Read The Infinite Plan for Free Online

letter. He then enumerated the rules of minimal wisdom, through which the monstrous errors capable of derailing the project of the Supreme Intelligence could be avoided. Those who did not capture all this in a single conference could take the course of six sessions, in which they would learn the rules of a good life, including diet, physical and mental exercises, controlled dreams, and several systems for charging the batteries of the Physical Body and the Mental Body, thus assuring themselves of a dignified life and peace of Soul after death.
    Charles Reeves was a man ahead of his time. Twenty years later several of his ideas would be predicated by various spiritualists up and down California, the last frontier, the goal of adventurers, desperadoes, nonconformists, fugitives from justice, undiscovered geniuses, impenitent sinners, and hopeless lunatics, a place where even today every possible formula for avoiding the anguish of living proliferates. It is not Charles Reeves, however, who must bear the blame for having initiated bizarre movements. There is something in the air of the place that agitates the spirit. Or maybe those who came to populate the region were in such a hurry to find their fortune—or easy oblivion—that their soul lagged behind, and they are still looking for it. Uncounted charlatans have profited from this phenomenon, offering magic formulas to fill the painful void left by the absent spirit. At the time Reeves was preaching, many in that land had already found a way to get rich by selling intangible benefits for the health of the body and solace of the soul, but he was not among them; he honored austerity and decorum, and thereby earned the respect of his followers. It was Olga who had glimpsed the possibilities for turning the Logi and the Master Functionaries to more commercial ends, perhaps by acquiring a site and starting their own church, but neither Charles nor Nora ever evinced any enthusiasm for that covetous idea; for them, divulging their truth was quite simply a heavy and inescapable moral burden, and never an excuse to peddle cheap merchandise.
    Nora Reeves could point to the exact day she lost faith in human goodness, the day her unspoken doubts about the meaning of life had begun. She was one of those people who are able to remember meaningless dates, so with even more reason the event of dropping two cataclysmic bombs, signaling an end to the war with Japan, was burned into her brain. In years to come she dressed in mourning for that anniversary, just when the rest of the country was throwing itself into celebrations. She lost interest even in those closest to her; it is true that maternal affection had never been one of her principal characteristics, but from that moment on she seemed to divorce herself entirely from her two children. She also withdrew from her husband, but so discreetly that he found nothing to reproach her for. She isolated herself in a secret cloister, where she remained untouched by reality until the end of her days; forty-some years later, without ever having participated in life, she died convinced that she was a princess of the Urals. On that fateful day, people celebrated the final defeat of the enemy with slant eyes and yellow skin, as months earlier they had rejoiced at the defeat of the Germans. It was the end of a long combat; the Japanese had been vanquished by the most powerful weapon in history, one that in only a few minutes killed one hundred thirty thousand human beings and condemned that many more to a drawn-out agony. The news of what had happened produced a horrified silence through the world, but the victors blocked out visions of charred bodies and pulverized cities in a tumult of flags, parades, and marching bands, anticipating the return of their fighting men.
    â€œDo you remember that black soldier we picked up on the road? Do you suppose he’s still alive? Will he be coming home too?” Gregory asked his mother before they