Reading 1341-1

TEXT OF READING 1341-1 M 54 (Executive, Christian Background)

Text

Date: 2/25/1937 Sex: M Age: 54 ReadingID: 7013

This Psychic Reading given by Edgar Cayce at his home on Arctic Crescent, Virginia Beach, Va., this 25th day of February, 1937, in accordance with request made by Mr. [1151], Active Member of the Ass”n for Research & Enlightenment, Inc.

[Edgar Cayce; Gertrude Cayce, Conductor; Gladys Davis, Steno.]

Born July 11, 1882, late afternoon, in Amsterdam, N.Y. Time of Reading 3:35 to 4:15 P. M. Eastern Standard Time. New York City. (Life Reading Suggestion)

1. EC: Yes, we have the records here of [1341]. Many associations we find that come from out of connections There is a relationship here between large orchard grounds and the entity near Cincinnati that should be looked into by the entity. There is an association with an old estate in England whose coat or crest is the unicorn, the helmet - yes, two unicorns, the helmet and staff and the plume about the staff. These are parental (?) associations of material natures. Yes, there was a railroad, too, with it.

2. In giving that as we find from the records here of the entity’s activities in its sojourns in the earth and those interims of the environs about the earth, we find little of an astrological aspect becoming a portion of the entity’s experience. Not that the entity may be said to be wholly material-minded, but the application of the mental self has been and is held to be so necessary in the material things that the spiritual is too easily lost sight of in practical application by the entity.

3. As we find then from a summation of the experiences (as we shall see), and from the application of self as related to the material, the mental and spiritual applications, this might be said of the entity:

4. While of sufficient mien to enjoy a good joke, to be laughed at or derided by others is unbearable to the entity; oft arising, or causing the mental exertions of the entity to produce a determination to override - by the very mental abilities - such that would cause or bring such experiences in the affairs or dealings of the entity.

5. Hence while the activities are very good in associations of political and economic conditions, affairs dealing with national and international relationships, this very experience or condition must be well cared for by the entity, lest this become a stumblingstone to those projects, those conditions as the entity may interest self in for the common welfare of the many.

6. Then it is necessary for not merely a mental patience (for this the entity possesses) but spiritual patience also.

7. In the astrological urges we find that Venus, Jupiter, Uranus and Neptune deal with latent urges; though these remain the more oft latent, unless there is a greater application of those influences in those directions as indicated.

8. Hence the entity is “a good fellow well met,” easily making friends; yet in the very nature is reserved in a manner. A good conversationalist, and he should make himself a better listener.

9. Do not continue to make for justification by reason alone materially, but justification by deeds done and by spiritual application of ideals more than ideas will bring a greater ability of holding the interest and of making practical the great mental abilities that are shown in the entity’s study, the entity’s speech, the entity’s activities in many ways.

10. This makes also for the greater interest mentally manifested in the many; and for the abilities to interest those who have been or who are upon waters, or overseas.

11. Hence international as well as national subjects become a portion of the entity’s experiences.

12. And when that type or element of patience is manifested, those activities with those influences dealing with international problems will become the greater interests of the entity.

13. As to the appearances in the earth, that influence the entity in the present, we find:

14. Before this the entity was in the earth during those periods of what is now called the American Revolution, during those activities of the Continental armies in portions of now New York, Connecticut, Hampshire and Vermont - in the name Wayne.

15. We find the entity was then of what would be called today the Intelligence Department of that portion of the Continental Armies; reporting to, making for activities especially with Mercer, Washington, Greene, and those of that part of the Army activities.

16. The entity gained through the greater portion of the experience, and remained in active force in those portions of the land after there were the settlings of the land.

17. From those experiences the interests then come in the ability to gather data or facts from those various projects, whether they be of a national or international nature, whether they be for commercial organizations or for a state, city, or the national projects that may be begun or attempted.

18. Hence not as a mere statistician but rather as one that would supply data for statisticians, for those in the greater authority.

19. And because of that very weakness the entity may be the greater service in the background than in the van of any great movement; though first overcoming or satisfying or basing the purposes of the activity upon spiritual imports and none of self, the entity may be a leader.

20. Before that we find the entity was in the land now called the Roman, during those periods when there were the greater expansions under Claudius Caesar for an empire that was to rule not only most of the activities of the world in military and economic life but in the moral life.

21. The entity then was among those of the emissaries who represented the reporting to those in authority under that Caesar; especially in the Grecian land, the Mesopotamian land, and a portion of the Palestine land.

