The Level is a symbol of fraternal equality recognizing the fatherhood of God, and the brotherhood of man. It is a tragic fact that there are many psychoneurotic individuals and others suffering from mental disorders, who are under malign psychic influence. Whatever treatment is given such individuals, including those who are now receiving institutional care, might be more successful by having the patients take up residence at an altitude of not less than five thousand feet. The electric shock and deep-freeze therapies used by several psychiatric institutions may achieve temporary success, but the price will be extracted later. Where a thought of fear constantly recurs and plunges one into anxiety or even despair against all the evidence of fact and reason, one is no longer normal but is the sufferer of a phobia. Sufferers from the manic phase of mental disorders are unstable in temperament and soon change their aims, policies, or goals, for none of these is clear enough. In our studies, the term “the unconscious” is not used in the narrow meaning of certain arbitrarily selected innate trends, a meaning given it by the psychoanalysts, but in a broadly scientific sense, as containing in potential latency all the possibilities gained in the conscious life and all the deposits of former Earth lives, and not only the personal possibilities, but also the super-personal or cosmic ones. It may be that the patients who are advised by their analysts to take up painting pictures as a form of therapy benefit by the concentration involved in the work, as well as by the relaxation of transferring their thoughts for a while from their own self-affairs. #RandolphHarris 1 of 16

There are different ways of escape for those who have problems. Some of them, such as inebriation, contraband, barbiturates and other paraphernalia, prophylactics and pleasures of the flesh, are frankly acknowledged to be so; others are less easily recognized as such and these include art and religion. Professor Stefan de Schill, psychoanalyst: A compulsion neurosis, of which there are several kinds, is caused by a person (technically called “a compulsive”) feeling guilty over unclean thoughts. One’s dry washing of hands is an outer symbol of one’s attempt or wish to get rid of them. Or one’s feet swinging, fingers tapping the table, and ear-pulling are nervous habits which betray tension. (2) Any good standard work on psychiatry deals with these habit patterns, these neuroses, which annoy or irritate others. In the catatonic state, the whole force of the person is turned inward and concentrated upon an idea or a picture or a happening which may be of a purely mental kind. They may or may not be aware of what is happening around them but they are unable to leave the condition at will; it must pass away of its own accord. What has the person who is obsessed, insane, paranoic, or hysterical really done? One has fixed one’s attention on a particular thought, idea, belief, or mental picture and one will not let it go. If the thought contradicts reality, we call one insane. In changing thought for the better, one of the first activities is to cleanse it of undesirable attributes, to wash them away by beneficial energetic willed control, immediately reacting to their appearance with a very definite mental exclamation of “No!” A mind filled with negative qualities cannot possibly be a healthy mind and is certainly unsuitable for high spiritual flights. #RandolphHarris 2 of 16

Neurotics talk about their quest but too often fail to apply its disciplinary principles, live in a perpetual muddle because they consider reasoning and planning to be anti-spiritual, and remain indecisive and unsettled because they are swaying from one emotion to another. They are easily excited, elated, or depressed. The fact is too often ignored that they have to go through a first stage in which they simply prepare themselves as grown-up human beings before trying higher flights. This is as much in their own interests as in society’s, for they will then be better able to deal with others and help themselves. Surely it is more prudent to take up an ideal which is not too far off, which may be an intermediate one that seems reachable and realizable. However, the must recognize this situation for what it is, practice a humble patience, and not try to put the burden of duty elsewhere. They are really looking for someone to nurse them out of their neurotic condition which, of course, mean a passage from emotional adolescence to adult responsibility. Too often the emotionally sick are excessively possessive and will no let go of someone. The neurotic turns minor situations into great crises. Dr. Freud thought that giving emotional support to distressed persons would probably come through forms of hypnosis or self-hypnosis. Today more and more use is made of methods of relaxation, imaging, suggestion, meditation, optimistic thinking, and kindred ways of countering stress or improving healing. “Let me hear what the Lord God is saying in me!” That was the cry of the Psalmist (85.8). However, just as piercing are my own humble cries, My Holy Friend. #RandolphHarris 3 of 16

