14. The Higher Development of Man

Man's development is a descent from the All-Unity to the particular and a gradual ascent in conscious freedom to the realization of his connection with the All and return to the General. Therefore, from the mental point of view, the dead stone is a model of the higher for man. In it the great connection is still preserved; in it only the law of causality is effective; what sets it in motion, it gives to the outside world. It extends from the mental into the physical, for pure thought is enclosed within it. Its life is only form. Thus the sun, which as a physical image of the Logos is at home in the mind, and the whole mineral kingdom can be regarded as a great laboratory of physical and chemical forces.