Page 29 - Gnosis volume 2

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of vitality there, in order to gratify the unsatisfied desires that they have carried with

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them beyond their physical lives .
The degree of their intervention is variable, and depends on the credulity that they
encounter. Orthodox Tradition classes them in the category of little devils or imps. The

thirst for "miracles, visions", etc. engenders a favourable atmosphere for their

apparition, which can take many forms, even perceptible to the senses. In order to

accentuate their importance, these apparitions often usurp the names of illustrious
men, or those of Saints or archangels; they even go as far as usurping the name or the

form of the Holy Virgin, or of the Christ Himself. The Philokalia and the Doctrine contain

numerous descriptions of cases of this nature.

Through the Science of Clues, Tradition teaches us a method which enables us to
discern this category of psychic phenomena, too often mistaken for facts emanating

really from the higher planes.

While we are on this subject, it is useful to emphasize that, in esoteric research, the

true and the false are confused easily in the phenomenalistic minds of the cultured
people of our times — confusion, by the way, that is generally favoured by this milieu,

that of Mixtus Orbis. This entanglement manifests itself, usually, in the emotional

domain, which is, most of the time, unbalanced in us, owing to our habit of lying which

has become a veritable second nature with us. Man, even the most educated or
cultured, having lost the innate faculty of spontane-

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I Corinthians, VII, 28.