LESSON NUMBER 34 THE RISE AND FALL OF MAN

These three[four] lessons are especially devoted to making you fully comprehend the cause of the periodic rise and fall of man, as an individual, a nation, or a whole civilization. They are also devoted to giving you the knowledge needed for rising to great heights with such stability that you will not fall.

We have never yet known the law of Nature which governs our rising and falling. We have not been able to command or obey that law because we have not known it. We have suffered the pains, aches, disasters, and tragedies of disobedience to Nature’s law because of our ignorance of it.

That is why we rise only so far, individually or collectively, before we inevitably fall. We rise to great heights very slowly, but fall quickly. From the Dark Ages to the heights of 1900 consumed seven centuries of great effort. The fall of man to another Dark Age will take but one [less than one] century.

Life is a series of experiences lived in the dark of ignorance while seeking the Light of all-knowing.

When your little successes become failures from lack of knowledge of God’s law which controls all structure,–a mouse trap which you are making, a monument or a mighty five span bridge,–you recover quickly and try it again. If you rise to great heights without knowledge and application of Nature’s Law of Balance, and fall to equally great depths as a consequence, you may not recover for many years of tragic suffering.

The Empire State Building, the Pyramids of Giza, or the Washington Monument will endure. They were erected with knowledge of the Law of Balance which equalizes all stresses, strains and tensions so that none of these exist. The Law of Balance voids them, because there is not one ounce of weight on one side of their equators which is not equally balanced on the other side.

The leaning Tower of Pisa cannot endure. It violates the Law of Balance. That violation not only creates stresses, strains and tensions, but each fraction of an inch more of leaning, or of adding to its height, multiplies them swiftly and dangerously.

A [an unequally balanced, disunited] civilization of disunity is impossible. We cannot have a unified civilization because we have never had a balanced system of human relations which will alone unify man.

Man can never be unified if the universal brotherhood of man principle is violated by unbalanced relations between men.

Mankind has always been divided into two unequal classes in which the essential values of life are taken by one class from the other. Disunity exists in all departments of life because of that division.

Discontent, enmity and hatred of all human units which make up the structure of our civilization also exist because of it. Man is now being destroyed by the very empires which he built for his glorification. The slave will always become the master. The commoner will always overthrow the throne.

It would be enlightening to read the law in this respect, as given to man in the Message of The Divine Iliad. We quote from this the following:

“Love of self, or nation of selves, turns neighbor against neighbor, and nation against nation. Self-love breeds hate and sows its seed in all the winds to blow where’er it will. Wherefor[e] say I, love of neighbor for neighbor, or nation for nation, unites all men as one.

“Serve first thy brother. Hurt first thyself rather than thy neighbor.

Gain nought from him unbalanced by thy giving. Protect thou the weak with thy strength, for if thou use thy strength against him his weakness will prevail against thee, and thy strength will avail thee nought.”

This law is being fulfilled throughout the world today. The slave has arisen against the master. The oppressed have arisen against their oppressors Monarchs have been unseated from many thrones. Russian peasants have killed their Czar. Labor has arisen against its exploiters. Conquered nations have thrown off their yokes, and conquerors are begging bread from other nations.

In unity lies the strength of all the cosmos, while disunity disintegrates great empires and the homes of men.

A UNITED civilization is possible only when human relations are balanced in all transactions which have to do with the distribution of the values of life which all men persistently and constantly seek.

Those essential values can never be taken by force for distribution to conquerors. The Universal Law of RHYTHMIC BALANCED INTERCHANGE will not allow it. They can be acquired only by giving in love.

We have built our now toppling civilization that way. Why should we expect it to endure? Love is the foundation upon which all balanced structures are created.

The Empire State Building can sway rhythmically in the winds of Earth without harming it but the vibrations caused by the winds and cyclones of man’s wars are shaking man’s growing structure with increasing violence and increasing danger. That is why civilizations fall so much more quickly than they rise. And that is also the reason why it is so much harder to shore up the falling structure of man when it has fallen as far as it already has, and will be impossible to save after socialization and nationalization of free enterprise in industry has rendered this one greatest balancing force of the world impotent. The complete impotence of industry and free enterprise is on its inevitable way. The colossal disaster which is now threatening the utter ruin of our present civilization is the EFFECT of a CAUSE which is thoroughly explainable–

and remediable–when we know the cause and have sufficient power left in us to invalidate the EFFECT–which we still have.

