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VOLUMES 1 and 2
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THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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HELENA PETROVNA BLAVATSKY
1831-1891
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THE SECRET DOCTRINE:
THE SYNTHESIS
OF
SCIENCE, RELIGION, AND PHILOSOPHY.
BY
H. P. BLAVATSKY,
AUTHOR OF "
"There is no Religion higher
than Truth."
VOL. I. -- COSMOGENESIS.
THE THEOSOPHICAL PUBLISHING COMPANY,
LIMITED.
7,
WILLIAM Q. JUDGE,
117,
THE MANAGER OF THE THEOSOPHIST,
Adyar,
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1888.
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"Entered according to Act of
Congress in the year 1888, by H. P. Blavatsky,
in the Office of the Librarian of
Congress at Washington, D. C."
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This Work
I Dedicate to all True Theosophists,
In every Country,
And of every Race,
For they called it forth, and for
them it was recorded.
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PREFACE.
THE Author -- the writer, rather --
feels it necessary to apologise for the long delay which has occurred in the
appearance of this work. It has been occasioned by ill-health and the magnitude
of the undertaking. Even the two volumes now issued do not complete the scheme,
and these do not treat exhaustively of the subjects dealt with in them. A large
quantity of material has already been prepared, dealing with the history of
occultism as contained in the lives of the great Adepts of the Aryan Race, and
showing the bearing of occult philosophy upon the conduct of life, as it is and
as it ought to be. Should the present volumes meet with a favourable reception,
no effort will be spared to carry out the scheme of the work in its entirety.
The third volume is entirely ready; the fourth almost so.
This scheme, it must be added, was
not in contemplation when the preparation of the work was first announced. As
originally announced, it was intended that the "Secret Doctrine"
should be an amended and enlarged version of "Isis Unveiled." It was,
however, soon found that the explanations which could be added to those already
put before the world in the last-named and other works dealing with esoteric
science, were such as to require a different method of treatment: and consequently
the present volumes do not contain, in all, twenty pages extracted from
"Isis Unveiled."
The author does not feel it necessary
to ask the indulgence of her readers and critics for the many defects of
literary style, and the imperfect English which may be found in these pages.
She is a foreigner, and her knowledge of the language was acquired late in
life. The English tongue is employed because it offers the most widely-diffused
medium for conveying the truths which it had become her duty to place before the
world.
These truths are in no sense put
forward as a revelation; nor does the author claim the position of a revealer
of mystic lore, now made public for the first time in the world's history. For
what is contained in this work is to be found scattered throughout thousands of
volumes embodying the scriptures of the great Asiatic and early European
religions, hidden under glyph and symbol, and hitherto left unnoticed because
of this veil. What is now attempted is to gather the oldest tenets together and
to make of them one harmonious and unbroken whole. The sole advantage which the
writer has over her predecessors, is that she need not resort to personal
speculations and theories. For this work is a partial statement of what she
herself has been taught by more advanced students, supplemented, in a few
details only, by the results of her
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own study and observation. The
publication of many of the facts herein stated has been rendered necessary by
the wild and fanciful speculations in which many Theosophists and students of
mysticism have indulged, during the last few years, in their endeavour to, as
they imagined, work out a complete system of thought from the few facts
previously communicated to them.
It is needless to explain that this
book is not the Secret Doctrine in its entirety, but a select number of
fragments of its fundamental tenets, special attention being paid to some facts
which have been seized upon by various writers, and distorted out of all
resemblance to the truth.
But it is perhaps desirable to state
unequivocally that the teachings, however fragmentary and incomplete, contained
in these volumes, belong neither to the Hindu, the Zoroastrian, the Chaldean,
nor the Egyptian religion, neither to Buddhism, Islam, Judaism nor Christianity
exclusively. The Secret Doctrine is the essence of all these. Sprung from it in
their origins, the various religious schemes are now made to merge back into
their original element, out of which every mystery and dogma has grown,
developed, and become materialised.
It is more than probable that the
book will be regarded by a large section of the public as a romance of the
wildest kind; for who has ever even heard of the book of Dzyan?
The writer, therefore, is fully
prepared to take all the responsibility for what is contained in this work, and
even to face the charge of having invented the whole of it. That it has many
shortcomings she is fully aware; all that she claims for it is that, romantic
as it may seem to many, its logical coherence and consistency entitle this new
Genesis to rank, at any rate, on a level with the "working
hypotheses" so freely accepted by modern science. Further, it claims
consideration, not by reason of any appeal to dogmatic authority, but because
it closely adheres to Nature, and follows the laws of uniformity and analogy.
The aim of this work may be thus
stated: to show that Nature is not "a fortuitous concurrence of
atoms," and to assign to man his rightful place in the scheme of the
Universe; to rescue from degradation the archaic truths which are the basis of
all religions; and to uncover, to some extent, the fundamental unity from which
they all spring; finally, to show that the occult side of Nature has never been
approached by the Science of modern civilization.
If this is in any degree
accomplished, the writer is content. It is written in the service of humanity,
and by humanity and the future generations it must be judged. Its author
recognises no inferior court of appeal. Abuse she is accustomed to; calumny she
is daily acquainted with; at slander she smiles in silent contempt.
De minimis non curat lex.
H.P.B.
London, October, 1888.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS.
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PAGE.
INTRODUCTION ... xvii.
The Need of such a Book ... xix.
The Antiquity of Documents and MSS.
... xxiii.
What the Book is intended to do ...
xxviii.
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VOLUME FIRST.
COSMOGENESIS.
PROEM ... 1
The Oldest MSS. in the world and its
Symbolism ... 2
The One Life, Active and Passive ...
4
The Secret Doctrine -- Pantheism --
Atheism ... 6
"Space" in all Religions
and in Occultism ... 9
Seven Cosmic Elements -- Seven Races
of Mankind ... 12
The Three Postulates of the Secret
Doctrine ... 14
Description of the Stanzas from the
Book of Dzyan ... 20
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BOOK I. -- PART I.
COSMIC EVOLUTION.
SEVEN STANZAS FROM THE BOOK OF DZYAN
... 27
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STANZA I. -- THE NIGHT OF THE
UNIVERSE... 35
The Seven Eternities ... 36
"Time" ... 37
The Universal Mind and the Dhyan
Chohans ... 38
Nidana and Maya: The Causes of Misery
... 39
The Great Breath ... 43
Being and Non-Being ... 45
The Eye of Dangma ... 47
Alaya, the Universal Soul ... 49
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STANZA II. -- THE IDEA OF
DIFFERENTIATION ... 53
The Absolute knows Itself not ... 55
The Germ of Life was not yet ... 57
The Universe was still concealed in
the Divine Thought ... 61
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STANZA III. -- THE AWAKENING OF
KOSMOS ... 62
The Great Vibration ... 63
Nature's Symbols ... 65
The Power of Numbers ... 67
The Logoi and the Dragon ... 73
The Astral Light ... 75
Primeval Radiations from Unity ... 79
The Web of Being ... 83
Conscious Electricity: Fohat ... 85
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STANZA IV. -- THE SEPTENARY
HIERARCHIES ... 86
The Sons of the Fire ... 86
The Vehicle of the Universe -- the
Dhyan Chohans ... 89
The Army of the Voice ... 93
Speech and Mind ... 95
The Ogdoad and the Heptad ... 99
The Stellar "Sons of Light"
... 103
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STANZA V. -- FOHAT: THE CHILD OF THE
SEPTENARY HIERARCHIES ... 106
The Fiery Whirlwind and the
Primordial Seven ... 106
They Produce Fohat ... 108
The Correlation of the
"Gods" ... 113
Evolution of the
"Principles" of Nature ... 119
The Mystery of the Fire ... 121
The Secret of the Elements ... 123
The Square of the Tabernacle ... 125
The Planetary Spirits and the Lipika
... 129
The Ring "Pass Not" ... 130
The Sidereal Book of Life ... 131
The Soul's Pilgrimage and its
"Rest" ... 134
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STANZA VI. -- OUR WORLD, ITS GROWTH
AND DEVELOPMENT ... 136
The Logos ... 136
Mystery of the Female Logos ... 137
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The Seven Layu Centres ... 138
The "Elementary Germs" ...
139
The Evolution of the Elements ... 140
The Building of the Worlds ... 145
A Neutral Centre ... 147
"Dead" Planets -- The Moon
... 149
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THEOSOPHICAL MISCONCEPTIONS ... 152
The Planetary Divisions and the Human
Principles ... 153
The Moon ... 155
Transmigrations of the Ego ... 159
The Septenary Chain ... 161
Relation of the other Planets to the
Earth ... 163
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EXPLANATIONS CONCERNING THE GLOBES
AND THE MONADS ... 170
The Lunar Chain and the Earth Chain
... 172
The Earth, the Child of the Moon ...
173
Classification of the Monads ... 175
The Monad Defined ... 177
The Lunar Monads -- the Pitris ...
179
A Triple Evolution in Nature ... 181
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STANZA VI. -- CONTINUED ... 191
"Creation" in the Fourth
Round ... 191
The "Curse,"
"Sin," and "War" ... 193
The Struggle for Life and the Birth
of the Worlds ... 202
The Adepts and the Sacred Island ...
207
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STANZA VII. -- THE PARENTS OF MAN ON
EARTH ... 213
Divisions of the Hierarchies ... 214
Correlations of Beings ... 223
What incarnates in Animal Man ... 233
Formation of Man: the Thinker ... 238
Occult and Kabalistic Pneumatics ...
243
Akasa and Ether ... 257
The Invisible "Lives" ...
259
Occult Vital Chemistry and
Bacteriology ... 261
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PAGE.
The Watcher and his Shadow ... 265
Earth peopled by the Shadows of the
Gods ... 267
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SUMMING UP ... 269
The pith and marrow of the Secret
Doctrine ... 273
Hermes in Christian Garb ... 285
Some Occult Aphorisms ... 289
The Seven Powers of Nature ... 293
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BOOK I. -- PART II.
THE EVOLUTION OF SYMBOLISM IN ITS
APPROXIMATE ORDER.
§§
I. SYMBOLISM AND IDEOGRAPHS ... 303
Emblem and Symbol differ ... 305
Magic Potency of Sound ... 307
Mystery Language ... 309
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II. THE MYSTERY LANGUAGE AND ITS KEYS
... 310
Egypt's many Religions ... 311
The Jews and their System ... 313
Moses copied from Sargon ... 319
Identity of Ancient Symbols ... 323
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III. PRIMORDIAL SUBSTANCE AND DIVINE
THOUGHT ... 325
Divine Thought, or Cineritious
Matter? ... 327
Ether and Intelligence ... 330
The Seven Prakritis ... 335
The Mystic Fire ... 339
One Tree of Knowledge ... 341
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IV. CHAOS -- THEOS -- KOSMOS ... 342
The Union of Chaos and Spirit ... 343
The Birth of Mind ... 345
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V. THE HIDDEN DEITY, ITS SYMBOLS AND
GLYPHS ... 349
The Gnostic Idea ... 351
International Correlation of Gods ...
