The Five Evolutionary Steps Of Man

That you may understand why it is called creative thought it is necessary briefly to study the process of evolution through which the thinking man has been created.

Thinking man has been a long time on the road of evolution, and he has traveled a very long way. In the words of judge T. Troward (in Bible Mystery and Bible Meaning), "Perfected man is the apex of the Evolutionary Pyramid, and this by a necessary sequence."

Let us trace thinking man through the five evolutionary steps through which we believe he has traveled, beginning with the very lowest; namely -

1. The Mineral Period. Here we find life in its lowest form, lying motionless and inert; a mass of mineral substances, with no power to move.

2. Then comes the Vegetable Period. Here we find life in a more active form, with intelligence sufficient to gather food, grow and reproduce, but still unable to move from its fixed moorings.

3. Then comes the Animal Period. Here we find life in a still higher and more intelligent form, with ability to move from place to place.

4. Then comes the Human or Thinking Man Period, where we find life in its highest known form; the highest, because man can think, and because thought is the highest known form of organized
energy. In the realm of thought man knows no limitations. He can send his thoughts to the stars with the quickness of a flash of lightning. He can gather facts and assemble them in new and varying combinations. He can create hypotheses and translate them into physical reality, through thought. He can reason both inductively and deductively.

5. Then comes the Spiritual Period. On this plane the lower forms of life, described in the previously mentioned four periods, converge and become infinitude in nature. At this point thinking man has unfolded, expanded and grown until he has projected his thinking ability into infinite intelligence. As yet, thinking man is but an infant in this fifth period, for he has not learned how to appropriate to his own use this infinite intelligence called Spirit. Moreover, with a few rare exceptions, man has not yet recognized thought as the connecting link which gives him access to the power of infinite intelligence. These exceptions have been such men as Moses, Solomon, Christ, Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Confucius and a comparatively small number of others of their type. Since their time we have had many who partly uncovered this great truth; yet the truth, itself, is as available now as it was then.

Law Of Success by Napoleon Hill