pward-life comes freedom from the
dangers of water, morass, and thorny places, and the power of
ascension is gained.

Here is one of the sentences, so characteristic of this author, and,
indeed, of the Eastern spirit, in which there is an obvious exterior
meaning, and, within this, a clear interior meaning, not quite so
obvious, but far more vital.

The surface meaning is, that by mastery of a certain power, called here
the upward-life, and akin to levitation, there comes the ability to walk
on water, or to pass over thorny places without wounding the feet.

But there is a deeper meaning. When we speak of the disciple's path
as a path of thorns, we use a symbol; and the same symbol is used
here. The upward-life means something more than the power, often
manifested in abnormal psychical experiences, of levitating the
physical body, or near-by physical objects. It means the strong power
of aspiration, of upward will, which first builds, and then awakes the
spiritual man, and finally transfers the conscious individuality to him;
for it is he who passes safely over the waters of death and rebirth, and
is not pierced by the thorns in the path. Therefore it is said that he
who would tread the path of power must look for a home in the air,
and afterwards in the ether.

Of the upward-life, this is written in the Katha Upanishad: "A hundred
and one are the heart's channels; of these one passes to the crown.
Going up this, he comes to the immortal." This is the power of
ascension spoken of in the Sutra.

40. By mastery of the binding-life comes radiance.

In the Upanishads, it is said that this binding-life unites the upward-life
to the downward-life, and these lives have their analogies in the "vital
breaths" in the body. The thought in the text seems to be, that, when
the personality is brought thoroughly under control of the spiritual
man, through the life-currents which bind them together, the personality
is endowed with a new force, a strong personal magnetism, one
might call it, such as is often an appanage of genius.

But the text seems to mean more than this and to have in view the
"vesture of the colour of the sun" attributed by the Upanishads to the
spiritual man; that vesture which a disciple has thus described: "The
Lord shall change our vile body, that it may be fashioned like unto his
glorious body"; perhaps "body of radiance" would better translate the
Greek.

In both these passages, the teaching seems to