355
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§§ PAGE.
VI. THE MUNDANE EGG ... 359
Egg-born Logoi ... 363
The Winged Globe ... 365
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VII. THE DAYS AND NIGHTS OF BRAHMA
... 368
Human Gods and Divine Men ... 369
The Rebirth of Gods ... 371
The Puranic Prophecy ... 377
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VIII. THE LOTUS AS A UNIVERSAL SYMBOL
... 379
Exoteric and Esoteric ... 381
The Purity of early Phallicism ...
383
The Egyptian Lotus ... 385
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IX. DEUS LUNUS ... 386
A Glance at the Lunar Myth ... 387
A Key-note to the Moon ... 389
Copies and Originals... 393
The Moon Bi-sexual ... 397
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X. TREE AND SERPENT AND CROCODILE
WORSHIP ... 403
Degeneration of the Symbol ... 405
The Seven-headed Dragons ... 407
Dragon and Crocodile ... 409
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XI. DEMON EST DEUS INVERSUS ... 411
Death is Life ... 413
The Fall of the Angels ... 418
Transformation of the Legend ... 421
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XII. THE THEOGONY OF THE CREATIVE
GODS ... 424
The Point within the Circle ... 426
The Logos or Verbum ... 429
The Factors of Creation ... 432
Identity of the Hierarchies in all
Religions ... 438
Difference between the Aryan and
Semitic Systems ... 444
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§§ PAGE.
XIII. THE SEVEN CREATIONS ... 445
The Gnostic and the Hindu Versions
... 449
The Seven Puranic
"Creations" ... 450
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XIV. THE FOUR ELEMENTS. ... 460
The "Gods" and the
"Elements" ... 463
The Language of the Elements ... 464
Pagan and Christian Worship of the
Elements ... 467
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XV. ON KWAN-SHI-YIN AND KWAN-YIN ...
470
Kwan-Shi-Yin and Phallicism ... 471
The Real Meaning ... 472
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BOOK I. -- PART III.
SCIENCE AND THE SECRET DOCTRINE
CONTRASTED.
§§
I. REASONS FOR THESE ADDENDA ... 477
Occultism versus Materialism ... 479
The Sabbath of the Mystic ... 481
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II. MODERN PHYSICISTS ARE PLAYING AT
BLIND MAN'S BUFF ... 482
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III. AN LUMEN SIT CORPUS NEC NON? ...
483
The Hypothetical Ether ... 485
Scientific Theories of its
Constitution ... 489
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IV. IS GRAVITATION A LAW? ... 490
Intelligences or Blind Forces? ...
493
The Cause of Attraction ... 498
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§§ PAGE.
V. THE THEORIES OF ROTATION SCIENCE
... 500
Conflicting Hypotheses ... 502
More Hypotheses ... 505
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VI. THE MASKS OF SCIENCE ... 506
What are the "Forces?" ...
508
The View of the Occultists ... 510
Scientific and Occult Theories on
Heat ... 515
The Atoms of Science ... 519
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VII. AN ATTACK ON THE SCIENTIFIC
THEORY OF FORCE BY A MAN OF SCIENCE ... 523
Ether and Atoms ... 527
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VIII. LIFE, FORCE, OR GRAVITY? ...
529
Dr. Richardson on Nervous Ether ...
531
The Senses and their Action ... 535
Too much "Life" may Kill
... 539
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IX. THE SOLAR THEORY ... 540
The Primordial Element ... 542
Elements and Meta-Elements ... 546
The Tree of Life and Being ... 549
Prof. Crookes on the Elements ... 552
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X. THE COMING FORCE ... 554
Mr. Keeley, an Unconscious Occultist
... 557
Inter-Etheric Waves ... 561
The Secrets of Sound and Odour ...
565
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Xl. ON THE ELEMENTS AND ATOMS ... 566
Metaphysical Chemistry ... 569
What are the Seven Planets? ... 575
The Cyclic Fall of the Gods ... 577
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§§ PAGE.
XII. ANCIENT THOUGHT IN MODERN DRESS
... 579
All-Potential Unity ... 583
The "Seventh" in Chemistry
... 585
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XIII. THE MODERN NEBULAR THEORY ...
588
Forces are Emanations ... 591
What is the Nebula? ... 595
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XIV. FORCES -- MODES OF MOTION OR
INTELLIGENCES? ... 601
The Vital Principle ... 603
Occult and Physical Science ... 605
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XV. GODS, MONADS, AND ATOMS ... 610
The Gods of the Ancients -- the
Monads ... 613
The Monad and the Duad ... 617
The Genesis of the Elements ... 621
Hermes and Huxley ... 625
The Teaching of Leibnitz ... 627
The Monads according to Occultism ...
632
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XVI. CYCLIC EVOLUTION AND KARMA ...
634
Karmic Cycles and Universal Ethics
... 637
Destiny and Karma ... 639
Karma-Nemesis ... 643
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XVII. THE ZODIAC AND ITS ANTIQUITY
... 647
The Jewish Patriarchs and the Signs
of the Zodiac ... 651
Zodiacal Cycles ... 656
Hindu Astronomy ... 661
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XVIII. SUMMARY OF THE MUTUAL POSITION
... 668
Science Confesses her Ignorance ...
669
Materialism is leading Europe towards
a catastrophe ... 675
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N.B. -- The Index and Glossary will
be found at the close of Volume II.
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INTRODUCTORY.
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"Gently to hear, kindly to
judge."
-- SHAKESPEARE.
SINCE the appearance of Theosophical
literature in England, it has become customary to call its teachings
"Esoteric Buddhism." And, having become a habit -- as an old proverb
based on daily experience has it -- "Error runs down an inclined plane,
while Truth has to laboriously climb its way up hill."
Old truisms are often the wisest. The
human mind can hardly remain entirely free from bias, and decisive opinions are
often formed before a thorough examination of a subject from all its aspects
has been made. This is said with reference to the prevailing double mistake (a)
of limiting Theosophy to Buddhism: and (b) of confounding the tenets of the
religious philosophy preached by Gautama, the Buddha, with the doctrines
broadly outlined in "Esoteric Buddhism." Any thing more erroneous
than this could be hardly imagined. It has enabled our enemies to find an
effective weapon against theosophy; because, as an eminent Pali scholar very
pointedly expressed it, there was in the volume named "neither esotericism
nor Buddhism." The esoteric truths, presented in Mr. Sinnett's work, had
ceased to be esoteric from the moment they were made public; nor did it contain
the religion of Buddha, but simply a few tenets from a hitherto hidden teaching
which are now supplemented by many more, enlarged and explained in the present
volumes. But even the latter, though giving out many fundamental tenets from the
SECRET DOCTRINE of the East, raise but a small corner of the dark veil. For no
one, not even the greatest living adept, would be permitted to, or could --
even if he would -- give out promiscuously, to a mocking, unbelieving world,
that which has been so effectually concealed from it for long aeons and ages.
"Esoteric Buddhism" was an
excellent work with a very unfortunate
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title, though it meant no more than
does the title of this work, the "SECRET DOCTRINE." It proved
unfortunate, because people are always in the habit of judging things by their
appearance, rather than their meaning; and because the error has now become so
universal, that even most of the Fellows of the Theosophical Society have
fallen victims to the same misconception. From the first, however, protests
were raised by Brahmins and others against the title; and, in justice to
myself, I must add that "Esoteric Buddhism" was presented to me as a
completed volume, and that I was entirely unaware of the manner in which the
author intended to spell the word "Budh-ism."
This has to be laid directly at the
door of those who, having been the first to bring the subject under public
notice, neglected to point out the difference between "Buddhism" --
the religious system of ethics preached by the Lord Gautama, and named after
his title of Buddha, "the Enlightened" -- and Budha, "Wisdom,"
or knowledge (Vidya), the faculty of cognizing, from the Sanskrit root
"Budh," to know. We theosophists of India are ourselves the real
culprits, although, at the time, we did our best to correct the mistake. (See
Theosophist, June, 1883.) To avoid this deplorable misnomer was easy; the
spelling of the word had only to be altered, and by common consent both
pronounced and written "Budhism," instead of "Buddhism."
Nor is the latter term correctly spelt and pronounced, as it ought to be
called, in English, Buddhaism, and its votaries "Buddhaists."
This explanation is absolutely
necessary at the beginning of a work like this one. The "Wisdom
Religion" is the inheritance of all the nations, the world over, though
the statement was made in "Esoteric Buddhism" (Preface to the
original Edition) that "two years ago (i.e. 1883), neither I nor any other
European living, knew the alphabet of the Science, here for the first time put
into a scientific shape," etc. This error must have crept in through
inadvertence. For the present writer knew all that which is
"divulged" in "Esoteric Buddhism" -- and much more -- many
years before it became her duty (in 1880) to impart a small portion of the
Secret Doctrine to two European gentlemen, one of whom was the author of
"Esoteric Buddhism"; and surely the present writer has the undoubted,
though to her, rather equivocal, privilege of being a European, by birth and
education. Moreover, a considerable part of the philosophy
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expounded by Mr. Sinnett was taught
in America, even before Isis Unveiled was published, to two Europeans and to my
colleague, Colonel H. S. Olcott. Of the three teachers the latter gentleman has
had, the first was a Hungarian Initiate, the second an Egyptian, the third a
Hindu. As permitted, Colonel Olcott has given out some of this teaching in
various ways; if the other two have not, it has been simply because they were
not allowed: their time for public work having not yet come. But for others it
has, and the appearance of Mr. Sinnett's several interesting books is a visible
proof of the fact. It is above everything important to keep in mind that no
theosophical book acquires the least additional value from pretended authority.
In etymology Adi, and Adhi Budha, the
one (or the First) and "Supreme Wisdom" is a term used by Aryasanga
in his Secret treatises, and now by all the mystic Northern Buddhists. It is a
Sanskrit term, and an appellation given by the earliest Aryans to the Unknown
deity; the word "Brahma" not being found in the Vedas and the early
works. It means the absolute Wisdom, and "Adi-bhuta" is translated "the
primeval uncreated cause of all" by Fitzedward Hall. AEons of untold
duration must have elapsed, before the epithet of Buddha was so humanized, so
to speak, as to allow of the term being applied to mortals and finally
appropriated to one whose unparalleled virtues and knowledge caused him to
receive the title of the "Buddha of Wisdom unmoved." Bodha means the
innate possession of divine intellect or "understanding";
"Buddha," the acquirement of it by personal efforts and merit; while
Buddhi is the faculty of cognizing the channel through which divine knowledge
reaches the "Ego," the discernment of good and evil, "divine
conscience" also; and "Spiritual Soul," which is the vehicle of
Atma. "When Buddhi absorbs our EGOtism (destroys it) with all its Vikaras,
Avalokiteshvara becomes manifested to us, and Nirvana, or Mukti, is
reached," "Mukti" being the same as Nirvana, i.e., freedom from
the trammels of "Maya" or illusion. "Bodhi" is likewise the
name of a particular state of trance condition, called Samadhi, during which
the subject reaches the culmination of spiritual knowledge.