In the previous lessons you have been learning the law. In these four lessons we will apply it to our present threat of dissolution.

To exemplify the workings of the law we will describe the methods employed by man in building his world up to its high pinnacle reached in 1900. Seven centuries were consumed by man to reborn his world from the dark seven century period of his last great fall. He has fallen farther in fifty years than he rose in seven centuries–and will have disappeared into oblivion in another forty years[,] unless he becomes sufficiently “transformed by the renewing of his Mind” in time to prevent it.

THE ESSENTIALS FOR AN ENDURING CIVILIZATION

Before describing the methods employed in building our present civilization we will restate the principles given to the world by the great teachers of the ages, including the new teachings of The Divine Iliad Message.

It has been realized that these teachings have been truths, just as the Golden Rule is truth. That which has not been realized is that these truths are not just abstract statements, but LAW[— ]inexorable LAW[—] which must not be violated without tragic reaction upon him who violates them.

Even though these essentials are conceded to be truths they are not comprehended scientifically in relation to the workings of God’s electric universe.

Even though we have known these truths we have not put them into practice–in fact the reverse has been the general practice.

It gains us nothing to repeat truths, even if we do concede them to be truths, unless we sufficiently understand their power to lift us to great heights by practicing them in our human relations or destroy us by violating them.

That is why all of these essential truths have been summed up into the simple words of God’s One law of RHYTHMIC BALANCED INTERCHANGE between all pairs of opposites in every transaction in Nature.

It is for the scientific explanation–and comprehension–of universal law by means of which all mankind is controlled, that these lessons are written[,] in order that we may find an enduring way of life for our human relations[,] which we can live while working with the law, instead of against it.

1. The foundation of God’s universe is love–balance–unity.

2. The expression of love, balance and unity in Nature is in giving and regiving equally. Nature never takes. Man cannot take happiness or love. He can only give it.

3. God’s law gives in equal measure to that which is given.

4. To him who takes from another that which has not been given, an equal measure shall be taken from him.

5. He who takes another’s happiness for himself shall find himself possessed of an agony which he can never lay down, for it will follow him unto the end of time.

6. He who [would do ill to] hurts another hurts himself only. No man has power to [unreadable handwriting - please see image below] hurt another–for no man can be hurt [by another’s slander] until he himself accepts the hurt of another and takes it into him.

7. The hurt of any man is the hurt of everyman. Blessings extended to any man bless all men. 8. He who desires[th] riches must first give riches. 9. He who would be a leader of men must first serve men. 10. He who desireth a throne must first enthrone all other men.

11. He who would sell much to his neighbor must give him that with which to buy. Poor neighbors cannot buy. See to it that your neighbor is not poor.

12. The greatest asset of man is man. The wealth of any man is dependent upon the wealth of every other man. Abundance for one is impossible in an impoverished world.

13. The heavens give to the earth of its rains, and the earth gives of its abundance to the heavens EQUALLY. That is what love means. The withholding of rain creates a desert and a cloudless sky.

14. The seed gives the whole of the tree to the heavens and the heavens give the whole of it back to the earth EQUALLY.

15. When the interchange of givings and regivings between heavens and earths are equal they repeat each other eternally. Such transactions in Nature are eternally repetitive. They continue on forever.

16. When the human race learns how to give and regive equally each will be enriched. He who withholds that which he should give to another impoverishes both himself and the other.

17. Every transaction between humans generates either one of two opposing forces. One is GOOD-WILL and the other is ILL-WILL. Goodwill will build you to a mighty power, and ill-will will eventually destroy you. Both are yours to choose from. The decision is yours.

HISTORY IS REPEATING ITSELF

No civilization can exist part free and part slave.

In defiance of this indisputable fact man has built a civilization which is part free and part slave. We have never had any other kind of civilization. It has always been that way. There has always been a division of man. There has always been the conqueror and the conquered–the master and slave–the ruler and the ruled–the oppressor and the oppressed. There has never been content nor unity. There has been only discontent and disunity.

