296 ROSICRUCIANCOSMO-CONCEPTION
The education consisted of calling up before the soul of
the child pictures of the different phases of life. The
consciousness of the early Atlantean was, as yet, principally
an internal picture-consciousness. The power of the educator
to call up these pictures before the soul of the child was the
determining factor upon which depended the soul qualities
that would be possessed by the grown man. The instinct and
not the reason was appealed to and aroused and by this
method of education the son, in the great majority of cases,
readily absorbed the qualities of the father. It is thus evident
that there was at that time good reason for bestowing honor
upon the descendants of great men, because the son almost
always inherited most of his father's good qualities.
Unfortunately, that is not the case in our time, although we
still follow the same practices of honoring the sons of great
men; but we have no reason whatever for doing so.
Among the Toltecs, experience came to be highly
valued. The man who had gained the most varied experience
was the most honored and sought. Memory was then so
great and accurate that our present memory is nothing in
comparison. In an emergency, a Toltec of wide practical
experience would be very likely to remember similar cases
in the past, and suggest what action should be taken. Thus he
became a valuable adviser to the community when a
situation developed which none of the members had
previously encountered and they were unable to think or
reason from analogy as to how to deal promptly with the
emergency. When such an individual was not available, they
were compelled to experiment in order to find what was best
to do.
In the middle third of Atlantis we find the beginning of
separate nations. Groups of people who discovered in one