Memory belongs to the stage or phase of the soul called man; mind, manas, man, and this phase lasts as long as there is any remembrance ; so long as two people who love remember each other so long will they exist and love as separated beings, both during the life, and after the death of the physical body, conditioned by the law of the pair of opposites ; but the true love of the soul can only find satisfaction in the realm beyond mind, where spirit meets with and merges into spirit, and realises Oneness where there is no memory of past pleasure or pain and where sin cannot exist; for the consciousness of wrong belongs only to mind, the separated state of being.

If memory could be taken by the soul to the realm of spirit all past mistakes and shortcomings would partake of Eternal Life and live for ever. Forgiveness of sin means that it is erased from the mirror the mind is holding before the soul. In the state of pure spirit there can be no memory of things past; it is the state of eternal youth that philosophers all down the ages have searched for, and which has been materially interpreted as meaning the renewal of youth and love in the physical body.

The mystics call this state annihilation, which if materially interpreted appears to mean nothing ness and repels rather than attracts a seeking soul who is beginning to tread the Path ; in reality it is a state of bliss too great to be understood by the mind of man, and so to him appears undesirable.

There are no words in which an explanation can be given to describe this, but perhaps an illustration may suggest a line of thought to a thoughtful soul. Sometimes when life's difficulties seem overwhelming and memories of the past become unbearable, a man seeks some form of distraction or dissipation which will give him, even for a few brief moments, forgetfulness of himself ; he wants, as he terms it, to be taken out of himself, the burden of his memories is greater than he can bear, it is the soul seeking to escape from its bondage ; the bonds that hold it to earth are memories, and it is longing for that freedom which is the goal of the mystic of every religion.

Heaven and hell are both stages of consciousness that belong to mind, each soul creates his own ; and they last as long as the soul remains in the world of opposites or separateness and for that soul there must always be heaven and hell, good and evil, positive and negative, pleasure and pain, sorrow and joy ; this is the state in which the soul exists and lives as man in this world and the next; but when the soul has freed itself from bondage by becoming the master of mind, then he has placed all those things under his feet, he has become divine man or Hu-man ; this is the stage of the Masters, Prophets and Saviours who have conquered the world ruled by the pairs of opposites, and are no more under its laws, they have become One with all that is, One with the Father, that Oneness of which words fail to convey any adequate meaning to the mind.

"The mind is the slayer of the real, let the Disciple slay the slayer."

The Voice of the Silence.

"By the delusion of the pairs of opposites spruns from attaction and repulsion,
O ! Bharata ! all beings walk this universe wholly deluded.
But those men of pure deeds in whom sin is come to an end,
they, freed from the delusive pairs of opposites, worship Me steadfast in vows."

Bhagavad Gita.

-oOo-