does more than this, for it identifies itself with this its image. And how
is this identification made possible?

It is brought about by the deception of sense, which is the medium of
communication between the spiritual and the material man. Until this
miraculous medium is put in action, there can be no conscious relation
between these two planes, admirably as they are adapted to each other.
Sense is spiritual on one side and material on the other: but it is only
on the material side that it gathers its reports: on the spiritual side it
only delivers them. Every one of the five messengers whereby we are
apprised of external existence brings us an earthly message only. And
since these messengers act spontaneously, and since the mind's only other
source of knowledge is intuition, which cannot be sensuously confirmed,--
it is little wonder if man has inclined to the persuasion that what is
highest in him is but an attribute of what is lowest, and that when the
body dies, the soul must follow it into nothingness.

Creative energy, being infinite, passes through the world of causes to the
world of effects--through the spiritual to the physical plane. Matter is
therefore the symbol of the ultimate of creative activity; it is the
negative of God. As God is infinite, matter is finite; as He is life, it
is death; as He is real, it is unreal; as He reveals, matter veils. And as
the relation of God to man's spirit is constant and eternal, so is the
physical quality of matter fixed and permanent. Now, in order to arrive at
a comprehension of what matter is in itself, let us descend from the
general to the specific, and investigate the philosophical elements of a
pebble, for instance. A pebble is two things: it is a mineral: and it is a
particular concrete example of mineral. In its mineral aspect, it is out
of space and time, and is--not a fact, but--a truth; a perception of the
mind. In so far as it is mineral, therefore, it has no relation to sense,