individual
memory of the centre,[259] which is one with the total Centre from
which it comes.

This element of unity, this human "I" in the divine "I," when
sufficiently developed, is able to evoke the memory of all the events
in which it has participated in the causal body, and also the memory
of those it has witnessed as a collective soul (elemental "block") in
bygone ages when active in various mineral, vegetable, and animal
species. As a centre in the great Centre, it can also call forth the
memory of everything in the Universe that its consciousness can
grasp.[260] And when, in this long pilgrimage, it has developed to the
farthest limits of the Universe it knows all that has been, is now,
and is to be in this Universe, consequently it knows both what it has
and what it has not participated in, for everything in the Universe
has then become part of itself.

Thus it is seen that the memory of the past is everywhere registered,
and that the difficulty a man has in bringing it back is caused by
nothing more than his imperfect development. Once he has entered the
"Strait Gate,"[261] and his consciousness is awake on the first plane
of Unity,[262] he becomes able to read the Great Book of Nature, in
which all vibrations are kept in potentiality; he can revive them by
an effort of will, similar to that he makes in a waking state, when he
wishes to bring back past impressions to his brain. The difference
lies in the fact that, in the latter case, being in the physical body,
he calls up the memory retained in the astral body; whilst in the
former case, being in the causal body, he brings memory within the
influence of the buddhic body, or even at times of higher bodies
still. The more the Being grows, and becomes able to fix his
consciousness on the higher planes, the wider extends his sphere of
influence, approaching that of divine Consciousness.

It is ignorance that brings forward this objection regarding loss of
memory, ignorance of life and of death, ignorance of the phenomena
that follow the last breath of a dying man, as well as of those
preceding the first faint cry of a new-born child. Sceptics, however,
might have shown a little more indulgence, for, as they are well
aware, ordinary memory _is_ even now so unreliable that a man has
great difficulty in recalling the whole of the thoughts that have
entered his brain during the last few minutes; he has forgotten the
details of the various events of the week; the