Transcription
"My Luminous Universe"
By Helen Keller
World famous deaf-blind author and humanitarian
(With the personal permission of Miss Helen Keller, and of Guideposts Associates Inc., we have received permission to reproduce her article entitled "My Luminous Universe." This article is copyright 1956 to "Guideposts," a magazine of faith and inspiration. A monthly magazine for all faiths published at Carmel, N.Y., U.S.A.)
It is difficult for me to answer when I am asked what are the main lessons life has taught me. Looking deeply into my inner self, I feel that ultimately I have not been influenced by any particular "lessons", but rather by forces working on my subconsciousness that have borne me on an unseen current.
The tendencies which my teacher divined and developed were the making of the ship that has carried me far out into the ocean of public life. Joy in adventure, travel and love of service to my fellow men were stronger than physical handicaps.
Instinctively I found my greatest satisfaction in working with men and women everywhere who ask not, "Shall I labour among Christians or Jews or Buddhists?" but say rather, "God, in Thy wisdom help me to decrease the sorrows of Thy children and increase their advantages and joys." Blindness and deafness were simply the banks that guided the course of my life-ship until the stream joined the sea.
But there is one lesson I have consciously learned-that, although in Ecclesiastes it is said "There is no new thing under the sun" (sic), yet history is full of new meanings in every age and nation, which continually blossom and bear fruit. To my surprise I discovered in my Greek sayings, "There is no force so mighty in the world as perseverance." It never occurred to the writer of that rich sentence in ancient times that it would sow new seeds of significance until a day would come when the blind, the deaf, and the crippled would rise up in the might of purpose, compel their obstacles aside, and press onward to creative accomplishment.
I have caught rays of light from different thinkers-Socrates, Plato, Baco, Kant, and Emanuel Swedenborg, the Swedish seer. With Socrates I believe in thinking out the meaning of words before committing them to speech. Plato's theory of the Absolute strengthens me because it gives truth to what I know is true, beauty to the beautiful, music to what I cannot hear, and light to what I cannot see. Swedenborg has shaken down the barriers of time and space in my life and supplied me with likenesses or correspondences between the world within and the world without, which give me courage and imagination beyond my three senses.
Thus I move from one philosophy to another, constructing out of a fragmentary outward environment a luminous, resonant universe.
These varied thoughts convince me that, blind or seeing, one is not happy unless one's heart is filled with the sun which never dissolves into gloom. God is that sun, and if one's faith in Him is only strong, He will somehow or other reveal one's powers and brighten the darkest days with His divine beams.
Since my 17th year I have tried to live according to the teachings of Emanuel Swedenborg. By "church" he did not mean an ecclesiastical organization, (sic) but a spiritual fellowship of thoughtful men and women who spend their lives for a service to mankind which outlasts them. He called it a civilisation (sic) that was to be born of a healthy, universal religion-good will, mutual understanding, service from all to each and each to all, regardless of dogma and ritual.
Swedenborg's religious works are in many long volumes, but their sum and substance are in three main ideas-God as Divine Love, God as Divine wisdom, and God as Power for use. These ideas come as waves from an ocean which floods every bay and harbour of life with new potency of will, of faith, of effort.
By love I do not mean a vague, aimless sentiment, but a desire for good united with wisdom and fulfilled in work and deed. Because God is infinite, He puts resources into each human being that outrun the possibilities of evil. He is always creating in us new forms of self-development and channels through which, even if unaware, we may quicken new impulses towards civilisation (sic), art, or humanitarianism.
My confidence in the final triumph of idealism over materialism does not spring from closing my mental eyes to the suffering of the evil-doing of men, but rather from a steadfast belief that good will climbs upward in human nature while the meanness and hatred drop into their native nothingness, and life goes on with unabated vigour to its new earth and heaven.
With me optimism changed from the hard bud of girlhood to a fuller knowledge of human affairs and the tragedies and horrors that often seem to pervert men from God's Plan of Good. But my faith in progress has not wavered.
In my travels round the world I have witnessed here and there wonderful awakenings to spiritual truth and a sense of responsibility for the welfare of the blind, the deaf, and other unfortunate human beings, which would be impossible if there were not a growing desire for the common good among mankind.
There are two ways to look at destiny, one from below and the other from above. In one view we are being pushed by irresistible forces, obsessed by the fear that war, ignorance, poverty, and barbarism will never be abolished. But looking up to the clock of Truth, I see that man has been civilised (sic) only a few minutes, and I rest in the assurance that out of the problems and tensions which disturb thinking minds and warm hearts there shall break the morning star of universal peace.
In this world full of perplexities, shuttling creeds and philosophies, I have struggled like everybody else to find myself and enter a field of usefulness. I believe that we begin heaven now and here if we do our work for others faithfully. There is no useful work that is not part of the welfare of mankind. Even the humblest occupation is "skilled labour" if it contains an effort above mere self-support to serve a spiritual or social need.
During many years of work for the handicapped, I have been braced by the happy consciousness that I can be "an architect of fate" and I never need to stop growing until the after-life.
I have never let myself be bothered by the idea of a supernatural heaven but I have a joyous sense of personal immortality. Life in the other world is just as real and full of change and wonder as on earth, but one is given eyes and ears to perceive far more clearly the varieties of good and constructive thought which the flesh conceals on earth.
In a sense souls transmigrate, not from place to place, but through endless phases of personality. Angels and demons are all from the human race, and each chooses his dwelling either in the light or in the shadows. All peoples and kindreds who believe in God, yes, even those who worship idols from a desire to do good, are taught new concepts of Him and how to live for the peace and happiness of those around them.
Love and brotherhood and harmonious thoughts send fragrance and music into the atmosphere as they are wrought into service. Life in heaven is free from the clogs of time and the burdens of weight.
I do not believe that anyone ever attains perfection because that attribute belongs to the Infinite alone. But the longing for perfection, which is one way of loving God, causes one to grow nobler and to taste innumerable delights through eternity.
As I look to the future, I fell (sic) the thrill of challenge to greater self- realisation (sic). I do not know what I shall do in the coming years, but I shall continue whatever services I can to the blind and others who are handicapped, and I intend to enlarge the studies which delighted me when I was young-philosophy and languages and the laws of the spirit.
I want to survey quietly the treasures of thought which I have gathered, but have not had leisure to explore. I do not know what they will lead me to, but I shall endeavor to gain fresh insights for my odyssey of work for the blind and the deaf. While I pursue my studies, I shall be sure that creative personalities will put a richer interpretation on my concepts of earth-life and fortify mankind for still higher areas of accomplishment.
Editor's Note-It will be of extreme interest to readers everywhere to note that this most gracious lady at 77 years of age, is still tirelessly serving the blind and blind-deaf, by travelling to all parts of the world, writing and lecturing. At an early age she learned typing; this article having been personally typed by her.
