Secrets of Yogi Philosophy

William Walker Atkinson

At the time I read Secrets of Yogi Philosophy of Yogi Ramacharaka = William Walker Atkinson

He writes about the seven principles of man, in which he sees a rising value.

7. Spirit.
6. Spiritual-Mind.
5. Intellect.
4. Instinctive-Mind.
3. Prana, or Vital Force.
2. Astral Body.
1. Physical Body.

It was published 1903 by and I think you can feel that the author is trapped in a mindset of a certain time when he writes:

"The fifth principle, the intellect, has unfolded to a certain degree,
particularly in the more advanced men of to-day, but the unfoldment
is merely beginning with many. Many men are but little more than
animals, and their minds function almost entirely upon the instinctive
plane.....

In some of the lower animals, the fourth principle has attracted to
itself the lowest shading of the fifth principle, and the animal manifests
signs of a faint reasoning. On the other hand, in some of the lower
forms of man—the Bushman, for example—the fourth principle has
scarcely been perceptibly colored by the incoming fifth principle, and
the "man" is scarcely more than a brute, in fact is more of a brute,
mentally, than some of the higher domesticated animals, who, having
been for many generations in close companionship with man, have
been colored by his mental emanations."

Can it be that you are occupied with the search for knowledge and have such a low opinion of people who just live differently than the Europeans? Could the people living before the invention of war not already have experienced high-level cultural achievements that were lost in the oral tradition. Every generation has to put their knowledge and ideas in their own words. We should be vigilant that we do not remain prisoners of the zeitgeist. For me, all people are equal, even if I wouldn't want to share with each of them my apartment.

But why should a shaman of the Ice Age be culturally or intellectually inferior to me, because I know how I can buy a refrigerator? It is always easy to see the weaknesses of someone else while I have no words for his strengths.

You can download copy of the book here.