Course XLI - Teaching 12: The Main Road

We are told that love is the beginning and end of the Path; so, the Main Road is that of love.
Pages and pages should be needed to explain the great power of the heart. Many mystics did not develop other precedent centers, but were able to be spiritually liberated just by causing the wonderful flower of their hearts to bloom.
Also, this center contains all other centers, and the whole realization nectar flows from its forty nine sources.
This inner flame and its pure golden shine flares up even in those who do not get used to meditation and spiritual speculation, but this force becomes a glowing star in those persons who strive for their inner self-development.
The Wheel of the Heart not only attracts, as the Sacrum Wheel does, or shapes as the Control Wheel does, or vivifies as the Solar Wheel does, but also assimilates into love the object or being attracted, and becomes love in this object or being.
There are innumerable stories of this kind about great beings perfected through the exercise of devotion and love. Rama Krishna’s biography is sufficient to check this fact. Certain devotee would lovingly meditate about images of those who founded great religions, and these beings would come up; then, he would see their images and, eventually, those visions would permeate him or, rather, he would become those visions.
The tremendous energy emanated from this center has repercussions in the physical body in strange and wonderful ways. Out of love for Christ, many Christian saints felt so vividly his passion and became Him in such a way that eventually exposed this union: Saint Francis of Assisi’s stigmata, Saint Therese of Jesus’ heart reverberation, the crown of thorns in Saint Rita of Cascia’s forehead.
Helen Petrovna Blavatsky would love her Masters so dearly that, being bursting with love physically a mysterious wound appeared beneath her heart.
As the force of this center increases, it will comprise all suffering of beings around, and even entire cities and nations. A Heart Wheel perfectly developed will encompass the suffering of all men in the planet with its immense protective wings; this is why Christ carried over his shoulders the suffering of mankind as a whole, and Krishna had images of all men engraved on him.
This splendid power fosters immense charity works, and the man who has it, is given strength to overcome every obstacle and achieve great beneficial works for those who are suffering.
Just as this wheel has a wonderful golden color and looks like an immense star behind its beneficial and higher aspect, so it is terrible behind its opposite aspect.
In a wicked person who has developed this Center, his image is like a sky covered by thick and dark clouds.
Just as through altruism and disdain to any offences inflicted one starts developing this center in a positive way, so rancor and jealousy develop this center negatively.
In the beginning, it looks like red flame that destroys at a short distance; later, it is suffocating smoke that destroys everything around. These strong passions gradually spread, eventually cover and ruin entire collectivities. An individual being of this kind can do anything and, finally, is self-destructive, permeating the whole planet with its malefic influence.