In a part-free-part-slave state the master can be master for only one swing of the cosmic pendulum. The slave will then be conqueror and the ruler will be enslaved, or worse.

That is law–inexorable law. All down the ages it has always been that way–and we even see it happening right now–but we have not yet learned the cruel lesson of it.

Consider the high point of culture in Athens in the days of Plato, Socrates, Aristotle, Phidias and other great philosophers, sculptors and architects who gave the world its classics for later generations to emulate, and built the most beautiful city in the world.

If anyone of that period prophesied that such a high culture would be utterly blotted out it would cause but a momentary laugh.

Yet it was blotted out–utterly and completely. Athens had 40,000 free men and 200,000 slaves, including concubines who had been free women. Concubine slaves conquered Athenian free men–not with swords, for Nature reacts in many ways.

Miscegenation conquered Athens. Miscegenation and homo-sexuality weakened that glorious race which gave so much beauty to the world.

And so it has been down through all human history from the fall of Babylon, through ancient and mediaeval history to the French, American and Russian revolutions of modern times in which the oppressed rose against their oppressors and slew them with their own swords to become free, so that they themselves, could become oppressors.

We ourselves, were not at all concerned when Oswald Spengler warned us of what would happen to this civilization in his book entitled “THE DECLINE OF THE WEST.” The decline which has already happened in fifty years is far greater than that which he prophesied, and it has embraced the world, not alone the West.

OUR “FOOL’S PARADISE” FIFTY YEARS OF ACCELERATING WORLD DEGENERACY

During the last fifty years a part of the world has degenerated to a lower level than it had arisen in six hundred years. The tortures of the inquisition in the trials of heretics during the 13th century were far more humane than the tortures of the Russian Inquisition of today, and of the steam chambers which boiled hundreds of thousands of human beings alive only yesterday.

In the Middle Ages the victims of torture for heresy had some protection from the law. Their tortures were prescribed and limited to the body. Very often the accused were liberated and their confiscated properties restored. Not so with the victims of the Russian Inquisition. The tortures inflicted upon them are far greater than ever recorded in world history, for they not only torture the body but dehumanize the spirit of man by demoniacal attacks upon the Consciousness, which alone has given to man the awareness of the spirit which centers him.

Moreover the victims of Russia’s Inquisition have no prescribed limits to their tortures. They are not even accused and given the right of recourse to by law. They are merely taken from their homes by thousands and, perhaps, never again heard from.

This is the kind of world we are living in today–TODAY–not centuries ago. We cannot brush it aside by saying that this happened centuries ago, and could not happen in this highly civilized world. Nor can we say that this happened on the other side of the world and could not happen here. It is a scientific fact that every thing which happens anywhere happens everywhere You can prove this by tuning your radio in on London or Iceland, and you know that it is factual–but you do not realize that any trend of the human race which manifests its nature anywhere upon the globe is as certain to reach you and your children, and your neighbor, as Paris fashions will surely reach New York.

What are we doing about it? We are doing nothing which is effectual for we do not know how to meet it. The Divine Iliad Message is to give you the knowledge of how to meet it. These lessons are giving you the comprehension of how to effectually meet it. You can meet it only by reversing your actions which are the cause of it.

It is waste time in forming [to form] countless little peace groups, or in asking [to ask] millions to pray to God to stop wars which men are making. Wars between nations are not man’s whole trouble, they are but one phase of the rapid degeneracy which man is bringing upon himself. Man alone can stop his wars the very moment he stops making wars.

If you want to go to New York from Chicago you do not head west and pray to God to set you down in New York–you stop going west and go east. Nor do you expect wheat when you sow brambles. God fulfills the law. He gives what you desire when you work with Him to fulfill your desire. It is time to stop thinking of wars with nations–and of the guns and atom bombs needed to stop those wars which will stop of themselves if we stop making other wars between man against man, and neighbor against neighbor.

These are the wars which are sending the human race into [another period of] oblivion. These are the REAL dangers–dangers which we do not heed while spending billions

for dangers which would dissolve like ice in the sun if we removed the real dangers which are causing these wars.