As the boy Samuel found out to his joy, and as the author of First Samuel noted, blessed is the soul that hears the Lord jabbering and chartering within (1 Samuel 3.9). Let me see if I can recall the particulars. Let us continue out chatsworth, O Lord. That is to say, let us pick up our conversation where it left off, at Chatsworth, our secret rendezvous, the little room within my soul that can be reached only inside my cell. Blessed are the ears that pick up the Godly Whispering, if I may borrow an expression from 1 Kings (19.12), and at the same time block out the Worldly Whisperer! Blessed are the ears that listen, not to Untruth mouthing off out in the street, but to Truth instructing inside the monastery! Blessed are the eyes that blink in distress at the World outside, but stare unblinkingly at the World inside! Blessed are those who get beyond the entrance of the interior life and strive daily to grasp what is hidden in Deepest Heaven! Blessed are those who make time for God of the ages and at the same time cut themselves off from all the distractions of the age! O my soul, take note of these beatitudes and bar the gates before your sensuality charges in! Only then can you hear what your Lord God is saying in you. “I am your salvation!” That is what the psalmist wanted the Lord to say (35.3). And that is what I, your Beloved Lord, am saying to you, My dear friend. I am your peace, I am your life, and what is more, I have many things to say to you. First, be on your best behaviour when we have our chats, and you will soon learn to enjoy them. Second, let the eely Transitoriness slip—grasp the eternal things only. Third, they are sweet, they are nice, all those petty yet pretty Temporalities, but they will drag you under the bushes every time. Fourth, all those creatures in the World, what help would they be if you were deserted by the Creator? #RandolphHarris 4 of 16

To sum up, dear friend of Mine, unclench your fists, and let everything you have fly out of your hands. Clean yourself up nicely and stay faithful to your Creator. Then you will begin to behold Beatitude. God’s power is immeasurable. He is the living mighty one. Now everything that is immeasurable is infinite. Therefore the power of God is infinite. Active power exists in God according to the measure in which He is actual. Now His existence is infinite, inasmuch as it is not limited by anything that receives it, as is clear from what has been said, when we discussed the infinity of the divine essence. Wherefore, it is necessary that active power in God should be infinite. For in every agent is it found that the more perfectly an agent has the form by which it acts the greater its power to act. For instance, the hotter a thing is, the greater the power has it to give heat; and it would have infinite power to give heat, were its own heat infinite. Whence, since divine essence, through which God acts, is infinite, as was shown above, it follows that His power likewise is infinite. The Philosopher is here speaking of an infinity in regard to matter not limited by any form; and such infinite belongs to quantity. However, the divine essence is otherwise, as was shown above; and consequently so also His power. It does not follow, therefore, that it is imperfect. The power of a univocal agent is wholly manifested in its effect. The generative power of humans, for example, is not able to do more than beget humans. However, the power of a non-univocal agent does not wholly manifest itself in the production of its effect: as, for example, the power of the sun does not wholly manifest itself in the production of an animal generated from putrefaction. #RandolphHarris 5 of 16

Now it is clear that God is not a univocal agent. For nothing agrees with Him either in species or in genus, as was shown above. Whence it follows that His effect is always less than His power. It is not necessary, therefore, that the infinite power of God should be manifested so as to produce an infinite effect. Yet even if it were to produce no effect, the power of God would not be ineffectual; because a thing is ineffectual which is ordained towards an end to which it does not attain. However, the power of God is not ordered toward its effect as towards an end; rather, it is the end of the effect produced by it. The Philosopher (Phys. Viii, 79) proves that if a body had infinite power, it would cause a non-temporal movement. And one shows that the power of the mover of Heaven is infinite, because it can move in an infinite time. It remains, therefore, according to one’s reckoning, that the infinite power of a body, if such existed, would move without time; not, however, the power of an incorporeal mover. The reason of this is that one body moving another is an unvocal agent; wherefore it follows that the whole power of the agent is made known in its motion. Since then the greater the power of a moving body, the more quickly does it move; the necessary conclusion is that if its power were infinite, it would move beyond comparison, fasters, and this is to move without time. An incorporeal mover, however, is not a univocal agent; whence it is not necessary that the whole of its power should be manifested in motion, so as to move without time; and especially since it moves in accordance with the disposition of its will. The Overself takes over one’s identity not by obliterating it but by including it through its surrender. #RandolphHarris 6 of 16

