Karma and Rebirth

Author(s): Christmas Humphereys
Publisher: Albemarle Street London

Page 75

KARMA AND REBIRTH APPLIED necessity” is not a circle but a spiral, and the path goes up or down. Henceforth the pilgrim chooses his own journey, and though there will always be guides available, he must learn to travel alone. “You yourself must make the effort,” says the Dhammapada, “ Buddhas do but point the Way.” And again, in The Voice of the Silence,“ Prepare thyself, for thou wilt have to travel on alone. The Tcacher can but point the Way. The Path is one for all; the means to reach the goal must vary with the Pilgrims." Yet now there is a joyous sense of the community of souls, the Oneness of all forms of life, the pilgrimage of the homeless making their slow way home. Character-building
For the first time there is encouragement to deliberate character-building, a thoughtful planning of the future without regard to time. “Sow a thought and you reap an act; sow an act and you reap a habit ; sow a habit and you reap a character ; sow a character and you reap a destiny.” So runs the old rune, and it is now seen to be true. Are you tired of a peevish temper? Seek its cause and remove the cause. Would you have greater concentration of mind ? None can prevent it, if you have the will to prepare a plan for self-development and to carry it through. When a man accepts and partially understands the working of Karma, he can at once begin this building of character, setting cach stone with deliberate care, knowing that he is building for Eternity. There is no longer hasty running up and pulling down, working on one plan to-day, on another to-morrow, on none at all the day after ; but there is the drafting of a well-thought-out scheme of character, as it were, and then the building according to the scheme, for the Soul becomes an architect as well as a builder, and wastes no more time in abortive beginnings.
All this takes time, but there is time for patience, both for the total of work to be done and for waiting for the right and
1 Karma, Annie Besant.
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