There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

There Is No Death

A Message of Comfort

by Clara M. Codd

Published in the 1900's

Nay, but as when one layeth

His worn-out robes away,

And, taking new ones, sayeth,

"These will I wear today!"

So putteh by the spirit

Lightly its garb of flesh,

And passeth to inherit

A residence afresh

-The Song Celestial

A COMFORTING IN TRUTH

THE WORLD OF THE SOUL

THE WITHDRAWAL OF CONSCIOUSNESS

THE GATEWAY OF SLEEP

THE AWAKENING

THE CREATIVE POWER OF THOUGHT

CHILDREN AFTER DEATH

PSYCHOLOGICAL STATES

OUR DESIRES AND THOUGHTS

THE REALM OF THE SPIRIT

GATEWAYS INTO HEAVEN

THE ANGELIC ORDERS

OUR GROWTH LIFE AFTER LIFE

ETERNAL TRUTHS

THOUGHTS OF COMFORT AND JOY

THE INVISIBLE WORLDS

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

A COMFORTING IN TRUTH

One of the most wonderful and comforting truths which the Ancient Wisdom brings to us is the fact there is in reality no death anywhere in the Universe. Nothing ever ceases to exist, it but changes its state. In the words of the poet Longfel ow:

"There is no death,

What seems so is transition"

And because in his deepest heart man has really known this all the time, he has an ineradicable

conviction that he cannot finally be separated from those he loves, and that they will surely meet again.

That is a true impression. We may lay it down as an eternal axiom that what a man loves he can never,

never lose.

"But" you will say, "my beloved one lies cold and still. Presently that dear body will crumble away. Where is she? How can I be sure that I shall ever see her again?"

Perhaps the first thing to realise is that she is not that body. That was only the clothing of her soul. She put it on through the gateway of birth, in order to come into touch with this wonderful order of experience we call life, although,in reality, other orders of experience are even more fully life than this one. Many poets and sages have had that idea. Plato says that we are "buried" in graves of bodies to set right our mistakes of a former life. And Walt Whitman writes: "Haply I the dead man, I the dreamer."

The very word "body" comes from an Anglo-Saxon word bodig, from which we get the word "abode", which means the dwelling-place. As is said in the Christian Scriptures: "For here have we no continuing city, but we seek one to come." Arnold Bennett calls the body the human machine. Because it is a living thing, with a dim, elemental life of its own, the term of St.Francis, "brother ass," is better. Genesis calls it the "coat of skin," and yet another definition is the school-uniform. We come to this life, seemingly without any volition of our own, to gain, through the experiences of this material world, the food of our soul's growth. When we leave it again we go to a rest time of the spirit, and are for a long time freed from the cares and troubles of earth life.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

THE WORLD OF THE SOUL

Where do we go? Above the sky? The popular conception is that heaven is above and hell beneath. No,

heaven is not beyond the stars, but here and now, all around us, as our Jesus taught. He said it was

"within". That means an inner, subtler order of matter, not physical at all, yet full of form and colour, surrounding and permeating this familiar world.

Occultists tell us that all forms of matter exist in several degrees of density. We can convert water into ice and again into steam. Science postulates somewhere an invisible world of protons and electrons, similar in idea to our sun with its circle of planets. They are not static, but incredibly alive, and moving with unimaginable speed. What kind of space are they moving through? A much finer, subtler order of matter

than that of our world, more fluidic, luminous, vivid, so shining a world that mediaeval writers called it

"Astral" or starry. And this luminous world interpenetrates and surrounds our physical world.

This is the world of the soul. Most of us believe we have a soul, but we cannot say what it looks like or where exactly it is. Again the derivation of the word will help us. It comes from the Greek word psyche, which gives us the words psychic and psychology. Psychical research and psychology in the West are

modern sciences, but in the East they are very old. The one endeavours to explore the world of the soul from the standpoint of matter or form- as Sir Oliver Lodge prophesied the science of the coming centuries would do- to see if it has form and colour, can be photographed, and so on. The other explores the world of the soul from the standpoint of its powers of consciousness, of feeling and thought. Today no one

would deny that thought is a very mighty power, a subtle wireless that is in action all the time.

