By Dr. S. G. Eghian
Return of an ego to earth life in a new body and in a new environment is called reincarnation. The doctrine of reincarnation is not a religious idea, though some teach it and almost every great religion in its early days knew it and accepted it as a fact.
Man is an evolving being and with the rest of evolving things and beings he is within the immutable law of evolution. Reincarnation is one of the laws of evolution. It is the law of rest and activity.
Everything in nature evolves by successive cycles of rest and activity. Rest is intended to consume and assimilate the fruits of activity. Activity is intended to consume the fruits of rest and place them again into activity for further advance.
There are smaller cycles of rest and activity within greater cycles of rest and activity up to infinity. Reincarnation of an ego is its return to a state of activity after a period of rest to which it passes through so called death. Deaths and births are moments when an ego enters into a cycle of rest or activity. If there were only one life cycle through which man could receive his evolution on earth, then there could not be so great and distinct a physical, mental and moral diversity among individuals, races and nations. A savage and a civilized man, or a man highly advanced morally and intellectually, and an ordinary man with mental and moral defects cannot be said to be born so by mere luck or chance, or by arbitrary Will of Deity. Sense of justice or intellectual reasoning cannot accept such a simple statement, and it is also inconsistent with the rest of the world process.
This obvious fact can be explained only by the law of evolution. Never a highly evolved thing or being in nature comes into existence by a jump, or without having a link of continuity to the rest of the things and beings.
A highly evolved man must have had greater numbers of cycles of rest and activity, that is, greater numbers of incarnations than a less evolved one. He may, possibly, have entered the era of human evolution earlier than the other.
The character of a man with which he enters the physical life is the net result of his activities in his previous existence. The low or high character of a man indicates the sort of life he has led in his previous incarnations. Man’s character casts his destiny. To suit his character at the time of his reincarnations man is led to an adaptable body and environment.