22. There the entity gained, there the entity lost. For with the taking on of the entity’s experiences with the teachings of Paul in portions of the land, in the acceptance of same, the entity gained; yet with being laughed at for his tender heartedness, his chicken-heartedness even as called then, it became the downfall or the losing portion of that experience - as Tultimustouen, or Timous as was generally termed in the experience.

23. From that experience and those activities, we find in the present those inclinations for the questioning of those who rely too much (as judged by the entity) upon their religious affiliations or associations; and yet not tolerant enough is the fault in these directions. Though there is the holding to tenets, the entity makes them as mental abilities rather than giving their proper evaluation in the affairs and in the lives and in the promptings of the fellow men. This became - and is yet - a condition, an experience, to be met.

24. Do it NOW!

25. For without the Lord guide, indeed may the greater mind fail - for it must!

26. Before that we find the entity was in the land now known as the Indian, or the Indian and the Egyptian; when there was the coordinating of those of the lands of Mu and of Saneid and Ra-Ta and On, all in their attempts for that purposefulness which is a harkening to something within the entity.

27. For the entity was an emissary and visited most of those and saw how that in the moral life and in the spiritual life there might become a unison, and peace and harmony made to be the coordinating forces in all the activities of the peoples of the earth.

28. So the entity becoming one with that purpose in self, and in the name Egoan, made for the first unison - and then of self-indulgence.

29. These that the entity made that become disrupting, meet them - first in self.

30. As to the abilities of the entity then, and that to which it may attain:

31. There are those experiences, as indicated, wherein the entity may accomplish much; or that whereunto the entity may accomplish is only limited to that wherein the entity limits the purpose. For if the purpose is builded in Creative Forces and spirituality rather than any economic, political or by partisan forces, the activities then become as helpmeets with the Creator of harmony in and among men. But if there is the self injected, then these must make for hard experiences. For the greater the ability, the greater is that required or demanded not only of and by self, but self’s relationships to Creative Forces as may manifest in a material world.

32. In those things as pertain then to the national and international relationships as to law and order for a DIVINE purpose may the greater forces come, materially - that in the financial and in the law may the entity find justification.

33. (Q) Was the entity [1341] connected with or related to the entity [1151] in any previous life? (A) In the Roman experience. They were then as co-laborers for a purpose.

34. (Q) Was the entity [1341] connected with an entity named BUCKLE during the nineteenth century? (A) Do not find so, save as a helpmeet for a Buckle - or Buckalew.

35. (Q) Is it intended that the entity [1151] maintain close personal relations with the entity [1341]? (A) This may be very well for [1341]!

36. (Q) Was the entity [1341] related previously to the entity […], his wife? (A) That’s a part of the relationships with the [1341]‘s of Cincinnati, New York - yes, and of those places near Edinburgh. Close relationships but rather blood, as would be called, than marital - yes, close relationships.

37. (Q) Will the entity [1341] crystallize his dream of an organization devoted to international peace, at an early date? (A) Conquer self, and he may!

38. (Q) Any other information? (A) Much might be said, much is bound about by self.

39. We are through for the present.

Copy to [1151] ” ” Ass’n file

Reports

Reports & Follow-up

R1. 4/5/32 Written by Mr. [1341] (11/37) and presented to the Association by Mr. [1151]:

Permit me to thank you for the inspiring quotation from Ingersoll, and to enclose another, written by him in the cottage of Burns. If you will carefully compare the features of both Ingersoll and Burns you will find them the same, and if you will read the last verse you will see that he himself feels that he has at last grasped the “something deemed divine.” As to the general subject you and [1151] and I discussed, I have rather hastily put together the following observations which may interest you in odd moments and which I begin with another quotation of verse:

“Oh God for a man, with heart, head, hand Like some of the simple great ones gone Forever and ever by. One still strong man in a blatant land, Whatever they call him what care I - Aristocrat, democrat, autocrat - one Who can rule and dare not lie.”

The idea of reincarnation is as old as the hills. Before the body of man was, his spirit was. Two-thirds of the human race accept the idea in principle. The remaining third are prepared for it by the idea of incarnation and the colloquy in the New Testament in which Jesus asks “Whom think ye I am?” and is answered that he might be Jeremiah or Elijah. But reincarnation is accepted anywhere now only as a belief. It must be proven in order to have universal validity. And if proven it would change the entire course of human thought. It would give humanity certainty of its future, reveal the justice of God, stimulate men to make the world a better place to dwell in so that in the next life they might receive the benefit, and give added force to every symbolic expression of Christianity.

Reincarnation is the secret of the leadership throughout the ages which is as essential to the development of humanity as vitality. As the spirit guides the body so intelligence rules the earth. Genius is a combination of past experience and inspiration. History is the sum of the work of human genius, of those inspired minds who have advanced the cause of mankind. They in all lands and climes have been guided intuitively. The sublime deeds of life are done by individual men who are the servants of the Most High.