The glimpse state my come on in different ways. Sometimes it disinclines the human from moving. However, if one must attend to some matter which requires one to go across a room or out of the house, one’s feet will seem to move of themselves, but very, very slowly. Before the glimpse can occur, the aspirant may have to pass through a major crisis of one’s inner life, sometimes of one’s outer life too. The mental pressure and emotional strain may leave one feeling utterly confused, perhaps even utterly forlorn. However, its sudden culmination in the glimpse will replace darkness by light, chaos by direction, and blindness by sight. It comes unexpectedly in relaxed moments, when enhanced physical or mental ease suspends the ego’s activity. Caught by the grace, and drawn into its stillness, one may find the physical body reproducing the same conditions by becoming quite immobile. If not of the heart, it may give one a catch of breath when the stillness is first felt if it comes unexpectedly and abruptly. The Divine Power is without shape, is pure Spirit; so the worshipper who accepts or creates any concept of it, or who sees it in spectral celestial vision, oneself furnishes a vehicle for it. In the cause of the concept, it arises from association of ideas: in the case of the vision, by expectancy or familiarity. In both cases, mind speaks whatever language, assumes whatever aspect appeals to the human thinking about God! The idea, ideal person, inspired prophet, or human redeemer whose image is best established in a person’s mind by custom and familiarity is in most cases the channel used by the Overself when bestowing the glimpse. Little by little the stress dissolves, the clamant duties to do this or that fall away as the recognition that this is a benedictory visitation comes closer. The glimpse may move so gently into awareness that the beginning is hardly noticed. Or it may move in with a rush that overwhelms one. With it, knowledge, understanding, meaning, nobility, and divinity fill the aura around one at the moment. #RandolphHarris 7 of 16

It is the awareness of a Presence, a felt but hushed benignity, which signals this kind of entry, this glimpse; but there are other kinds, more forceful yet not more superior. If the glimpse comes unexpectedly in most cases, it comes unaccountedly in others. In the beginning of what one really wants to happen, this feeling of an inward-drawing presence. This awareness is a new experience so it flickers on and off, unadjusted. Who knows? It may come to you so quietly, so devoid of sounds and expectation, that so many smile at what begins to happen to you. However, then it may come like a cloudburst. The glimpse may come in the depth of meditation where expectancy places it. However, it may also come at unexpected moments. Either gently and slowly the ego is taken over or violently and quickly the “I” is seized. This may happen during meditation or at any time when one is somewhat relaced, out of it. And then the long looked-for event will happen. A presence, nay a power, will suddenly make itself felt and control one out of oneself by an irresistible impetus moving like a tidal wave. It will come to one as quietly as the moon comes into the sky. The glimpses are not controllable. They come or go without consulting us. The glimpse may come only once or twice in a lifetime to one quester yet repeat itself twentyfold to another person. There are scattered moments of inner rapture underived from Earthly things, although they may be started off by Earthly things. The beauty of these glimpses is heightened by the delight of their unexpectedness. The coming of a glimpse is not predictable, although it may be encouraged by contact with Nature, appreciation of art, or practice of meditation. #RandolphHarris 8 of 16

