The Early Races

By "Reincarnation" we mean the repeated incarnation, or embodiment in

flesh, of the soul or immaterial part of man's nature. The term

"Metempsychosis" is frequently employed in the same sense, the

definition of the latter term being: "The passage of the soul, as an

immortal essence, at the death of the body, into another living body."

The term "Transmigration of Souls" is sometimes employed, the term being

used in the ense of "passing from one body into another." But the term

"Transmigration" is often used in connection with the belief of certain

undeveloped races who held that the soul of men sometimes passed into

the bodies of the lower animals, as a punishment for their sins

committed during the human life. But this belief is held in disrepute

by the adherents of Reincarnation or Metempsychosis, and has no

connection with their philosophy or beliefs, the ideas having sprung

from an entirely different source, and having nothing in common.



There are many forms of belief--many degrees of doctrine--regarding

Reincarnation, as we shall see as we proceed, but there is a fundamental

and basic principle underlying all of the various shades of opinion, and

divisions of the schools. This fundamental belief may be expressed as

the doctrine that there is in man an immaterial Something (called the

soul, spirit, inner self, or many other names) which does not perish at

the death or disintegration of the body, but which persists as an

entity, and after a shorter or longer interval of rest reincarnates, or

is re-born, into a new body--that of an unborn infant--from whence it

proceeds to live a new life in the body, more or less unconscious of its

past existences, but containing within itself the "essence" or results

of its past lives, which experiences go to make up its new "character,"

or "personality." It is usually held that the rebirth is governed by the

law of attraction, under one name or another, and which law operates in

accordance with strict justice, in the direction of attracting the

reincarnating soul to a body, and conditions, in accordance with the

tendencies of the past life, the parents also attracting to them a soul

bound to them by some ties in the past, the law being universal,

uniform, and equitable to all concerned in the matter. This is a general

statement of the doctrine as it is generally held by the most

intelligent of its adherents.



E. D. Walker, a well-known English writer on the subject, gives the

following beautiful idea of the general teachings: "Reincarnation

teaches that the soul enters this life, not as a fresh creation, but

after a long course of previous existences on this earth and elsewhere,

in which it acquired its present inhering peculiarities, and that it is

on the way to future transformations which the soul is now shaping. It

claims that infancy brings to earth, not a blank scroll for the

beginning of an earthly record, nor a mere cohesion of atomic forces

into a brief personality, soon to dissolve again into the elements, but

that it is inscribed with ancestral histories, some like the present

scene, most of them unlike it and stretching back into the remotest

past. These inscriptions are generally undecipherable, save as revealed

in their moulding influence upon the new career; but like the invisible

photographic images made by the sun of all it sees, when they are

properly developed in the laboratory of consciousness they will be

distinctly displayed. The current phase of life will also be stored away

in the secret vaults of memory, for its unconscious effects upon the

ensuing lives. All the qualities we now possess, in body, mind and soul,

result from our use of ancient opportunities. We are indeed 'the heir of

all the ages,' and are alone responsible for our inheritances. For these

conditions accrue from distant causes engendered by our older selves,

and the future flows by the divine law of cause and effect from the

gathered momentum of our past impetuses. There is no favoritism in the

universe, but all have the same everlasting facilities for growth. Those

who are now elevated in worldly station may be sunk in humble

surroundings in the future. Only the inner traits of the soul are

permanent companions. The wealthy sluggard may be the beggar of the next

life; and the industrious worker of the present is sowing the seeds of

future greatness. Suffering bravely endured now will produce a treasure

of patience and fortitude in another life; hardships will give rise to

strength; self-denial must develop the will; tastes cultivated in this

existence will somehow bear fruit in coming ones; and acquired energies

will assert themselves whenever they can by the Law of Parsimony upon

which the principles of physics are based. Vice versa, the unconscious

habits, the uncontrollable impulses, the peculiar tendencies, the

favorite pursuits, and the soul-stirring friendships of the present

descend from far-reaching previous activities."



The doctrine of Reincarnation--Metempsychosis--Rebirth--has always been

held as truth by a large portion of the human race. Following the

invariable law of cyclic changes--the swing of the pendulum of

thought--at times it has apparently died out in parts of the world, only

to be again succeeded by a new birth and interest among the descendants

of the same people. It is a light impossible to extinguish, and although

its flickering flame may seem to die out for a moment, the shifting of

the mental winds again allows it to rekindle from the hidden spark, and

lo! again it bursts into new life and vigor. The reawakened interest in

the subject in the Western world, of which all keen observers have taken

note, is but another instance of the operation of the Cyclic Law. It

begins to look as if the occultists are right when they predict that

before the dawn of another century the Western world will once more have

embraced the doctrines of Rebirth--the old, discarded truth, once so

dear to the race, will again be settled in popular favor, and again move

toward the position of "orthodox" teaching, perhaps to be again

crystallized by reason of its "orthodoxy" and again to lose favor and

fade away, as the pendulum swings backward to the other extreme of

thought.