Moses, Samuel, Isaiah and David in Israel, Rameses and Thetmosis III in Egypt, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Alexander in Greece, Caesar in Rome, Hannibal in Carthage, Mahomet, Harun and Mamun in the Caliphate, Buddha in India, Confucius in China, Zoroaster in Media, Justinian in the Byzantine Empire, Charlamagne in Francia, Columbus in Italy, Magellan in Portugal, Cortez in Spain, Charles V in Austria, Peter in Russia, Cromwell and Pitt in England, Luther and Bismarck in Germany, Washington and Lincoln in America are among the achievers of all time who have advanced humanity step by step to greater things.

They and those like them, individuals all, have brought humanity down to date. Sweep away those who have labored and struggled singly in leadership of their fellows throughout historic life on the planet and man is again under a tree in the forest, subsisting on the line of least resistance. And without the individual help of those good women who have been the wives and mothers of the world, as well as those feminine characters who have assisted in the leadership of mankind, such as Semiramis, Zenobia, Brunnhilda, Isabella, Catherine, Elizabeth and Joan d’Arc, there would be but a verdant nature on an unthinkable earth. All these spirits, added to the conquerors and statesmen, teachers and writers, inventors and captains of industry have fashioned the world we live in, wresting something new in government, thought or material out of old conditions to make for progress.

Vitality, determination, opportunity, inspiration and right reason provide the means by which achievers perform their tasks. They spring forward for each occasion and seem to have been created for it. In moments of supreme decision they appear to see more clearly than others what should be done and advance toward accomplishment with assurance. Through boyhood and youth they often given evidence of uncommon and preternatural precocity. They understand problems pertaining to activities in which they seek to become engaged as though they had had long experience in them. Their companions and associates, even in youth, are forced to give way to their asserted genius. As they grow older a glamor attaches to them. Men delight to know and follow them.

“Sword and staff, or talents sword-like or staff-like carry on the work of the world,” says Emerson. This is due in large measure to the fact that they utter the truth lying as a germ in the mind of all and thereby convince, or by the magnitude of their operations attain success, but also to that indefinable something we call personality. In times of stress they realize themselves and express that which is in the nature of their being in deeds. It is then that clearest inspiration comes to them. They feel innately that certain things are or should be so. This is direct or immediate intuition.

Thus millions had seen apples fall, but when Isaac Newton did so he perceived the law of gravitation. Martin Luther said: “I do not know where my ideas come from.” Bonaparte said: “no great general ever profited by experience in war.” His rivals said of him that he possessed an uncanny intuition on the battlefield. Meneval says of him that “he began to dictate in a serious and emphatic tone, without resting for a moment. As ideas came to him his voice assumed a more animated tone. In rendering his thought expressions came without effort.” Filson Young relates of Columbus that “there gradually grew up in his mind the intuition or conviction - I refuse to call it an opinion - that over that blue verge of the west there was land to be found. How this seed of conviction first lodged in his mind it would be impossible to say.” Andrew D. White says of Bismarck that “his insight and foresight seemed due to intuition, to sudden flashes which lighted up his course and determined his conduct.” At twenty-four Cavour wrote that he already saw himself minister of a united Italy. Memmsen says of Caesar that “his remarkable power of intuition revealed itself in the precision and practicality of all his arrangements, even when he gave orders without having seen with his own eyes.” Zenephon says of Socrates: “If it appeared to him that a sign from heaven had been given him, nothing would have induced him to go against the heavenly warning; he would as soon have been persuaded to accept the guidance of a blind man ignorant of the path to lead him on a journey in place of one who knew the road and could see; and so he denounced the folly of others who did things contrary to the warnings in order to avoid some disrepute among men. For himself he despised all human aid by comparison with counsel from above.” Socrates himself said of a conviction that “this came to me apart from demonstration.”

As men through hardship and struggle are broken to humility and the realization that they may gain inner light and happiness solely through kindness, mercy and simplicity, they are brought in harmony with and therefore nearer to that apperception by which they find surcease from difficulty and restoration of soul. Augustine, turning from his “fill of hell” and “fog of lustfulness”, as he termed them in his “Confessions”, to the contemplation of God became the light of a thousand years. As one can see the stars in the daytime only from the bottom of a well, he may behold the truth more clearly in the adversity which brings sorrow and unselfishness into his heart. This is true of St. Francis of Assisi and the line of mystics who have discerned love of God in love of man.