It is less predictable than the clearing of haze which so often hovers over the nearby Swiss lake. “The wind bloweth where it listeth,” said Jesus in this connection. There are moments when all one’s acutest thought-movement is stilled and one finds oneself bereft of power, forced into utter submission to the divine Overself. If it starts with a faint awareness of being caught in a still moment, it ends in a full experience. The glimpse shows up something of one’s higher identity. What is interesting also is that its advent is unpredictable, its form changeable: but it is always fascinating. I do not know the name of the ancient Chinese poet who write these lines but they refer to the glimpse: “For about thirty years I wandered, searching for the real Tao everywhere…but at this moment, seeing the peach blossoms, I am suddenly enlightened, and have no more doubts.” They come in their own mysterious seasons, stay with us in all their brief beauty, and depart as mysteriously and as elusively as they came. A man hears himself pronounced dead by his doctor. He begins to hear an uncomfortable noise, a loud ringing or buzzing, and at the same time feels oneself moving very rapidly through a long dark tunnel. After this, he suddenly finds himself outside of his own physical body…and sees his own body from a distance, as though he is a spectator. Soon other things begin to happen. Others come to meet and to help him. He glimpses the spirits of relatives and friends who have already died, and a loving, warm spirit of a kind he has never encountered before—a being of light—appears before him…He is overwhelmed by intense feelings of joy, love, and peace. Despite his attitude, though, he somehow reunited with his physical body and lives. This passage from Raymond Moody’s best-selling book Life After Life is a composite near-death experience. Near-death experiences are more common than you might suspect. Several investigators each interviewed a hundred or more people who had come close to death through physical traumas such as cardiac arrest. In each study, 30 to 40 percent of such patients recalled a near-death experience. When George Gallup Jr. interviewed a national sample of Americans, 15 percent reported having experiences a close brush with death. #RandolphHarris 9 of 16

One-third of these people (representing some 8 million people by Gallup’s estimate) reported an accompanying mystical experience. Some claimed to recall things said while they lay unconscious and near death. (However, then, anesthetized surgical patients in a “controlled coma” are sometimes not as out for the count as surgical teams might suppose. Occasionally, they can later recall operating-room conversation or obscure facts or words presented over headphones.) Mr. Moody’s description of the “complete” near-death experience sounds peculiarly like the psychiatric researcher Ronald Siegel’s description of the typical hallucinogenic experience. Both offer a replay of old memories, out-of-body sensations, and visions of tunnels or funnels and bright lights or beings of light. Patients who have experienced temporal-lobe seizures have also reported profound mystical experiences, as have solitary sailors and polar explorers while enduring monotony, isolation, and cold. Oxygen deprivation can produce such hallucinations. As oxygen deprivation turns off the brain’s inhibitory cells, neural activity increases in the visual cortex, notes Susan Blackmore. The result is a growing patch of light, which looks so much like what you would see while moving through a tunnel. Perhaps, then, the bored or stressed brain manufactures the near-death experience. The near-death experience, argued Siegel, is best understood as “hallucinatory activity of the brain.” It is like gazing out a window at dusk: we begin to see the reflected interior of the room as if it were outside, either because the light from outside is dimming (as in the near-death experience) or because the inside light is being amplified (as with barbiturates). #RandolphHarris 10 of 16

Some near-death investigators object. They say that those who have experienced both hallucinations and near-death phenomenon typically deny their similarity. Moreover, a near-death experience may change people in way that a drug trip does not. Those who have been “embraced by the light” may become kinder, more spiritual, more believing in life after death. And even if the near-death experience is hallucinatory, might it not also be genuinely mystical, an authentic and rare opportunity for spiritual insight? Skeptics reply that these effects stem from the death-related context of the experience. When near death, people Worldwide sometimes report intuitions of another World, though their content varies with the culture. Under stress, the brain draws on what it knows. Prayer cannot guarantee against a return of any troubles which it succeeds in eliminating when their cause still remains uneliminated. Although prayer will unquestionably contribute to purification of feelings and liberation from passions, it is not usually enough by itself to give more than temporary success; moreover it is beset with psychic dangers. Not all persons can undergo it safely. Yet it is worth consideration. As the purificatory regime begins to show its effect, there will be clearly visible or strongly pronounced evidence of the stirring up discharges of unpleasant impurities from the body through skin, bowels, urine, and mouth. Prayer throughout its course and an unfired regime only in its early stages, eliminates so much waste toxins that it may be like taking a diuretic. The cleansing effects of prayer follow only after the disturbing effects. For when the waste matter and excess mucous is stirred up (so that they can be carried away and thrown away), there results unpleasant physical symptoms and unhappy mental ones. However, all this vanishes within two or three days in the case of long fasts, or certainly as soon as eating is resumed in the case of short ones. The purifying process of an unfired prayer works in the same way as that of medication sometimes. It does not make a single effort with a single result but rather a series of efforts with a series of results. Hence the distressing elimination symptoms are periodic and recurring, being successive and deepening stages of cleansing. #RandolphHarris 11 of 16

