Then in my mind I heard Lea say that we would be going back in time until we reached a point where my soul had incarnated into a prehistoric Chinese culture.
Suddenly I found myself both experiencing the body of a thirty-year-old Chinese slave trader and simultaneously, observing from outside that body. I knew that I was a cruel and vicious person who took pleasure in the ill treatment of the slaves whom I owned and traded. Scene after scene of brutal, degrading treatment of others passed before my eyes and I felt sick with self-hatred and shame. Then I died and suffered the miserable existence of sharing the low astral planes with similar depraved personalities like myself until I was born again into one of the earliest Egyptian dynasties.
I became aware of this next incarnation when I again saw and simultaneously experienced myself as a giant black Numidean slave working in the stone quarries of the Pharaoh. Unfortunately my physical vitality was tremendous, so I lived scores of years in extremely hard labor with many cruel slave masters who seemed to delight in laying their whips upon my massive back and shoulders. Finally, and mercifully, I died.
While I had the impression that there were other lifetimes in between, the next incarnation that I became aware of was in a later Egyptian period. I was a Pharaoh who succeeded in freeing the slaves in his land during his reign. I saw myself trying to rule wisely and well, but being constantly frustrated by the corrupt and treacherous priesthood. Finally my royal wrath could no longer be contained and I killed the fat and foppish high priest along with as many of his lesser priests as I could get my hands on. But my bloody actions divided my country, and I, too, was murdered at the end of a long civil war.
Again I had the impression of many incarnations intervening before I saw and felt myself wearing the robes of a cardinal in the early Renaissance church of Rome. I was a fanatic at insisting that sins be driven out of human flesh by torture. Gleefully and with 'holy vengeance' I devised newer and better torture methods, such as-my God- chopping off my victim's limbs a section at a time. While I frequently used the burning stake, I usually reserved it for women who refused me their sexual favors. I was indeed a monstrous hypocrite. Because the pope was weak and I was rich and ruthless, I became the most powerful priest in the church. Fortunately for the people of Italy, who lived in fear of me, the plague favored them by carrying me off prematurely.
This death was followed by a hideous period, on the lowest astral planes. Since my selfish desires kept me from rising to higher levels, I was forced to associate with the most loathsome and distorted personalities.
Then brief impressions of other lives flashed by until once again I became aware of a vividly clear incarnation as the daughter of a poor stone-cutter living in a Spain shuddering from the excesses of the Inquisition. I was the eldest in a very poor but large family of eight daughters including myself. I worked long hours to support my aging parents and my many sisters and probably would have lived a long life of this menial drudgery if I had not had this one heretical obsession: I refused to accept the idea of eternal hell. My family spent many years trying to force me to recant this heresy until my sisters, in order to save my poor soul, called upon the officers of the Inquisition for help. My obsession was stronger than the pain of many ingenious means of torture and, in a last desperate attempt to save my soul, I was burned at the stake surrounded by the faces of my sisters praying for my redemption.
The pain and fear associated with this past flaming death caused me to wake up with a scream in the year 1976. It was 4 a.m. and Karl was asking me if I was all right. After assuring him that I was okay now, I fell back to sleep and awakened in my C.I. chair back in 2150.
Lea was bending over me wiping the sweat off my face with a damp cloth. Seeing my eyes open, she lowered her face to mine and gently kissed my lips. Then she said, 'Now you know one of the reasons why micro man doesn't want to remember past lives.'
'My God,' I exclaimed, 'if they are all as horrible as mine, I don't blame anyone for not wanting to remember them!'
'Oh, they aren't all horrible,' Lea assured me. 'You had many lives that were rather peaceful and uneventful. But you didn't learn much from most of them. The five incarnations that you've just relived formed a learning pattern which illustrated to you the consequences of cruel treatment of others. Your soul selects an opportunity for you to grow on. If you waste the opportunity in one life, your soul balances that with an opposite opportunity in another life.'
'That's a hard way to learn,' I complained. 'Does everyone have to learn that painfully?'
'Everyone who chooses the spiritual devolution of the soul ends up with total delusionary amnesia of their past and, thus, has no Macro awareness of the perfect order maintained by the soul in selecting learning opportunities. If you can't remember your macrocosmic oneness with all, you will desire micro power to alleviate your fears of loneliness and weakness. Micro man treats others selfishly, cruelly, to increase his feelings of power, adequacy, and security,' was her answer.
'All right, Lea,' I said. 'I sure hope I learned something from those horrible experiences. Can't I relive some pleasant ones?'
'Certainly,' she replied. 'It won't be necessary to ask C.I. for help any more. We've opened a pathway to your past. In the future if you meditate deeply you will be able to recall fragments of many more lives. For the moment, however, lie back in your chair arid I'll help you practice retro cognition.'
I followed her suggestion and allowed her mind to help me relax and 'put aside my conscious micro concerns. Soon, with her help, I was once again floating through time-on and on-through peripheral flashes of other lives and experiences. However, these were not ones that Lea wished us to look at in more detail, so we continued our journey along the mighty river of time.
Before long I focused clearly on a life as an islander in the tropical South Pacific. It was a lovely peaceful life in a small Polynesian society in which I watched myself grow from a young boy into strong manhood. I married a dark lovely girl whom I recognized immediately as Carol, although her physical appearance was certainly not the same as in 2150. We had a number of children, among whom I noticed were Neal and Jean.
Our life on this Pacific island was one of cooperation and love. Our head man was a very wise and patient leader who seemed to know how to resolve human problems at an early stage before great harm could arise. By the time I reached middle age he was a very old man, yet I recognized in him the soul of Rana. Upon his death I was accepted as leader by all and spent many happy years before the advent of the white traders.
I was very old when the great ships arrived bearing the cruel, lust-filled white men. I tried to warn my people of the anger I felt in these strangers, but like curious children they could not resist the fascination and excitement surrounding these strange beings.
The fascination was short-lived for soon the white men began taking our young men and women off with them when they sailed away. The day came when if we saw the great white sails approaching our island, we would all try to hide. But our island was small and the ships sent out search parties to rout out all who hid. It was then that I tried to organize an escape to another island, but we were discovered and I, as the leader, was executed.
It seemed that after this life I had a very pleasant sojourn on the higher astral planes in which I renewed acquaintances with many old friends and was briefly reunited with Lea. Together we planned new incarnations in which we could learn to further overcome the micro desires which kept us separate. She left our temporary resting place first in order to incarnate as a male of the British nobility during the late 18th century. I left the astral level soon afterward to incarnate as a male in one of the North American Indian tribes of the early 19th century.
In this last incarnation I devoted my life to philosophy and healing and became a respected medicine man. In late middle age I began to spend almost all of my time seeking out and teaching young children how to live more loving and accepting lives. While I experienced some opposition to my teachings from the more warlike members of the tribe, my reputation as a healer was so great that no one openly opposed me. I am convinced that in time I could have changed the course of history for my people, but again I was thwarted by white invaders. One day while almost all of our men were off hunting, white soldiers came charging down upon our camp, killing women and children and anyone else they could find. I died trying to protect the young children of my school, some of whom I recognized as members of my 2150 Alpha.
When I had returned to consciousness in our C.I. room I asked Lea why it was necessary for me to experience such tragedy and frustration. She took her time before answering, then replied with a question of her own.
'From the seven lives you have now reviewed, Jon,' she asked, 'what's the most important lesson you have learned?'
'I'm not sure, Lea,' I replied. 'It seems that sooner or later my hopes and goals were always thwarted and