The truly great have ever been as simple as Lincoln. In themselves they were not great. They merely seemed so. They were enabled to do remarkable things by their own initiative and that inspiration and kindness which came to them. “If God is with a man, he cannot fail; if He is against him, he cannot succeed,” said Lincoln. Before every battle the sensitive Washington knelt in prayer. Alfred of England, one of the noblest characters of human story, said: “As long as I have lived I have striven to live worthily.” He longed when death should overtake him to leave with the men who came after him a remembrance of him in good works. Canute, when told by his courtiers that he might accomplish anything, by taking his seat by the ocean and commanding the tide to turn back proved that he by his own power could do nothing. Luther, before deciding to face the Diet at Worms where his life was endangered, found in prayer that light which told him he was to go no matter what might be the outcome. Charlemagne sought learning like the humblest scholar at his court, attending school there when late in life. His favorite book, Augustine’s “City of God”, was always near him. Otto the Great was alike distinguished by his simplicity and his desire for learning. Mrs. Gladstone confided in John Merley that the Great Commoner had succeeded in the struggle for self mastery “ever since he was three or four and twenty, first by the natural power of his character and second by incessant wrestling in prayer - prayer that had been abundantly answered.” Paul saw the vision of a more glorified humanity and thenceforth lived for his fellow men. These are some of “the simple great ones, gone forever and ever by.”

It was because they were simple that they were helped by God. Insight came to them because they sought His will. Consciously or unconsciously they placed themselves in harmony with the Infinite Intelligence. “If the body has many attributes of higher value than pleasure,” says Cicero, “what think you of the mind? The wisest sages of antiquity believed that the mind contains an element of the celestial divine.” Says Marcus Aurelius: “God is in man and so we must constantly attend to the divinity within us, for it is only in this way that we can have any knowledge of the nature of God.” And Agapetus: “He who knows himself will know God; and he who knows God will be made like to God; and he becomes worthy of God who does nothing unworthy of God, but speaks the things that are His and speaks what He thinks and does what He speaks.” Isaiah says: “The Lord Eternal hath given me a tongue for teaching, that I should know how to strengthen the weary with the word. He wakeneth my ear to listen like those that are well taught.” Jeremiah: “And the Lord stretched forth His hand and touched me therewith on my mouth; and the Lord said unto me, behold I have put My words in thy mouth.” Ezekiel: “And he said unto me, son of man receive all My words that I will speak unto thee and hear them with thine ears.” “Happy are they,” says Augustine, “who know it was Thou that gave the command. For all things are done for them that serve Thee, either for the providing of themselves of what is needful for the present, or for the foreshadowing of something to come hereafter.” Thomas a Kempis pleads: “Seek for thyself a secret place, love to dwell alone with thyself, desire the conversation of none, but rather pour out devout prayer unto God that thou mayest keep thy mind in compunction and thy conscience pure.” St. Bernard says: “To lose thyself in some sort as if thou were not and to have no consciousness of thyself at all - to be emptied of thyself and to be almost annihilated - such is heavenly conversation - so to be affected is to become God.” Tagore in his autobiography relates: “From now I began to train myself to listen to His command, to understand the deference between my own inclination and His will. What appeared to my conscience to be his command that I tried to follow. Then I prayed to Him to inspire me with righteousness, to guard me with moral strength, to give me patience, courage, fortitude and contentment. I could make out that He was dwelling within me, seated in my heart. Even as He, dwelling in the sky, guides the stars and planets, so does He, dwelling within my heart, inspire all my righteous feelings and guide my soul.” Schepenhauer declares that “it is possible in certain cases for knowledge to escape from the bondage of the will, at which time the individuality of man is cancelled and he becomes entirely absorbed in disinterested contemplation. This revolution and emancipation, in which the will disappears and pure perception has the upper hand, can only be explained as a sudden breaking forth of the faculty of intuition.” Thus it is likely that no new truth is ever added to the thought of the world except by immediate intuition; that is, by realization without demonstration. Empirical investigation assists by concentration of cognition in the discovery of hypotheses before unknown, whether in invention, science or pure reason, but does not in itself disclose that which is discovered which comes to one suddenly and intuitively. Indicative and deductive principles as applied to experience only prove that which is already known.

It was such an intuitive message that declared of David that “I will appoint him my first born, the highest among the kings of the earth.” “My son art thou. Ask it of me and I will give thee nations for an inheritance, and for thy possession the uttermost ends of the earth.” “The spirit of the Lord came suddenly upon David from that day and forward.” “And David felt conscious that the Lord had established him as king over Israel.” “Thou hast also spoken of Thy servant’s house for a distant time.” “Thou preservest me to be the head of nations. A people which I know not shall serve me.” (2 Samuel 22:44) “The spirit of the Lord spoke through me and his word was upon my tongue. Thus said the God of Israel, that I should be ruler over men, ruling in the fear of God.”

