the world as we know it would certainly cease to exist.

“It should not be thought, however, that we can treat the physical universe as being of no account because it is in the deepest sense an illusion. For it is a reflection of God, and all that we can know of Him—and surely even the reflection of God is fit for the deepest worship and reverence!

“This illusion of reality, which we call the earth, manifests by reflection the law and order of the Universal Spirit, and the illusion is manifested in reflected accord with that unseen power. (That power that enables man to think ideas, attributes and qualities of God into whatever form his mind interprets their reflection in his consciousness to mean—his mind being one of the innumerable reflectors, the aforesaid ‘cups of water.’—EDITOR)

“Do not underrate the importance of a true understanding of the picture I have painted for you; it is no use of your sitting out on a journey unless you believe there is a road that is able to be mapped out and traversed by you. Similarly, it is no good in your setting out to try to produce the powers which the Yoga philosophy makes clear to you, unless you understand the sort of universe in which you are really living.

“For, if you believe in matter as a solid reality, after the manner of the West, then you can never really have faith enough to perform the works that you otherwise would. For faith cannot shake an enchained imagination, and the powers of the Yogic could not work if the world were really ‘a fortuitous concourse of atoms,’ or a ‘solid structure’ in which mind was only a production of the brain, and dependent upon it in the same way that a candle-flame is dependent upon the existence of the candle.

“You, must, as I have said, bring yourself to realize that the world is the result of Maya, the great illusion; for it will not insult your intelligence to believe that an illusion is controllable by those who can create illusion, and who can also therefore dispel it. Your imagination, thus released, will be a tool to your faith.

“You have to make your own personal escape from the toils of this illusion—to get back to a realization of yourself