrection is related to the children who are coming out of the material world’s deep cellars, in other words, to those who have high ideals. However, to be able to come out of the cellar you should possess strong willpower and unparalleled faith. You may often hear someone saying, “I can eat any food available, I am not choosy at all; I can dress in any clothes, I am not particular about the color or the quality of the fabric.” Such a person wants to present himself as humble, as one who accepts the conditions of life. It is not right. Whoever eats all kinds of food indiscriminately is without an ideal or with a very low one. This is how the omnivorous animal eats, but the human being is not an animal. When you eat, you need to choose your food carefully. Nature has created a variety of food, but you should choose the purest and the best one, which will have a beneficial effect on your body. Then you are a person of a high ideal!

 

Nature knows her children, she knows who of them have high ideals and who lack them. She is testing them all the time. Nature wants to discover what is hidden in the recesses of the human soul, in the depths of the human mind and heart. Nature wants to find out more about the human aspirations and impulses, so she lets you in her garden full of fruit trees, which are bearing various fruits of different properties. Then she observes which fruit you would reach for. If you choose to take from the best fruit, Nature will make a note in her Book, “Behold one of my wise children who has a high ideal and will become a true human being.”

 

But, if Nature sees that the person is too lazy to climb a tree but picks fruits from the lower branches, she will form a different opinion. She will make a note in her Book, “You will not turn out to be a true human being! You do not have a high ideal.” “What shall I do then?” “You should climb up the tree and pick fruits from there.” “But it is too high, I may fall down.” You need to climb the tree even though you may fall down jeopardizing your life. Then Nature will make a note in her Book, “This child is courageous and will become a true human being.”

 

Some people look up at the tops and stretch arms to them, but get frightened. So, they look down at the lower branches and search the ground for fallen fruits bending over to pick them up. For people like this one Nature will write down, “These are my children forgotten in the cellar who will not become true human beings.”

 

Remember that Nature focuses on the intrinsic aspiration of the human being. She only registers the facts, observes them, and puts in her records whatever she sees. Therefore, if Nature has recorded the best about you, you are the reason for that. And if she has chronicled anything not recommended by her, again you are the reason for this. She simply records the facts as they are without exaggerating or diminishing them; and based on them, Nature draws her conclusions. The effects that influence your life are a consequence of the choices you have made.

 

There was a young Egyptian woman named Eltamar, daughter of a poor villager, who was distinguished from her friends by the high ideal she had within her soul. She was wise and intelligent, chaste and modest. When she went to school, her teacher asked her, “Eltamar, will you remain a virgin or marry to somebody?” She replied, “I have only one ideal in my life and I am going to live accordingly. If I am to marry, it will be only to the king’s son. Whoever comes to ask me, I will refuse, if he is not the king’s son. This is my choice: I will marry to the king’s son or will remain a virgin.” You may say that this choice is foolish. No, this young woman is not foolish, but has a high ideal.

 

What is the application of the great ideal to life? If you have faith, if you follow some teaching, if you apply particular norms, if you hold a certain image in your consciousness, all this corresponds to the high ideal. Your spirit will be powerful as the son of Truth. Who is the son of Truth? He is the king’s son, the ideal of each soul. Therefore, when you go out early in the morning to see the sunrise, be there on time, before the Sun has risen over the horizon. Meet the first ray of the rising Sun. It is the most important one - the king’s son or the son of Truth, who has all power and might of the Sun hidden in him. If you do not receive the first ray, you have missed the sunrise. Receive the first ray and then return home at peace. The first ray carries the riches of all the rays. The first ray is the first fruit of the rising Sun or of the Great Tree of Life. The other rays are its last fruits. The Living Nature says about those people who think that they can greet the Sun at any moment or can observe it at any hour during the day, “You will not become true human beings.”

 

If you climb up a mountain and get thirsty, do not drink water indiscriminately. Stop where you are, look around and find the purest wellspring. Bend, take a handful of the crystal clear mountain water and drink it. If you do it in this way, you are a reliable person of a high ideal. If you say that you can drink from here and there, from anywhere, Nature will make a note that you cannot be relied on, you lack strength of character and have a low ideal.

 

Students of spiritual knowledge are distinguished by their high ideals. When you go to a mountain wellspring, no matter what difficulties you have, you should bend and drink from the center where the purest water is. When you have climbed high in the mountain, do not rush to go down, but choose the most beautiful place and sit there for a rest. Look around and preserve the imprint of that beautiful scenery deep within your soul. And going down to the valley, bring the memory of that vivid picture - of the living peak, which you have climbed. High mountain peaks and pure, crystal clear wellsprings are full of life-force and will leave everlasting unforgettable traces in your consciousness.

