Presentation Learn to discern where our impulses come from. Evolution has placed human beings on the frontiers of the animal world and the higher world, considered divine. This situation is thus at the origin of the ambiguity of our nature, double, at the same time lower and higher. Complementary as spirit and matter are, these two natures should help us develop harmoniously: by learning to dominate the first and by working to awaken the second. 'The majority of human beings belong to the group without light. They talk about rediscovering Nature and obeying the natural laws, but which nature are they talking about? There are two natures in man, one lower, one higher. People think they are obeying Nature when in fact they are doing something exactly opposite to their higher Nature, whereas others concentrate on their divine Nature and do everything in their power to subjugate and restrict the impulses of their human nature. Confusion reigns in people’s minds and that is why it is so important to make them realize that a higher Nature exists in them, which expresses itself quite differently from the human nature they inherited from the animal kingdom.' Omraam Mikhaël Aïvanhov Table of contents 1 - Human Nature or Animal Nature? 2 - The Lower Self is a Reflection 3 - Man's True Identity 4 - Methods of Escape 5 - The Sun Symbolizes the Divine Nature 6 - Put the Personality to Work 7 - Perfection Comes with the Higher Self 8 - The Silent Voice of the Higher Self 9 - Only by Serving the Divine Nature 10 - Address the Higher Self in Others 11 - Man's Return to God, the Victory

This volume contains ten new essays focused on the exploration and articulation of a narrative that considers the notion of order within medieval and modern philosophy—its various kinds (natural, moral, divine, and human), the different ways in which each is conceived, and the diverse dependency relations that are thought to obtain among them. Descartes, with the help of others, brought about an important shift in what was understood by the order of nature by placing laws of nature at the foundation of his natural philosophy. Vigorous debate then ensued about the proper formulation of the laws of nature and the moral law, about whether such laws can be justified, and if so, how-through some aspect of the divine order or through human beings-and about what consequences these laws have for human beings and the moral and divine orders. That is, philosophers of the period were thinking through what the order of nature consists in and how to understand its relations to the divine, human, and moral orders. No two major philosophers in the modern period took exactly the same stance on these issues, but these issues are clearly central to their thought. The Divine Order, the Human Order, and the Order of Nature is devoted to investigating their positions from a vantage point that has the potential to combine metaphysical, epistemological, scientific, and moral considerations into a single narrative.