THE REAL DANGERS OF MAN

Let us consider some of the real dangers which are creeping unnoticed upon the human race, for which we are providing no armament. The following are some of them:

1. FEAR. Fear to do the right thing because it might cost us something.

We do not want another war. So we appease. We compromise with righteousness. We do not want to lose the lands which we stole by confiscation or conquest. So we trade with the enemy and exchange Ambassadors. The world’s greatest danger today is FEAR. Fear has lowered the morale of the free world. So we invite that which we fear to come to us. We are afraid to do the right thing which will prevent the things we fear from coming to us, and that very fear is bringing them to us. OUR GREATEST NATIONAL NEED IS COURAGE.

2. DISCONTENT arising from DISUNITY. Discontent breeds a dangerous restlessness in the human race which manifests itself in a desire to overthrow the cause of discontentment. Millions of our own people are dangerously discontented–and justifiably so. Class disunity is the basic cause of the tremendous discontent of today. Lack of a feeling of security in the discontented is making our valued workers easy prey for communist propaganda, which stresses the overthrow of the upper class and confiscation of their wealth for division among the discontented.

Labor unions are the direct effect of discontent. Strikes and limitation of production by workers have grown out of discontent.

3. FIFTH COLUMN and LEFT WING infiltration. The entire structure of our world civilization is rapidly being undermined by human termites which gnaw at our foundations to overthrow our freedom. Our weakness is in granting them the rights of a political party when they allegedly are trying to destroy our way of life. They are as much an enemy as those enemies who bear guns. We defend ourselves against enemies with guns, and coddle those more dangerous ones who do not bear such an evidence of enmity as guns do.

4. The threat of Freedom of person and of free enterprise through the gradual absorption of personal rights and the siphoning of the peoples earnings by centralized Government.

5. The reversal of the relation of man to State. We are far on the road to becoming puppets of the State with all of our movements and actions dictated by the State. England is much farther on that road than America.

Its people are fast losing their freedom. The dole is being used in England for political purposes. It not only degenerates the worker but kills incentive in him, and desire for work.

6. The threat of bureaucracy and the dole in America. The trend of all governments is in the direction of dictatorship. The methods used to secure permanency of office by an individual or party is to get enough people on the pay roll of a patron government–either for services rendered, or for the dole–to insure a voting majority.

Bureaucracy is hamstringing industry and the dole is destroying tens of thousands of valuable contributors to our national welfare. National and local use of the dole for political purposes is a danger of incalculable magnitude.

7. The increase of treason, disloyalty, greed, bribery and sabotage in our Federal Government, and in civil offices throughout the nation, and the general disregard of ethics. Since 1910 there has been a rapid growth toward moral degradation throughout the country which is increasing so rapidly in power that its contagion is affecting the morals of the entire nation. This insidious poison must either be wiped out or its spread would destroy us even if we had no wars.

8. The increase of crime because of its partnership with those who have sworn to protect us from it. Our entire nation could be taken over, and dominated by crime, if the growth is not soon checked. Likewise the glorification of crime is multiplying youth delinquents, which, in turn is multiplying crime in growing cycles.

9. Increase of homo-sexuality and other sex perversions. Whenever luxury, idleness, and unbalanced conditions exist which encourage physical degeneracy, Nature replies by multiplying the power of man to destroy himself, just as Nature multiplies man’s powers of regeneration when man works purposefully in tilling Nature’s soil. This danger to the world is a very grave threat to the whole race, not to just a small portion of it.

10. Decline in world culture, and the decrease in producing genius. Fifty years ago the art of the world was at a high standard. The English, French and American Salons were rich with the works of the great artists who then lived to give beauty to the world. Today the art of the world is ugly.

The degeneracy of much modern painting and sculpture,–and in other arts,–has its roots in the sex degeneracy of many of those who produce it. The dehumanization of part of the world has back of it the same cause which is degenerating the race culturally. That cause is sex perversion. Nature is taking a hand in giving back to man that which he [man] gave to man. When man destroys himself Nature helps him fulfill his desire, for Nature is purposeful and eliminates that which is not purposeful. It is time that we knew this in order that we may meet and check it by working WITH Nature instead of AGAINST it.