The inner urge in its favour is needed to sanction prayer; the instructive incentive must be felt before embarking on it. Otherwise, it will merely be forced concentration. Everyone, except the persons whose physical constitution unfits them for it, should mark their entry upon the path of purification starting with a short prayer. If one has never prayed before, it may be modified prayer during which one abstains from all negative information, comments, and words but takes well comedies, uplifting music, pleasant environments, or a safe vacation Two to four days is sufficiently log for this purpose. Otherwise the best time to pray is at the opening of the seasons of spring and summer. Spring marks the beginning of the ancient new year, he real new year, around March 21. The more an aspirant purifies oneself by using this simple method of physical praying, the more will one be able to obtain a corresponding mental purification. After the first year or two, one will find it possible to go on to a fuller mode of praying, during which nothing be praise of the Lord and optimistic thoughts should be communicated. Oliver Cowdery preached the firs sermon delivered by an elder of the new church on Sunday, April 11, 1830. Large numbers of people came to hear him and several were baptized that day. Joseph then went to Colesville, New York, held meetings here, and others were baptized. Some who believed wanted to come to church without being baptized, saying other minsters had already baptized them. A revelation was given on this subject in which the Lord said: This is a new and everlasting covenant; even that which was from the beginning. Wherefore, although a human should be baptized an hundred times, it availeth one nothing; for you can not enter in at the strait gate by the Law of Moses, neither by your dead works. #RandolphHarris 12 of 16

For it is because of your dead works, have caused this last covenant, and this church to be built up uno me; even as in days of old. Wherefore, enter ye in at the gate, as I have commanded. Oliver Cowdery, Hyrum and Samuel Smith, Joseph Knight, and Joseph Smith, Sr., were instructed as to their duties in the church and were warned to be faithful in their work in a revelation given through Joseph Smith, Jr., in April. Two gems of wisdom were included in this revelation. The Lord said: Beware of pride, lest thou shouldst enter into temptation. You must take up your cross, in which you must pray vocally before the World, as well as in secret, and in your family, and among your friends, and in all places. In June Joseph received a revelation from God about things which had happened many hundreds of years before when Moses lived on the Earth. God told Joseph many things that happened to Moses, records of which had been lost or left out of the Bible when it was compiled. These helped Joseph understand more about the World and God’s purposes. The first conference of the church was held in June, 1830. The meeting was opened with prayer and singing, and the members partook of the sacrament of the Lord’s Supper. Those who had been baptized recently were confirmed, and other were ordained to the priesthood. God’s Spirit was with these people in mighty power. Many saw wonderful visions and knew what God wanted them to do to help in the work. They were happy to know God needed them as he had the disciples who lived in Jesus’ day. The Lord blessed His people. Many of the sick were healed, and other miracles were performed. While they enjoyed these wonderful blessings, the new church began to have its troubles. Many people in the World did not believe the wonderful story told by Joseph and his friends. They did not believe the Lord would speak to people in that day or that Angels visited the Earth. #RandolphHarris 13 of 16

The unbelievers hated the men who taught these things and gathered together in groups, or mobs, to express their feelings. They did everything they could think of to break up the meetings and keep God’s servants from preaching and baptizing. One Saturday the church people built a dam across a little stream of water in order that there might be water deep enough to baptize on the next day. The mob of unbelievers broke down the dam so there could be no baptism on Sunday. However, early Monday morning the men of the church rebuilt the dam and a number of the people were baptized before the mob realized what was happening. At a meeting that evening the new members were to be confirmed by the laying on of hands, but before the meeting began the mob had a constable arrest Joseph for preaching about the Book of Mormon. After talking with Joseph, the constable discovered that he was not the evil man the mob had said he was. The officer confided in Joseph that the mob planned to kill him, and suggested that Joseph go with him to escape trouble. When the mob saw that Joseph was escaping, they chased him and the constable. The horse was going as fast as it could when a wheel came off the wagon. Joseph was fearful lest the mob should catch up with them, but they hurriedly put the wheel back on the wagon and escaped. That night, while Joseph slept on a bed in the corner of the room where they found refuge, the constable slept on the floor with his feet against the door and a loaded gun at his side in order that one might protect his new friend. Joseph was brought into court the next day. Many false charges were made against him. His enemies brought people who swore that Joseph had done all sorts of evil things, but they were so hopelessly mixed up in their stories that the judge did not believe them. After several attempts to prove him guilty of something—just anything—he was released. #RandolphHarris 14 of 16