Unwise are those who, in their blind
and, in our age, untimely hatred of Buddhism, and, by re-action, of
"Budhism," deny its esoteric teachings (which are those also of the
Brahmins), simply because the name
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suggests what to them, as
Monotheists, are noxious doctrines. Unwise is the correct term to use in their
case. For the Esoteric philosophy is alone calculated to withstand, in this age
of crass and illogical materialism, the repeated attacks on all and everything
man holds most dear and sacred, in his inner spiritual life. The true
philosopher, the student of the Esoteric Wisdom, entirely loses sight of
personalities, dogmatic beliefs and special religions. Moreover, Esoteric
philosophy reconciles all religions, strips every one of its outward, human
garments, and shows the root of each to be identical with that of every other
great religion. It proves the necessity of an absolute Divine Principle in
nature. It denies Deity no more than it does the Sun. Esoteric philosophy has never
rejected God in Nature, nor Deity as the absolute and abstract Ens. It only
refuses to accept any of the gods of the so-called monotheistic religions, gods
created by man in his own image and likeness, a blasphemous and sorry
caricature of the Ever Unknowable. Furthermore, the records we mean to place
before the reader embrace the esoteric tenets of the whole world since the
beginning of our humanity, and Buddhistic occultism occupies therein only its
legitimate place, and no more. Indeed, the secret portions of the
"Dan" or Jan-na"* ("Dhyan") of Gautama's metaphysics
-- grand as they appear to one unacquainted with the tenets of the Wisdom
Religion of antiquity -- are but a very small portion of the whole. The Hindu
Reformer limited his public teachings to the purely moral and physiological
aspect of the Wisdom Religion, to Ethics and MAN alone. Things "unseen and
incorporeal," the mystery of Being outside our terrestrial sphere, the
great Teacher left entirely untouched in his public lectures, reserving the
hidden Truths for a select circle of his Arhats. The latter received their
Initiation at the famous Saptaparna cave (the Sattapanni of Mahavansa) near
Mount Baibhar (the Webhara of the Pali MSS.). This cave was in Rajagriha, the
ancient capital of Mogadha, and was the Cheta cave of Fa-hian, as rightly
suspected by some archaeologists.**
Time and human imagination made short
work of the purity and philo-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Dan, now become in modern Chinese
and Tibetan phonetics ch'an, is the general term for the esoteric schools, and
their literature. In the old books, the word Janna is defined as "to
reform one's self by meditation and knowledge," a second inner birth.
Hence Dzan, Djan phonetically, the "Book of Dzyan."
** Mr. Beglor, the chief engineer at
Buddhagaya, and a distinguished archaeologist, was the first, we believe, to
discover it.
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sophy of these teachings, once that
they were transplanted from the secret and sacred circle of the Arhats, during
the course of their work of proselytism, into a soil less prepared for
metaphysical conceptions than India; i.e., once they were transferred into
China, Japan, Siam, and Burmah. How the pristine purity of these grand
revelations was dealt with may be seen in studying some of the so-called
"esoteric" Buddhist schools of antiquity in their modern garb, not
only in China and other Buddhist countries in general, but even in not a few
schools in Thibet, left to the care of uninitiated Lamas and Mongolian
innovators.
Thus the reader is asked to bear in
mind the very important difference between orthodox Buddhism -- i.e., the
public teachings of Gautama the Buddha, and his esoteric Budhism. His Secret
Doctrine, however, differed in no wise from that of the initiated Brahmins of
his day. The Buddha was a child of the Aryan soil; a born Hindu, a Kshatrya and
a disciple of the "twice born" (the initiated Brahmins) or Dwijas.
His teachings, therefore, could not be different from their doctrines, for the
whole Buddhist reform merely consisted in giving out a portion of that which
had been kept secret from every man outside of the "enchanted" circle
of Temple-Initiates and ascetics. Unable to teach all that had been imparted to
him -- owing to his pledges -- though he taught a philosophy built upon the
ground-work of the true esoteric knowledge, the Buddha gave to the world only
its outward material body and kept its soul for his Elect. (See also Volume
II.) Many Chinese scholars among Orientalists have heard of the "Soul
Doctrine." None seem to have understood its real meaning and importance.
That doctrine was preserved secretly
-- too secretly, perhaps -- within the sanctuary. The mystery that shrouded its
chief dogma and aspirations -- Nirvana -- has so tried and irritated the
curiosity of those scholars who have studied it, that, unable to solve it
logically and satisfactorily by untying the Gordian knot, they cut it through,
by declaring that Nirvana meant absolute annihilation.
Toward the end of the first quarter
of this century, a distinct class of literature appeared in the world, which
became with every year more defined in its tendency. Being based, soi-disant,
on the scholarly researches of Sanskritists and Orientalists in general, it was
held scientific. Hindu, Egyptian, and other ancient religions, myths, and
emblems were made to yield anything the symbologist wanted them to
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yield, thus often giving out the rude
outward form in place of the inner meaning. Works, most remarkable for their
ingenious deductions and speculations, in circulo vicioso, foregone conclusions
generally changing places with premisses as in the syllogisms of more than one
Sanskrit and Pali scholar, appeared rapidly in succession, over-flooding the
libraries with dissertations rather on phallic and sexual worship than on real
symbology, and each contradicting the other.
This is the true reason, perhaps, why
the outline of a few fundamental truths from the Secret Doctrine of the Archaic
ages is now permitted to see the light, after long millenniums of the most
profound silence and secrecy. I say "a few truths," advisedly, because
that which must remain unsaid could not be contained in a hundred such volumes,
nor could it be imparted to the present generation of Sadducees. But, even the
little that is now given is better than complete silence upon those vital
truths. The world of to-day, in its mad career towards the unknown -- which it
is too ready to confound with the unknowable, whenever the problem eludes the
grasp of the physicist -- is rapidly progressing on the reverse, material plane
of spirituality. It has now become a vast arena -- a true valley of discord and
of eternal strife -- a necropolis, wherein lie buried the highest and the most
holy aspirations of our Spirit-Soul. That soul becomes with every new
generation more paralyzed and atrophied. The "amiable infidels and accomplished
profligates" of Society, spoken of by Greeley, care little for the revival
of the dead sciences of the past; but there is a fair minority of earnest
students who are entitled to learn the few truths that may be given to them
now; and now much more than ten years ago, when "Isis Unveiled," or
even the later attempts to explain the mysteries of esoteric science, were
published.
One of the greatest, and, withal, the
most serious objection to the correctness and reliability of the whole work
will be the preliminary STANZAS: "How can the statements contained in them
be verified?" True, if a great portion of the Sanskrit, Chinese, and
Mongolian works quoted in the present volumes are known to some Orientalists,
the chief work -- that one from which the Stanzas are given -- is not in the
possession of European Libraries. The Book of Dzyan (or "Dzan") is
utterly unknown to our Philologists, or at any rate was never heard of by them
under its present name. This is, of course, a great drawback
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to those who follow the methods of
research prescribed by official Science; but to the students of Occultism, and
to every genuine Occultist, this will be of little moment. The main body of the
Doctrines given is found scattered throughout hundreds and thousands of
Sanskrit MSS., some already translated -- disfigured in their interpretations,
as usual, -- others still awaiting their turn. Every scholar, therefore, has an
opportunity of verifying the statements herein made, and of checking most of
the quotations. A few new facts (new to the profane Orientalist, only) and
passages quoted from the Commentaries will be found difficult to trace. Several
of the teachings, also, have hitherto been transmitted orally: yet even those
are in every instance hinted at in the almost countless volumes of Brahminical,
Chinese and Tibetan temple-literature.
However it may be, and whatsoever is
in store for the writer through malevolent criticism, one fact is quite
certain. The members of several esoteric schools -- the seat of which is beyond
the Himalayas, and whose ramifications may be found in China, Japan, India, Tibet,
and even in Syria, besides South America -- claim to have in their possession
the sum total of sacred and philosophical works in MSS. and type: all the
works, in fact, that have ever been written, in whatever language or
characters, since the art of writing began; from the ideographic hieroglyphs
down to the alphabet of Cadmus and the Devanagari.
It has been claimed in all ages that
ever since the destruction of the Alexandrian Library (see Isis Unveiled, Vol.
II., p. 27), every work of a character that might have led the profane to the
ultimate discovery and comprehension of some of the mysteries of the Secret
Science, was, owing to the combined efforts of the members of the Brotherhoods,
diligently searched for. It is added, moreover, by those who know, that once
found, save three copies left and stored safely away, such works were all
destroyed. In India, the last of the precious manuscripts were secured and
hidden during the reign of the Emperor Akbar.*
It is maintained, furthermore, that
every sacred book of that kind, whose text was not sufficiently veiled in
symbolism, or which had any
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Prof. Max Muller shows that no
bribes or threats of Akbar could extort from the Brahmans the original text of
the Veda; and boasts that European Orientalists have it (Lecture on the
"Science of Religion," p. 23). Whether Europe has the complete text
is very doubtful, and the future may have very disagreeable surprises in store
for the Orientalists.
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direct references to the ancient
mysteries, after having been carefully copied in cryptographic characters, such
as to defy the art of the best and cleverest palaeographer, was also destroyed
to the last copy. During Akbar's reign, some fanatical courtiers, displeased at
the Emperor's sinful prying into the religions of the infidels, themselves
helped the Brahmans to conceal their MSS. Such was Badaoni, who had an
undisguised horror for Akbar's mania for idolatrous religions.*
Moreover in all the large and wealthy
lamasaries, there are subterranean crypts and cave-libraries, cut in the rock,
whenever the gonpa and the lhakhang are situated in the mountains. Beyond the
Western Tsay-dam, in the solitary passes of Kuen-lun** there are several such
hiding places. Along the ridge of Altyn-Toga, whose soil no European foot has
ever trodden so far, there exists a certain hamlet, lost in a deep gorge. It is
a small cluster of houses, a hamlet rather than a monastery, with a
poor-looking temple in it, with one old lama, a hermit, living near by to watch
it. Pilgrims say that the subterranean galleries and halls under it contain a
collection of books, the number of which, according to the accounts given, is
too large to find room even in the British Museum.***
All this is very likely to provoke a
smile of doubt. But then, before
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Badaoni wrote in his Muntakhab at
Tawarikh: "His Majesty relished inquiries into the sects of these infidels
(who cannot be counted, so numerous they are, and who have no end of revealed
books) . . . As they (the Sramana and Brahmins) surpass other learned men in
their treatises on morals, on physical and religious sciences, and reach a high
degree in their knowledge of the future, in spiritual power, and human
perfection, they brought proofs based on reason and testimony, and inculcated
their doctrines so firmly that no man could now raise a doubt in his Majesty
even if mountains were to crumble to dust, or the heavens were to tear
asunder." This work "was kept secret, and was not published till the
reign of Jahangir." (Ain i Akbari, translated by Dr. Blochmann, p. 104,
note.)