So the soul is the thinking, feeling self, which thinks and feels after death even more vividly than before.

Can we think without a brain, or feel without nerves? Much better. Our brain and nerve cel s are only like the keys of a piano to the musician. The music is in his soul, but he needs the instrument to show

something of what that music is.

St. Paul classified man as a trinity,having a body, a soul, and a spirit. These last two are not

interchangeable terms, for they are quite different words in the Greek original. The word "spirit" is a translation of the Greek word pneuma, Latin spiritus. It means the pristine "breath of life." It is subtle, pure, divine. God breathed into physical and psychical man the breath of life and be became a living,

immortal Self, sharing for evermore the underlying, eternal life of the Universe. This is where every son of man is also and forever a Son of the Most High, a heritage he can never forego. We can only approach

the thought of it by symbology and al egory. St.Peter cal s it "the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible." St.Paul calls it "Christ in you, the hope of glory." Jesus was even more explicit, when He said, "Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?" quoting King David, who wrote: "Ye are gods; and all of you are children of the most High." After death, slowly the best of our life's experiences are sublimated and taken up into that hidden, divine consciousness, causing it also to grow and develop.

Thus, we shed the clothing of the body, and live at first the life of the soul, final y teaching the glorious and completely blissful life of the freed spirit.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

THE WITHDRAWAL OF CONSCIOUSNESS

Let us try to picture the life of each state. First of all the process of dying. It must come to all, but death is a friend,never to be feared but welcomed. The hour of death is known on the other side, and one ever

passes over who is not met by someone he knows who has preceded him. During life here, our

consciousness is turned outwards, contacting life's experiences. When the time to leave approaches, the consciousness withdraws and begins to turn inwards. Sometimes a dying person will ask for the lights to be turned up, or will say that the room is receding. Quite often,too, as the other side draws near,the one who is passing will begin to discern the people or the scenery upon that other side. A dying Irish soldier said to his nurse: "Sister,look at al these lovely ladies." They would look like that to him, for he was seeing the Land of the Ever-Young, where matter is luminous and radiant.

Then, as the consciousness draws ever more inwards, a very wonderful and important thing takes place.

In our ordinary waking consciousness we seem to have forgotten so many of the daily events of life, but that is not real y so. In the deeper parts of ourselves nothing is ever forgotten, and as a man passes to life on the other side, he seems to pass quickly through the halls of his own memory. It is as if, leaving the arena of life,the man looks back, and in birdseye view sees that life as a whole, where he succeeded and where he failed. Then, as the soul leaves the body the consciousness for a short time passes into

deep sleep, during which the psychic body, which, during life, permeated and surrounded the physical

sheath, is adjusted to an independent existence upon the other side.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

THE GATEWAY OF SLEEP

Although most of us do not realise it, whilst we are in the body we nightly leave it through the gateway of sleep,which is the same portal as the gateway of death. "How wonderful is sleep," writes Shelley, "sleep and his brother, death." To die is indeed but to fal asleep for the last time in this incarnation. But, whilst we live, we are still connected with our bodies whilst we sleep by a shining magnetic thread which

instantaneously recalls the man to wakefulness if his body is touched. At death this connecting link is broken and so return is no more possible. Does this not recall to memory the words of Ecclesiastes: "or ever the silver cord be loosed." Thus, the world which he now enters is not a wholly unfamiliar world, for he has traversed some of it before, during the sleep of his body.

"Is the dying person conscious of al this?" we may ask. "What about what is called the death struggle?"

This is only the physical muscles ceasing to function. The person himself is unaware of it. He is occupied with that unfolding picture of his past life, and this may go on in his consciousness even after his body has ceased to breathe. A dying person should never be disturbed or troubled. Watch his passing with

peace and affectionate solicitude. An ancient Tibetan scripture tel s us to sit beside him and whisper

loving words, for although his ears may not hear, his soul will hear.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

THE AWAKENING

The period of unconsciousness into which a man passes after death does not generally last very long,

although this depends upon personal factors. With most it is about thirty-six hours. Then the man wakes to a shining, restful world, and the first thing he will see will be some of those who have preceded him.

