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No association of spiritually minded persons can as such rise higher than the Personality who has inspired it, and in whose superior power and knowledge it has rested its roots. As Ralph Waldo Emerson pithily phrases the thought: "An institution is the lengthened shadow of one man." Europe and America, for instance, are dotted with groups working along routes of mental and semi-spiritual development, but in every such group you will find that it draws its real life from its Founder or from its Head. The point in development reached by the Head marks the limitation to which he can bring his followers, and he can take them no further.

-- Notebooks Category 1: Overview of the Quest > Chapter 4 : Organized Groups > # 119