THE DAY OF JUDGEMENT DAWNS

In order that we may more fully comprehend the only way that greater depths of degradation may be spared the human race it would be well to look ourselves squarely in the face.

Let us see where we were fifty years ago, where we are now, and W H Y we are now at the verge of a very deep chasm.

The world was then divided into empires which had all been built by the sword. All were built up by conquest just as the ancient empires were built. The world sought peace, happiness, power and prosperity for itself by taking peace, happiness, power and prosperity from others, ignorant of the fact that everything which it had taken from others–including their peace and happiness–would be given back to the world in equal measure, life for life, agony for agony, in fulfillment of God’s law of RHYTHMIC BALANCED INTERCHANGE in all of Nature’s transactions.

MAN IS NOW REAPING THE HARVEST OF THAT WHICH HE HAS SOWN.

Great Britain was a great and powerful Empire in 1900. She was a World Power of first magnitude. She ruled the seas and many great nations like India, Australia, New Zealand, and Canada, and had other strongholds in countries which she had exploited such as China, Spain and Egypt. She was rich and prosperous beyond compute. Her titled class owned great estates and her power was seemingly invulnerable. Her people were conspicuously divided into two opposite classes called ARISTOCRATS and COMMONERS.

Today England is on rations–impoverished–weak and humble–her Empire breaking up–her best sons being killed–her titled class of aristocrats gradually being shorn of their ancient prestige–their estates being sold or confiscated–the freedom of her people gradually being restricted. India and Egypt have revolted. Iran has repudiated her rights. She is no longer a World Power controlling world finance. Instead of that she is a heavy borrower who acknowledgedly cannot pay her debts. Her morale is so low that she can with only great difficulty, raise but a semblance of that splendid courage to resist which amazed the world at the time of the Dunkirk tragedy.

All of this in fifty years. W H Y? Because her enemies all rose up against her and smote her.

Why did England have enemies which smote her? Because England was [made enemies by being] the enemy of the countries which smote her.

The United States was also rich and powerful. Its culture was at a high standard. It had built a great Empire which reached from coast to coast. It had no income tax and no worry about conscription.

Today the United States is in debt for hundreds of billions. Incomes are being taxed to almost confiscation point. Hundreds of thousands of our best blood have been, and are being, killed. Its youth are being called to war, and mothers, who have before known war’s agonies, are again preparing to face them.

All of this in fifty years. W H Y? Because her enemies rose up against her to smite her. Why did the United States have enemies to smite her? Because she made enemies by being the enemy of other men.

How did we make enemies of other men?

Our Empire began with a handful of men who came here to find freedom from persecution. These early American free men almost immediately began the persecution and slaughter of the free men whom they found here. They made enemies who, in turn, slaughtered them.

We gradually slaughtered the entire race of Indians and kidnapped thousands of Africans to enslave, just as our savage ancestors did ages ago. We fought over one hundred cruel and needless wars and killed hundreds of thousands of people whom we made our enemies by being their enemies.

Consider France, the world center of art, with its great African and Indo-Chinese Empire–Austria and the glory of Vienna’s music–Holland with its conquered East Indies –Belgium, with its blood bought Congo wealth–Germany–Italy–Czarist Russia and other countries which we considered impregnable only fifty years ago.

Where are these powerful countries today? Where are their kings who then sat upon seemingly secure thrones? Where, even, are the thrones?

Where is the powerful Czar of all the Russias, who condemned hundreds of thousands of his own people to Siberian exile? He and his family were slaughtered by enemies whom they had made by being their enemies.

THE GREAT UNLEARNED LESSON

All empires were built with hate and fear. The building of them bred hate and fear. Cruelty and brutality have never yet made friends[–]for love alone makes friends[–] and love has not yet come into the world.

In all of the empire building of man where is there love anywhere in its human relations?

God’s law always works. Whatever seed you sow you harvest in kind, multiplied–as seed always multiplies.

EVERY NATION MADE ENEMIES BY BEING ENEMIES. WE FEAR MAN TODAY BECAUSE WE MADE HIM FEAR US YESTERDAY.