They will have come to meet him. At one time, in Australia,the writer used to broadcast these ideas, and letters came in from al over the southern hemisphere. A doctor in New Zealand wrote that one night he

was called out to a lonely station, or farm, kept by a very old couple. When he got there the old man was already dead. He had died with arms outstretched. His wife,commenting on this, said: "Oh! sir, we once had a daughter who died when she was seventeen, and just before he passed my husband declared he

saw her,and held out his arms towards her,saying: 'I am coming, Mary, wait for me'.

What kind of life had he now entered upon? It will be a little difficult to describe,for we al naturally picture it in earthly terms, and that is not quite the case. Let us put it this way. We cannot carry over there anything which belongs to this earthly life alone,such as wealth we have amassed, celebrity we have

gained, or the pleasures of the body,such as eating and drinking or sex sensation as such,for we are now living in a world and in a form of matter where these things are no longer particularly real. But all that which belongs to us as a soul, as a feeling, thinking self, goes with us and is enormously enhanced and enlarged. Al intellectual delights, all true love of others,all pure religious aspiration,love of beauty and truth, these upon the other side build a very lovely and wonderful life for the man who has for the time left this vale of tears.

Another thing to be remembered is that psychic matter has its own laws and conditions, and they are not the same as those of physical matter. For instance, psychic matter is unaffected by heat or cold.

Therefore our soul bodies do not feel either. But thought and feeling are much more vivid and clear than when we had to set in motion the heavy particles of the physical brain and nerve cel s. Time and space

valuations are different, too. What a person thinks of is immediately before him. What he loves is at his side.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

THE CREATIVE POWER OF THOUGHT

Do we wear clothes, eat food, and live in houses? Yes, but the clothes and the houses are not woven or

built. They are the creation of men's thoughts and imaginations,for there thought and desire are mighty creative forces,as indeed they are here also. Like congregates with like, builds churches,concert halls, laboratories, and other buildings. There is no longer any need for food and drinks, for he psychic body requires neither. If we carry over a great attachment to meals we shall create their semblance,but we

shall soon lose the habit. The ancient Celts cal ed this plane the Land of the Ever-Young, because

psychic matter is unaffected by fatigue, disease, or old age. These belong to the discipline of life here, and when we die we lose them for the time being. No one there is a cripple, or diseased, or ever gets

tired. What a relief for those who have dragged out a weary existence on a sickbed, or through a hard

life! Would we call them back? Some may say that they have seen a spirit photograph of an old mother

or grandmother, and that there they still look old. Let us remember the tremendous power of thought and imagination there. If we have carried over the thought that we are old, we shall still continue to look so until we have lost the habit. Sometimes a man carries over the thought that he is old and tired. Then he will rest until he, too, has lost that.

There was a man who had been an invalid nearly al his life. But he was a very beautiful character and

many people loved him. When he died it seemed to him at first that he was surrounded by a most restful, comforting atmosphere. This was real y formed by all the loving thoughts and prayers which were coming

from those left on earth who had loved him.

Perhaps we do not realise that our loved ones,passed on, are never out of reach of our thoughts and our prayers. Do not forget them. Pray for them, for in that more subtle world these loving forces are veritable guardian angels to those passed on.

A British General, who had been a man of very evil life,found himself after death in a most unhappy

condition. His own sins and evil thoughts had created a dark world for him. The first ray of light came to him when someone on earth remembered him with love and compassion and prayed for him. He found

his way to brighter realms by following that gleam.

We should try not to be too grief-stricken when our dear ones go, for sometimes excessive grief will

weave a cloud round us and prevent us from truly contacting our lost one, either here in thought, or when we leave our own body temporarily at night. A mother used to pass over every night surrounded by a

thick cloud of grief, for she had lost her little girl to whom she was completely devoted. The child ran to meet her,but at first the thick cloud prevented the mother from seeing her. Then a helper dissipated the cloud and the mother held the child in her arms.

