There is a factor bearing upon the etheric body to which very little reference has ever been made, the reason being that it would have been utterly useless information. Let me embody it in a tabulated statement, beginning with a few points earlier imparted but which should here be repeated for clarity and placed in proper sequence:

1. The planetary Logos works through the medium of the three major centers:
   1. The Center where the will of God is known: Shamballa.
   2. The Center where the love of God is manifest: the Hierarchy.
   3. The Center where the intelligence of God is producing the evolutionary process: Humanity.
2. The three major centers, both planetary and human, exist in etheric substance and they may or may not produce physical correspondences. All the Masters, for instance, do not work through a physical vehicle. They nevertheless have an etheric body composed of the substance of the cosmic etheric levels - buddhic, atmic, monadic and logoic levels - and these levels are the four cosmic ethers, the higher correspondence of our etheric planes; these higher levels are the four levels of the cosmic physical plane. Until They choose, at the sixth Initiation of Decision, one of the seven Paths of Ultimate Destiny, the Masters function in Their cosmic etheric bodies.
   These three major energy centers are closely related to each other, and through his own individual major centers (the head, the heart and the throat) [160] the disciple is in relation with the three planetary centers. I would have you ponder on this statement for it has practical value.
3. The Monad, as you know, is to be found on the cosmic second etheric level, called the monadic plane. When the antahkarana has been built, then cosmic etheric substance can be slowly substituted for the ordinary and familiar etheric substance which "substands" the dense physical body of a man.
4. The ray upon which the Monad is to be found - one of the three major rays and, therefore, related to one of the three major centers - conditions:
   1. The disciple's absorption into one of the three departments of hierarchical work, i.e., a first ray soul will go normally into such an Ashram as that of the Master M. in the department of the Manu; a second ray disciple will pass into a second ray Ashram such as mine (D.K.) or that of the Master K.H. and therefore into the department of the Christ; a third ray soul will be absorbed into one of the Ashrams (and there are many) functioning under the Lord of Civilization, the Master R.
   2. All who come into incarnation upon one of the Rays of Attribute - the fourth, fifth, sixth and seventh rays - find their way finally on to one of the three major Rays of Aspect. The changes of shifts in ray focus are made when the etheric body has in it an adequate measure of the substance of the lowest of the cosmic ethers, the buddhic substance; this is basic for all, on all the rays, for at the end of the age, when cosmic etheric substance [161] composes the etheric vehicles of the initiate, the three rays become the two rays, and later another absorption takes place into the second Ray of Love-Wisdom which is the ray of our present solar system.

The first initiation is purely the concern of the man's own soul, and the moment that that initiation has been taken, a measure of buddhic energy can enter and the process of transference of the higher ethers and their substitution for the lower can go forward. This, as you may well imagine, produces conflict; the personality etheric body rejects the incoming higher ether, and thus crises are produced in the initiate's life. [162]