 

Apply the high ideal everywhere in your life! If you look for a book to read, find the books of the most renowned writers, of the most eloquent preachers. If you want to visit an art gallery, go to the exhibitions of the most prominent artists. You may ask, “Should we not see ordinary paintings as well?” You see such paintings every day in your life. It is enough to observe people watching how they eat, what food they use, at what time they have their meals so that you can see some ordinary pictures before your eyes. However, if you choose to see the paintings based on the high ideal, one is enough. It will be the work of the greatest artist, the artist of a high ideal. When you want to choose a friend, you should follow the same Law and find the wisest, most knowledgeable person who has the purest heart - the best friend ever. When one chooses a wife or husband, that person should be guided by the high ideal too. Those who deviate from the high ideal, cause themselves the adversities and sufferings in their life.

 

Now we are speaking about those ideas and principles in life, which should be applied daily. Someone may point out that if your ideal is not a good one, it will not lead you to a good end. If your present ideal is not right, then set it right. The next moment in life is yours so you can choose another ideal. Thus, you will finally come to the ideal of your soul that is eternal and guides the human being onto the right path - the Path of Love. If you have missed the first ray of the Sun today, you can see it tomorrow. And if you miss it again the next day, the day will be lost for you. But if you meet the first ray of the Sun today, you can meet it the following days as well. Only in this way can your entire life improve. The most enlightened thought, the most sublime feeling, the most beautiful action contain the first ray of the Sun that imbues the human soul.

 

How can the human life be set right? Find out your biggest and smallest errors and hold them to your attention until you free yourself from them. Even if you need to hold them for years, do not yield to them. Finally, your errors will say, “This is a person with a strong character who deserves to live. We surrender before you becoming your servants: you will go ahead and we are going to follow you.” Some spiritual students, who do not pass their exams and suffer a setback in life, easily fall into despair. They leave the battlefield denying their high ideal and saying, “Nothing decent will come out of us.” Those are people who do not preserve their high ideal.

 

What is the purpose of the human existence on Earth? Attending a feast? The human being has been summoned to the experimental school of Earth for character testing, mind and heart studies, and coming to know oneself. Whenever you sit at the table to feast, Nature watches you with wide open eyes, observing how you hold the fork and the spoon, how you eat, what napkins you use. From all these details, she draws conclusions as to what kind of a person you will become.

 

If you are invited to the second seating of the feast and you eat from an already used plate, do you think that you are a person following a high ideal? What do the holders of a high ideal do? They have clean plates, clean spoons and forks in their bags; and if the dirty plates are not replaced with clean ones, they say, “May we use our own plates, our own spoons and forks?” This is how students of spiritual science should behave.

 

If you want to feast someone according to the high ideal, you should do it in this way: order ten loaves of bread made of fresh, high quality flour without any admixtures, that is prepared by the best, cleanest, and neatest baker. Then cover the table with a clean white tablecloth and place a clean plate and a piece of that warm bread in front of each guest. Place also a cluster of grapes, an apple, and a pear. The grapes should be picked from the best vineyard situated in a sunny, nice place. The apples and pears should be from trees that have grown up according to the high ideal. The guests will take their seats at the table quietly and well-disposed and will help themselves. Then they will all give thanks and will take a walk to the surrounding area, where they can drink water from a pure wellspring. This is the new way to give a feast.

 

You encounter wealthy people who are very fastidious to their food, but they do not apply the high ideal to their mental and moral behavior. They allow both lies and thefts as normal things in their life. They begin well, guided by a certain ideal in the physical world, but finish badly because in the spiritual aspect they lack any ideal. Nature writes down about such a person, “You will not become a true human being.” Some people say that they can love anyone and everyone, but they are not telling the truth. I have not yet met a person who can love anyone and everyone. It is possible in words, but it doesn’t happen in reality. Love is being tested in Life. Saying “Love” you should feel its inner content and meaning. Those who experience true Love, will be able to transform their life in a second.

 

Whom shall you love? God. First you shall love God, then your neighbor and last but not least - yourself. This is the Great Truth in Life. Whoever does not begin life with loving God, will not evolve into a true human being. If you want a confirmation of the Truth in my words, go through the history of humankind to find out at least one great person on Earth who has denied Love for God. All great people: the geniuses, saints, and enlightened Teachers of humankind did have Love for God. Some may object, “If we focus on Love for God, we will neglect people and our relationships with them.” No, we will not forget about people, but will introduce the high ideal into their lives. If all people have aspired for the first ray of the Sun and the Great Love for God, the world of today would develop properly and the contemporary people would enjoy good health, power, and abundance. Many say that they have big hearts embracing everyone and anyone, even the entire humankind. These are only words that do not correspond to the Truth. To love someone means to know that person. To love all people means to know them. But you know your neighbor only if you can correct his errors. Therefore, if you love all people, it means that you are able to correct the errors of everyone. Is that true? You say that you love the entire humankind and at the same time you cannot tolerate your wife who is a member of it. You have a son and a daughter, but you are not on good terms with them. It is impossible to know and love someone without being in good terms with that person. So, your statement that you love all people is not true. How can you come to know someone? By your love for God. It will lead you to know your neighbor and yourself too. This knowledge will make you happy and ready to fulfill the Will of God.

