In an infinite universe there should be infinite possibilities for growth in wisdom, self realization, and expansion of consciousness, and for the development of compassion and the power to sacrifice --provided, of course, one is around to develop all those precious powers!

. . . the devotee, who, striving with all his might, obtaineth perfection because of efforts continued through many births, goeth to the supreme goal . . .

. . . When the embodied self surpasseth these three qualities of goodness, action, and indifference . . . it is released from rebirth and death . . .

All the worlds,  and  even  the  heavenly  realm of Brahmâ, are subject to the laws of rebirth . . .

. . . an ideal human body [is] . . . totally endowed with the eight favorable qualities, which are ripened fruits of previously committed virtuous actions . . . . You should practice those virtuous actions which will cause you to be reborn with this ideal form . . .

. . . Some souls choose confinements in mortal bodies because they are corporeally inclined . . . But those possessed of a diviner structure are absolved from all local bonds of earth . . .

. . . souls must re-enter the absolute substance whence they have emerged . . . . To accomplish this . . . they must develop . . . the perfections, the germ of which is planted in them; and if they have not fulfilled this . . . during one life, they must commence another, a third, and so forth, until they have acquired the condition which fits them for reunion with God.

Woe be unto you, ungodly men, which have forsaken the law of the most high God!  for if you increase, it shall be your destruction; and if you be born, ye shall be born to a curse; and if ye die, a curse shall be your portion.

. . . Greek [stoic] philosophy could admit no prospect except a perpetual repetition of the same alternate evolution and involution, a never-ending systole and diastole of the cosmic life . . . . The education of Souls is continued in successive worlds.

. . . [as] to those souls which, on account of their excessive mental defects, stood in need of bodies of a grosser and more solid nature . . . this visible world was also called into being . . . . The hope of freedom is entertained . . . when they shall have fulfilled their . . . duties in this world.

When the souls not yet come forth from the pit of the natural darkness of bodily matter, are nevertheless in a state of increasing improvement, then, in an ascending way, they migrate from body to body, each purer than the former one, until the time of climbing up to the steps on the wished-for perfection of mankind . . .

There can never be a perfect world unless gradually those born into it can take advantage of lessons learned in earlier lives instead of starting at scratch.

. . . . Life was considered as a time of trial: If its initiation was successfully past, the spirit rested after death until the moment came for another return to earth.  This continued until, after many lives, some attained the state of spiritual perfection that admitted them to Gwenved, the "White" heaven where they became fully conscious of God.  They chose . . . to return as teachers . . .

. . . . Attached to a mortal envelope, [our soul] . . . is sent by the gods now into one body, now into another, in view of the universal harmony, in order that the union of the mortal and immortal elements in human nature may contribute to the unity of the Whole . . . .

. . . . Why should I not return as often as I am capable of acquiring fresh knowledge and further power?  Do I achieve so much in one sojourning as to make it not worth my while to return?

. . . . Let the soul return as often as it wishes.  Certainly the earth is rich enough to bestow ever new gifts, new centuries, new countries, new minds, new discoveries and hopes.

Cast into this life . . . where, after a previous existence . . . we are . . . remade, renewed, tempered by suffering, by strife, by passion, by doubt, by disease, by death . . . for our purification . . . to make us perfect . . .

. . . . The individual soul, he though, progresses through a series of reincarnations, each leading it to a more perfect development, and the rapidity of its advance depends on its own purification . . .

I think immortality is the passing of a soul through many lives or experiences, and such as are truly lived, used and learned, help on to the next, each growing richer, happier and higher . . .

. . . There is . . . the possibility (indeed for most individuals, the necessity) of returning to some form of embodied life, in which the advance towards complete beautification, or deliverance through enlightenment, can be continued . . .

. . . . I could well imagine that I might have lived in former centuries and there encountered questions I was not yet able to answer; that I had to be born again because I had not fulfilled the task that was given to me . . .

. . . What I do maintain is that life here would have infinitely more value if we knew that beyond death we should pursue, and ultimately to a successful issue, the elusive idea of which we are always in quest.

. . . No man can learn fully in one life the lessons of unbroken health and of bodily sickness, of riches and of poverty, of study and action, of comradeship and isolation, of defiance and of obedience, of virtue and of vice . . .

Thus, like the revolutions of a wheel, there is a regular succession of death and birth, the moral cause of which is the cleaving to existing objects, while the instrumental cause is karma, . . . merit and demerit.

The passions and desires are not produced by the body, but, on the contrary, the body is caused to be by the former.  It is desire and passion which caused us to be born, and will bring us to birth again and again in some body on this earth or another globe.  It is by passion and desire we are made to evolve through the mansions of death called lives on earth . . .

. . . and before we can attain to that final harmony between the universe and ourselves, to which we look forward as the consummation of existence, how much we have to learn about both!