When we first begin to notice ourselves, we have the odd sensation that something is wrong, but we can’t see what it is. Because the present moment begins to whisper of our past (sin) and our future (death), our ego can become afraid to look honestly at what we are.

Before the Presence in the present moment, we look upon our form and feel an ancient shame and the curse of the ancient death penalty upon it. An egotist will be afraid to look back at the cause or forward to doom. Pride, to maintain itself, dares not look at error or at the consequence of error.

Pride—assuming the role of an infallible god—forbids itself to see its beginnings in error—or its end in death. We have grown up in the likeness of the fallen Adam, naked and ashamed. But in most of us there remains a carry-over of ambition for glory and power.

Before we can “get down” to the business of achieving, all conscious inhibition and guilt must first be removed so we can begin to enjoy the dubious advantages of vanity without guilt.

To our bitter regret, we escape the present moment by embracing temptation into the pleasures and glorification of the physical world.

Calling up the forgotten, selfish, childhood games, we renew them with great zest and build a “real” world from the memories of fantasy play—so that now the war games become real bombs and bullets that inflict the final judgment on others.

"Pride—assuming the role of an infallible god—forbids itself to see its beginnings in error—or its end in death"

From that very moment onward, whenever we draw on excitement to escape or to make an ego-dream come true, we find the dream begins to materialize—into a nightmare!

Adam was created; because of his failing we are procreated—and that is the essential difference between us and the Original Man. We came into being differently from him. Adam was never a child; his nature altered when he fell, from an immortal being to a mortal (sexual) being.

Because of his lust, “man born of woman” requires many ego body-building experiences to help him grow from infancy into Adam’s likeness—the sexual, food-eating animal that he fell to become when he experienced his first shame.

We must not continue to build our minds and bodies past this point, nor should we keep developing a lifestyle around emotional or sensual experiences, because after a certain age the memory-thrones we build for our egos to sit on become a terrible burden.

Thoughts and experiences soon begin to weigh heavily upon the conscience. We try to forget our overgrown self by using more excitement and ego-building stimulations that only add fat to the fire.

All the experiences through which we try to escape actually make us grow into self-conscious, smelly ugly, overgrown fools—and our prideful souls strain themselves to death trying to mask the odors of ugliness and decay beneath colorful clothes, ointments and scents—until death, at the last, gets its dignity in a brocaded coffin.