seconaphim

28:3.1The sec­o­raphic hosts are pro­duced by the seven Re­flec­tive Spir­its as­signed to the head­quar­ters of each super­uni­verse. There is a def­i­nite Par­a­dise-re­spon­sive tech­nique as­so­ci­ated with the cre­ation of these an­gels in groups of seven. In each seven there are al­ways one pri­mary, three sec­ondary, and three ter­tiary se­con­a­phim; they al­ways per­son­al­ize in this ex­act pro­por­tion. When seven such se­con­a­phim are cre­ated, one, the pri­mary, be­comes at­tached to the ser­vice of the An­cients of Days. The three sec­ondary an­gels are as­so­ci­ated with three groups of Par­a­dise-ori­gin ad­min­is­tra­tors in the super­gov­ern­ments: the Di­vine Coun­selors, the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom, and the Uni­ver­sal Cen­sors. The three ter­tiary an­gels are at­tached to the as­cen­dant trin­i­tized as­so­ciates of the super­uni­verse rulers: the Mighty Mes­sen­gers, Those High in Au­thor­ity, and Those with­out Name and Num­ber.

28:3.2These se­con­a­phim of the super­uni­verses are the off­spring of the Re­flec­tive Spir­its, and there­fore re­flec­tiv­ity is in­her­ent in their na­ture. They are re­flec­tively re­spon­sive to all of each phase of ev­ery crea­ture of ori­gin in the Third Source and Cen­ter and the Par­a­dise Cre­ator Sons, but they are not di­rectly re­flec­tive of the be­ings and en­ti­ties, per­sonal or oth­er­wise, of sole ori­gin in the First Source and Cen­ter. We pos­sess many ev­i­dences of the ac­tu­al­ity of the uni­ver­sal in­tel­li­gence cir­cuits of the In­fi­nite Spirit, but even if we had no other proof, the re­flec­tive per­for­mances of the se­con­a­phim would be quite suf­fi­cient to demon­strate the re­al­ity of the uni­ver­sal pres­ence of the in­fi­nite mind of the Con­joint Ac­tor.

28:4.1The pri­mary se­con­a­phim, of as­sign­ment to the An­cients of Days, are liv­ing mir­rors in the ser­vice of these tri­une rulers. Think what it means in the econ­omy of a super­uni­verse to be able to turn, as it were, to a liv­ing mir­ror and therein to see and there­with to hear the cer­tain re­sponses of an­other be­ing a thou­sand or a hun­dred thou­sand light-years dis­tant and to do all this in­stantly and unerringly. Rec­ords are es­sen­tial to the con­duct of the uni­verses, broad­casts are ser­vice­able, the work of the Soli­tary and other mes­sen­gers is very help­ful, but the An­cients of Days from their po­si­tion mid­way be­tween the in­hab­ited worlds and Par­a­dise—be­tween man and God—can in­stantly look both ways, hear both ways, and know both ways.

28:4.2This abil­ity—to hear and see, as it were, all things—can be per­fectly re­al­ized in the super­uni­verses only by the An­cients of Days and only on their re­spec­tive head­quar­ters worlds. Even there lim­its are en­coun­tered: From Uversa, such com­mu­ni­ca­tion is lim­ited to the worlds and uni­verses of Or­von­ton, and while in­op­er­a­tive be­tween the super­uni­verses, this same re­flec­tive tech­nique keeps each one of them in close touch with the cen­tral uni­verse and with Par­a­dise. The seven super­gov­ern­ments, though in­di­vid­u­ally seg­re­gated, are thus per­fectly re­flec­tive of the au­thor­ity above and are wholly sym­pa­thetic, as well as per­fectly con­ver­sant, with the needs be­low.

28:4.3The pri­mary se­con­a­phim are found to in­cline by in­her­ent na­ture to­wards seven types of ser­vice, and it is be­fit­ting that the first se­ri­als of this or­der should be so en­dowed as in­her­ently to in­ter­pret the mind of the Spirit to the An­cients of Days:

28:4.41. The Voice of the Con­joint Ac­tor. In each super­uni­verse the first pri­mary se­con­a­phim and ev­ery sev­enth one of that or­der sub­se­quently cre­ated ex­hibit a high or­der of adapt­abil­ity for un­der­stand­ing and in­ter­pret­ing the mind of the In­fi­nite Spirit to the An­cients of Days and their as­so­ciates in the super­gov­ern­ments. This is of great value on the head­quar­ters of the super­uni­verses, for, un­like the lo­cal cre­ations with their Di­vine Min­is­ters, the seat of a super­gov­ern­ment does not have a spe­cial­ized per­son­al­iza­tion of the In­fi­nite Spirit. Hence these sec­o­raphic voices come the near­est to be­ing the per­sonal rep­re­sen­ta­tives of the Third Source and Cen­ter on such a cap­i­tal sphere. True, the seven Re­flec­tive Spir­its are there, but these moth­ers of the sec­o­raphic hosts are less truly and au­to­mat­i­cally re­flec­tive of the Con­joint Ac­tor than of the Seven Mas­ter Spir­its.

28:4.52. The Voice of the Seven Mas­ter Spir­its. The sec­ond pri­mary se­con­a­phim and ev­ery sev­enth one there­after cre­ated in­cline to­wards por­tray­ing the col­lec­tive na­tures and re­ac­tions of the Seven Mas­ter Spir­its. Though each Mas­ter Spirit is al­ready rep­re­sented on a super­uni­verse cap­i­tal by some one of the seven Re­flec­tive Spir­its of as­sign­ment, such rep­re­sen­ta­tion is in­di­vid­ual, not col­lec­tive. Col­lec­tively, they are only re­flec­tively pres­ent; there­fore do the Mas­ter Spir­its wel­come the ser­vices of these highly per­sonal an­gels, the sec­ond se­ri­als of the pri­mary se­con­a­phim, who are so com­pe­tent to rep­re­sent them be­fore the An­cients of Days.

28:4.63. The Voice of the Cre­ator Sons. The In­fi­nite Spirit must have had some­thing to do with the cre­ation or train­ing of the Par­a­dise Sons of the or­der of Mi­chael, for the third pri­mary se­con­a­phim and ev­ery sev­enth se­rial there­after pos­sess the re­mark­able gift of be­ing re­flec­tive of the minds of these Cre­ator Sons. If the An­cients of Days would like to know—re­ally know—the at­ti­tude of Mi­chael of Neb­a­don re­gard­ing some mat­ter un­der con­sid­er­a­tion, they do not have to call him on the lines of space; they need only call for the Chief of Neb­a­don Voices, who, upon re­quest, will pre­sent the Mi­chael se­con­a­phim of rec­ord; and right then and there the An­cients of Days will per­ceive the voice of the Mas­ter Son of Neb­a­don.

28:4.7No other or­der of son­ship is thus “re­flectible,” and no other or­der of an­gel can thus func­tion. We do not fully un­der­stand just how this is ac­com­plished, and I doubt very much that the Cre­ator Sons them­selves fully un­der­stand it. But of a cer­tainty we know it works, and that it un­fail­ingly works ac­cept­ably we also know, for in all the his­tory of Uversa the sec­o­raphic voices have never erred in their pre­sen­ta­tions.

28:4.8You are here be­gin­ning to see some­thing of the man­ner in which di­vin­ity en­com­passes the space of time and mas­ters the time of space. You are here ob­tain­ing one of your first fleet­ing glimpses of the tech­nique of the eter­nity cy­cle, di­ver­gent for the mo­ment to as­sist the chil­dren of time in their tasks of mas­ter­ing the dif­fi­cult hand­i­caps of space. And these phe­nom­ena are ad­di­tional to the es­tab­lished uni­verse tech­nique of the Re­flec­tive Spir­its.

