As we enter the darker spheres of our nature we meet earthbound intelligences who would attach themselves to us were we to permit them. Later we have to face the composite body of our past evil—a thought-form of our own creation—and to whom we have given elements of a soul nature; for unknowingly we are all creators. This, called “The Dweller of the Threshold,” will confront us, and is a living, dynamic force. Being elemental it can assume any shape of horror with which it wishes to impress us, and usually takes a feminine form. If we permit this evil to gain control over us for but a moment—for it is hypnotic—it will give the nervous system, especially to those uninitiated as to its true nature, a dangerous shock. But if at such a moment we aspire to the Reality for protection and understand, it will disintegrate like the ash of a cigarette. When this is destroyed it will remove the subconscious impressions of fear that children as well as men suffer from in their dreams.
Causes of Evil
The three main causes of evil in this world are:
(1) Gratification of our animal passions and desires.
(2) The evil of the intermediate worlds (which the average person knows little about).
(3) Lack of devotion to Truth (the perfect attribute of God).
The Root of Evil
In Yoga teaching the causes of evil must be sought in the self-created universe where dwells the “I am.” Long has humanity sought to explain the why of evil by objective analysis. But the cause of a thing is not within the thing, and the cause of the underworld is to be found neither in the crime, nor in the underworld. Until man, the son of Manu, the Thinker, by contact with the Lord God of Truth within, has come to understand the cause of his affliction and sufferings, he can neither avoid, nor profit by them. The Dayspring of Youth, by M