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7. The Reserves. General reserves of the supervisor seraphim are held on the headquarters of the constellations. Such angelic reservists are in no sense inactive; many serve as messenger aids to the constellation rulers; others are attached to the Salvington reserves of unassigned Vorondadeks; still others may be attached to Vorondadek Sons on special assignment, such as the Vorondadek observer, and sometimes Most High regent, of Urantia.

4. The Teaching Counselors. These angels are the invaluable assistants of the spiritual teaching corps of the local universe. Teaching counselors are secretaries to all orders of teachers, from the Melchizedeks and the Trinity Teacher Sons down to the morontia mortals who are assigned as helpers to those of their kind who are just behind them in the scale of ascendant life. You will first see these associate teaching seraphim on some one of the seven mansion worlds surrounding Jerusem.

4. Assistant Teachers. The assistant teachers are the helpers and associates of their fellow seraphim, the teaching counselors. They are also individually connected with the extensive educational enterprises of the local universe, especially with the sevenfold scheme of training operative on the mansion worlds of the local systems. A marvelous corps of this order of seraphim functions on Urantia for the purpose of fostering and furthering the cause of truth and righteousness.

2. Mechanical Controllers. These are the exceedingly versatile and mobile assistants of the associate power directors. Trillions upon trillions of them are commissioned in Ensa, your minor sector. These beings are called mechanical controllers because they are so completely dominated by their superiors, so fully subservient to the will of the associate power directors. Nevertheless they are, themselves, very intelligent, and their work, though mechanical and matter-of-fact in nature, is skillfully performed.

Institutional religion is now caught in the stalemate of a vicious circle. It cannot reconstruct society without first reconstructing itself; and being so much an integral part of the established order, it cannot reconstruct itself until society has been radically reconstructed.

The satellites of the seven primary worlds of the finaliters are the rendezvous of the personalities of the super- and central universes who may be executing assignments in Nebadon. While the ascending mortals go about freely on all of the cultural worlds and training spheres of the 490 worlds comprising the Melchizedek University, there are certain special schools and numerous restricted zones which they are not permitted to enter. This is especially true of the forty-nine spheres under the jurisdiction of the finaliters.

Seats numbers 17, 18, 19, and 20 are not permanently occupied. They are temporarily filled by the unanimous consent of the sixteen permanent members, being kept open for later assignment to ascending mortals from the present postbestowal Son age on Urantia.

Lucky days were sought out, Thursday being most favorably regarded, and weddings celebrated at the full of the moon were thought to be exceptionally fortunate. It was the custom of many Near Eastern peoples to throw grain upon the newlyweds; this was a magical rite which was supposed to insure fecundity. Certain Oriental peoples used rice for this purpose.

Five per cent of the Andites, the very superior culture of the coastal district about the mouths of the Tigris and Euphrates who had kept themselves free from intermarriage with the inferior neighboring tribesmen, refused to leave their homes. This group represented the survival of many superior Nodite and Adamite strains.

These were the times of the New Stone Age overlapping the oncoming Bronze Age. In Scandinavia it was the Bronze Age associated with mother worship. In southern France and Spain it was the New Stone Age associated with sun worship. This was the time of the building of the circular and roofless sun temples. The European white races were energetic builders, delighting to set up great stones as tokens to the sun, much as did their later-day descendants at Stonehenge. The vogue of sun worship indicates that this was a great period of agriculture in southern Europe.

800,000 years ago game was abundant; many species of deer, as well as elephants and hippopotamuses, roamed over Europe. Cattle were plentiful; horses and wolves were everywhere. The Neanderthalers were great hunters, and the tribes in France were the first to adopt the practice of giving the most successful hunters the choice of women for wives.

In the not-distant future, new telescopes will reveal to the wondering gaze of Urantian astronomers no less than 375 million new galaxies in the remote stretches of outer space. At the same time these more powerful telescopes will disclose that many island universes formerly believed to be in outer space are really a part of the galactic system of Orvonton. The seven superuniverses are still growing; the periphery of each is gradually expanding; new nebulae are constantly being stabilized and organized; and some of the nebulae which Urantian astronomers regard as extragalactic are actually on the fringe of Orvonton and are traveling along with us.

Circuit supervisors are created for their specific tasks, and they eternally serve in the groups of their original assignment. They are not rotated in service and hence make an agelong study of the problems found in the realms of their original assignment. For example: Tertiary circuit supervisor number 572,842 has functioned on Salvington since the early concept of your local universe, and he is a member of the personal staff of Michael of Nebadon.

In the north the Andites, through warfare and marriage, obliterated the blue men, but in the south they survived in greater numbers. The Basques and the Berbers represent the survival of two branches of this race, but even these peoples have been thoroughly admixed with the Saharans.

The development of civilization on Urantia has not differed so greatly from that of other worlds which have sustained the misfortune of spiritual isolation. But when compared with the loyal worlds of the universe, your planet seems most confused and greatly retarded in all phases of intellectual progress and spiritual attainment.

The twelve groups of Urantia destiny reservists are composed of mortal inhabitants of the sphere who have been rehearsed for numerous crucial positions on earth and are held in readiness to act in possible planetary emergencies. This combined corps now consists of 962 persons. The smallest corps numbers 41 and the largest 172. With the exception of less than a score of contact personalities, the members of this unique group are wholly unconscious of their preparation for possible function in certain planetary crises. These mortal reservists are chosen by the corps to which they are respectively attached and are likewise trained and rehearsed in the deep mind by the combined technique of Thought Adjuster and seraphic guardian ministry. Many times numerous other celestial personalities participate in this unconscious training, and in all this special preparation the midwayers perform valuable and indispensable services.

3. Social Architects. From the individual planets up through the morontia training worlds, these seraphim labor to enhance all sincere social contacts and to further the social evolution of universe creatures. These are the angels who seek to divest the associations of intelligent beings of all artificiality while endeavoring to facilitate the interassociation of will creatures on a basis of real self-understanding and genuine mutual appreciation.

Do not overlook the fact that Urantia was assigned to us as a life-experiment world. On this planet we made our sixtieth attempt to modify and, if possible, improve the Satania adaptation of the Nebadon life designs, and it is of record that we achieved numerous beneficial modifications of the standard life patterns. To be specific, on Urantia we worked out and have satisfactorily demonstrated not less than twenty-eight features of life modification which will be of service to all Nebadon throughout all future time.

When these groups of master seraphim disagree in matters of planetary policy or procedure, their differences are usually composed by the governor general, but all his rulings are subject to appeal in accordance with the nature and gravity of the issues involved in the disagreement.

THE Melchizedeks are widely known as emergency Sons, for they engage in an amazing range of activities on the worlds of a local universe. When any extraordinary problem arises, or when something unusual is to be attempted, it is quite often a Melchizedek who accepts the assignment. The ability of the Melchizedek Sons to function in emergencies and on widely divergent levels of the universe, even on the physical level of personality manifestation, is peculiar to their order. Only the Life Carriers share to any degree this metamorphic range of personality function.