If a man’s ambition is his intuitive perception of what he may become if he will, the thought of Alexander the Great that he must conquer and govern the world was as inspired as that of David. Mommsen says: “Caesar renewed the interrupted work of the great Alexander whose image we may well believe never was absent from Caesar’s soul. In the capital of his empire he regulated the destinies of the world for the present and the future.” The Emperor Julian remarks: “Nor do I despise that lot with which I was endowed by the god Helios, that I should be born of a house that rules and governs the world in my time.” Gibbon says of Zinghis Kahn that “he accepted the title of Zinghis, the most great, and a divine right to the conquest and dominion of the earth.” The same historian also declares that “the conquest and monarchy of the world was the first object of the ambition of Timur.” Gregory VII felt that he had been entrusted by God with the task of uniting all mankind in a single society in which His will would be the only law. This was also the thought of Boniface VIII. Charles XII longed to emulate Alexander. Turenne most admired the exploits of the great Greek and of Julius Caesar. So did Bonaparte, who in his exile at St. Helena said that the grand ideal toward which his efforts had been directed was a great confederacy of peoples, bound together “by unity of codes, principles, opinions, feelings and interests.” He prophesied that it would yet be realized, sooner or later, “by the force of circumstances.”

These figures of the past had the same intuitive perception of destiny for the reason that they were the same spirit born again from life to life, showing quite naturally the same talents and aspirations. Their line is as follows:

Bonaparte 1769-1821 Charles XII 1682-1718 Turenne 1611-1675 Suleiman 1494-1566 Casimir IV 1427-1492 Timur 1336-1405 Boniface VIII 1239-1303 Zinghis Kahn 1164-1227 Alphonse VII 1126-1157 Gregory VII 1036-1085 Canute 995-1035 Hugh the Great 905-956 Alfred 848-900 Harun al Hashid 766-809 Leo the Isaurian 680-740 Heracleus 575-642 Justinian 483-565 Attila 385-453 Julian 331-363 Maximin 275-314 Aurelian 212-274 Septimus Serverus 146-211 Trajan 53-117 Tiberius B.C. 37-42 A.D. Julius Caesar B.C. 101-44 B.C. Mithradates I 170-138 Hannibal 234-183 Ptolemy Philadelphus 309-246 Alexander 356-323 Alcibiades 450-404 Miltiades 540-488 Psammeticus I 664-610 Sargon 755-705 Shelmonessar II 878-823 Sheshonk 950-885 David 1055-980

This was the one of whom it was said: “Out of him cometh forth the corner stone, out of him the tent nail, out of him the battle bow, out of him every ruler of others together. And they shall be like mighty men, treading down their enemies in the mire of the streets in the battle, and they shall fight because the Lord is with them, and the riders on horses shall be made ashamed.” The Old Testament seers were neither the first, nor the last to lay down the principle of everlasting life. Socrates said that death is only the separation of the soul from the body; that the intelligence is soul, like the Divine Mind, and both are immortal; that we recollect afterward things which we acquired before our birth; that “if the soul exists before birth and when it comes into life and is born from anything else than death and a state of death, must it not also exist after dying, since it must be born again.” “These souls,” he said, “flit about until, through the desire of the corporeal which clings to them, they are again imprisoned in a body.” And again: “God and the principle of life and everything that is immortal can never perish. The soul being immortal is also imperishable.” Aristotle says: “Now though only one of the powers of the soul, intellect alone of these powers has no bodily organ; it alone in immortal; it alone is divine.” In the Upanishads in the seventh century B.C. Death answers Nachiketas, “The knowing self is not born; it dies not; it sprang from nothing; nothing sprang from it. The ancient is unborn, eternal, everlasting. If the slayer thinks that he slays, or if the slain think he is slain, they do not understand, for this one does not slay nor is that one slain.” Philo of Alexandria before Christian thought had perfected itself and Giardano Bruno in later times attested to the same belief. Hume says: “Metempsychosis is the only system of immortality that philosophy can hearken to.” Bulwer Llyton declares: “Eternity may be but an endless series of those migrations which men call deaths, abandonments of home after home, ever to fairer scenes and loftier heights. Age after age the spirit may shift his tent, fated not to death in the dull elysium of the heathen but carrying with it evermore its two attributes, activity and energy.” And Schopenhauer makes this statement: “We find the doctrine of metempsychosis springing from the earliest and noblest ages of the human race, and always spread abroad on the earth as the belief of the great majority of mankind.”