28:4.9Though ap­par­ently de­prived of the per­sonal pres­ence of the Mas­ter Spir­its above and of the Cre­ator Sons be­low, the An­cients of Days have at their com­mand liv­ing be­ings at­tuned to cos­mic mech­a­nisms of re­flec­tive per­fec­tion and ul­ti­mate pre­ci­sion whereby they may en­joy the re­flec­tive pres­ence of all those ex­alted be­ings whose per­sonal pres­ence is de­nied them. By and through these means, and oth­ers un­known to you, God is po­ten­tially pres­ent on the head­quar­ters of the super­uni­verses.

28:4.10The An­cients of Days per­fectly de­duce the Fa­ther’s will by equat­ing the Spirit voice-flash from above and the Mi­chael voice-flashes from be­low. Thus may they be unerringly cer­tain in cal­cu­lat­ing the Fa­ther’s will con­cern­ing the ad­min­is­tra­tive af­fairs of the lo­cal uni­verses. But to de­duce the will of one of the Gods from a knowl­edge of the other two, the three An­cients of Days must act to­gether; two would not be able to achieve the an­swer. And for this rea­son, even were there no oth­ers, the super­uni­verses are al­ways pre­sided over by three An­cients of Days, and not by one or even two.

28:4.114. The Voice of the An­gelic Hosts. The fourth pri­mary se­con­a­phim and ev­ery sev­enth se­rial prove to be an­gels pe­cu­liarly re­spon­sive to the sen­ti­ments of all or­ders of an­gels, in­clud­ing the super­na­phim above and the ser­a­phim be­low. Thus the at­ti­tude of any com­mand­ing or super­vis­ing an­gel is im­me­di­ately avail­able for con­sid­er­a­tion at any coun­cil of the An­cients of Days. Never a day passes on your world that the chief of ser­a­phim on Uran­tia is not made con­scious of the phe­nom­e­non of re­flec­tive trans­fer­ence, of be­ing drawn upon from Uversa for some pur­pose; but un­less fore­warned by a Soli­tary Mes­sen­ger, she re­mains wholly ig­no­rant of what is sought and of how it is se­cured. These min­is­ter­ing spir­its of time are con­stantly fur­nish­ing this sort of un­con­scious and cer­tainly, there­fore, un­prej­u­diced tes­ti­mony con­cern­ing the end­less ar­ray of mat­ters en­gag­ing the at­ten­tion and coun­sel of the An­cients of Days and their as­so­ciates.

28:4.125. Broad­cast Re­ceivers. There is a spe­cial class of broad­cast mes­sages which are re­ceived only by these pri­mary se­con­a­phim. While they are not the reg­u­lar broad­cast­ers of Uversa, they work in li­ai­son with the an­gels of the re­flec­tive voices for the pur­pose of syn­chro­niz­ing the re­flec­tive vi­sion of the An­cients of Days with cer­tain ac­tual mes­sages com­ing in over the es­tab­lished cir­cuits of uni­verse com­mu­ni­ca­tion. Broad­cast re­ceivers are the fifth se­ri­als, the fifth pri­mary se­con­a­phim to be cre­ated and ev­ery sev­enth one there­after.

28:4.136. Trans­port Per­son­al­i­ties. These are the se­con­a­phim who carry the pil­grims of time from the head­quar­ters worlds of the super­uni­verses to the outer cir­cle of Ha­vona. They are the trans­port corps of the super­uni­verses, op­er­at­ing in­ward to Par­a­dise and out­ward to the worlds of their re­spec­tive sec­tors. This corps is com­posed of the sixth pri­mary se­con­a­phim and ev­ery sev­enth one sub­se­quently cre­ated.

28:4.147. The Re­serve Corps. A very large group of se­con­a­phim, the sev­enth pri­mary se­ri­als, are held in re­serve for the un­clas­si­fied du­ties and the emer­gency as­sign­ments of the realms. Not be­ing highly spe­cial­ized, they can func­tion fairly well in any of the ca­pac­i­ties of their di­verse as­so­ciates, but such spe­cial­ized work is un­der­taken only in emer­gen­cies. Their usual tasks are the per­for­mance of those gen­er­al­ized du­ties of a super­uni­verse which do not fall within the scope of the an­gels of spe­cific as­sign­ment.

28:5.1Se­con­a­phim of the sec­ondary or­der are no less re­flec­tive than their pri­mary fel­lows. Be­ing classed as pri­mary, sec­ondary, and ter­tiary does not in­di­cate a dif­fer­en­tial of sta­tus or func­tion in the case of se­con­a­phim; it merely de­notes or­ders of pro­ce­dure. Iden­ti­cal qual­i­ties are ex­hib­ited by all three groups in their ac­tiv­i­ties.

28:5.2The seven re­flec­tive types of sec­ondary se­con­a­phim are as­signed to the ser­vices of the co-or­di­nate Trin­ity-ori­gin as­so­ciates of the An­cients of Days as fol­lows:

28:5.3To the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom—the Voices of Wis­dom, the Souls of Phi­los­o­phy, and the Unions of Souls.

28:5.4To the Di­vine Coun­selors—the Hearts of Coun­sel, the Joys of Ex­is­tence, and the Sat­is­fac­tions of Ser­vice.

28:5.5To the Uni­ver­sal Cen­sors—the Dis­cern­ers of Spir­its.

28:5.6Like the pri­mary or­der, this group is cre­ated se­ri­ally; that is, the first-born was a Voice of Wis­dom, and the sev­enth there­after was sim­i­lar, and so with the six other types of these re­flec­tive an­gels.

28:5.71. The Voice of Wis­dom. Cer­tain of these se­con­a­phim are in per­pet­ual li­ai­son with the liv­ing li­braries of Par­a­dise, the cus­to­di­ans of knowl­edge be­long­ing to the pri­mary super­na­phim. In spe­cial­ized re­flec­tive ser­vice the Voices of Wis­dom are liv­ing, cur­rent, re­plete, and thor­oughly re­li­able con­cen­tra­tions and fo­cal­iza­tions of the co-or­di­nated wis­dom of the uni­verse of uni­verses. To the well-nigh in­fi­nite vol­ume of in­for­ma­tion cir­cu­lat­ing on the mas­ter cir­cuits of the super­uni­verses, these su­perb be­ings are so re­flec­tive and se­lec­tive, so sen­si­tive, as to be able to seg­re­gate and re­ceive the essence of wis­dom and unerringly to trans­mit these jew­els of men­ta­tion to their su­pe­ri­ors, the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom. And they so func­tion that the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom not only hear the ac­tual and orig­i­nal ex­pres­sions of this wis­dom but also re­flec­tively see the very be­ings, of high or lowly ori­gin, who gave voice to it.

28:5.8It is writ­ten, “If any man lack wis­dom, let him ask.” On Uversa, when it be­comes nec­es­sary to ar­rive at the de­ci­sions of wis­dom in the per­plex­ing sit­u­a­tions of the com­plex af­fairs of the super­uni­verse gov­ern­ment, when both the wis­dom of per­fec­tion and of prac­ti­ca­bil­ity must be forth­com­ing, then do the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom sum­mon a bat­tery of the Voices of Wis­dom and, by the con­sum­mate skill of their or­der, so at­tune and di­rec­tion­ize these liv­ing re­ceivers of the en­minded and cir­cu­lat­ing wis­dom of the uni­verse of uni­verses that pres­ently, from these sec­o­raphic voices, there en­sues a stream of the wis­dom of di­vin­ity from the uni­verse above and a flood of the wis­dom of prac­ti­cal­ity from the higher minds of the uni­verses be­low.