When we pass out of the body at night we do not take our brains with us, and unless those brains are

very sensitive and well controlled it will be difficult to make them register experiences they have not shared. But most of us have had the experience of waking in the morning with a sense of peace and

comfort, or perhaps with a vivid dream. The psychology of dreams is a very complex matter, and most

dreams are not true memories. But fragments do come through markedly an extraordinary vividness,for

life there is so much more life than it is here.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

CHILDREN AFTER DEATH

Do children remain young there? As time goes on they grow up and approach a kind of ageless maturity.

Some will wonder how we shal recognise them. We do not real y recognise people by the shape of their

faces. In the soul world recognition is so quick and full that no one ever fails to find another. If they have died at a very young age, before the divine Ego has taken complete control, and the Guardian Angel has

resigned matters into his hands, general y about the age of six or seven years, they may come back

quickly, and quite often comes back to the same parents. There are several cases of this known.

And what do we do in the psychic world? Many things. We no longer have to earn our living. No one can

starve or be deprived of anything he needs. So a man has the opportunity, perhaps for the first time, to turn his attention to what has always interested him, but for which he never had time on earth. Suppose we love music or literature, especially one particular composer or author. Our thoughts and interest will lead us into touch with him upon the other side. Women who loved little children and never had any of

their own, become foster-mothers to troops of happy children. For of all people children are the happiest upon the other side, for this is the land where they can really "make-believe". And at night their own mothers find them, too, through the gateway of sleep. Doctors no longer minister to sick bodies, but there are many sick souls who call out their compassion and sympathy.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

PSYCHOLOGICAL STATES

What of the orthodox teachings about heaven and hell? Are there such places? There are no places

called heaven and hel , but there are psychological states which may be thus described. There certainly is no eternal hell. That terrible idea came into Christianity when the old truth of the cyclic return of the soul to earth was lost and so man was forced into the illogical position of positing unending results upon fleeting and finite causes. Heaven and hell can be experienced whilst still in the body. The evil, selfish man is in hel , the saint in heaven. The very derivation of the words will give us the clue. Heaven means illimitable expansion; hel means cut off, isolated, in prison. In the Old Testament the Hebrew word which is sometimes translated as hell is just as often translated as a pit or grave. And in the New Testament the word most often translated as hel is the Greek word hades, which merely means the unseen, the

invisible. All hel s are psychological and are created by a man whilst he lives, but none of them are

eternal and everlasting.

The whole principle of the after-life can be put in this way. Here we live an objective life,surrounded by the objects of the physical plane. But inwardly we live a subjective life which really means much more to us, formed of memories, hopes, ideals and longings. The more evolved a man is, which is the same as

saying that he is the richer in soul, the more wonderful, varied and rich becomes that inward life. After death that which was a dim, subjective world becomes a very vivid and objective existence. A great Adept once phrased it like this: Man is constantly peopling his current in space with a world of his own, crowded with the offspring of his fancies, desires, impulses, passions. This interior world becomes increasingly an exterior one after death.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

OUR DESIRES AND THOUGHTS

There is another thing to be remembered. Because a man has died, his character has not suddenly

undergone any change. He is stil the same man, with the same desires and thoughts. Supposing that

whilst upon earth they have been mostly fixed on sensual enjoyments, or on thoughts of cruelty and

revenge, with the loss of his physical body these sentiments will glow with added fervour in his subtler form, but the instrument with which they may be gratified will be gone. He will be tortured by his own

unholy desires which he cannot gratify. Seers, seeing this condition, and using al egorical language to describe non-physical states, may speak of such a man as "burning in the flames of hel ." But, after a while, these flames, if they remain unfed, and he man does not discover a medium through whom he can

vicariously gratify them, will die down and the man will find his consciousness opening out into a much more beautiful region of the Universe. The memory of them, however, will persist into his new life on

earth,speaking to him s the voice of conscience.