 

It does not matter what people of today have been told about Love, they usually confuse Love with personal feelings and emotions, saying, “My heart burns with love, so I know love.” What burns and burns to ashes is not Love. These are the rays of the dark light that bring death and decay; they defile and distort the human soul. Do you think that human love can deceive the Great Creator of the Universe? Do you think that the manifestations of the Living Intelligent Nature can be mistaken for the human actions? God recognizes what is His, or in other words, what is Divine anywhere. God of the Eternal Blessing loves the good and truthful within human being. It is said in the Scriptures, “You have come to love the Truth in man.”[1] The Truth is the sublime, the purest, and the most beautiful in the human being. Someone wants to know whether the Spiritual World is interested in our everyday life. The ordinary things in life may interest people but not the Sublime Intelligent Beings. If you are the chief servant of a rich master and ten servants are at your disposal to obey you, should your master look after you? He knows that the other servants will consider and satisfy your needs. One of them will clean your clothes, another one - your shoes, still another one will tide your room, and so on. The master does not pay attention to your shoes, but he is interested in the servant who has polished them. If the servant has applied the high ideal and polished the shoes of his fellowman according to all the rules of his craft, he will attract the attention of his master. The master will say, “This servant has an ideal, I can rely on him.”

 

How will you apply the high ideal in your life? If a wife wants to make a shirt for her husband and she is satisfied with the first available material she can place her hands on and makes it in a ship-shod way, then she does not possess a high ideal. If she wants to make a shirt for her husband, she needs to wander around all the shops until she finds the fabric that fulfills the requirements of the high ideal. Then she needs to sew the shirt according to all rules of this profession. This is a woman holding a high ideal. The husband should do the same. If he wants to buy a dress material for his wife, he should not buy the first one he comes across just to give something to her, but he should make an effort to find the best fabric and bring it to the best dressmaker to sew it. If the wife and the husband act according to the principles of the high ideal, Nature will write down about both of them, “Behold people of good character, who have high ideals and make the best choice!”

 

You have a friend and want to give him a book for a present. You will go around all bookshops in order to choose the most valuable and instructive book so that your friend may read it, advance through it, and remember it for the rest of his life. Then your friendship is based on the high ideal. You want to write down a few thoughts as a keepsake for your friend. What will you do? If you copy whatever comes in hand, you are not holding a high ideal. You copy, for example some quotation by Petko Slaveykov[2] about money, “Money, money, you are an almighty queen” and you feel satisfied. But money is not an ideal and cannot be a driving force for humankind. You should write some thought that has been tested and experienced by you, extracting it from the bottom of your soul. And when your friend reads it, he will appreciate it and be grateful to you. And Nature will write down, “You will become a true human being.”

 

A person says that he loves someone. Why people love others? Is it for their beautiful eyes and eyebrows? Is it for their beautiful mouths and noses? It is misunderstanding of Love. Love is not excited by some external features. To love others for their external features means that you do not have a high ideal. To love your friend means to see a good character ’s trait distinguishing that friend from all other people. This trait is unchanging - you can always rely on it. A good character ’s trait is neither in the beautiful eyes nor in the beautiful mouth or nose. It is in the highest place, at the peaks of this person’s life. When you find the good trait of your friend, you will embrace it and hold it within yourself as a sacred gift. And Nature will write down again, “You will grow up as a great human being.”

 

You have a teacher whom you admire, so you say, “My teacher is well read in many sciences: physics, chemistry, mathematics, astronomy. My teacher is really a learned person.” Knowledge is not determining for the person. It does not make one learned. Something else defines the teacher. A lot of knowledge that is not processed is a burden which only a few can carry. The external knowledge is only an adornment of the hat; the hat is the essential, not its ribbon. A teacher tells a female student, “You could buy the most beautiful hat for yourself but without any adornments on it.” She goes with her friend to buy a hat. She chooses the best hat, but the hatter tells her that without a ribbon the hat is not impressive. “My teacher told me to buy a hat without adornments.” “Your teacher does not know anything about hats. If you add a ribbon the hat will look better.” Her friend insists to add one more ribbon. The girl gives up and puts two ribbons on her hat saying, “Now my teacher will be satisfied with my hat.” No, the hat has lost its value. Why? It is because it conforms to extraneous ideals.