28:5.9If con­fu­sion arises re­gard­ing the har­mo­niza­tion of these two ver­sions of wis­dom, im­me­di­ate ap­peal is made to the Di­vine Coun­selors, who forth­with rule as to the proper com­bi­na­tion of pro­ce­dures. If there is any doubt as to the au­then­tic­ity of some­thing com­ing in from realms where re­bel­lion has been rife, ap­peal is made to the Cen­sors, who, with their Dis­cern­ers of Spir­its, are able to rule im­me­di­ately as to “what man­ner of spirit” ac­tu­ated the ad­viser. So are the wis­dom of the ages and the in­tel­lect of the mo­ment ever pres­ent with the An­cients of Days, like an open book be­fore their benef­i­cent gaze.

28:5.10You can just faintly com­pre­hend what all this means to those who are re­spon­si­ble for the con­duct of the super­uni­verse gov­ern­ments. The im­men­sity and the com­pre­hen­sive­ness of these trans­ac­tions are quite be­yond fi­nite con­cep­tion. When you stand, as I re­peat­edly have, in the spe­cial re­ceiv­ing cham­bers of the tem­ple of wis­dom on Uversa and see all this in ac­tual op­er­a­tion, you will be moved to ado­ra­tion by the per­fec­tion of the com­plex­ity, and by the surety of the work­ing, of the in­ter­plan­e­tary com­mu­ni­ca­tions of the uni­verses. You will pay homage to the di­vine wis­dom and good­ness of the Gods, who plan and ex­e­cute with such su­perb tech­nique. And these things ac­tu­ally hap­pen just as I have por­trayed them.

28:5.112. The Soul of Phi­los­o­phy. These won­der­ful teach­ers are also at­tached to the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom and, when not oth­er­wise di­rec­tion­ized, re­main in fo­cal syn­chrony with the mas­ters of phi­los­o­phy on Par­a­dise. Think of step­ping up to a huge liv­ing mir­ror, as it were, but in­stead of be­hold­ing the like­ness of your fi­nite and ma­te­rial self, of per­ceiv­ing a re­flec­tion of the wis­dom of di­vin­ity and the phi­los­o­phy of Par­a­dise. And if it be­comes de­sir­able to “in­car­nate” this phi­los­o­phy of per­fec­tion, so to di­lute it as to make it prac­ti­cal of ap­pli­ca­tion to, and as­sim­i­la­tion by, the lowly peo­ples of the lower worlds, these liv­ing mir­rors have only to turn their faces down­ward to re­flect the stan­dards and needs of an­other world or uni­verse.

28:5.12By these very tech­niques do the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom adapt de­ci­sions and rec­om­men­da­tions to the real needs and ac­tual sta­tus of the peo­ples and worlds un­der con­sid­er­a­tion, and al­ways do they act in con­cert with the Di­vine Coun­selors and the Uni­ver­sal Cen­sors. But the sub­lime re­plete­ness of these trans­ac­tions is be­yond even my abil­ity to com­pre­hend.

28:5.133. The Union of Souls. Com­plet­ing the tri­une staff of at­tach­ment to the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom, are these re­flec­tors of the ide­als and sta­tus of eth­i­cal re­la­tion­ships. Of all the prob­lems in the uni­verse re­quir­ing an ex­er­cise of the con­sum­mate wis­dom of ex­pe­ri­ence and adapt­abil­ity, none are more im­por­tant than those aris­ing out of the re­la­tion­ships and as­so­ci­a­tions of in­tel­li­gent be­ings. Whether in hu­man as­so­ci­a­tions of com­merce and trade, friend­ship and mar­riage, or in the li­aisons of the an­gelic hosts, there con­tinue to arise petty fric­tions, mi­nor mis­un­der­stand­ings too triv­ial even to en­gage the at­ten­tion of con­cil­ia­tors but suf­fi­ciently ir­ri­tat­ing and dis­turb­ing to mar the smooth work­ing of the uni­verse if they were al­lowed to mul­ti­ply and con­tinue. There­fore do the Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom make avail­able the wise ex­pe­ri­ence of their or­der as the “oil of rec­on­cil­i­a­tion” for an en­tire super­uni­verse. In all this work these wise men of the super­uni­verses are ably sec­onded by their re­flec­tive as­so­ciates, the Unions of Souls, who make avail­able cur­rent in­for­ma­tion re­gard­ing the sta­tus of the uni­verse and con­cur­rently por­tray the Par­a­dise ideal of the best ad­just­ment of these per­plex­ing prob­lems. When not specif­i­cally di­rec­tion­ized else­where, these se­con­a­phim re­main in re­flec­tive li­ai­son with the in­ter­preters of ethics on Par­a­dise.

28:5.14These are the an­gels who fos­ter and pro­mote the team­work of all Or­von­ton. One of the most im­por­tant lessons to be learned dur­ing your mor­tal ca­reer is team­work. The spheres of per­fec­tion are manned by those who have mas­tered this art of work­ing with other be­ings. Few are the du­ties in the uni­verse for the lone ser­vant. The higher you as­cend, the more lonely you be­come when tem­porar­ily with­out the as­so­ci­a­tion of your fel­lows.

28:5.154. The Heart of Coun­sel. This is the first group of these re­flec­tive ge­niuses to be placed un­der the super­vi­sion of the Di­vine Coun­selors. Se­con­a­phim of this type are in pos­ses­sion of the facts of space, be­ing se­lec­tive for such data in the cir­cuits of time. Es­pe­cially are they re­flec­tive of the super­aphic in­tel­li­gence co-or­di­na­tors, but they are also se­lec­tively re­flec­tive of the coun­sel of all be­ings, whether of high or low es­tate. When­ever the Di­vine Coun­selors are called upon for im­por­tant ad­vice or de­ci­sions, they im­me­di­ately req­ui­si­tion an en­sem­ble of the Hearts of Coun­sel, and pres­ently there is handed down a rul­ing which ac­tu­ally in­cor­po­rates the co-or­di­nated wis­dom and ad­vice of the most com­pe­tent minds of the en­tire super­uni­verse, all of which has been cen­sored and re­vised in the light of the coun­sel of the high minds of Ha­vona and even of Par­a­dise.

28:5.165. The Joy of Ex­is­tence. By na­ture these be­ings are re­flec­tively at­tuned to the super­aphic har­mony super­vi­sors above and to cer­tain of the ser­a­phim be­low, but it is dif­fi­cult to ex­plain just what the mem­bers of this in­ter­est­ing group re­ally do. Their prin­ci­pal ac­tiv­i­ties are di­rected to­ward pro­mot­ing re­ac­tions of joy among the var­i­ous or­ders of the an­gelic hosts and the lower will crea­tures. The Di­vine Coun­selors, to whom they are at­tached, sel­dom use them for spe­cific joy find­ing. In a more gen­eral man­ner and in col­lab­o­ra­tion with the re­ver­sion di­rec­tors, they func­tion as joy clear­ing­houses, seek­ing to up­step the plea­sure re­ac­tions of the realms while try­ing to im­prove the hu­mor taste, to de­velop a super­hu­mor among mor­tals and an­gels. They en­deavor to demon­strate that there is in­her­ent joy in free­will ex­is­tence, in­de­pen­dent of all ex­tra­ne­ous in­flu­ences; and they are right, al­though they meet with great dif­fi­culty in in­cul­cat­ing this truth in the minds of prim­i­tive men. The higher spirit per­son­al­i­ties and the an­gels are more quickly re­spon­sive to these ed­u­ca­tional ef­forts.