Jesus called these states prisons. During an evil life, a man has been weaving around himself, although he does not realise it, a web of unholy thoughts and desires, and these will hold him prisoner for a while after death. The writer once saw such a case herself. She was in America at the time, and it was the day after the execution of a woman for the murder of her husband. When the writer awoke in the

morning,there was the woman before her, wringing her hands and wailing, "Why must I die?" As

sometimes happens after death,she did not seem to realise that she was what we call dead. All around

her, built by her own subconscious thought processes, were the scenes of the murder, the trial and the

execution, and she went through them again and again. Feeling desperately sorry for her, the writer put her arms around her, but nothing she could do or say seemed able to enter the consciousness of he

murderess, who remained total y unaware of anyone but herself. So a more experienced helper was

sought to come and deliver her. Intense selfishness weaves a thick cloud round a man which isolates him for a time. But, for the vast majority of us, kindly, decent people, no such fate awaits us after death, only release and peace.

The worst of men have something beautiful in them and that beauty will at last bring them through a

temporary purgatory to happiness and peace. For heaven is the final and ultimate home of every son of

man who is yet for ever also the Son of the Most High. The trend after death is all towards our truer and diviner selves, and their habitant is in heaven. The man whose heart is open to al life with love and

compassion is in a heaven of happiness even whilst he still lives here. All that which is beautiful, true and good,we take back with us to our eternal selves after death, and in the light of that purer world, life's experiences take on their true meaning. To some the transition to that heavenly world comes very soon

indeed. To all it comes some time, even if only for a short while. The psychic world is fashioned by the merely personal in us, good or bad. The glories of heaven open out before us when we rise purified from our too little and too selfish conceptions of life.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

THE REALM OF THE SPIRIT

We now approach in thought a realm of being so glorious,so instinct with unearthly joy, that it can only be described by the figurative language of symbology. A great seer has thus described it: "A sea of living light, surrounded by every conceivable variety of loveliness in colour and form- the whole changing with every wave of thought that a man sends out from his mind, and being indeed, s he presently discovers,

only the expression of his thought in the matter of the plane. There is no loveliness in earth or sky or sea which is not there with a fulness and intensity beyond all power of imagination; but out of all this

splendour of living reality each man sees only that which he has within himself the power to see."

Wordsworth says in his Laodomia:

"He spake of love, such loves as Spirits feel

in worlds whose course is equable and pure,

No fears to beat away- no strife to heal-

The past unsighted for, and the future sure;

Spake of heroic arts in graver mood

Revived, with finer harmony pursued;

Of all that is most beauteous- imaged there

In happier beauty; more pellucid streams,

An ampler ether, a diviner air,

And fields invested with purpureal gleams;

Climes which the sun, who sheds the brightest day

Earth knows, is all unworthy to survey.

Again the Scriptures in Revelations describe the same thing. "And God shal wipe away al tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shal there be any more pain....And there shall in nowise enter into it any thing that defileth, neither whatsoever worketh

abomination, or maketh a lie."

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

GATEWAYS INTO HEAVEN

We may say that there are four gateways into heaven, or, in another symbology, that there are four seeds which men sow whilst living, some one only,others more than one, which flower and ripen in the air of

heaven, and make a wonderful compensation for all the trials and troubles of life. It is indeed the rest time of the human spirit, but it is also a time of great assimilation and growth.

1- The seed of the love of friends and relations. Not the selfish, too personal love which finds its fulfilment upon the physical plane, but that selfless love which desires above all the good and happiness of loved ones. There a man finds himself surrounded by everyone he has ever loved. There will not be one

missing. Even if one should stil be wearing a physical body, his spirit will be there, and that is so much more responsive and glorious than when it is trying to shine through the mask of a physical body In that world no words are necessary. What a man would say is known and completely understood by his

friends. Down here we so often cannot express truly what we think and feel. Too often words lead astray and are misunderstood. There, that is not possible. It is truly the plane of the communion of spirit, where all who love are one. And only the highest of each is there, that which can never give pain or

disappointment.

2- The seed of the love of God. This denotes the religious temperament. Not everyone has it. But where

it is truly selfless and loyal it creates a veritable heaven for the devotee. For, although he probably never realised it, through his devotion and constant thought of a Divine Ideal during life, he had built a radiant form through which, after death and even during life,the Great Original could bless and instruct and come into communion with His worshipper.

Thus to the lovers of the Buddha and Jesus, These will be with Their worshippers during the heaven life in the very forms in which They were always pictured. The devotee has built the form,but the Spirit of the Great One ensouls and uses it. There was once a little Salvation Army Captain who lived a rather lonely life. But he never felt lonely, for his whole soul was caught up in continual adoration of the Lord Jesus.