The character and genius of those mentioned as of the line of David reborn from life to life are the same. The greatest of military strategists, statesmen by being builders of unity and order, law-givers, writers and even orators, they, or more properly speaking the last mentioned as Bonaparte. Potentially, the personal characteristics in each life are similar. If we would demur that Attila was unlike Alexander, Caesar or Bonaparte, let us consult Creasy, who in his “Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World” says: “When we turn from the legendary to the historic Attila we see clearly that he was not one of the vulgar herd of barbaric conquerors. Consummate military skill may be traced in his campaigns; and he relied far less on the brute force of armies for the aggrandizement of his empire than on the unbounded influence over the affections of friends and the fears of foes, which his genius enabled him to acquire. Austerely sober in his private life, - severely just on the judgment seat, - conspicuous among a nation of warriors for hardihood, strength and skill in every martial exercise, - grave and deliberate in counsel, but rapid and remorseless in execution, - he gave safety and security to all who were under his dominion, while he waged a war of extermination against all who opposed or sought to escape from it.” Arrian says of Alexander: “As to those pleasures which regarded the body, he showed himself indifferent; as to the desires of the mind he was insatiable.” Helland Rose says of Bonaparte: “In spite of his prodigious failure, he was superlatively great in all that pertains; to government, the quickening of human energies and the art of war…His greatness lies, not merely in the abiding importance of his undertakings, but still more in the titanic force that he threw into the inception and accomplishment of all of them - a force which invests the storm-blasted monoliths strewn along the latter portion of his career with a majesty unapproachable by a tamer race of toilers.” Sheshonk founded a new dynasty in Egypt by his own capacity, conquered Israel, Judah and Nubia, and developed his kingdom to great prosperity. During the reign of thirty-five years of Shalmonessar II over Assyria, Babylon was reduced to vassalage by his military prowess. Great in soldierly and administration qualities the second Sargon by his own capacities became king of Babylon. Psammeticus was a firm and wise ruler under whom Egypt recovered its prosperity and extended its boundaries. Greece was saved at Marathon by the genius of Miltiades. Athens lost the war with Syracuse because it failed to make use of the talents of Alcibiades, and Hellas finally triumphed through Alexander. Philadelphus was the greatest of the Ptolemies and patronized scientific and literary research. Hannibal was not only a great warrior, but a statesman and a man of resource. The innate military prowess of Mithradates I enabled him to succeed his brother on the throne and extend the frontiers of Parthia over Babylon, Bactria, Iran and Media. And it was the same intuition and memory that led Tiberius, Trajan, Septimus Sereus, Aurelian, Maximin and Julian to rise by military steps and solely by individual merit to the purple.

Finley says “the fame of Heracleus would have rivalled that of Alexander, Caesar or Hannibal had he expired at Jerusalem after the successful termination of the Persian war. He had established peace throughout the Empire, restored the strength of the Roman government, revived the power of Christianity in the East, and replanted the holy cross on Mount Calvary. His glory admitted of no addition.” Of Leo the Isaurian Foord writes: “He opened his reign with the most splendid victory in history, saving his realm and religion from destruction, once more staving off from Europe an attack which could not otherwise have been resisted; out of the wild chaos about him he built up a fresh and in many respects an entirely new structure of Europe, throwing into the tremendous task a force and enduring energy, a stern and pure religious enthusiasm. Where he inherited ruin and misery, he left strength, order, peace and reviving prosperity.”

Justinian, who reformed the legal and administrative system of the empire and instigated its wars and ecclesiastical reforms, was a man of remarkable bodily and mental energy. The reign of Harun al Raschid was the most brilliant in the history of the Caliphate. Scholar and poet, he surrounded himself with learned men. Zinghis Kahn and Timur subdued Asia, but possessed the traits and likeness of Caesar and Bonaparte. Spain was united by the statesmanship and military talents of Alphonse VII. The executive and diplomatic genius of Gregory VII laid the foundations of papal power for centuries. Though the life of Boniface VIII fell in a more unfortunate time, he evinced the same qualities of leadership. Alfred and Canute were alike as simple warriors and statesmen, loved by their followers. Casimir IV of Poland was one of the greatest statesmen of his age. His habits were simple, his political sagacity profound. Creasy says of Suleiman the Magnificent: “We must remember his princely courage, his military genius, his high and enterprising spirit, his strict observance of the laws of his religion without any taint of bigoted persecution, the order and economy which he combined with so much grandeur and munificence, his liberal encouragement of art and literature, his seal for the diffusion of education, the conquests by which he extended his empire, and the wise and comprehensive legislation with which he provided for the good government of all his subjects.” Hugh the Great was the real founder of the dynasty of the Capets. He might have made himself king had he chosen, but, instead, nominally supported the last of the Carelingians while himself exercising all real power. Cardinal de Retz says that Turenne from his youth up possessed all good qualities. He was a warrior and of heroic mould. Montecuculli, his opponent and enemy of the battlefield, said: “Today a man has fallen who did honor to man,” and uncovered respectfully.