** Karakorum mountains, Western
Tibet.
*** According to the same tradition
the now desolate regions of the waterless land of Tarim -- a true wilderness in
the heart of Turkestan -- were in the days of old covered with flourishing and
wealthy cities. At present, hardly a few verdant oases relieve its dead
solitude. One such, sprung on the sepulchre of a vast city swallowed by and
buried under the sandy soil of the desert, belongs to no one, but is often
visited by Mongolians and Buddhists. The same tradition speaks of immense
subterranean abodes, of large corridors filled with tiles and cylinders. It may
be an idle rumour, and it may be an actual fact.
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the reader rejects the truthfulness
of the reports, let him pause and reflect over the following well known facts.
The collective researches of the Orientalists, and especially the labours of
late years of the students of comparative Philology and the Science of
Religions have led them to ascertain as follows: An immense, incalculable
number of MSS., and even printed works known to have existed, are now to be
found no more. They have disappeared without leaving the slightest trace behind
them. Were they works of no importance they might, in the natural course of
time, have been left to perish, and their very names would have been
obliterated from human memory. But it is not so; for, as now ascertained, most
of them contained the true keys to works still extant, and entirely
incomprehensible, for the greater portion of their readers, without those
additional volumes of Commentaries and explanations. Such are, for instance,
the works of Lao-tse, the predecessor of Confucius.*
He is said to have written 930 books
on Ethics and religions, and seventy on magic, one thousand in all. His great
work, however, the heart of his doctrine, the "Tao-te-King," or the
sacred scriptures of the Taosse, has in it, as Stanislas Julien shows, only
"about 5,000 words" (Tao-te-King, p. xxvii.), hardly a dozen of
pages, yet Professor Max Muller finds that "the text is unintelligible
without commentaries, so that Mr. Julien had to consult more than sixty
commentators for the purpose of his translation," the earliest going back
as far as the year 163 B.C., not earlier, as we see. During the four centuries
and a half that preceded this earliest of the commentators there was ample time
to veil the true Lao-tse doctrine from all but his initiated priests. The
Japanese, among whom are now to be found the most learned of the priests and
followers of Lao-tse, simply laugh at the blunders and hypotheses of the
European Chinese scholars; and tradition affirms that the commentaries to which
our Western Sinologues have access are not the real occult records, but
intentional veils, and that the true commentaries, as well as almost all the
texts, have long since disappeared from the eyes of the profane.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "If we turn to China, we find
that the religion of Confucius is founded on the Five King and the Four
Shu-books, in themselves of considerable extent and surrounded by voluminous
Commentaries, without which even the most learned scholars would not venture to
fathom the depth of their sacred canon." (Lectures on the "Science of
Religion," p. 185. Max Muller.) But they have not fathomed it -- and this
is the complaint of the Confucianists, as a very learned member of that body,
in Paris, complained in 1881.
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If one turns to the ancient
literature of the Semitic religions, to the Chaldean Scriptures, the elder
sister and instructress, if not the fountain-head of the Mosaic Bible, the
basis and starting-point of Christianity, what do the scholars find? To
perpetuate the memory of the ancient religions of Babylon; to record the vast
cycle of astronomical observations of the Chaldean Magi; to justify the
tradition of their splendid and eminently occult literature, what now remains?
-- only a few fragments, said to be by Berosus.
These, however, are almost valueless,
even as a clue to the character of what has disappeared. For they passed
through the hands of his Reverence the Bishop of Caesarea -- that
self-constituted censor and editor of the sacred records of other men's
religions -- and they doubtless bear to this day the mark of his eminently
veracious and trustworthy hand. For what is the history of this treatise on the
once grand religion of Babylon?
Written in Greek by Berosus, a priest
of the temple of Belus, for Alexander the Great, from the astronomical and
chronological records preserved by the priests of that temple, and covering a
period of 200,000 years, it is now lost. In the first century B.C. Alexander
Polyhistor made a series of extracts from it -- also lost. Eusebius used these
extracts in writing his Chronicon (270-340 A.D.). The points of resemblance --
almost of identity -- between the Jewish and the Chaldean Scriptures,* made the
latter most dangerous to Eusebius, in his role of defender and champion of the
new faith which had adopted the Jewish Scriptures, and with them an absurd
chronology. It is pretty certain that Eusebius did not spare the Egyptian
Synchronistic tables of Manetho -- so much so that Bunsen** charges him with
mutilating history most unscrupulously. And Socrates, a historian of the fifth
century, and Syncellus, vice-patriarch of Constantinople (eighth century), both
denounce him as the most daring and desperate forger.
Is it likely, then, that he dealt
more tenderly with the Chaldean records, which were already menacing the new
religion, so rashly accepted?
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Found out and proven only now,
through the discoveries made by George Smith (vide his "Chaldean account
of Genesis"), and which, thanks to this Armenian forger, have misled all
the civilized nations for over 1,500 years into accepting Jewish derivations
for direct Divine Revelation!
** Bunsen's "Egypt's Place in History,"
vol. i. p. 200
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So that, with the exception of these
more than doubtful fragments, the entire Chaldean sacred literature has
disappeared from the eyes of the profane as completely as the lost Atlantis. A
few facts that were contained in the Berosian History are given in Part II. of
Vol. II., and may throw a great light on the true origin of the Fallen Angels,
personified by Bel and the Dragon.
Turning now to the oldest Aryan
literature, the Rig-Veda, the student will find, following strictly in this the
data furnished by the said Orientalists themselves, that, although the Rig-Veda
contains only "about 10,580 verses, or 1,028 hymns," in spite of the
Brahmanas and the mass of glosses and commentaries, it is not understood
correctly to this day. Why is this so? Evidently because the Brahmanas,
"the scholastic and oldest treatises on the primitive hymns,"
themselves require a key, which the Orientalists have failed to secure.
What do the scholars say of Buddhist
literature? Have they got it in its completeness? Assuredly not.
Notwithstanding the 325 volumes of the Kanjur and the Tanjur of the Northern
Buddhists, each volume we are told, "weighing from four to five
pounds," nothing, in truth, is known of Lamaism. Yet, the sacred canon of
the Southern Church is said to contain 29,368,000 letters in the Saddharma
alankara,* or, exclusive of treatises and commentaries, "five or six times
the amount of the matter contained in the Bible," the latter, in the words
of Professor Max Muller, rejoicing only in 3,567,180 letters. Notwithstanding,
then, these "325 volumes" (in reality there are 333, Kanjur
comprising 108, and Tanjur 225 volumes), "the translators, instead of
supplying us with correct versions, have interwoven them with their own
commentaries, for the purpose of justifying the dogmas of their several
schools."** Moreover, "according to a tradition preserved by the
Buddhist schools, both of the South and of the North, the sacred Buddhist Canon
comprised originally 80,000 or 84,000 tracts, but most of them were lost, so
that there remained but 6,000," the professor tells his audiences. "Lost"
as usual for Europeans. But who can be quite sure that they are likewise lost
for Buddhists and Brahmins?
Considering the sacredness for the
Buddhists of every line written
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Spence Hardy, "The Legends and
Theories of the Buddhists," p. 66.
** "Buddhism in Tibet," p.
78.
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upon Buddha or his "Good
Law," the loss of nearly 76,000 tracts does seem miraculous. Had it been
vice versa, every one acquainted with the natural course of events would
subscribe to the statement that, of these 76,000, five or six thousand
treatises might have been destroyed during the persecutions in, and emigrations
from, India. But as it is well ascertained that Buddhist Arhats began their
religious exodus, for the purpose of propagating the new faith beyond Kashmir
and the Himalayas, as early as the year 300 before our era,* and reached China
in the year 61 A.D.** when Kashyapa, at the invitation of the Emperor Ming-ti,
went there to acquaint the "Son of Heaven" with the tenets of
Buddhism, it does seem strange to hear the Orientalists speaking of such a loss
as though it were really possible. They do not seem to allow for one moment the
possibility that the texts may be lost only for West and for themselves; or,
that the Asiatic people should have the unparalleled boldness to keep their
most sacred records out of the reach of foreigners, thus refusing to deliver
them to the profanation and misuse of races even so "vastly superior"
to themselves.
Owing to the expressed regrets and
numerous confessions of almost every one of the Orientalists (See Max Muller's
Lectures for example) the public may feel sufficiently sure (a) that the
students of ancient religions have indeed very few data upon which to build
such final conclusions as they generally do about the old religions, and (b)
that such lack of data does not prevent them in the least from dogmatising. One
would imagine that, thanks to the numerous records of the Egyptian theogony and
mysteries preserved in the classics, and in a number of ancient writers, the
rites and dogmas of Pharaonic Egypt ought to be well understood at least;
better, at any rate, than the too abstruse philosophies and Pantheism of India,
of whose religion and language Europe had hardly any idea before the beginning
of the present century. Along the Nile and on the face of the whole country,
there stand to this hour, exhumed yearly and daily, fresh relics which
eloquently tell their own history. Still it is not so. The learned Oxford
philologist himself confesses the truth by saying that "Though . . . we
see still standing the Pyramids, and the ruins of temples and labyrinths, their
walls
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Lassen, ("Ind.
Althersumkunde" Vol. II, p. 1,072) shows a Buddhist monastery erected in
the Kailas range in 137 B.C.; and General Cunningham, earlier than that.
** Reverend T. Edkins, "Chinese
Buddhism."
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covered with hieroglyphic
inscriptions, and with the strange pictures of gods and goddesses. . . . . On
rolls of papyrus, which seem to defy the ravages of time, we have even
fragments of what may be called the sacred books of the Egyptians; yet, though
much has been deciphered in the ancient records of that mysterious race, the
mainspring of the religion of Egypt and the original intention of its
ceremonial worship are far from being fully disclosed to us."* Here again
the mysterious hieroglyphic documents remain, but the keys by which alone they
become intelligible have disappeared.
