The third divine instinct or hidden inner trend is the urge to formulate a plan. It will be apparent that this urge grows out of, or is dependent upon, the previous two trends considered. It finds its microcosmic reflection in the many plans and projects of finite man as he lives his little life or runs busily about the planet in connection with his tiny personal affairs. It is this universal capacity to work and plan which is the guarantee that there exists in man the capacity to respond eventually and in group formation to God's plan, based on God's vision. All these basic, developing, divine instincts and expressions of God's consciousness and awareness find their embryonic reflections in our modern humanity. It is no part of my purpose to indicate my understanding of God's Plan. This is limited naturally by my capacity. Only dimly do I sense it, and only occasionally and faintly does the outline of God's stupendous objective dawn on my mind. This Plan can only be sensed, visioned and known in truth by the Hierarchy, and then only in group formation and by those Masters Who can function in full monadic consciousness. They alone are beginning to comprehend what it is. Suffice it for the rest of those in the Hierarchy - the initiates and disciples in their ordered ranks and various gradings - to cooperate with that immediate aspect of the Plan which they can grasp and which comes down to them through the inspired minds of their Directors at certain stated times, and in certain specific years. Such a year was 1933. Such another will be the year 1942. At those times, when the Hierarchy meets in silent conclave, a part of God's vision, and His [242] formulation of that vision for the immediate present, is revealed for the next nine year cycle. They then, in perfect freedom and with full mutual cooperation lay Their plans to bring about the desired objectives of the Heads of the Hierarchy, as They in Their turn cooperate with still higher Forces and Knowers.

We have here received much upon which to ponder, to [243] think and to meditate. Let us search for the thread of gold which will lead us, in waking consciousness, into the treasure house of our own souls, and there let us learn to be at-one with all that breathes, to sense the vision for the whole, as far as we can, and to work in unison with God's plan as far as it has been revealed to us by Those Who know.

These ancient rules, or determining factors - the essential conditioning laws in the life of the Soul - are in their nature basically psychological. For that reason, they warrant our study. On its own plane, the soul knows no separation, and the factor of synthesis governs all soul relations. The soul is occupied not only with the form that the vision of its objective may take, but with the quality or the meaning which that vision veils or hides. The soul knows the Plan; its form, outline, methods and objective are known. Through the use of the creative imagination, the soul creates; it builds thought-forms on the mental plane and objectifies desire on the astral plane. It proceeds there to externalize its thought and its desire upon the physical plane through applied force, creatively actuated by the imagination of the etheric or vital vehicle. Yet because the soul is intelligence, motivated by love, it can (within the realized synthesis which governs its activities) analyze, discriminate and divide. The soul likewise aspires to that which is greater than itself, and reaches out to the world of divine ideas, and thus itself occupies a midway position between the world of ideation and the world of forms. This is its difficulty and its opportunity.