THE PURPOSE OF LIFE To fulfil our duty in the divine scheme we must try to understand not only that scheme as a whole, but the special part that man is intended to play in it.

The divine outbreathing reached its deepest immersion in matter in the mineral kingdom, but it reaches its ultimate point of differentiation not at the lowest level of materiality, but at the entrance into the human kingdom on the upward arc of evolution.

We have thus to realize three stages in the course of this evolution.
(a) The downward arc in which the tendency is towards differentiation and also towards greater materiality.

In this stage spirit is involving itself in matter, in order that it may learn to receive impressions through it.
(b) The earlier part of the upward arc, in which the tendency is still towards greater differentiation, but at the same time towards spiritualization and escape from materiality.

In this stage the spirit is learning to dominate matter and to see it as an expression of itself.
(c) The later part of the upward arc, when differentiation has been finally accomplished, and the tendency is towards unity as well as towards greater spirituality.