Martinus: Livets Bog, vol. 4, sect. 1262

1262. The return of our fate or karma is a "mirror principle", which, when nothing else intervenes, produces in our own fate an absolutely exact reproduction of what we ourselves promote in the fate of other beings. If we oppress another being or deprive it of its liberty to any extent, this action must inevitably engender a corresponding oppression and loss of liberty in our own fate. One cannot compensate or make up for oppression and loss of liberty one has caused another being by having some illness or physical difficulty in one's own fate. How could such a difficulty benefit the other being? And in what way could it benefit oneself in the given situation? Karma or retribution is not in any way whatsoever a "principle of punishment". In the absolute sense no suffering or difficulty can be a manifestation of "revenge". The notion that it can is able to occur only in the still animal part of the primitive human being's consciousness or mentality. All manifestation of energy, movement or manifestation can, in its ultimate analysis, exist only as "cause and effect". The living being is confronted with this "law of cause and effect". With its drive for self-preservation, the exercising of its will, the satisfying of its wishes and desires, this being intervenes in the domain of this law. It sets particular kinds of energy waves or vibrations in motion. And specific waves of energy must, according to this law, give rise to corresponding, specific "effects". Every "cause" can have only its own, particular "effect". "Salt" must always react as "salt". It cannot sometimes react as "sugar", just as "sugar" of course cannot sometimes react as "salt" nor as any other chemical. Neither can a particular manifested action create something in one case and something completely different in another. It must always trigger the same effect. If it does not trigger the same effect, this shows merely that in the new case new elements have been added that have changed the effect. If one climbs a flight of stairs, the effect of this must inevitably be that one goes continuously upwards. The effect can never in any case be that one goes "down" the same staircase. One cannot go "down" a flight of stairs by going "up" them. An "effect" of any kind has thus its own, specific "cause", without which this "effect" could not possibly be attained. Every time we want to attain a particular "effect", we absolutely must manifest the specific "cause" that will result in the "effect". In these examples we have thus the unalterable structure of the law of retribution or karma.