Nevertheless, having found that
"there is a natural connection between language and religion"; and,
secondly, that there was a common Aryan religion before the separation of the
Aryan race; a common Semitic religion before the separation of the Semitic
race; and a common Turanian religion before the separation of the Chinese and
the other tribes belonging to the Turanian class; having, in fact, only discovered
"three ancient centres of religion" and "three centres of
language," and though as entirely ignorant of those primitive religions
and languages, as of their origin, the professor does not hesitate to declare
"that a truly historical basis for a scientific treatment of those
principal religions of the world has been gained!"
A "scientific treatment" of
a subject is no guarantee for its "historical basis"; and with such
scarcity of data on hand, no philologist, even among the most eminent, is
justified in giving out his own conclusions for historical facts. No doubt, the
eminent Orientalist has proved thoroughly to the world's satisfaction, that
according to Grimm's law of phonetic rules, Odin and Buddha are two different
personages, quite distinct from each other, and he has shown it scientifically.
When, however, he takes the opportunity of saying in the same breath that Odin
"was worshipped as the supreme deity during a period long anterior to the
age of the Veda and of Homer" (Compar. Theol., p. 318), he has not the
slightest "historical basis" for it. He makes history and fact
subservient to his
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* So little acquainted are our
greatest Egyptologists with the funerary rites of the Egyptians and the outward
marks of the difference of sexes made on the mummies, that it has led to the
most ludicrous mistakes. Only a year or two since, one of that kind was
discovered at Boulaq, Cairo. The mummy of what had been considered the wife of
an unimportant Pharaoh, has turned out, thanks to an inscription found on an
amulet hung on his neck, to be that of Sesostris -- the greatest King of Egypt!
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own conclusions, which may be very
"scientific," in the sight of Oriental scholars, but yet very wide of
the mark of actual truth. The conflicting views on the subject of chronology,
in the case of the Vedas, of the various eminent philologists and Orientalists,
from Martin Haug down to Mr. Max Muller himself, are an evident proof that the
statement has no historical basis to stand upon, "internal evidence"
being very often a jack-o'lantern, instead of a safe beacon to follow. Nor has
the Science of modern Comparative Mythology any better proof to show, that
those learned writers, who have insisted for the last century or so that there
must have been "fragments of a primeval revelation, granted to the
ancestors of the whole race of mankind . . . . preserved in the temples of
Greece and Italy," were entirely wrong. For this is what all the Eastern
Initiates and Pundits have been proclaiming to the world from time to time.
While a prominent Cinghalese priest assured the writer that it was well known
that the most important Buddhist tracts belonging to the sacred canon were
stored away in countries and places inaccessible to the European pundits, the
late Swami Dayanand Sarasvati, the greatest Sanskritist of his day in India,
assured some members of the Theosophical Society of the same fact with regard
to ancient Brahmanical works. When told that Professor Max Muller had declared
to the audiences of his "Lectures" that the theory . . . . "that
there was a primeval preternatural revelation granted to the fathers of the
human race, finds but few supporters at present," -- the holy and learned
man laughed. His answer was suggestive. "If Mr. Moksh Mooller, as he
pronounced the name, were a Brahmin, and came with me, I might take him to a
gupta cave (a secret crypt) near Okhee Math, in the Himalayas, where he would
soon find out that what crossed the Kalapani (the black waters of the ocean)
from India to Europe were only the bits of rejected copies of some passages
from our sacred books. There was a "primeval revelation," and it
still exists; nor will it ever be lost to the world, but will reappear; though
the Mlechchhas will of course have to wait."
Questioned further on this point, he
would say no more. This was at Meerut, in 1880.
No doubt the mystification played, in
the last century at Calcutta, by the Brahmins upon Colonel Wilford and Sir
William Jones was a cruel one. But it had been well deserved, and no one was
more to be blamed
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in that affair than the Missionaries
and Colonel Wilford themselves. The former, on the testimony of Sir William
Jones himself (see Asiat. Res., Vol. I., p. 272), were silly enough to maintain
that "the Hindus were even now almost Christians, because their Brahma,
Vishnu and Mahesa were no other than the Christian trinity."* It was a
good lesson. It made the Oriental scholars doubly cautious; but perchance it
has also made some of them too shy, and caused, in its reaction, the pendulum
of foregone conclusions to swing too much the other way. For "that first
supply on the Brahmanical market," made for Colonel Wilford, has now
created an evident necessity and desire in the Orientalists to declare nearly
every archaic Sanskrit manuscript so modern as to give to the missionaries full
justification for availing themselves of the opportunity. That they do so and
to the full extent of their mental powers, is shown by the absurd attempts of
late to prove that the whole Puranic story about Chrishna was plagiarized by
the Brahmins from the Bible! But the facts cited by the Oxford Professor in his
Lectures on the "Science of Religion," concerning the now famous
interpolations, for the benefit, and later on to the sorrow, of Col. Wilford,
do not at all interfere with the conclusions to which one who studies the Secret
Doctrine must unavoidably come. For, if the results show that neither the New
nor even the Old Testament borrowed anything from the more ancient religion of
the Brahmans and Buddhists, it does not follow that the Jews have not borrowed
all they knew from the Chaldean records, the latter being mutilated later on by
Eusebius. As to the Chaldeans, they assuredly got their primitive learning from
the Brahmans, for Rawlinson shows an undeniably Vedic influence in the early
mythology of Babylon; and Col. Vans Kennedy has long since justly declared that
Babylonia was, from her origin, the seat of Sanskrit and Brahman learning. But
all such proofs must lose their value, in the presence of the latest theory
worked out by Prof. Max Muller. What it is everyone knows. The code of phonetic
laws has now become a universal solvent for every identification and
"connection" between
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Max Muller's "Introduction
to the Science of Religion." Lecture On False Analogies in comparative
Theology, pp. 288 and 296 et seq. This relates to the clever forgery (on leaves
inserted in old Puranic MSS.), in correct and archaic Sanskrit, of all that the
Pundits of Col. Wilford had heard from him about Adam and Abraham, Noah and his
three sons, etc., etc
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the gods of many nations. Thus,
though the Mother of Mercury (Budha, Thot-Hermes, etc.), was Maia, the mother
of Buddha (Gautama), also Maya, and the mother of Jesus, likewise Maya
(illusion, for Mary is Mare, the Sea, the great illusion symbolically) -- yet
these three characters have no connection, nor can they have any, since Bopp,
has "laid down his code of phonetic laws."
In their efforts to collect together
the many skeins of unwritten history, it is a bold step for our Orientalists to
take, to deny, a priori, everything that does not dovetail with their special
conclusions. Thus, while new discoveries are daily made of great arts and
sciences having existed far back in the night of time, even the knowledge of
writing is refused to some of the most ancient nations, and they are credited
with barbarism instead of culture. Yet the traces of an immense civilization,
even in Central Asia, are still to be found. This civilization is undeniably
prehistoric. And how can there be civilization without a literature, in some
form, without annals or chronicles? Common sense alone ought to supplement the
broken links in the history of departed nations. The gigantic, unbroken wall of
the mountains that hem in the whole table-land of Tibet, from the upper course
of the river Khuan-Khe down to the Kara-Korum hills, witnessed a civilization
during millenniums of years, and would have strange secrets to tell mankind.
The Eastern and Central portions of those regions -- the Nan-Schayn and the
Altyne-taga -- were once upon a time covered with cities that could well vie
with Babylon. A whole geological period has swept over the land, since those
cities breathed their last, as the mounds of shifting sand, and the sterile and
now dead soil of the immense central plains of the basin of Tarim testify. The
borderlands alone are superficially known to the traveller. Within those
table-lands of sand there is water, and fresh oases are found blooming there,
wherein no European foot has ever yet ventured, or trodden the now treacherous
soil. Among these verdant oases there are some which are entirely inaccessible
even to the native profane traveller. Hurricanes may "tear up the sands
and sweep whole plains away," they are powerless to destroy that which is
beyond their reach. Built deep in the bowels of the earth, the subterranean
stores are secure; and as their entrances are concealed in such oases, there is
little fear that any one should discover them, even should several armies
invade the sandy wastes where --
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"Not a pool, not a bush, not a
house is seen,
And the mountain-range forms a rugged
screen
Round the parch'd flats of the dry,
dry desert. . . . ."
But there is no need to send the
reader across the desert, when the same proofs of ancient civilization are
found even in comparatively populated regions of the same country. The oasis of
Tchertchen, for instance, situated about 4,000 feet above the level of the
river Tchertchen-D'arya, is surrounded with the ruins of archaic towns and
cities in every direction. There, some 3,000 human beings represent the relics
of about a hundred extinct nations and races -- the very names of which are now
unknown to our ethnologists. An anthropologist would feel more than embarrassed
to class, divide and subdivide them; the more so, as the respective descendants
of all these antediluvian races and tribes know as little of their own
forefathers themselves, as if they had fallen from the moon. When questioned
about their origin, they reply that they know not whence their fathers had
come, but had heard that their first (or earliest) men were ruled by the great
genii of these deserts. This may be put down to ignorance and superstition, yet
in view of the teachings of the Secret Doctrine, the answer may be based upon
primeval tradition. Alone, the tribe of Khoorassan claims to have come from
what is now known as Afghanistan, long before the days of Alexander, and brings
legendary lore to that effect as corroboration. The Russian traveller, Colonel
(now General) Prjevalsky, found quite close to the oasis of Tchertchen, the
ruins of two enormous cities, the oldest of which was, according to local
tradition, ruined 3,000 years ago by a hero and giant; and the other by the
Mongolians in the tenth century of our era. "The emplacement of the two
cities is now covered, owing to shifting sands and the desert wind, with
strange and heterogeneous relics; with broken china and kitchen utensils and
human bones. The natives often find copper and gold coins, melted silver,
ingots, diamonds, and turquoises, and what is the most remarkable -- broken
glass. . . . ." "Coffins of some undecaying wood, or material, also,
within which beautifully preserved embalmed bodies are found. . . . . The male
mummies are all extremely tall powerfully built men with long waving hair. . .
. . A vault was found with twelve dead men sitting in it. Another time, in a
separate coffin, a young girl was discovered by us. Her eyes were closed with
golden discs, and the jaws held firm by a golden circlet running from under the
chin across the top of the head. Clad in a narrow
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woollen garment, her bosom was
covered with golden stars, the feet being left naked." (From a lecture by
N. M. Prjevalsky.) To this, the famous traveller adds that all along their way
on the river Tchertchen they heard legends about twenty-three towns buried ages
ago by the shifting sands of the deserts. The same tradition exists on the
Lob-nor and in the oasis of Kerya.