28:5.176. The Sat­is­fac­tion of Ser­vice. These an­gels are highly re­flec­tive of the at­ti­tude of the di­rec­tors of con­duct on Par­a­dise, and func­tion­ing much as do the Joys of Ex­is­tence, they strive to en­hance the value of ser­vice and to aug­ment the sat­is­fac­tions to be de­rived there­from. They have done much to il­lu­mi­nate the de­ferred re­wards in­her­ent in un­selfish ser­vice, ser­vice for the ex­ten­sion of the king­dom of truth.

28:5.18The Di­vine Coun­selors, to whom this or­der is at­tached, uti­lize them to re­flect from one world to an­other the ben­e­fits to be de­rived from spir­i­tual ser­vice. And by us­ing the per­for­mances of the best to in­spire and en­cour­age the mediocre, these se­con­a­phim con­tribute im­mensely to the qual­ity of de­voted ser­vice in the super­uni­verses. Ef­fec­tive use is made of the fra­ter­nal com­pet­i­tive spirit by cir­cu­lat­ing to any one world in­for­ma­tion about what the oth­ers, par­tic­u­larly the best, are do­ing. A re­fresh­ing and whole­some ri­valry is pro­moted even among the se­raphic hosts.

28:5.197. The Dis­cerner of Spir­its. A spe­cial li­ai­son ex­ists be­tween the coun­selors and ad­vis­ers of the sec­ond Ha­vona cir­cle and these re­flec­tive an­gels. They are the only se­con­a­phim at­tached to the Uni­ver­sal Cen­sors but are prob­a­bly the most uniquely spe­cial­ized of all their fel­lows. Re­gard­less of the source or chan­nel of in­for­ma­tion, no mat­ter how mea­ger the ev­i­dence at hand, when it is sub­jected to their re­flec­tive scrutiny, these dis­cern­ers will forth­with in­form us as to the true mo­tive, the ac­tual pur­pose, and the real na­ture of its ori­gin. I mar­vel at the su­perb func­tion­ing of these an­gels, who so unerringly re­flect the ac­tual moral and spir­i­tual char­ac­ter of any in­di­vid­ual con­cerned in a fo­cal ex­po­sure.

28:5.20The Dis­cern­ers of Spir­its carry on these in­tri­cate ser­vices by virtue of in­her­ent “spir­i­tual in­sight,” if I may use such words in an en­deavor to con­vey to the hu­man mind the thought that these re­flec­tive an­gels thus func­tion in­tu­itively, in­her­ently, and unerringly. When the Uni­ver­sal Cen­sors be­hold these pre­sen­ta­tions, they are face to face with the naked soul of the re­flected in­di­vid­ual; and this very cer­tainty and per­fec­tion of por­trai­ture in part ex­plains why the Cen­sors can al­ways func­tion so justly as righ­teous judges. The dis­cern­ers al­ways ac­com­pany the Cen­sors on any mis­sion away from Uversa, and they are just as ef­fec­tive out in the uni­verses as at their Uversa head­quar­ters.

28:5.21I as­sure you that all these trans­ac­tions of the spirit world are real, that they take place in ac­cor­dance with es­tab­lished us­ages and in har­mony with the im­mutable laws of the uni­ver­sal do­mains. The be­ings of ev­ery newly cre­ated or­der, im­me­di­ately upon re­ceiv­ing the breath of life, are in­stantly re­flected on high; a liv­ing por­trayal of the crea­ture na­ture and po­ten­tial is flashed to the super­uni­verse head­quar­ters. Thus, by means of the dis­cern­ers, are the Cen­sors made fully cog­nizant of ex­actly “what man­ner of spirit” has been born on the worlds of space.

28:5.22So it is with mor­tal man: The Mother Spirit of Sal­ving­ton knows you fully, for the Holy Spirit on your world “searches all things,” and what­so­ever the di­vine Spirit knows of you is im­me­di­ately avail­able when­ever the sec­o­raphic dis­cern­ers re­flect with the Spirit con­cern­ing the Spirit’s knowl­edge of you. It should, how­ever, be men­tioned that the knowl­edge and plans of the Fa­ther frag­ments are not re­flectible. The dis­cern­ers can and do re­flect the pres­ence of the Ad­justers (and the Cen­sors pro­nounce them di­vine), but they can­not de­ci­pher the con­tent of the mind­ed­ness of the Mys­tery Mon­i­tors.

28:6.1In the same man­ner as their fel­lows, these an­gels are cre­ated se­ri­ally and in seven re­flec­tive types, but these types are not as­signed in­di­vid­u­ally to the sep­a­rate ser­vices of the super­uni­verse ad­min­is­tra­tors. All ter­tiary se­con­a­phim are col­lec­tively as­signed to the Trin­i­tized Sons of At­tain­ment, and these as­cen­dant sons use them in­ter­change­ably; that is, the Mighty Mes­sen­gers can and do uti­lize any of the ter­tiary types, and so do their co-or­di­nates, Those High in Au­thor­ity and Those with­out Name and Num­ber. These seven types of ter­tiary se­con­a­phim are:

28:6.21. The Sig­nif­i­cance of Ori­gins. The as­cen­dant Trin­i­tized Sons of a super­uni­verse gov­ern­ment are charged with the re­spon­si­bil­ity of deal­ing with all is­sues grow­ing out of the ori­gin of any in­di­vid­ual, race, or world; and the sig­nif­i­cance of ori­gin is the paramount ques­tion in all our plans for the cos­mic ad­vance­ment of the liv­ing crea­tures of the realm. All re­la­tion­ships and the ap­pli­ca­tion of ethics grow out of the fun­da­men­tal facts of ori­gin. Ori­gin is the ba­sis of the re­la­tional re­ac­tion of the Gods. Al­ways does the Con­joint Ac­tor “take note of the man, in what man­ner he was born.”

28:6.3With the higher de­scen­dant be­ings, ori­gin is sim­ply a fact to be as­cer­tained; but with the as­cend­ing be­ings, in­clud­ing the lower or­ders of an­gels, the na­ture and cir­cum­stances of ori­gin are not al­ways so clear, though of equally vi­tal im­por­tance at al­most ev­ery turn of uni­verse af­fairs—hence the value of hav­ing at our dis­posal a se­ries of re­flec­tive se­con­a­phim who can in­stantly por­tray any­thing re­quired re­spect­ing the gen­e­sis of any be­ing in ei­ther the cen­tral uni­verse or through­out the en­tire realm of a super­uni­verse.

28:6.4The Sig­nif­i­cances of Ori­gins are the liv­ing ready-ref­er­ence ge­nealo­gies of the vast hosts of be­ings—men, an­gels, and oth­ers—who in­habit the seven super­uni­verses. They are al­ways ready to sup­ply their su­pe­ri­ors with an up-to-date, re­plete, and trust­wor­thy es­ti­mate of the an­ces­tral fac­tors and the cur­rent ac­tual sta­tus of any in­di­vid­ual on any world of their re­spec­tive super­uni­verses; and their com­pu­ta­tion of pos­sessed facts is al­ways up to the minute.

