If a child was born in the world with all the knowledge of the grown-up people the soul of the child would have had no interest whatever in it. It is the gradual progress that a soul makes day after day after coming on earth; it is that progress which wakens the soul to the world's pleasures and pains. The real meaning of initiation is to be reborn; to be born again. The first birth is the birth of the person, the next birth is the birth of the soul. And therefore by initiation it is meant that the soul is born again.