No sooner was he released than he was again arrested and taken to another country to appear before another court. Here he was badly mistreated. Men spat on him and abused him. They gave him nothing to eat except crusts of bread and water. Again he was brought before the court and his enemies tried to find some fault with him, but they could not. He was declared “not guilty” and set free. Joseph regrated that the people he so much wanted to help had mistreated him. He prayed for strength. As he prayed he knew that no matter what men did to him he would have to go on preaching the wonderful message of Jesus. The Lord comforted Joseph by a revelation given in July, 1830, saying: Thou hast been delivered from all thine enemies, and thou hast been delivered from the power of Satan, and from darkness! Thou shalt continue in calling upon God in my name, and writing the things which shall be given thee by the Comforter, and expounding all scripters unto the church, and it shall be given thee, in the very moment, what thou shalt speak and write. Be patient in afflictions, for thou shalt have many; but endure them, for lo, I am with you, even unto the end of thy days. Perhaps Joseph thought how the apostles of Jesus’ day were persecuted. Perhaps he remembered that some of the men who made it possible for everyone to have the Bible gave their lives for the cause. Other humans who have tried to help God in ways that were new and different in all periods of the World’s history have suffered at the hands of those who did not want to see changes made. Joseph knew he had been called to help Jesus Christ restore His church again to Earth. He knew that even though he was to suffer as had other men before him, he would continue to serve the Lord in whatever work he was instructed to do.  #RandolphHarris 15 of 16

Instructions were given Joseph in this same revelation. Jesus Christ, the Lord, continued, saying: Attend to thy calling and thou shalt have wherewith to magnify thine office, and to expound all Scriptures. Thou shalt take no purse, nor scrip, neither staves, neither two coats, for the church shall give unto thee in the very hour what thou needest for food, and for raiment, and for shoes, for money, and for scrip. Yea, and also, all those whom thou hast ordained. And they shall do even according to his pattern. Amen. You do not have to be good. You do not have to walk on your knees for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting. You only have to le the soft soul of your body love what it loves. Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mind. Meanwhile the World goes on. Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers. Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air, are heading home again. Whoever you are, no matter how lonely, the World offers itself to your imagination, calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting—over and over announcing your place in the family of things. May the words of my mouth and the mediation of my heart be acceptable unto Thee, O Lord, my Rock and my Redeemer. Thou who establishes peace in the Heaven, grant peace unto all America. Amen. May it be Thy will, O Lord our God and God of our fathers, to grant our portion in Thy Torah, and may the Temple be rebuilt in our day. There we will serve Thee with awe as in the days of old. As long as an enemy is judged solely by one’s appearance, one’s victory is assured. It the end, it may be our certainty that we are infallible, which may prove our downfall. #RandolphHarris 16 of 16

Love a very private primary suite and bath? This home is for you.

CRESLEIGH MEADOWS AT PLUMAS RANCH

Plumas Lake, CA |

Now Selling!

Cresleigh Meadows is now selling! Found just north of Feather River Boulevard, Cresleigh Meadows is home of the largest neighborhood in Plumas Ranch as well as the popular Bear River Park. With four floor plans available, ranging from approximately 2,000 – 3,500 square feet offering, three to five bedrooms, we are certain you will find the home that fits your needs and lifestyle.

Popular design elements include open floor plans, large kitchen islands, and flex spaces are staples in Cresleigh homes. Multi-generational living options also available in select homes.

Homeowners will love the convenient commuter access to nearly Sacramento and Yuba City.

Best of all, each Cresleigh home comes fully equipped with an All Ready connected home! This smart home package comes included with your home and features great tools including: video door bell and digital deadbolt for the front door, connect home hub so you can set scenes and routines to make life just a little easier. Two smart switches and USB outlets are also included, plus we’ll gift you a Google Home Hub and Go! https://cresleigh.com/cresleigh-meadows-at-plumas-ranch/