28:6.52. The Mem­ory of Mercy. These are the ac­tual, full and re­plete, liv­ing rec­ords of the mercy which has been ex­tended to in­di­vid­u­als and races by the ten­der min­is­tra­tions of the in­stru­men­tal­i­ties of the In­fi­nite Spirit in the mis­sion of adapt­ing the jus­tice of righ­teous­ness to the sta­tus of the realms, as dis­closed by the por­tray­als of the Sig­nif­i­cance of Ori­gins. The Mem­ory of Mercy dis­closes the moral debt of the chil­dren of mercy—their spir­i­tual li­a­bil­i­ties—to be set down against their as­sets of the sav­ing pro­vi­sion es­tab­lished by the Sons of God. In re­veal­ing the Fa­ther’s pre-ex­is­tent mercy, the Sons of God es­tab­lish the nec­es­sary credit to in­sure the sur­vival of all. And then, in ac­cor­dance with the find­ings of the Sig­nif­i­cance of Ori­gins, a mercy credit is es­tab­lished for the sur­vival of each ra­tio­nal crea­ture, a credit of lav­ish pro­por­tions and one of suf­fi­cient grace to in­sure the sur­vival of ev­ery soul who re­ally de­sires di­vine cit­i­zen­ship.

28:6.6The Mem­ory of Mercy is a liv­ing trial bal­ance, a cur­rent state­ment of your ac­count with the super­nat­u­ral forces of the realms. These are the liv­ing rec­ords of mercy min­is­tra­tion which are read into the tes­ti­mony of the courts of Uversa when each in­di­vid­ual’s right to un­end­ing life comes up for ad­ju­di­ca­tion, when “thrones are cast up and the An­cients of Days are seated. The broad­casts of Uversa is­sue and come forth from be­fore them; thou­sands upon thou­sands min­is­ter to them, and ten thou­sand times ten thou­sand stand be­fore them. The judg­ment is set, and the books are opened.” And the books which are opened on such a mo­men­tous oc­ca­sion are the liv­ing rec­ords of the ter­tiary se­con­a­phim of the super­uni­verses. The for­mal rec­ords are on file to cor­rob­o­rate the tes­ti­mony of the Mem­o­ries of Mercy if they are re­quired.

28:6.7The Mem­ory of Mercy must show that the sav­ing credit es­tab­lished by the Sons of God has been fully and faith­fully paid out in the lov­ing min­istry of the pa­tient per­son­al­i­ties of the Third Source and Cen­ter. But when mercy is ex­hausted, when the “mem­ory” thereof tes­ti­fies to its de­ple­tion, then does jus­tice pre­vail and righ­teous­ness de­cree. For mercy is not to be thrust upon those who de­spise it; mercy is not a gift to be tram­pled un­der foot by the per­sis­tent rebels of time. Nev­er­the­less, though mercy is thus pre­cious and dearly be­stowed, your in­di­vid­ual draw­ing cred­its are al­ways far in ex­cess of your abil­ity to ex­haust the re­serve if you are sin­cere of pur­pose and hon­est of heart.

28:6.8The mercy re­flec­tors, with their ter­tiary as­so­ciates, en­gage in nu­mer­ous super­uni­verse min­istries, in­clud­ing the teach­ing of the as­cend­ing crea­tures. Among many other things the Sig­nif­i­cances of Ori­gins teach these as­cend­ers how to ap­ply spirit ethics, and fol­low­ing such train­ing, the Mem­o­ries of Mercy teach them how to be truly mer­ci­ful. While the spirit tech­niques of mercy min­istry are be­yond your con­cept, you should even now un­der­stand that mercy is a qual­ity of growth. You should re­al­ize that there is a great re­ward of per­sonal sat­is­fac­tion in be­ing first just, next fair, then pa­tient, then kind. And then, on that foun­da­tion, if you choose and have it in your heart, you can take the next step and re­ally show mercy; but you can­not ex­hibit mercy in and of it­self. These steps must be tra­versed; oth­er­wise there can be no gen­uine mercy. There may be pa­tron­age, con­de­scen­sion, or char­ity—even pity—but not mercy. True mercy comes only as the beau­ti­ful cli­max to these pre­ced­ing ad­juncts to group un­der­stand­ing, mu­tual ap­pre­ci­a­tion, fra­ter­nal fel­low­ship, spir­i­tual com­mu­nion, and di­vine har­mony.

28:6.93. The Im­port of Time. Time is the one uni­ver­sal en­dow­ment of all will crea­tures; it is the “one tal­ent” in­trusted to all in­tel­li­gent be­ings. You all have time in which to in­sure your sur­vival; and time is fa­tally squan­dered only when it is buried in ne­glect, when you fail so to uti­lize it as to make cer­tain the sur­vival of your soul. Fail­ure to im­prove one’s time to the fullest ex­tent pos­si­ble does not im­pose fa­tal penal­ties; it merely re­tards the pil­grim of time in his jour­ney of as­cent. If sur­vival is gained, all other losses can be re­trieved.

28:6.10In the as­sign­ment of trusts the coun­sel of the Im­ports of Time is in­valu­able. Time is a vi­tal fac­tor in ev­ery­thing this side of Ha­vona and Par­a­dise. In the fi­nal judg­ment be­fore the An­cients of Days, time is an el­e­ment of ev­i­dence. The Im­ports of Time must al­ways af­ford tes­ti­mony to show that ev­ery de­fen­dant has had am­ple time for mak­ing de­ci­sions, achiev­ing choice.

28:6.11These time eval­u­a­tors are also the se­cret of prophecy; they por­tray the el­e­ment of time which will be re­quired in the com­ple­tion of any un­der­tak­ing, and they are just as de­pend­able as in­di­ca­tors as are the fran­dalanks and chro­nol­deks of other liv­ing or­ders. The Gods fore­see, hence fore­know; but the as­cen­dant au­thor­i­ties of the uni­verses of time must con­sult the Im­ports of Time to be able to fore­cast events of the fu­ture.

28:6.12You will first en­counter these be­ings on the man­sion worlds, and they will there in­struct you in the ad­van­ta­geous use of that which you call “time,” both in its pos­i­tive em­ploy­ment, work, and in its neg­a­tive uti­liza­tion, rest. Both uses of time are im­por­tant.

28:6.134. The Solem­nity of Trust. Trust is the cru­cial test of will crea­tures. Trust­wor­thi­ness is the true mea­sure of self-mas­tery, char­ac­ter. These se­con­a­phim ac­com­plish a dou­ble pur­pose in the econ­omy of the super­uni­verses: They por­tray to all will crea­tures the sense of the obli­ga­tion, sa­cred­ness, and solem­nity of trust. At the same time they unerringly re­flect to the gov­ern­ing au­thor­i­ties the ex­act trust­wor­thi­ness of any can­di­date for con­fi­dence or trust.

28:6.14On Uran­tia, you grotesquely es­say to read char­ac­ter and to es­ti­mate spe­cific abil­i­ties, but on Uversa we ac­tu­ally do these things in per­fec­tion. These se­con­a­phim weigh trust­wor­thi­ness in the liv­ing scales of unerring char­ac­ter ap­praisal, and when they have looked at you, we have only to look at them to know the lim­i­ta­tions of your abil­ity to dis­charge re­spon­si­bil­ity, ex­e­cute trust, and ful­fill mis­sions. Your as­sets of trust­wor­thi­ness are clearly set forth along­side your li­a­bil­i­ties of pos­si­ble de­fault or be­trayal.

28:6.15It is the plan of your su­pe­ri­ors to ad­vance you by aug­mented trusts just as fast as your char­ac­ter is suf­fi­ciently de­vel­oped to grace­fully bear these added re­spon­si­bil­i­ties, but to over­load the in­di­vid­ual only courts dis­as­ter and in­sures dis­ap­point­ment. And the mis­take of plac­ing re­spon­si­bil­ity pre­ma­turely upon ei­ther man or an­gel may be avoided by uti­liz­ing the min­istry of these in­fal­li­ble es­ti­ma­tors of the trust ca­pac­ity of the in­di­vid­u­als of time and space. These se­con­a­phim ever ac­com­pany Those High in Au­thor­ity, and never do these ex­ec­u­tives make as­sign­ments un­til their can­di­dates have been weighed in the sec­o­raphic bal­ances and pro­nounced “not want­ing.”