He, in heaven, will come into glowing contact with his Lord.

3- The seed of the love of Man. Some are always looking upwards to the One; others more naturally look

downwards over the many. It is only another way of loving the One. The man who during life gave himself wholeheartedly to the service of his fellowmen, will find, after death, that he will come into contact with those greatest servants of humanity, the freed men, the Perfected Souls, those who were once men s we

are, but who have long ago left the School of the World, and yet remains near it that They may still help and serve Their younger brethren. The result will be that the man who loves his fellowmen will come back to earth with wider knowledge and greater power to help.

4- The seed of the love of Truth and Beauty. This makes the sage or the artist of whatever degree of

development. The scientist or philosopher is real y seeking Truth, the innate laws of the Universe, the Will of God. There in heaven he sees it working in a wide, untrammel ed vision, there he learns to understand and to adore. When he returns to earth he will bring back something of that heavenly vision, and this will cause him to search for it et again here. But never down here will he see, in all its pristine fulness, that which stirs his heart with an almost unconscious memory.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

THE ANGELIC ORDERS

The special companions of the artist, even when alive,though he knew it not, are the natural priests of the Beautiful, the Angels- or, as the East calls them, the Devas. The word Devas means literally The Shining Ones, the name John Bunyan also gave them. They are not human, nor does a human being become an

angel. Each belongs to a different line of evolution. The Deva does not know sorrow and sin and pain.

Perhaps his way is a longer one because of this. His way is the way of joy and peace, and his

characteristic influence is one of joy and upliftment. Man becomes a mangod,a Perfected Man, and, as

Eliphas Levi puts it, "Is above and commands even the angels." Does this not remind us of the text in Hebrew: "Thou madest him a little lower than the angels; thou crownedst him with glory and honour."

The unseen presence of the deva hosts brings their special atmosphere of beauty and joy. For

instance,to the musical y sensitive, organ music in a church, or the playing of a great orchestra,brings solace and peace and upliftment. The hal or church is invisibly surrounded by angelic hosts who have

come in response to the music. One investigator into the unseen came across a little boy in the heaven

world who during earth life had been a chorister in one of the great Minsters of England. He often sang the solos in the Cathedral , and opposite his stall in the choir was a narrow window with a picture of St.

Cecilia, the patron Saint of music. As he sang Sunday after Sunday,the stained glass of St Cecilia grew living and real to the imagination of the boy, and he sang to her. His thought created her form,but the form was ensouled by a great angel of music, cal ed in the East a Gandharva, or Heavenly Singer. When

that child returns to earth, his musical capacity will have been greatly increased.

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OUR GROWTH LIFE AFTER LIFE

That is how we al grow, life after life, followed by after-life upon after-life- grow in capacity, in power to love, in spirituality. So life is never in vain, however hard it may be. Could we not stay there for ever? For hundreds of years, as we count time on this side, we shal rest in that blissful state, and then the thirst for sentient existence will arise again in us, and will bring us back once more to this order of existence. To use a rough simile; food is the means of growth for our physical bodies. It does not take long to eat a meal, but i ttakes several hours to assimilate it, and the it becomes the physical man. Life's experiences are the food of our soul's growth. We may be threescore years and ten taking it, but it will be hundreds of years before that has become really part of us, and so, as a soul, we are increased in power and

understanding. Before we return to earth,another vision will open before us,not of the life we are leaving, but of the one we are about to enter upon. This is best glimpsed by the spiritually mature, and we bring through as innate ideas something of its memory in a new brain when we drink of the "waters of Lethe."

Thus, Sir Francis Bacon wrote that from early youth he felt himself called upon to be of service to

mankind.