The traces of such civilization, and
these and like traditions, give us the right to credit other legendary lore
warranted by well educated and learned natives of India and Mongolia, when they
speak of immense libraries reclaimed from the sand, together with various
reliques of ancient MAGIC lore, which have all been safely stowed away.
To recapitulate. The Secret Doctrine
was the universally diffused religion of the ancient and prehistoric world.
Proofs of its diffusion, authentic records of its history, a complete chain of
documents, showing its character and presence in every land, together with the
teaching of all its great adepts, exist to this day in the secret crypts of
libraries belonging to the Occult Fraternity.
This statement is rendered more
credible by a consideration of the following facts: the tradition of the
thousands of ancient parchments saved when the Alexandrian library was
destroyed; the thousands of Sanskrit works which disappeared in India in the
reign of Akbar; the universal tradition in China and Japan that the true old
texts with the commentaries, which alone make them comprehensible -- amounting
to many thousands of volumes -- have long passed out of the reach of profane
hands; the disappearance of the vast sacred and occult literature of Babylon;
the loss of those keys which alone could solve the thousand riddles of the
Egyptian hieroglyphic records; the tradition in India that the real secret
commentaries which alone make the Veda intelligible, though no longer visible
to profane eyes, still remain for the initiate, hidden in secret caves and crypts;
and an identical belief among the Buddhists, with regard to their secret books.
The Occultists assert that all these
exist, safe from Western spoliating hands, to re-appear in some more
enlightened age, for which in the words of the late Swami Dayanand Sarasvati,
"the Mlechchhas (outcasts, savages, those beyond the pale of Aryan
civilization) will have to wait."
For it is not the fault of the
initiates that these documents are now "lost" to the profane; nor was
their policy dictated by selfishness, or
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any desire to monopolise the
life-giving sacred lore. There were portions of the Secret Science that for
incalculable ages had to remain concealed from the profane gaze. But this was
because to impart to the unprepared multitude secrets of such tremendous
importance, was equivalent to giving a child a lighted candle in a powder
magazine.
The answer to a question which has
frequently arisen in the minds of students, when meeting with statements such
as this, may be outlined here.
"We can understand," they
say, "the necessity for concealing from the herd such secrets as the Vril,
or the rock-destroying force, discovered by J. W. Keely, of Philadelphia, but
we cannot understand how any danger could arise from the revelation of such a
purely philosophic doctrine, as, e.g., the evolution of the planetary
chains."
The danger was this: Doctrines such
as the planetary chain, or the seven races, at once give a clue to the
seven-fold nature of man, for each principle is correlated to a plane, a
planet, and a race; and the human principles are, on every plane, correlated to
seven-fold occult forces -- those of the higher planes being of tremendous
power. So that any septenary division at once gives a clue to tremendous occult
powers, the abuse of which would cause incalculable evil to humanity. A clue,
which is, perhaps, no clue to the present generation -- especially the Westerns
-- protected as they are by their very blindness and ignorant materialistic
disbelief in the occult; but a clue which would, nevertheless, have been very
real in the early centuries of the Christian era, to people fully convinced of
the reality of occultism, and entering a cycle of degradation, which made them
rife for abuse of occult powers and sorcery of the worst description.
The documents were concealed, it is
true, but the knowledge itself and its actual existence had never been made a
secret of by the Hierophants of the Temple, wherein MYSTERIES have ever been
made a discipline and stimulus to virtue. This is very old news, and was
repeatedly made known by the great adepts, from Pythagoras and Plato down to
the Neoplatonists. It was the new religion of the Nazarenes that wrought a
change for the worse -- in the policy of centuries.
Moreover, there is a well-known fact,
a very curious one, corroborated to the writer by a reverend gentleman attached
for years to a Russian Embassy -- namely, that there are several documents in
the St. Peters-
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burg Imperial Libraries to show that,
even so late as during the days when Freemasonry, and Secret Societies of
Mystics flourished unimpeded in Russia, i.e., at the end of the last and the
beginning of the present century, more than one Russian Mystic travelled to
Tibet via the Ural mountains in search of knowledge and initiation in the
unknown crypts of Central Asia. And more than one returned years later, with a
rich store of such information as could never have been given him anywhere in
Europe. Several cases could be cited, and well-known names brought forward, but
for the fact that such publicity might annoy the surviving relatives of the
said late Initiates. Let any one look over the Annals and History of
Freemasonry in the archives of the Russian metropolis, and he will assure
himself of the fact stated.
This is a corroboration of that which
has been stated many times before, and, unfortunately, too indiscreetly.
Instead of benefiting humanity, the virulent charges of deliberate invention
and imposture with a purpose thrown at those who asserted but a truthful, if
even a little known fact, have only generated bad Karma for the slanderers. But
now the mischief is done, and truth should no longer be denied, whatever the
consequences. Is it a new religion, we are asked? By no means; it is not a
religion, nor is its philosophy new; for, as already stated, it is as old as
thinking man. Its tenets are not now published for the first time, but have
been cautiously given out to, and taught by, more than one European Initiate --
especially by the late Ragon.
More than one great scholar has
stated that there never was a religious founder, whether Aryan, Semitic or
Turanian, who had invented a new religion, or revealed a new truth. These
founders were all transmitters, not original teachers. They were the authors of
new forms and interpretations, while the truths upon which the latter were
based were as old as mankind. Selecting one or more of those grand verities --
actualities visible only to the eye of the real Sage and Seer -- out of the
many orally revealed to man in the beginning, preserved and perpetuated in the
adyta of the temples through initiation, during the MYSTERIES and by personal
transmission -- they revealed these truths to the masses. Thus every nation
received in its turn some of the said truths, under the veil of its own local
and special symbolism; which, as time went on, developed into a more or less
philosophical cultus, a Pantheon in mythical disguise. Therefore is Confucius,
a very ancient
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legislator in historical chronology,
though a very modern Sage in the World's History, shown by Dr. Legge* -- who
calls him "emphatically a transmitter, not a maker" -- as saying:
"I only hand on: I cannot create new things. I believe in the ancients and
therefore I love them."** (Quoted in "Science of Religions" by
Max Muller.)
The writer loves them too, and
therefore believes in the ancients, and the modern heirs to their Wisdom. And
believing in both, she now transmits that which she has received and learnt
herself to all those who will accept it. As to those who may reject her
testimony, -- i.e., the great majority -- she will bear them no malice, for
they will be as right in their way in denying, as she is right in hers in
affirming, since they look at TRUTH from two entirely different stand-points.
Agreeably with the rules of critical scholarship, the Orientalist has to reject
a priori whatever evidence he cannot fully verify for himself. And how can a
Western scholar accept on hearsay that which he knows nothing about? Indeed,
that which is given in these volumes is selected from oral, as much as from
written teachings. This first instalment of the esoteric doctrines is based
upon Stanzas, which are the records of a people unknown to ethnology; it is
claimed that they are written in a tongue absent from the nomenclature of
languages and dialects with which philology is acquainted; they are said to
emanate from a source (Occultism) repudiated by science; and, finally, they are
offered through an agency, incessantly discredited before the world by all
those who hate unwelcome truths, or have some special hobby of their own to
defend. Therefore, the rejection of these teachings may be expected, and must
be accepted beforehand. No one styling himself a "scholar," in whatever
department of exact science, will be permitted to regard these teachings
seriously. They will be derided and rejected a priori in this century; but only
in this one. For in the twentieth century of our era scholars will begin to
recognize that the Secret Doctrine has neither been invented nor exaggerated,
but, on the contrary, simply outlined; and finally, that its teachings antedate
the Vedas.*** Have not the latter been derided, rejected, and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Lun Yu (§ I a) Schott.
"Chinesische Literatur," p. 7.
** "Life of Confucius," p.
96.
*** This is no pretension to
prophecy, but simply a statement based on the knowledge of facts. Every century
an attempt is being made to show the world that Occultism [[Footnote continued
on next page]]
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called "a modern forgery" even
so recently as fifty years ago? Was not Sanskrit proclaimed at one time the
progeny of, and a dialect derived from, the Greek, according to Lempriere and
other scholars? About 1820, Prof. Max Muller tells us, the sacred books of the
Brahmans, of the Magians, and of the Buddhists, "were all but unknown,
their very existence was doubted, and there was not a single scholar who could
have translated a line of the Veda . . . of the Zend Avesta, or . . . of the
Buddhist Tripitaka, and now the Vedas are proved to be the work of the highest
antiquity whose 'preservation amounts almost to a marvel' (Lecture on the
Vedas).
The same will be said of the Secret
Archaic Doctrine, when proofs are given of its undeniable existence and
records. But it will take centuries before much more is given from it. Speaking
of the keys to the Zodiacal mysteries as being almost lost to the world, it was
remarked by the writer in "Isis Unveiled" some ten years ago that:
"The said key must be turned seven times before the whole system is
divulged. We will give it but one turn, and thereby allow the profane one
glimpse into the mystery. Happy he, who understands the whole!"
The same may be said of the whole
Esoteric system. One turn of the key, and no more, was given in
"Isis." Much more is explained in these volumes. In those days the
writer hardly knew the language in which the work was written, and the
disclosure of many things, freely spoken about now, was forbidden. In Century
the Twentieth some disciple more informed, and far better fitted, may be sent
by the Masters of Wisdom to give final and irrefutable proofs that there exists
a Science called Gupta-Vidya; and that, like the once-mysterious sources of the
Nile, the source of all religions and philosophies now known to the world has
been for many ages forgotten and lost to men, but is at last found.
Such a work as this has to be
introduced with no simple Preface, but with a volume rather; one that would
give facts, not mere disquisitions, since the SECRET DOCTRINE is not a treatise,
or a series of vague theories, but contains all that can be given out to the
world in this century.
It would be worse than useless to
publish in these pages even those
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] is no vain superstition. Once the door permitted to be kept a little
ajar, it will be opened wider with every new century. The times are ripe for a
more serious knowledge than hitherto permitted, though still very limited, so far.
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portions of the esoteric teachings
that have now escaped from confinement, unless the genuineness and authenticity
-- at any rate, the probability -- of the existence of such teachings was first
established. Such statements as will now be made, have to be shown warranted by
various authorities: those of ancient philosophers, classics and even certain
learned Church Fathers, some of whom knew these doctrines because they had
studied them, had seen and read works written upon them; and some of whom had
even been personally initiated into the ancient Mysteries, during the
performance of which the arcane doctrines were allegorically enacted. The
writer will have to give historical and trustworthy names, and to cite
well-known authors, ancient and modern, of recognized ability, good judgment,
and truthfulness, as also to name some of the famous proficients in the secret
arts and science, along with the mysteries of the latter, as they are divulged,
or, rather, partially presented before the public in their strange archaic
form.