And yet we must not regard any of these men who contributed so much to civilization as great. We think of David as the author of the Psalms more than as the warrior and statesman who unified Israel. His simplicity in the presence of God has endeared him to Christendom. Alexander appeals to us also as the pupil of Aristotle and because he took with him to India a body of savants who were to advance civilization alone with the sword. Caesar, said by Merivale to be the greatest name in history, is known to every school boy mainly as the author of the “commentaries.” And the youthful Bonaparte, emulating Alexander, took with him to Egypt a number of scholars who were destined to discover the Rosetta stone, unlock the learning of the ancient East and found the study of comparative religions.

If Caesar were to walk in upon us today, diverted of all pomp, power and reputation, attired in the clothes of our time, it is quite unlikely that we should regard him as great, though we might think he had a certain air of distinction. But, even so, the distinction would arise solely from his personality. We might agree with Mommsen that he was a gentleman and a man of genius and that he had a heart. Anything else would require the time and the opportunity to call forth those latent forces within his nature, which, added to inspiration from without, could make him again an instrument for the development of humanity. We should find the contour of his features the same. And we should find this to be so because the spirit gives form to the body. We know as the result of careful analysis that traits of character are depicted in the face. Indeed, we have a new type of professional activity in personnel experts who tell by the physiognomy who and who not to employ. We know that characteristics are shown in the shape and lines of the hand. We know that temperament is shown somewhat by the structure of the body itself. It should not be difficult, then, to go a step further, and grasp the meaning of Isaiah when he said: “Behold, I shall remove the veil from off all faces and destroy death to eternity, saith the Lord.”

Caesar, or shall we say Bonaparte? was only one of many geniuses who have profoundly influenced civilization and made the story of history. If we have an intuition that one of these was the other how shall we prove it? We know that there is a law of continuity of form, that is that form in nature is continued in its own form, as the tree, the flower, the dog and the man. We know that there is a law of continuity of being, that the spirit which is imperishable, because now in a body as a process of nature and giving its differentiating features the form they possess, must have been in a body before and must be in a body again. We must depend upon our intuition that one is the other, an intuition which has come to us without reasoning or comparison, and then if the features are the same and the character and powers are similar we may conclude that the law of probability is in our favor. But if we can trace the course, through century after century, wherever they had opportunity, of all the great Builders, whether in large affairs, art or letters, and each one of the instances corresponds perfectly in contour of physiognomy, character and powers, then we may conclude that our theory is science and that the basis of history is spirit, personality, intelligence, leadership.

And we may conclude likewise that this is the basis of time, space, the universe. We do not see God because God entirely obliterates self in incessant effort for good everywhere. If we look into the sprouting crops, the restless ocean waves, the stars twinkling in the night, the puppies and children playing, the application of electricity and steam we see constant activity. We must understand, then, that one of the attributes of the universe is activity. The eternal hills of earth, the gaseous mass of the nebulae seem changeless, but investigation of other worlds and nebulae in differing stages of growth reveal that all are constantly active. Empires wax and wane, formal religions rise and fall, “our little systems have their day and cease to be, for they are but trembling lights of Thee.” But all are moving slowly but surely from lower to higher forms, from the apparent triumph of decadent form and moral wrong to the ultimate survival of the fit. Therefore we know that another attribute of the universe is growth, or evolution. Constant activity and growth toward what? If we look about us and study the history of mankind we find that the highest aspirations we have toward perfection are expressed in justice, love, kindness, mercy, unity and the general welfare. If we look outside of ourselves in the realm of objective nature we see a constant development for the good of the whole. The spirit of the whole in man necessitates justice, kindness, love, mercy, unity and the general welfare. The spirit of nature outside ourselves necessitates the spirit of the good of the whole. Hence we may reason that the attributes of the universe are justice, kindness, love, mercy, unity and the general welfare. All of these attributes are spiritual. Back of and through the universe is mind, the mind of God. His attributes are perfect justice, love, kindness and mercy.