 

Imagine that you are a writer and receive a beautiful pen with a golden nib from your friend. Another friend visits you, sees the pen, and adds a big precious stone on it. Still another one comes and puts one more precious stone on it. You want to write with your pen, but it is difficult: the precious stones make your pen heavy and gradually your thought becomes also heavy; it does not flow as fluently and easily as before. What are the adornments in Life? Such are the temporal and transitional ideas of the contemporary humankind, of the spiritual students and believers of today. They do not comprehend the power of the Divine that penetrates the human soul like a spark, inflaming the eternal fire within it.

 

Some people say, “I wish someone would hang a diamond around my neck even though this will not correspond to the high ideal.” It is not good. It makes sense to have a diamond hung around your neck, only if it is the biggest, most beautiful, and purest one. This is how your ideal should be. If someone wants to hang around your neck a small, barely noticeable diamond, do not accept it. Whatever you wear outside and within should correspond to the high ideal; otherwise do not even consider it. Strive for the greatest, for the most beautiful, for the best and purest in the world. This is the Truth to be placed within your souls, hearts, and minds.

 

To talk about the high ideal to people means to follow the flow of the Great River of Life. Where is this River running? Tonight I have been speaking to you about the high ideal expressed through the greatest, the most beautiful, the purest, and the best in the world. It is the first ray emanating from the Divine Source. If you receive this first ray, you will become spiritual students and true human beings. You will be among those who perceive the Truth as a high ideal of their soul. If you were late and did not receive the first ray, you would fall into the situation of the children forgotten in the cellar of Nature. This cellar is for the ordinary, not for the special, or in other words, for the Divine children. The Great World has been created especially for them.

 

Everyone talks about what exists within them. The holder of a high ideal speaks about it as the loving person speaks about Love; the truth-lover speaks about Truth; and the sage speaks about Wisdom. So, the person of love speaks about Love and the coward speaks about fear. Comparing them, who gains? The one who speaks about Love. The sage speaks about issues of importance, while the knownothing - about petty things. The wise one builds and the fool destroys; the wise one writes creatively and the fool copies. Who of them wins? The wise one, while the fool loses. A son of a rich man says that he has learned how to sign the money orders sent by his father. The life of many people consists only in signing. They have just signed to take something from this or that person. And when Nature looks at such a person who only takes and gives nothing in return, she writes down, “This child will not become a true human being. It has learned only to sign, but it cannot write anything else alone.”

 

What is required from people of today? You should follow the Path of the Enlightened Beings, Brothers of the Light, and Assistants of the Universal Brotherhood. They all carry a high ideal within their souls. They think, feel, and act according to the requirements of that high ideal. And when one of these Beings decides to come down to Earth, all advised It to go among the best people, in other words among those who strive for a high ideal. Who will the Master pay a visit to? He will go to those students whose souls yearn for their Teacher. Visiting them, he will say, “Here are some of my students who live by the high ideal.” But passing by the house of a student who has not created a bond with him, the Master will say, “Here lives one of my forgotten students.” He will pass by and continue on his way without leaving anything for that student.

 

The high ideal can be expressed in a few words: it is that, which is most beautiful, righteous, and truthful - all that is of best quality. Place the high ideal within your soul and see how your life will improve. Application is needed. If you say that your heart is empty, know that you lack Love. “What should I do to attain Love?” Rise early every morning and go out to see the sunrise. If you receive the first ray of the Sun, you have already opened your heart for Love. The first ray means the first thought and feeling that pass through your mind and heart. Write down the first thought and feeling that have come to you when you wake up in the morning. Nature is very strict in this respect. Nature listens attentively to the first thought crossing child’s mind at wake-up; as well as to the first feeling moving the child’s heart. And if you, a child of Life, think first of God from the moment you rise from sleep, think of His Love that fills your soul and awakens gratitude within you for all blessings, Nature will write about you, “This child is going to be a great human being!”

 

Lecture of the General Esoteric Class held by the Master Beinsa Douno on September 11, 1923, Sofia.

 

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1. See also 1John 3:18–20, “My little children, let us not love in word or in tongue, but in deed and in Truth. And by this we know that we are of the Truth and shall assure our hearts before Him. For if our heart condemns us, God is greater than our heart and knows all things.”

2. Petko Slaveykov (1827–1875): Bulgarian poet and supporter of the National movement for liberation from the Ottoman Empire.

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