How is this to be done? What is the
best way for achieving such an object? was the ever-recurring question. To make
our plan clearer, an illustration may be attempted. When a tourist coming from
a well-explored country, suddenly reaches the borderland of a terra incognita,
hedged in, and shut out from view by a formidable barrier of impassable rocks,
he may still refuse to acknowledge himself baffled in his exploratory plans.
Ingress beyond is forbidden. But, if he cannot visit the mysterious region
personally, he may still find a means of examining it from as short a distance
as can be arrived at. Helped by his knowledge of landscapes left behind him, he
can get a general and pretty correct idea of the transmural view, if he will
only climb to the loftiest summit of the altitudes in front of him. Once there,
he can gaze at it, at his leisure, comparing that which he dimly perceives with
that which he has just left below, now that he is, thanks to his efforts,
beyond the line of the mists and the cloud-capped cliffs.
Such a point of preliminary
observation, for those who would like to get a more correct understanding of
the mysteries of the pre-archaic periods given in the texts, cannot be offered
to them in these two volumes. But if the reader has patience, and would glance
at the present state of beliefs and creeds in Europe, compare and check it with
what is known to history of the ages directly preceding and
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following the Christian era, then he
will find all this in Volume III. of this work.
In that volume a brief recapitulation
will be made of all the principal adepts known to history, and the downfall of
the mysteries will be described; after which began the disappearance and final
and systematic elimination from the memory of men of the real nature of
initiation and the Sacred Science. From that time its teachings became Occult,
and Magic sailed but too often under the venerable but frequently misleading
name of Hermetic philosophy. As real Occultism had been prevalent among the
Mystics during the centuries that preceded our era, so Magic, or rather
Sorcery, with its Occult Arts, followed the beginning of Christianity.
However great and zealous the
fanatical efforts, during those early centuries, to obliterate every trace of
the mental and intellectual labour of the Pagans, it was a failure; but the
same spirit of the dark demon of bigotry and intolerance has perverted
systematically and ever since, every bright page written in the pre-Christian
periods. Even in her uncertain records, history has preserved enough of that
which has survived to throw an impartial light upon the whole. Let, then, the
reader tarry a little while with the writer, on the spot of observation
selected. He is asked to give all his attention to that millennium which
divided the pre-Christian and the post-Christian periods, by the year ONE of
the Nativity. This event -- whether historically correct or not -- has
nevertheless been made to serve as a first signal for the erection of manifold
bulwarks against any possible return of, or even a glimpse into, the hated
religions of the Past; hated and dreaded -- because throwing such a vivid light
on the new and intentionally veiled interpretation of what is now known as the
"New Dispensation."
However superhuman the efforts of the
early Christian fathers to obliterate the Secret Doctrine from the very memory
of man, they all failed. Truth can never be killed; hence the failure to sweep
away entirely from the face of the earth every vestige of that ancient Wisdom,
and to shackle and gag every witness who testified to it. Let one only think of
the thousands, and perhaps millions, of MSS. burnt; of monuments, with their
too indiscreet inscriptions and pictorial symbols, pulverised to dust; of the
bands of early hermits and ascetics roaming about among the ruined cities of
Upper and Lower Egypt, in desert and
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mountain, valleys and highlands,
seeking for and eager to destroy every obelisk and pillar, scroll or parchment
they could lay their hands on, if it only bore the symbol of the tau, or any
other sign borrowed and appropriated by the new faith; and he will then see
plainly how it is that so little has remained of the records of the Past.
Verily, the fiendish spirits of fanaticism, of early and mediaeval Christianity
and of Islam, have from the first loved to dwell in darkness and ignorance; and
both have made
"-------------- the sun like
blood, the earth a tomb,
The tomb a hell, and hell itself a
murkier gloom!"
Both creeds have won their proselytes
at the point of the sword; both have built their churches on heaven-kissing
hecatombs of human victims. Over the gateway of Century I. of our era, the
ominous words "the KARMA OF ISRAEL," fatally glowed. Over the portals
of our own, the future seer may discern other words, that will point to the
Karma for cunningly made-up HISTORY, for events purposely perverted, and for
great characters slandered by posterity, mangled out of recognition, between
the two cars of Jagannatha -- Bigotry and Materialism; one accepting too much,
the other denying all. Wise is he who holds to the golden mid-point, who
believes in the eternal justice of things. Says Faigi Diwan, the "witness
to the wonderful speeches of a free-thinker who belongs to a thousand
sects": "In the assembly of the day of resurrection, when past things
shall be forgiven, the sins of the Ka'bah will be forgiven for the sake of the
dust of Christian churches." To this, Professor Max Muller replies:
"The sins of Islam are as worthless as the dust of Christianity. On the
day of resurrection both Muhammadans and Christians will see the vanity of
their religious doctrines. Men fight about religion on earth -- in heaven they
shall find out that there is only one true religion -- the worship of God's
SPIRIT."*
In other words -- "THERE IS NO
RELIGION (OR LAW) HIGHER THAN TRUTH" -- "SATYAT NASTI PARO
DHARMAH" -- the motto of the Maharajah of Benares, adopted by the
Theosophical Society.
As already said in the Preface, the
Secret Doctrine is not a version of "Isis Unveiled" -- as originally
intended. It is a volume explanatory of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Lectures on the Science of
Religion," by F. Max Muller, p. 257.
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it rather, and, though entirely
independent of the earlier work, an indispensable corollary to it. Much of what
was in Isis could hardly be understood by theosophists in those days. The
Secret Doctrine will now throw light on many a problem left unsolved in the
first work, especially on the opening pages, which have never been understood.
Concerned simply with the
philosophies within our historical times and the respective symbolism of the
fallen nations, only a hurried glance could be thrown at the panorama of
Occultism in the two volumes of Isis. In the present work, detailed Cosmogony
and the evolution of the four races that preceded our Fifth race Humanity are
given, and now two large volumes explain that which was stated on the first
page of ISIS UNVEILED alone, and in a few allusions scattered hither and
thither throughout that work. Nor could the vast catalogue of the Archaic
Sciences be attempted in the present volumes, before we have disposed of such
tremendous problems as Cosmic and Planetary Evolution, and the gradual
development of the mysterious Humanities and races that preceded our
"Adamic" Humanity. Therefore, the present attempt to elucidate some
mysteries of the Esoteric philosophy has, in truth, nothing to do with the
earlier work. As an instance, the writer must be allowed to illustrate what is
said.
Volume I. of "Isis" begins
with a reference to "an old book" --
"So very old that our modern
antiquarians might ponder over its pages an indefinite time, and still not
quite agree as to the nature of the fabric upon which it is written. It is the
only original copy now in existence. The most ancient Hebrew document on occult
learning -- the Siphrah Dzeniouta -- was compiled from it, and that at a time
when the former was already considered in the light of a literary relic. One of
its illustrations represents the Divine Essence emanating from ADAM* like a
luminous arc proceeding to form a circle; and then, having attained the highest
point of its circumference, the ineffable glory bends back again, and returns
to earth, bringing a higher type of humanity in its vortex. As it approaches
nearer and nearer to our planet, the Emanation becomes more and more shadowy,
until upon touching the ground it is as black as night."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The name is used in the sense of
the Greek word [[anthropos]].
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The "very old Book" is the
original work from which the many volumes of Kiu-ti were compiled. Not only
this latter and the Siphrah Dzeniouta but even the Sepher Jezirah,* the work
attributed by the Hebrew Kabalists to their Patriarch Abraham (!), the book of
Shu-king, China's primitive Bible, the sacred volumes of the Egyptian
Thoth-Hermes, the Puranas in India, and the Chaldean Book of Numbers and the
Pentateuch itself, are all derived from that one small parent volume. Tradition
says, that it was taken down in Senzar, the secret sacerdotal tongue, from the
words of the Divine Beings, who dictated it to the sons of Light, in Central
Asia, at the very beginning of the 5th (our) race; for there was a time when
its language (the Sen-zar) was known to the Initiates of every nation, when the
forefathers of the Toltec understood it as easily as the inhabitants of the
lost Atlantis, who inherited it, in their turn, from the sages of the 3rd Race,
the Manushis, who learnt it direct from the Devas of the 2nd and 1st Races. The
"illustration" spoken of in "Isis" relates to the evolution
of these Races and of our 4th and 5th Race Humanity in the Vaivasvata
Manvantara or "Round"; each Round being composed of the Yugas of the
seven periods of Humanity; four of which are now passed in our life cycle, the
middle point of the 5th being nearly reached. The illustration is symbolical,
as every one can well understand, and covers the ground from the beginning. The
old book, having described Cosmic Evolution and explained the origin of
everything on earth, including physical man, after giving the true history of
the races from the First down to the Fifth (our) race, goes no further. It
stops short at the beginning of the Kali Yuga just 4989 years ago at the death
of Krishna, the bright "Sun-god," the once living hero and reformer.
But there exists another book. None
of its possessors regard it as very ancient, as it was born with, and is only
as old as the Black Age,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Rabbi Jehoshua Ben Chananea, who
died about A.D. 72, openly declared that he had performed "miracles"
by means of the Book of Sepher Jezireh, and challenged every sceptic. Franck,
quoting from the Babylonian Talmud, names two other thaumaturgists, Rabbis
Chanina and Oshoi. (See "Jerusalem Talmud, Sanhedrin," c. 7, etc.;
and "Franck," pp. 55, 56.) Many of the Mediaeval Occultists,
Alchemists, and Kabalists claimed the same; and even the late modern Magus,
Eliphas Levi, publicly asserts it in print in his books on Magic.
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namely, about 5,000 years. In about
nine years hence, the first cycle of the first five millenniums, that began
with the great cycle of the Kali-Yuga, will end. And then the last prophecy
contained in that book (the first volume of the prophetic record for the Black
Age) will be accomplished. We have not long to wait, and many of us will
witness the Dawn of the New Cycle, at the end of which not a few accounts will
be settled and squared between the races. Volume II. of the Prophecies is
nearly ready, having been in preparation since the time of Buddha's grand
successor, Sankaracharya.
One more important point must be
noticed, one that stands foremost in the series of proofs given of the
existence of one primeval, universal Wisdom -- at any rate for the Christian
Kabalists and students. The teachings were, at least, partially known to
several of the Fathers of the Church. It is maintained, on purely historical
grounds, that Origen, Synesius, and even Clemens Alexandrinus, had been
themselves initiated into the mysteries before adding to the Neo-Platonism of
the Alexandrian school, that of the Gnostics, under the Christian veil. More
than this, some of the doctrines of the Secret schools -- though by no means
all -- were preserved in the Vatican, and have since become part and parcel of
the mysteries, in the shape of disfigured additions made to the original
Christian programme by the Latin Church. Such is the now materialised dogma of
the Immaculate Conception. This accounts for the great persecutions set on foot
by the Roman Catholic Church against Occultism, Masonry, and heterodox
mysticism generally.