Nature is ever renewing himself in countless forms. Winter and spring, sleeping and waking, decay and renewal, death and birth are but evidences of the change which precedes new life. It would be as contrary to the facts to say that the outward form of the universe is God as to say that the body of man is man himself. For just as back of the universe is mind so back of the body is mind. But “back of” is self evidently not the proper term, for the spirit of man only expresses itself in and through the body to which it has given its form. And so God expresses himself through nature, his nature. And as all in the universe changes and renews form while the spirit remains forever the same, so we grow old and die but renew at birth with the same spirit. Only God, however, is perfect. Hence our life is forever and ever toward that perfection which we can never attain. We can be more like him only as we are more just, kind, loving, merciful and therefore one with him. And in that way only can we find happiness. He is perfectly happy because he is perfectly just, kind, loving and merciful. He is so because he effaces himself for all, His glory lies only in his work for the good of all. We wander away from Him in our selfishness, willfulness for self, our perversion of our individuality and life to merely selfish ends.

We can behold God only through truth. If we would behold the laws of God we must behold the laws of nature. The scientist perceives in truth the means of usefulness to man. So does the investor. So does the teacher. So does the business man. The most patent of all the truths of nature is that all must serve the whole for the good of the whole. The message of the preacher is of value only to the extent that it is in harmony with the law of God which is the law of justice, kindness, love, mercy and therefore of unity.

The great enemy of truth, of the nature of God and man, is ignorance. The great enemy of man is his own selfishness. Ignorance and selfishness go hand in hand for if we were not ignorant of the effects of selfishness it is unthinkable that we should be so selfish. The great implements of ignorance are the tradition and prejudice which solemnly informed Columbus that what his honest thought told him he could do could not be done, threatened Luther with the fate of Huss and Bruno at the stake, declared the tomato to be a poisoned apple, and still exhausts itself in the contention that immortality, the greatest of God’s gifts to man, is to be arrived at by belief. If the truth of man’s universal immortality will emancipate his mind from ignorance and prejudice, it should be told in the name of God. And with the proof that man’s salvation from selfishness lies only in his own efforts toward justice, kindness, love and mercy, in the spirit of humanity and therefore of the whole, in the service of man and therefore of God, we shall come nearer to the fulfillment of the prophesy of old of one God, one humanity, one law and one state in a federation of the world. Genuine democracy is nowhere indicated more clearly than in the loss of the wealth, the power, the tyranny, the title of the man who may use them selfishly and yet at death can take with him to face the justice of God only that character of himself with which he must live in the next life on earth. From this neither dogma nor ritual can save him, for that which he sows will he also reap.

Nothing which a spirit has developed is lost. A Michael Angelo becomes a Rodin, Moliere lives again as Voltaire, Plutarch as Montaigne, Francis of Assisi as Lincoln, Danton as Roosevelt, Jefferson as Wilson, Washington as Garabaldi. As contemplation is only the prelude to activity, it is unthinkable that the individual spirit should ever seek an endless nirvana of contemplation without rebirth. And inasmuch as like causes have like effects and the universe has infinite worlds in infinite space, man’s past and future are not confined to this earth.

Five thousand instances of intuition of identity of genius in history, supported by unmistakable likeness of physiognomy, personality and potentiality, should prove to any reasonable mind the presumption, gradually growing into a certainty of conviction, that each one of the billion and eight hundreds of millions of people now on the earth has lived before, will live again and can find happiness in this life and that to come only in the development of the best within him for the benefit of all. Would not this work, for which courage and fortitude are required, bring us nearer to the ideal of Charles Kingsley: “A nation - and were it even possible, a whole world - of free men, lifting their foreheads to God and nature; calling no man master, for none is their master, even God; knowing and obeying their duties toward the Maker of the Universe, and therefore to each other, and that not from fear, nor calculation of profit or loss, but because they had loved and liked it, and had seen the beauty of righteousness and trust and peace, because the law of God was in their hearts; and need at last, it may be, neither king nor priest, for each man and each woman were kings and priests of God. Such a nation - such a society - what nobler conception of mortal existence can we form? Would not that indeed be the kingdom of God come on earth?”

R2. 4/7/40 See 1151-25, Par. 15-A advising Mr. [1151] not to terminate activities with Mr. [1341].

R3. 10/3/40 See 1151-27, Par. 3-A in re [1341] and wife defrauding Mr. [1151].

Background

Background

B1. 2/17/37 Friend Mr. [1151]‘s letter: “I wonder if you would arrange a Life Reading on my account for [1341] and ask the following questions:“

Mentioned Entities

Entity (Cayce Term), Intuition, Soul, Napoleon, King David, Egypt, Law of Moses, Purpose, Greece, Ohio, Prayer, Reincarnation, Abraham Lincoln, Ideal, Rome, Babylon, David Kahn, Destiny, England, Isaiah

Source: The Complete Edgar Cayce Readings, A.R.E. CD-ROM (2006). Reading 1341-1, ReadingID 7013.