The persecuted of the world have risen to smite their persecutors.

England’s degradation of China by the forced sale of opium upheld by two cruel wars and the confiscation of [shanghai and] Hong Kong, is now England’s degradation.

She now fears the enemy she made to fear her–and she is humbling herself mightily in fear of losing Hong Kong and other Asiatic holdings[–]which she will lose.

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Her serfs and workers for little wages have demanded a dole–and the master is doing the work of the serf in his own house while being taxed to pay the serf.

Laborers have long ago risen against masters to demand a share in that which they produce.

The negro race whom we enslaved, are now counting the days when their outnumbering votes will enslave their masters and the beginning of the mongrelization of the white race by intermarriage is now bringing a new worry into both races–both white and colored–both being equally hurt.

“Sell your goods to your neighbor” the business world of 1900 said. “Let the purchaser beware–but sell your goods. Represent them as honestly as you can–but sell your goods.

“You cannot be honest and get rich so employ the law to protect you from the law. Forget altruism, morals, ethics. You must survive. Foreclose on the widow or orphan. They are your prey. Business is business. You must look out for yourself. Let others look out for themselves. You are not your brother’s keeper.”

That was our business policy up to the year 1925. It has modified a little since then, but where, in that policy is there the slightest iota of the universal Brotherhood of Man principle, or of love itself, upon which the universe is founded?

Consider our world policy of empire building. Where in it is there the slightest indication of the LOVE YE ONE ANOTHER principle without which civilization cannot hold together?

We will put this principle [policy] into words. Try to find any expression of love in them. You will not find it. Why, therefore, need we be astonished if civilization disintegrates to a point beyond our control–a point which we surely will reach nine years from now–only nine short years–unless we reverse our human relations?

WORLD EMPIRE BUILDING POLICY–PAST AND PRESENT

“Build your empire. You need more lands to expand your body. You need more wealth to make your body prosperous. You need more workers to save you from work. You need more possessions to make your rich more rich. You need more leisure to become one of the ruling class which rules, but does not serve.

“Take other lands by the sword. Take lands from the heathen. They are weak and you are strong. You are enlightened, they are ignorant barbarians. Send missionaries to enlighten them, to save their Souls from sin.

“Exploit them and pay but little, for they need but little. If they resist you blow them from the cannon’s mouth to teach them a lesson, as empire builders did when the Sepoys rebelled. Let them know that you rule the world–that you are ruler of the lands and the seas.

“Enslave them if you need more workers for less wages. Whip them till they bleed if they slacken their work. Sell their wives and babes if they breed too fast. They are your property. You acquired them by conquest. You may do with them what you choose.

“Find new lands–new continents. Make them yours from coast to coast. Enslave their people or kill them. Kill the weak with your strength. Be strongly-armed. The fittest alone survive. When they resist, and kill, show them no mercy. Make their lands yours alone. Do not share them. Conquer its peoples and destroy them.

“Divide also your own peoples into two classes. Have a ruling class and a working class–the workers must serve the rich to make the rich more rich, and if the workers are not sufficient put their children into sweat shops to produce more goods for the rich.”

THE OBVIOUS QUESTION

Where in this outline of world policy can we find any trace of the GOLDEN RULE which says: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”?

Can you reasonably expect the God of Love to look down upon such fiendish cruelty and bless it? Or could you expect Him to take the oppressor’s side as against the side of the oppressed?

Why, then, these constant prayers which ask God to help us kill our fellow men–who are all children of the One God?

Why, instead, do we not learn that if we give love we will be given love?

When will we ever learn that the way to peace, happiness and prosperity is through love alone, and that the practice of hate will destroy us?

Why not acknowledge now that we are still barbarians with a desire in us to unfold our spiritual natures in our perpetual search for peace and happiness? Man’s spiritual nature is essentially GOOD. He has not yet found his spiritual nature. For ages he has been living in the material body, fulfilling the demands of his sensed physical body.

It is time that man be illumined with the Light of his spiritual unity with God. The renaissance of man is dawning. Let us seek the Light of man’s new day by living in that Light.