“Seth material” search engine (Jane Roberts)

This is in itself an expression of the dualism of which I have spoken. Evolution does not of course apply only to the human species, and as I have said consciousness on your plane exists in all things. When your friend asked his question he was, I believe, referring to the point at which self-consciousness entered into so-called inert form.

You know now that so-called inert form has consciousness. To some degree it even possesses self-consciousness, and so there is no point at which self-consciousness entered, so to speak, with the sound of trumpets. Consciousness, to a degree, was inherent in the first materialization physically upon your plane.

You are either conscious of self or you are not. On your plane self-consciousness exists as a rule. A tree is conscious of itself as a tree. It does not think of itself as a rock. A dog knows it is not a cat. What I am trying to point out to you here is this supreme egotistical presumption that self-consciousness must of necessity involve humanity per se. It does not.

So-called human consciousness did not suddenly appear. Our poor maligned friend, the ape, did not suddenly beat his hairy chest in exaltation and cry “I am a man.” There was no such point and this, if you will forgive my pun, is my point.

The beginnings of human consciousness, on the other hand, began as soon as multicellular groupings began to form in field patterns of a certain complexity. While there was no specific point of entry as far as human consciousness was concerned, there was a point before which human consciousness as such did not exist. Self-consciousness did exist. The consciousness of being human in your terms was fully developed in the caveman, but—and I cannot emphasize this enough—the human conception was alive in the fish.

Humanity’s so-called supreme blossom is the human ego, and this is at times a poisoning blossom indeed. As I have said before, there is nothing wrong with the ego. The point however remains that man became so fascinated with the conscious ego that he ignored the part of himself that made the ego possible, and ignored the part of himself that gives to the ego the very powers of which he is so consciously proud.

I wanted to make one point, but first, there is nothing like a witness to convince my darling nervous Ruburt that I am I, and not her, meaning Jane; like a good evidence of telepathy, as in John’s case this evening.

Now the point I wanted to make is that again as I have said, in the same manner that psychological experience is real and vivid and yet cannot be seen or touched or examined in your laboratories, so is inner data from the inner senses vivid, though it cannot be seen or touched.

(Walking into the living room before preparing for bed, I was surprised to find Jane standing silently at her desk. Staring at me, she then pointed to a pen and paper she had evidently placed there on the desk. As I sat down to write she began to dictate. Resume at 1:35 AM.)

(In this session Seth spoke of my past life and attributed my current patterns of life to the lessons learned by my previous existences. Of immediately provable fact is that during the session Jane [Ruburt] spoke with a deeper voice than usual, she had a definite Boston accent on certain words. Prior to the start of the session I had, in conversation, asked Robbie [Joseph] a question involving his point of continuous existence versus evolution. Seth answered my questions and while he was giving his general answer, other related questions would creep into my mind and these would immediately be answered by Seth. This happened so frequently that towards the end of the session, when I would think of a question I would have immediate confidence that it would be subsequently answered.