But the teaching of Reincarnation never has passed away altogether from

the race--in some parts of the world the lamp has been kept burning

brightly--nay, more, at no time in human history has there been a period

in which the majority of the race has not accepted the doctrine of

Rebirth, in some of its various forms. It was so one thousand years

ago--two thousand--five thousand--and it is so to-day. In this Twentieth

Century nearly if not quite two-thirds of the race hold firmly to the

teaching, and the multitudes of Hindus and other Eastern peoples cling

to it tenaciously. And, even outside of these people, there are to be

found traces of the doctrine among other races in the East, and West. So

Reincarnation is not a "forgotten truth," or "discarded doctrine," but

one fully alive and vigorous, and one which is destined to play a very

important part in the history of Western thought during the Twentieth

Century.



It is interesting to trace the history of the doctrine among the ancient

peoples--away back into the dim recesses of the past. It is difficult to

ascribe to any particular time, or any particular race, the credit of

having "originated" Reincarnation. In spite of the decided opinions, and

the differing theories of the various writers on this subject, who would

give Egypt, or India, or the lost Atlantis, as the birthplace of the

doctrine, we feel that such ideas are but attempts to attribute a

universal intuitive belief to some favored part of the race. We do not

believe that the doctrine of Reincarnation ever "originated" anywhere,

as a new and distinct doctrine. We believe that it sprang into existence

whenever and wherever man arrived at a stage of intellectual development

sufficient to enable him to form a mental conception of a Something that

lived after Death. No matter from what source this belief in a "ghost"

originated, it must be admitted that it is found among all peoples, and

is apparently an universal idea. And, running along with it in the

primitive peoples, we find that there is, and always has been, an idea,

more or less vague and indistinct, that somehow, someway, sometime, this

"ghost" of the person returns to earthly existence and takes upon itself

a new fleshly garment--a new body. Here, then, is where the idea of

Reincarnation begins--everywhere, at a certain stage of human mental

development. It runs parallel with the "ghost" idea, and seems bound up

with that conception in nearly every case. When man evolves a little

further, he begins to reason that if the "ghost" is immortal, and

survives the death of the body, and returns to take upon itself a new

body, then it must have lived before the last birth, and therefore must

have a long chain of lives behind it. This is the second step. The third

step is when man begins to reason that the next life is dependent upon

something done or left undone in the present life. And upon these three

fundamental ideas the doctrine of Reincarnation has been built. The

occultists claim that in addition to this universal idea, which is more

or less intuitive, the race has received more or less instruction, from

time to time, from certain advanced souls which have passed on to higher

planes of existence, and who are now called the Masters, Adepts,

Teachers, Race Guides, etc., etc. But whatever may be the explanation,

it remains a truth that man seems to have worked out for himself, in all

times and in all places, first, an idea of a "ghost" which persists

after the body dies; and second, that this "ghost" has lived before in

other bodies, and will return again to take on a new body. There are

various ideas regarding "heavens" and "hells," but underlying them all

there persists this idea of re-birth in some of its phases.



Soldi, the archaeologist, has published an interesting series of works,

dealing with the beliefs of primitive peoples, who have passed from the

scene of human action. He shows by the fragments of carving and

sculpture which have survived them that there was an universal idea

among them of the "ghost" which lived after the body died; and a

corresponding idea that some day this "ghost" would return to the scene

of its former activities. This belief sometimes took the form of a

return into the former body, which idea led to the preservation of the

body by processes of mummifying, etc., but as a rule this belief

developed into the more advanced one of a re-birth in a new body.



The earlier travelers in Africa have reported that here and there they

found evidences and traces of what was to them "a strange belief" in the

future return of the soul to a new body on earth. The early explorers of

America found similar traditions and beliefs among the Red Indians,

survivals of which exist even unto this day. It is related of a number

of savage tribes, in different parts of the world, that they place the

bodies of their dead children by the roadside, in order that their souls

may be given a good chance to find new bodies by reason of the

approaching of many traveling pregnant women who pass along the road. A

number of these primitive people hold to the idea of a complex soul,

composed of several parts, in which they resemble the Egyptians,

Hindus, Chinese, and in fact all mystical and occult philosophies. The

Figi Islanders are said to believe in a black soul and a white soul, the

former of which remains with the buried body and disintegrates with it,

while the white soul leaves the body and wanders as a "ghost," and

afterward, tiring of the wandering, returns to life in a new body. The

natives of Greenland are said to believe in an astral body, which leaves

the body during sleep, but which perishes as the body disintegrates

after death; and a second soul which leaves the body only at death, and

which persists until it is reborn at a later time. In fact, the student

finds that nearly all of the primitives races, and those semi-civilized,

show traces of a belief in a complex soul, and a trace of doctrine of

Reincarnation in some form. The human mind seems to work along the same

lines, among the different races--unless one holds to the theory that

all sprang from the same root-race, and that the various beliefs are

survivals of some ancient fundamental doctrine--the facts are not

disturbed in either case.



In the last mentioned connection, we might mention that the traditions

concerning Ancient Atlantis--the lost continent--all hold to the effect

that her people believed strongly in Reincarnation, and to the ideas of

the complex soul. As the survivors of Atlantis are believed to have been

the ancestors of the Egyptians on the one hand, and of the Ancient

Peruvians on the other--the two branches of survivors having maintained

their original doctrines as modified by different environments--we might

find here an explanation of the prevalence of the doctrine on both sides

of the ocean. We mention this merely in passing, and as of general

interest in the line of our subject.