28:6.165. The Sanc­tity of Ser­vice. The priv­i­lege of ser­vice im­me­di­ately fol­lows the dis­cov­ery of trust­wor­thi­ness. Noth­ing can stand be­tween you and op­por­tu­nity for in­creased ser­vice ex­cept your own un­trust­wor­thi­ness, your lack of ca­pac­ity for ap­pre­ci­a­tion of the solem­nity of trust.

28:6.17Ser­vice—pur­pose­ful ser­vice, not slav­ery—is pro­duc­tive of the high­est sat­is­fac­tion and is ex­pres­sive of the di­vinest dig­nity. Ser­vice—more ser­vice, in­creased ser­vice, dif­fi­cult ser­vice, ad­ven­tur­ous ser­vice, and at last di­vine and per­fect ser­vice—is the goal of time and the des­ti­na­tion of space. But ever will the play cy­cles of time al­ter­nate with the ser­vice cy­cles of prog­ress. And af­ter the ser­vice of time there fol­lows the super­ser­vice of eter­nity. Dur­ing the play of time you should en­vi­sion the work of eter­nity, even as you will, dur­ing the ser­vice of eter­nity, rem­i­nisce the play of time.

28:6.18The uni­ver­sal econ­omy is based on in­take and out­put; through­out the eter­nal ca­reer you will never en­counter mo­not­ony of in­ac­tion or stag­na­tion of per­son­al­ity. Prog­ress is made pos­si­ble by in­her­ent mo­tion, ad­vance­ment grows out of the di­vine ca­pac­ity for ac­tion, and achieve­ment is the child of imag­i­na­tive ad­ven­ture. But in­her­ent in this ca­pac­ity for achieve­ment is the re­spon­si­bil­ity of ethics, the ne­ces­sity for rec­og­niz­ing that the world and the uni­verse are filled with a mul­ti­tude of dif­fer­ing types of be­ings. All of this mag­nif­i­cent cre­ation, in­clud­ing your­self, was not made just for you. This is not an ego­cen­tric uni­verse. The Gods have de­creed, “It is more blessed to give than to re­ceive,” and said your Mas­ter Son, “He who would be great­est among you let him be server of all.”

28:6.19The real na­ture of any ser­vice, be it ren­dered by man or an­gel, is fully re­vealed in the faces of these sec­o­raphic ser­vice in­di­ca­tors, the Sanc­ti­ties of Ser­vice. The full anal­y­sis of the true and of the hid­den mo­tives is clearly shown. These an­gels are in­deed the mind read­ers, heart searchers, and soul re­veal­ers of the uni­verse. Mor­tals may em­ploy words to con­ceal their thoughts, but these high se­con­a­phim lay bare the deep mo­tives of the hu­man heart and of the an­gelic mind.

28:6.206 and 7. The Se­cret of Great­ness and the Soul of Good­ness. The as­cend­ing pil­grims hav­ing awak­ened to the im­port of time, the way is pre­pared for the re­al­iza­tion of the solem­nity of trust and for the ap­pre­ci­a­tion of the sanc­tity of ser­vice. While these are the moral el­e­ments of great­ness, there are also se­crets of great­ness. When the spir­i­tual tests of great­ness are ap­plied, the moral el­e­ments are not dis­re­garded, but the qual­ity of un­selfish­ness re­vealed in dis­in­ter­ested la­bor for the wel­fare of one’s earthly fel­lows, par­tic­u­larly wor­thy be­ings in need and in dis­tress, that is the real mea­sure of plan­e­tary great­ness. And the man­i­fes­ta­tion of great­ness on a world like Uran­tia is the ex­hi­bi­tion of self-con­trol. The great man is not he who “takes a city” or “over­throws a na­tion,” but rather “he who sub­dues his own tongue.”

28:6.21Great­ness is syn­ony­mous with di­vin­ity. God is su­premely great and good. Great­ness and good­ness sim­ply can­not be di­vorced. They are for­ever made one in God. This truth is lit­er­ally and strik­ingly il­lus­trated by the re­flec­tive in­ter­de­pen­dence of the Se­cret of Great­ness and the Soul of Good­ness, for nei­ther can func­tion with­out the other. In re­flect­ing other qual­i­ties of di­vin­ity, the super­uni­verse se­con­a­phim can and do act alone, but the re­flec­tive es­ti­mates of great­ness and of good­ness ap­pear to be in­sep­a­ra­ble. Hence, on any world, in any uni­verse, must these re­flec­tors of great­ness and of good­ness work to­gether, al­ways show­ing a dual and mu­tu­ally de­pen­dent re­port of ev­ery be­ing upon whom they fo­cal­ize. Great­ness can­not be es­ti­mated with­out know­ing the con­tent of good­ness, while good­ness can­not be por­trayed with­out ex­hibit­ing its in­her­ent and di­vine great­ness.

28:6.22The es­ti­mate of great­ness varies from sphere to sphere. To be great is to be God­like. And since the qual­ity of great­ness is wholly de­ter­mined by the con­tent of good­ness, it fol­lows that, even in your pres­ent hu­man es­tate, if you can through grace be­come good, you are thereby be­com­ing great. The more stead­fastly you be­hold, and the more per­sis­tently you pur­sue, the con­cepts of di­vine good­ness, the more cer­tainly will you grow in great­ness, in true mag­ni­tude of gen­uine sur­vival char­ac­ter.

28:7.1The se­con­a­phim have their ori­gin and head­quar­ters on the cap­i­tals of the super­uni­verses, but with their li­ai­son fel­lows they range from the shores of Par­a­dise to the evo­lu­tion­ary worlds of space. They serve as val­ued as­sis­tants to the mem­bers of the de­lib­er­a­tive as­sem­blies of the super­gov­ern­ments and are of great help to the cour­tesy colonies of Uversa: the star stu­dents, mil­len­nial tourists, ce­les­tial ob­servers, and a host of oth­ers, in­clud­ing the as­cen­dant be­ings in wait­ing for Ha­vona trans­port. The An­cients of Days take plea­sure in as­sign­ing cer­tain of the pri­mary se­con­a­phim to as­sist the as­cend­ing crea­tures domi­ciled on the four hun­dred ninety study worlds sur­round­ing Uversa, and here also do many of the sec­ondary and ter­tiary or­ders serve as teach­ers. These Uversa satel­lites are the fin­ish­ing schools of the uni­verses of time, pre­sent­ing the prepara­tory course for the seven-cir­cuited uni­ver­sity of Ha­vona.

28:7.2Of the three or­ders of se­con­a­phim, the ter­tiary group, at­tached to the as­cen­dant au­thor­i­ties, min­is­ter most ex­ten­sively to the as­cend­ing crea­tures of time. You will on oc­ca­sion meet them soon af­ter your de­par­ture from Uran­tia, though you will not freely make use of their ser­vices un­til you reach the tar­ry­ing worlds of Or­von­ton. You will en­joy their com­pan­ion­ship when you be­come fully ac­quainted with them dur­ing your so­journ on the Uversa school worlds.

