(A.A. Bailey, Letters on Occult Meditation, pp. 282-287, 1922 — LETTER VIII, ACCESS TO THE MASTERS VIA MEDITATION.)

"The methods of approach are broadly three and we might indicate five results that will eventuate from the employment of these methods. The three methods are:—

1. Sanctified service.

2. Love demonstrating through wisdom.

3. Intellectual application.

They are all three but diverse methods of expressing one and the same thing,—active one-pointedness that expresses itself in service for the race through love and wisdom. But some individuals express this in one way and some in another; some carry the outer appearance of intellectuality and others of love, yet before the attainment is possible intellectuality must be based on love, whilst love without mental development and that discrimination that mind affords is apt to be unbalanced and unwise. Both love and mind must be expressed in terms of service before the full flower of either is attained. Let us consider each of these methods separately and indicate the meditation to be followed thereon:—

Sanctified Service. This is the method of the man who wields the law, the method of the occultist, and the rudiments of the method are laid down in raja-yoga .............. The word "sanctification," as you know, in the basic sense signifies the complete surrender of the whole being to one object, the Lord or Ruler. It means the giving wholly to the one the devotee aspires to. It means the consecration of the whole threefold man to the work in hand. It entails, therefore, the application of the entire time and self to the bringing of each body under the subjugation of the Ego, and the complete mastery of each plane and subplane. It involves the comprehension of each evolution and form of divine life as found on those planes and sub-planes, with one aim in view and only one—the furthering of the plan of the Hierarchy of Light. The method followed is that of the intensest application to the work of rounding out the bodies and of making them fit instruments for service. It is perhaps the hardest way that a man can tread. It leaves no department of the life untouched. All is brought under law. In meditation therefore the form of that meditation will be a threefold structure:—

a. The laws governing the physical body will be studied and brooded over. This brooding will find expression in a rigid disciplining of the physical body. It will be set apart wholly for service, and subjected consequently to a process that will attune and develop it more quickly.

b. The body of the emotions will be scientifically studied and the laws of water (occultly understood) will be comprehended. The significance of the term, "there shall be no more sea" will be known, and the sea of storm and passion will be superseded by the sea of glass, which directly reflects the higher intuition, and mirrors it with perfect accuracy, being unruffled and immovable. The emotional body will be set apart wholly for service, and its place in the threefold microcosm will be regarded as corresponding to that in the macrocosm, whilst the occult significance of its being the only complete unit in the threefold lower nature will be apprehended, and the fact made use of to effect certain results. Ponder on this.

c. The place of lower mind in the scheme of things will be studied, and the quality of discrimination developed. Discrimination and fire are occultly allied and just as the Logos by fire tries every man's work of what sort it is, so the microcosm on a lesser scale has to do the same. Just as the Logos likewise does this paramountly in the fifth round of judgment and of separation, so the microcosm on his lesser scale does the same in the last and fifth period of his evolution,—touched upon and described earlier in these letters. Every power of the mind will be utilised to the uttermost for the furtherance of the plans of evolution; first in the man's own development, then in the special field of work wherein he expresses himself, and lastly in his relationship with other units of the race, as he constitutes himself their guide and servant.

See you therefore the synthesis of it? First the strenuous one-pointedness that is the sign of the occultist blended with the wisdom and love which are reflected from the higher in the mirror of the emotional body, and then the intellect forced to act as the servant of the Ego through one-pointed effort animated by love and wisdom. The result will be the true Yogi.

I would point out here that the true Yogi is he who, after due carrying out of the set forms and times of meditation, merges that meditation in the everyday living, and will eventually be in the attitude of meditation all the day. Meditation is the means whereby the higher consciousness is contacted. When the contact becomes continuous, meditation, as you understand it, is superseded. In this first method the occult student works from the periphery to the centre, from the objective to the subjective, from the form to the life within the form. Therefore through the emphasis laid in Raja Yoga on the physical body and its wise control the occultist realises the essential importance of the physical, and the uselessness of all his knowledge apart from a physical body whereby he can express himself and serve the race. It is the line of the first ray, and its affiliated or complementary ray.

Love and Wisdom. This method is the line of least resistance for the sons of men. It is the sub-ray of the synthetic ray of an analogous vibration, of which our solar system is the objective manifestation. But I would seek to point out that the love achieved by the student of meditation who follows this line is not the sentimental conception that is so often discussed. It is not the non-discriminating love that sees no limitation, nor concedes a fault. It is not the love that seeks not to correct and that expresses itself in an ill advised attitude to all who live. It is not the love that sweeps all into service, suitable or unsuitable, and that recognises no difference in point of development. Much that is called love,—if logically followed out—would apparently dispense with the ladder of evolution, and rank all as of equal value. So potentially all are, but in present terms of service all are not.

True love or wisdom sees with perfect clarity the deficiencies of any form, and bends every effort to aid the indwelling life to liberate itself from trammels. It wisely recognises those that need help, and those that need not its attention. It hears with precision, and sees the thought of the heart and seeks ever to blend into one whole the workers in the field of the world. This it achieves not by blindness, but by discrimination and wisdom, separating contrary vibrations and placing them in position diverse. Too much emphasis has been laid on that called love (interpreted by man, according
to his present place in evolution) and not enough has been placed on wisdom, which is love expressing itself in service, such a service that recognises the occult law, the significance of time, and the point achieved.

This is the line of the second ray and its affiliated and complementary rays. Later it is the all-inclusive one, and the solvent and absorber. It can be followed, being synthetic, on either the Raja Yoga line or the Christian Gnostic line, owing to its synthetic significance....

Intellectual application. Here the order is reversed and the student, being frequently polarised in his mental body has to learn through that mind to understand the other two, to dominate and control, and to utilise to the uttermost the powers inherent in the threefold man. The method here is perhaps not so hard in some ways, but the limitations of the fifth principle have to be transcended before real progress can be made. These limitations are largely crystallisation and that which you call pride. Both have to be broken before the student who progresses through intellectual application can serve his race with love and wisdom as the animating cause.

He has to learn the value of the emotions, and in so learning he has to master the effect of fire on water, occultly understood. He has to learn the secret of that plane, which secret (when known) gives him the key to the downpour of illumination from the Triad via the causal and thence to the astral. It holds the key also of the fourth etheric level. This will not as yet be comprehended by you, but the above hint holds for the student much of value.

This is the line of the third ray and of its four subsidiary rays, and is one of great activity, of frequent transference, and of much mental display in the lower worlds.

Only when the student, who progresses by intellectual application, has learned the secret of the fifth plane, will he live the life of sanctified service, and so blend the three rays. Always synthesis most be attained, but always the fundamental colouring or tone remains. The next or fifth round will show the greatest exposition of this method. It will be the round of supreme mental development, and will carry its evolving Monads to heights undreamed of now.

This round marks the height of the second method, that through love or wisdom. It is the fourth round, that wherein the emotional reaches a high point of vibration, and there is direct connection between the fourth plane of harmony, between the emotional body, or the fourth principle, the quaternary, the fourth root-race or the Atlantean which co-ordinated the astral. I give you food for thought in these correspondences." [287]

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