Lecture I

The passing of the individual through successive incarnations is of importance for the collective evolution of the human race. The latter has advanced through successive lives in the past, and is still advancing, and parallel with it the earth too is moving forwards in its evolution. The time will come when the earth will have reached the end of its career. Then the earthly planet will fall away as a physical entity from the sum-total of human souls, just as the human body falls away from the spirit at death, when, in order to continue living, the soul enters the spiritual realm which is adapted to it between death and re-birth. When once this is realized, it must appear as man's highest ideal to have progressed far enough at earthly death, to be able to reap all possible benefits which may be obtained from earthly life.