28:7.3These ter­tiary se­con­a­phim are the time­savers, space abridgers, er­ror de­tec­tors, faith­ful teach­ers, and ev­er­last­ing guide­posts—liv­ing signs of di­vine surety—in mercy placed at the cross­roads of time, there to guide the feet of anx­ious pil­grims in mo­ments of great per­plex­ity and spir­i­tual un­cer­tainty. Long be­fore at­tain­ing the por­tals of per­fec­tion, you will be­gin to gain ac­cess to the tools of di­vin­ity and to make con­tact with the tech­niques of De­ity. In­creas­ingly, from the time you ar­rive on the ini­tial man­sion world un­til you close your eyes in the Ha­vona sleep prepara­tory to your Par­a­dise tran­sit, you will avail your­self of the emer­gency help of these mar­velous be­ings, who are so fully and freely re­flec­tive of the sure knowl­edge and cer­tain wis­dom of those safe and de­pend­able pil­grims who have pre­ceded you on the long jour­ney to the por­tals of per­fec­tion.

28:7.4We are de­nied the full priv­i­lege of us­ing these an­gels of the re­flec­tive or­der on Uran­tia. They are fre­quent vis­i­tors on your world, ac­com­pa­ny­ing as­signed per­son­al­i­ties, but here they can­not freely func­tion. This sphere is still un­der par­tial spir­i­tual quar­an­tine, and some of the cir­cuits es­sen­tial to their ser­vices are not here at pres­ent. When your world is once more re­stored to the re­flec­tive cir­cuits con­cerned, much of the work of in­ter­plan­e­tary and in­teruni­verse com­mu­ni­ca­tion will be greatly sim­pli­fied and ex­pe­dited. Ce­les­tial work­ers on Uran­tia en­counter many dif­fi­cul­ties be­cause of this func­tional cur­tail­ment of their re­flec­tive as­so­ciates. But we go on joy­fully con­duct­ing our af­fairs with the in­stru­men­tal­i­ties at hand, not­with­stand­ing our lo­cal de­pri­va­tion of many of the ser­vices of these mar­velous be­ings, the liv­ing mir­rors of space and the pres­ence pro­jec­tors of time.

28:7.5[Spon­sored by a Mighty Mes­sen­ger of Uversa.]

119:3.3And, as might have been ex­pected, on the third day there­after there ap­peared, unan­nounced, on the head­quar­ters world of sys­tem 87 in con­stel­la­tion 61, a strange Ma­te­rial Son, ac­com­pa­nied by a lone se­con­a­phim, ac­cred­ited by the Uversa An­cients of Days, and cer­ti­fied by Im­manuel of Sal­ving­ton. Im­me­di­ately the act­ing Sys­tem Sov­er­eign ap­pointed this new and mys­te­ri­ous Ma­te­rial Son act­ing Plan­e­tary Prince of world 217, and this des­ig­na­tion was at once con­firmed by the Most Highs of con­stel­la­tion 61.

17:3.5The Re­flec­tive Spir­its are not merely trans­mit­ting agents; they are re­ten­tive per­son­al­i­ties as well. Their off­spring, the se­con­a­phim, are also re­ten­tive or rec­ord per­son­al­i­ties. Ev­ery­thing of true spir­i­tual value is reg­is­tered in du­pli­cate, and one im­pres­sion is pre­served in the per­sonal equip­ment of some mem­ber of one of the nu­mer­ous or­ders of sec­o­raphic per­son­al­i­ties be­long­ing to the vast staff of the Re­flec­tive Spir­its.

17:4.3The Im­age Aids serve for­ever by the sides of their an­ces­tral Spir­its, and they have at their dis­posal an un­be­liev­able host of helper se­con­a­phim. The Im­age Aids do not di­rectly func­tion in con­nec­tion with the train­ing worlds of as­cend­ing mor­tals. They are closely as­so­ci­ated with the in­tel­li­gence ser­vice of the uni­ver­sal scheme of mor­tal pro­gres­sion, but you will not per­son­ally come in con­tact with them when you so­journ in the Uversa schools be­cause these seem­ingly per­sonal be­ings are de­void of will; they do not ex­er­cise the power of choice. They are true im­ages, wholly re­flec­tive of the per­son­al­ity and mind of the in­di­vid­ual Spirit an­ces­tor. As a class, as­cend­ing mor­tals do not in­ti­mately con­tact with re­flec­tiv­ity. Al­ways some be­ing of the re­flec­tive na­ture will be in­ter­posed be­tween you and the ac­tual op­er­a­tion of the ser­vice.

17:8.2To­gether with their In­fi­nite Mother Spirit, the Su­preme Spirit groups are the im­me­di­ate cre­ators of the vast crea­ture fam­ily of the Third Source and Cen­ter. All or­ders of the min­is­ter­ing spir­its spring from this as­so­ci­a­tion. Pri­mary super­na­phim orig­i­nate in the In­fi­nite Spirit; sec­ondary be­ings of this or­der are cre­ated by the Mas­ter Spir­its; ter­tiary super­na­phim by the Seven Spir­its of the Cir­cuits. The Re­flec­tive Spir­its, col­lec­tively, are the mother-mak­ers of a mar­velous or­der of the an­gelic hosts, the mighty se­con­a­phim of the super­uni­verse ser­vices. A Cre­ative Spirit is the mother of the an­gelic or­ders of a lo­cal cre­ation; such se­raphic min­is­ters are orig­i­nal in each lo­cal uni­verse, though they are fash­ioned af­ter the pat­terns of the cen­tral uni­verse. All these cre­ators of min­is­ter­ing spir­its are only in­di­rectly as­sisted by the cen­tral lodg­ment of the In­fi­nite Spirit, the orig­i­nal and eter­nal mother of all the an­gelic min­is­ters.

26:1.132. The Min­is­ter­ing Spir­its of the Super­uni­verses—the se­con­a­phim, the ter­tiaphim, and the om­niaphim. Se­con­a­phim, the chil­dren of the Re­flec­tive Spir­its, var­i­ously serve in the seven super­uni­verses. Ter­tiaphim, of ori­gin in the In­fi­nite Spirit, are even­tu­ally ded­i­cated to the li­ai­son ser­vice of the Cre­ator Sons and the An­cients of Days. Om­niaphim are cre­ated con­cert­edly by the In­fi­nite Spirit and the Seven Su­preme Ex­ec­u­tives, and they are the ex­clu­sive ser­vants of the lat­ter. The dis­cus­sion of these three or­ders forms the sub­ject of a suc­ceed­ing nar­ra­tive in this se­ries.

28:0.1As the super­na­phim are the an­gelic hosts of the cen­tral uni­verse and the ser­a­phim of the lo­cal uni­verses, so are the se­con­a­phim the min­is­ter­ing spir­its of the super­uni­verses. In de­gree of di­vin­ity and in po­ten­tial of su­prem­acy, how­ever, these chil­dren of the Re­flec­tive Spir­its are much more like super­na­phim than ser­a­phim. They serve not alone in the super­cre­ations, and both nu­mer­ous and in­trigu­ing are the trans­ac­tions spon­sored by their un­re­vealed as­so­ciates.

• may become Paradise Companions, Technical Advisers

25:4.42. The Se­con­a­phim.

• may become Paradise Companions, Technical Advisers

25:8.1The Par­a­dise Com­pan­ions are a com­pos­ite or as­sem­bled group re­cruited from the ranks of the ser­a­phim, se­con­a­phim, super­na­phim, and om­niaphim. Though serv­ing for what you would re­gard as an ex­traor­di­nary length of time, they are not of per­ma­nent sta­tus. When this min­istry has been com­pleted, as a rule (but not in­vari­ably) they re­turn to those du­ties they per­formed when sum­moned to Par­a­dise ser­vice.