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There Is No Death by Clara M. Codd

ETERNAL TRUTHS

Genius shows itself early in life So does spiritual genius. Every one of us is an incipient hero, saint or sage, according to his fundamental bias of thought, emotion or activity. We never come back alone. With us will come friends and dear ones from former lives. Over and over again shal we meet them, not

always in the same guise, for all the world's a stage, and each man in his time plays many parts. But we cannot fail to find them, and each time learn to love them better stil . Perhaps there is nothing else to learn in life,but how truly to love. There are two eternal truths, and they are these: whatever a man thinks of he is at once in touch with, whether it be a friend living or so-called dead, or whether it be an ideal of something infinitely beyond him; and whatever a man loves he can never,never lose,for love is eternal

and can never be denied. Perhaps seeming loss or estrangement can teach us how to love more

unselfishly. Dr. Annie Besant once said: "When you can be just as happy when the one you love best is not there,you have learn how to love."

Do not let us talk about our loved ones being in the grave. Nothing is there but the worn-out vesture of the man. We may treasure it, as a mother treasures little shoes a child once wore,but it is no longer of any concern to him. He is living a wider, happier life, freed from al the ills and disabilities of the body.

Would we call him back to a suffering, diseased body, or to the trials and anxieties of life? Never fear death. It is, as the Latins phrased it, the gate of life. All must die, for it is the loving will of the Creator, who would give surcease from pain, and rest to assimilate growth.

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THOUGHTS OF COMFORT AND JOY

However much we may feel the loss of a dear one, let us try not to be too grief-stricken, for sorrowful thought may reach him and cause him pain. Do not wish him back too ardently. If we only knew what a

much happier world he is now inhabiting! And he is not far from us. Not only can he feel our loving

thoughts and prayers, but, for a time, he is not out of reach or personal touch with us when we leave our own bodies temporarily in sleep,and are therefore in a similar condition to himself. Let him pass

peaceful y to his rest and bliss. We shall soon follow him, and he will be among the first to welcome us when our turn comes to pass from earth life. Let us every try to remember his greater gain, and send him always our dearest love and prayers. They will bring him added comfort and joy.

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THE INVISIBLE WORLDS

Perhaps in conclusion some will say:"How true, how comforting is this! But does anyone real y know?" In the space of of this short presentation it is not possible to answer that ful y. But it can be said that the power to see and hear the surrounding invisible worlds is but an extension of the senses we normally

employ, and is lying latent in every one of us. All that to which our senses respond can be described as rhythmic waves in matter. Sound causes waves in the air, and our ears catch these. Similar waves, far

more rapid and subtle, and moving through the ether, not the air, are caught by our eyes, and we see. X-rays are beyond human visibility, yet the sensitive photographic plate can register them. Some people,

either through the experiences of past lives, or through heredity, are born with an unusually sensitive response to the more subtle vibrations of nature. We speak of them as being clairvoyant or clairaudient.

When these powers, which are latent in all of us, are ful y developed and brought into working order,

which is the case with a fully developed Yogi or Occultist, the whole of the subtler, more radiant worlds which permeate and surround this one, will lie open to the il umined gaze of the seer. Such trained

seership is responsible for the truths enumerated above,but it should not be confused with the sporadic seership of undeveloped races, and is rare and difficult to achieve. Yet, in the end, all will possess it, and when that day arrives man will no longer hope that he has a soul and will live after death, for he will know that he does, and his friends will be ever with him whether living or dead. As we read in Corinthians:"The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death." What the seer knows,the heart of loving man has intuitively always known.

The Chinese call the dead man the "guest of heaven." Ah! what a happy guest is he. Let us remember the immortal words of the poet Shel ey, in a poem to his greatest friend who had passed away:

"Peace! Peace! He is not dead, he doth not sleep,

He is awakened from the dream of life."

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Table of Contents

A COMFORTING IN TRUTH

THE WORLD OF THE SOUL

THE WITHDRAWAL OF CONSCIOUSNESS

THE GATEWAY OF SLEEP

THE AWAKENING

THE CREATIVE POWER OF THOUGHT

CHILDREN AFTER DEATH

PSYCHOLOGICAL STATES

OUR DESIRES AND THOUGHTS

THE REALM OF THE SPIRIT

GATEWAYS INTO HEAVEN

THE ANGELIC ORDERS

OUR GROWTH LIFE AFTER LIFE

ETERNAL TRUTHS

THOUGHTS OF COMFORT AND JOY

THE INVISIBLE WORLDS