| The Causes of Disease Summarized In every
    occult consideration of disease it must be accepted as a basic proposition that all
    disease is a result of the misuse of force in some earlier life or in this. This is
    fundamental. In connection with this I would remind you of some statements I have earlier
    made on this matter. 
      - Ninety per cent of the causes of disease are to be found in the etheric and astral
        bodies. Wrong use of mental energy and misapplied desire are paramount factors, yet with
        the bulk of humanity still in the Atlantean stages of consciousness, only five per cent of
        the prevalent diseases are due to mental causes. The percentage varies with the
        development of the race and its evolution. Disease is therefore the working out into
        manifestation of undesirable, subjective conditions - vital, emotional and mental.
 
      - Everything concerning the health of man can be approached from three angles:
          - That of the personality life - of this we are learning much. [113]
 
          - That of humanity as a whole - this is beginning to be appreciated.
 
          - That of the planetary life - of this we can know little.
 
         
       
      - All disease is caused by lack of harmony between form and life, between soul and
        personality; this lack of harmony runs through all the kingdoms in nature.
 
      - The bulk of diseases are of:
          - Group origin.
 
          - The result of infection.
 
          - Malnutrition, physically, subjectively and occultly understood.
 
         
       
      - Diseases for the masses, for the average citizen, for the intelligentsia and for
        disciples differ widely and have differing fields of expression.
          - The three major groups of diseases for the first two classes are:
 
            Tuberculosis. 
            The social diseases. 
            Cancer. 
          - The two major diseases for the intelligentsia and for disciples are:
 
            Heart complaints. 
            Nervous diseases.    
        
      
      Disease is a
        fact in nature. When this is accepted, men will begin to work with the Law of Liberation,
        with right thought, leading to right attitudes and orientation, and with the principle of
        non-resistance. Of this non-resistance, the overpowering willingness to die which is so
        frequently a characteristic of the final stage immediately preceding death is the lowest
        manifestation. It is non-resistance which psychologically governs coma. [114]
      The Law of
        Cause and Effect, or of Karma, governs all disease. This embraces individual, group,
        national and total human karma.
    
    If you will
    pause at this point and review what I have restated, and if you will reread and reflect
    upon the four Laws and the four Rules you will possess the needed groundwork upon which to
    proceed with our future studies, beginning with the diseases incident to the life of
    discipleship. Some of this I have already dealt with in  A Treatise on the Seven
    Rays, Vol. II. pages 520-625. There the approach was largely from the angle of
    the mystic, whereas I am here going to touch upon the problems of the accepted disciple.  |