• may serve as Evangels of Light attached to mortal finaliter companies

31:7.2Any ce­les­tial per­son­al­ity as­signed to the ser­vice of any fi­nal­i­ter corps is de­nom­i­nated an Evan­gel of Light. These be­ings do not take the fi­nal­i­ter oath, and though sub­ject to the corps or­ga­ni­za­tion they are not of per­ma­nent at­tach­ment. This group may em­brace Soli­tary Mes­sen­gers, super­na­phim, se­con­a­phim, Par­a­dise Cit­i­zens, or their trin­i­tized off­spring—any be­ing re­quired in the pros­e­cu­tion of a tran­sient fi­nal­i­ter as­sign­ment. Whether or not the corps is to have these be­ings at­tached to the eter­nal mis­sion, we do not know. At the con­clu­sion of at­tach­ment these Evan­gels of Light re­sume their for­mer sta­tus.

• as Most High Assistants

37:4.2From time to time we thus ben­e­fit from the min­istry and as­sis­tance of such Par­a­dise-ori­gin be­ings as Per­fec­tors of Wis­dom, Di­vine Coun­selors, Uni­ver­sal Cen­sors, In­spired Trin­ity Spir­its, Trin­i­tized Sons, Soli­tary Mes­sen­gers, super­na­phim, se­con­a­phim, ter­tiaphim, and other gra­cious min­is­ters, who so­journ with us for the pur­pose of help­ing our na­tive per­son­al­i­ties in the ef­fort to bring all Neb­a­don into fuller har­mony with the ideas of Or­von­ton and the ide­als of Par­a­dise.

• serve on planets in light and life

55:4.18At any time af­ter this age the Plan­e­tary Adam and Eve can pe­ti­tion the Sov­er­eign Cre­ator Son for re­lease from plan­e­tary du­ties in or­der to be­gin their Par­a­dise as­cent; or they can re­main on the planet as di­rec­tors of the newly ap­pear­ing or­der of in­creas­ingly spir­i­tual so­ci­ety com­posed of ad­vanced mor­tals striv­ing to com­pre­hend the philo­sophic teach­ings of the fi­nal­i­ters por­trayed by the Bril­liant Evening Stars, who are now as­signed to these worlds to col­lab­o­rate in pairs with the se­con­a­phim from the head­quar­ters of the super­uni­verse.

30:1.8212. Se­con­a­phim.

30:2.842. Se­con­a­phim.

26:1.16Super­na­phim are lim­ited in “spirit po­lar­ity” re­gard­ing only one phase of ac­tion, that with the Uni­ver­sal Fa­ther. They can work singly ex­cept when di­rectly em­ploy­ing the ex­clu­sive cir­cuits of the Fa­ther. When they are in power re­cep­tion on the Fa­ther’s di­rect min­istry, super­na­phim must vol­un­tar­ily as­so­ciate in pairs to be able to func­tion. Se­con­a­phim are like­wise lim­ited and in ad­di­tion must work in pairs in or­der to syn­chro­nize with the cir­cuits of the Eter­nal Son. Ser­a­phim can work singly as dis­crete and lo­cal­ized per­son­al­i­ties, but they are able to en­cir­cuit only when po­lar­ized as li­ai­son pairs. When such spirit be­ings are as­so­ci­ated as pairs, the one is spo­ken of as com­ple­men­tal to the other. Com­ple­men­tal re­la­tion­ships may be tran­sient; they are not nec­es­sar­ily of a per­ma­nent na­ture.

15:10.22At al­most all times it is pos­si­ble to find rep­re­sen­ta­tives of all groups of cre­ated be­ings on the head­quar­ters worlds of the super­uni­verses. The rou­tine min­is­ter­ing work of the super­uni­verses is per­formed by the mighty se­con­a­phim and by other mem­bers of the vast fam­ily of the In­fi­nite Spirit. In the work of these mar­velous cen­ters of super­uni­verse ad­min­is­tra­tion, con­trol, min­istry, and ex­ec­u­tive judg­ment, the in­tel­li­gences of ev­ery sphere of uni­ver­sal life are min­gled in ef­fec­tive ser­vice, wise ad­min­is­tra­tion, lov­ing min­istry, and just judg­ment.

26:4.1The sec­ondary super­na­phim are min­is­ters to the seven plan­e­tary cir­cuits of the cen­tral uni­verse. Part are de­voted to the ser­vice of the pil­grims of time, and one half of the en­tire or­der is as­signed to the train­ing of the Par­a­dise pil­grims of eter­nity. These Par­a­dise Cit­i­zens, in their pil­grim­age through the Ha­vona cir­cuits, are also at­tended by vol­un­teers from the Mor­tal Fi­nal­ity Corps, an ar­range­ment that has pre­vailed since the com­ple­tion of the first fi­nal­i­ter group.

28:0.2As pre­sented in these nar­ra­tives, the min­is­ter­ing spir­its of the super­uni­verses em­brace the fol­low­ing three or­ders:

28:0.31. The Se­con­a­phim.

28:0.42. The Ter­tiaphim.

28:0.53. The Om­niaphim.

28:0.6Since the lat­ter two or­ders are not so di­rectly con­cerned with the as­cen­dant scheme of mor­tal pro­gres­sion, they will be briefly dis­cussed prior to the more ex­tended con­sid­er­a­tion of se­con­a­phim. Tech­ni­cally, nei­ther ter­tiaphim nor om­niaphim are min­is­ter­ing spir­its of the super­uni­verses, though both serve as spirit min­is­ters in these do­mains.

• transport ascenders to Havona

30:4.28The first act of your Ha­vona ca­reer will be to rec­og­nize and thank your trans­port se­con­a­phim for the long and safe jour­ney. Then you are pre­sented to those be­ings who will spon­sor your early Ha­vona ac­tiv­i­ties. Next you go to reg­is­ter your ar­rival and pre­pare your mes­sage of thanks­giv­ing and ado­ra­tion for dis­patch to the Cre­ator Son of your lo­cal uni­verse, the uni­verse Fa­ther who made pos­si­ble your son­ship ca­reer. This con­cludes the for­mal­i­ties of the Ha­vona ar­rival; where­upon you are ac­corded a long pe­riod of leisure for free ob­ser­va­tion, and this af­fords op­por­tu­nity for look­ing up your friends, fel­lows, and as­so­ciates of the long as­cen­sion ex­pe­ri­ence. You may also con­sult the broad­casts to as­cer­tain who of your fel­low pil­grims have de­parted for Ha­vona since the time of your leav­ing Uversa.

• transporters can traverse from Uversa past dark gravity bodies to Havona

39:2.9The “en­ergy range” of ser­a­phim is wholly ad­e­quate for lo­cal uni­verse and even for super­uni­verse re­quire­ments, but they could never with­stand the en­ergy de­mands en­tailed by such a long jour­ney as that from Uversa to Ha­vona. Such an ex­haus­tive jour­ney re­quires the spe­cial pow­ers of a pri­mary se­con­a­phim of trans­port en­dow­ments. Trans­port­ers take on en­ergy for flight while in tran­sit and re­cu­per­ate per­sonal power at the end of the jour­ney.

• assigned to Mighty Messengers, Those High in Authority, and Those without Name and Number

22:5.5The Trin­i­tized Cus­to­di­ans are em­braced by the Par­a­dise Trin­ity in groups of sev­enty thou­sand, and one sev­enth of each group is as­signed to a super­uni­verse. There are now in the ser­vice of Or­von­ton slightly over ten mil­lion of these trusted and high Cus­to­di­ans. They serve on Uversa and on the ma­jor and mi­nor head­quar­ters spheres. In their labors they are as­sisted by a corps of sev­eral bil­lion se­con­a­phim and other able super­uni­verse per­son­al­i­ties.