The days of Constantine were the last
turning-point in history, the period of the Supreme struggle that ended in the
Western world throttling the old religions in favour of the new one, built on
their bodies. From thence the vista into the far distant Past, beyond the
"Deluge" and the Garden of Eden, began to be forcibly and
relentlessly closed by every fair and unfair means against the indiscreet gaze
of posterity. Every issue was blocked up, every record that hands could be laid
upon, destroyed. Yet there remains enough, even among such mutilated records,
to warrant us in saying that there is in them every possible evidence of the
actual existence of a Parent Doctrine. Fragments have survived geological and
political cataclysms to tell the story; and every survival shows evidence that
the now Secret Wisdom was once the
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one fountain head, the ever-flowing
perennial source, at which were fed all its streamlets -- the later religions
of all nations -- from the first down to the last. This period, beginning with
Buddha and Pythagoras at the one end and the Neo-Platonists and Gnostics at the
other, is the only focus left in History wherein converge for the last time the
bright rays of light streaming from the aeons of time gone by, unobscured by
the hand of bigotry and fanaticism.
This accounts for the necessity under
which the writer has laboured to be ever explaining the facts given from the
hoariest Past by evidence gathered from the historical period. No other means
was at hand, at the risk even of being once more charged with a lack of method
and system. The public must be made acquainted with the efforts of many
World-adepts, of initiated poets, writers, and classics of every age, to
preserve in the records of Humanity the Knowledge of the existence, at least,
of such a philosophy, if not actually of its tenets. The Initiates of 1888 would
indeed remain incomprehensible and ever a seemingly impossible myth, were not
like Initiates shown to have lived in every other age of history. This could be
done only by naming Chapter and Verse where may be found mention of these great
characters, who were preceded and followed by a long and interminable line of
other famous Antediluvian and Post-diluvian Masters in the arts. Thus only
could be shown, on semi-traditional and semi-historical authority, that
knowledge of the Occult and the powers it confers on man, are not altogether
fictions, but that they are as old as the world itself.
To my judges, past and future,
therefore -- whether they are serious literary critics, or those howling
dervishes in literature who judge a book according to the popularity or
unpopularity of the author's name, who, hardly glancing at its contents, fasten
like lethal bacilli on the weakest points of the body -- I have nothing to say.
Nor shall I condescend to notice those crack-brained slanderers -- fortunately
very few in number -- who, hoping to attract public attention by throwing
discredit on every writer whose name is better known than their own, foam and
bark at their very shadows. These, having first maintained for years that the
doctrines taught in the Theosophist, and which culminated in "Esoteric
Buddhism," had been all invented by the present writer, have finally
turned round, and denounced "Isis Unveiled" and the rest as a
plagiarism from Eliphas Levi (!), Paracelsus (!!), and, mirabile
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dictu, Buddhism and Brahmanism (!!!)
As well charge Renan with having stolen his Vie de Jesus from the Gospels, and
Max Muller his "Sacred Books of the East" or his "Chips"
from the philosophies of the Brahmins and Gautama, the Buddha. But to the
public in general and the readers of the "Secret Doctrine" I may
repeat what I have stated all along, and which I now clothe in the words of
Montaigne: Gentlemen, "I HAVE HERE MADE ONLY A NOSEGAY OF CULLED FLOWERS,
AND HAVE BROUGHT NOTHING OF MY OWN BUT THE STRING THAT TIES THEM."
Pull the "string" to pieces
and cut it up in shreds, if you will. As for the nosegay of FACTS -- you will
never be able to make away with these. You can only ignore them, and no more.
We may close with a parting word
concerning this Volume I. In an INTRODUCTION prefacing a Part dealing chiefly
with Cosmogony, certain subjects brought forward might be deemed out of place,
but one more consideration added to those already given have led me to touch
upon them. Every reader will inevitably judge the statements made from the
stand-point of his own knowledge, experience, and consciousness, based on what
he has already learnt. This fact the writer is constantly obliged to bear in
mind: hence, also the frequent references in this first Book to matters which,
properly speaking, belong to a later part of the work, but which could not be
passed by in silence, lest the reader should look down on this work as a fairy
tale indeed -- a fiction of some modern brain.
Thus, the Past shall help to realise
the PRESENT, and the latter to better appreciate the PAST. The errors of the
day must be explained and swept away, yet it is more than probable -- and in
the present case it amounts to certitude -- that once more the testimony of
long ages and of history will fail to impress anyone but the very intuitional
-- which is equal to saying the very few. But in this as in all like cases, the
true and the faithful may console themselves by presenting the sceptical modern
Sadducee with the mathematical proof and memorial of his obdurate obstinacy and
bigotry. There still exists somewhere in the archives of the French Academy,
the famous law of probabilities worked out by an algebraical process for the
benefit of sceptics by certain mathematicians. It runs thus: If two persons
give their evidence to
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a fact, and thus impart to it each of
them 5/6 of certitude; that fact will have then 35/36 of certitude; i.e., its
probability will bear to its improbability the ratio of 35 to 1. If three such
evidences are joined together the certitude will become 215/216. The agreement
of ten persons giving each 1/2 of certitude will produce 1023/1024, etc., etc.
The Occultist may remain satisfied, and care for no more.
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PROEM.
-------
PAGES FROM A PRE-HISTORIC PERIOD.
AN Archaic Manuscript -- a collection
of palm leaves made impermeable to water, fire, and air, by some specific
unknown process -- is before the writer's eye. On the first page is an
immaculate white disk within a dull black ground. On the following page, the
same disk, but with a central point. The first, the student knows to represent
Kosmos in Eternity, before the re-awakening of still slumbering Energy, the
emanation of the Word in later systems. The point in the hitherto immaculate
Disk, Space and Eternity in Pralaya, denotes the dawn of differentiation. It is
the Point in the Mundane Egg (see Part II., "The Mundane Egg"), the
germ within the latter which will become the Universe, the ALL, the boundless,
periodical Kosmos, this germ being latent and active, periodically and by
turns. The one circle is divine Unity, from which all proceeds, whither all
returns. Its circumference -- a forcibly limited symbol, in view of the
limitation of the human mind -- indicates the abstract, ever incognisable
PRESENCE, and its plane, the Universal Soul, although the two are one. Only the
face of the Disk being white and the ground all around black, shows clearly
that its plane is the only knowledge, dim and hazy though it still is, that is
attainable by man. It is on this plane that the Manvantaric manifestations
begin; for it is in this SOUL that slumbers, during the Pralaya, the Divine
Thought,* wherein lies concealed the plan of every future Cosmogony and
Theogony.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is hardly necessary to remind
the reader once more that the term "Divine Thought," like that of
"Universal Mind," must not be regarded as even vaguely shadowing
forth an intellectual process akin to that exhibited by man. The
"Unconscious," according to von Hartmann, arrived at the vast
creative, or rather Evolutionary Plan, "by a clairvoyant wisdom superior
to all consciousness," which in the Vedantic language would mean absolute
Wisdom. Only those who realise how far Intuition soars above the tardy
processes of ratiocinative thought can form the faintest conception of
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
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It is the ONE LIFE, eternal, invisible,
yet Omnipresent, without beginning or end, yet periodical in its regular
manifestations, between which periods reigns the dark mystery of non-Being;
unconscious, yet absolute Consciousness; unrealisable, yet the one
self-existing reality; truly, "a chaos to the sense, a Kosmos to the
reason." Its one absolute attribute, which is ITSELF, eternal, ceaseless
Motion, is called in esoteric parlance the "Great Breath,"* which is
the perpetual motion of the universe, in the sense of limitless, ever-present SPACE.
That which is motionless cannot be Divine. But then there is nothing in fact
and reality absolutely motionless within the universal soul.
Almost five centuries B.C. Leucippus,
the instructor of Democritus, maintained that Space was filled eternally with
atoms actuated by a ceaseless motion, the latter generating in due course of
time, when those atoms aggregated, rotatory motion, through mutual collisions
producing lateral movements. Epicurus and Lucretius taught the same, only
adding to the lateral motion of the atoms the idea of affinity -- an occult
teaching.
From the beginning of man's
inheritance, from the first appearance of the architects of the globe he lives
in, the unrevealed Deity was recognised and considered under its only
philosophical aspect -- universal motion, the thrill of the creative Breath in
Nature. Occultism sums up the "One Existence" thus: "Deity is an
arcane, living (or moving) FIRE, and the eternal witnesses to this unseen
Presence are Light, Heat, Moisture," -- this trinity including, and being
the cause of, every
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] that absolute Wisdom which transcends the ideas of Time and Space. Mind,
as we know it, is resolvable into states of consciousness, of varying duration,
intensity, complexity, etc. -- all, in the ultimate, resting on sensation,
which is again Maya. Sensation, again, necessarily postulates limitation. The
personal God of orthodox Theism perceives, thinks, and is affected by emotion;
he repents and feels "fierce anger." But the notion of such mental
states clearly involves the unthinkable postulate of the externality of the
exciting stimuli, to say nothing of the impossibility of ascribing
changelessness to a Being whose emotions fluctuate with events in the worlds he
presides over. The conceptions of a Personal God as changeless and infinite are
thus unpsychological and, what is worse, unphilosophical.
* Plato proves himself an Initiate,
when saying in Cratylus that [[theos]] is derived from the verb [[theein]],
"to move," "to run," as the first astronomers who observed
the motions of the heavenly bodies called the planets [[theoi]], the gods. (See
Book II., "Symbolism of the Cross and Circle.") Later, the word
produced another term, [[aletheia]] -- "the breath of God."
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phenomenon in Nature.* Intra-Cosmic
motion is eternal and ceaseless; cosmic motion (the visible, or that which is
subject to perception) is finite and periodical. As an eternal abstraction it
is the EVER-PRESENT; as a manifestation, it is finite both in the coming direction
and the opposite, the two being the alpha and omega of successive
reconstructions. Kosmos -- the NOUMENON -- has nought to do with the causal
relations of the phenomenal World. It is only with reference to the
intra-cosmic soul, the ideal Kosmos in the immutable Divine Thought, that we
may say: "It never had a beginning nor will it have an end." With
regard to its body or Cosmic organization, though it cannot be said that it had
a first, or will ever have a last construction, yet at each new Manvantara, its
organization may be regarded as the first and the last of its kind, as it
evolutes every time on a higher plane . . . .
A few years ago only, it was stated
that:--
"The esoteric doctrine teaches,
like Buddhism and Brahminism, and even the Kabala, that the one infinite and
unknown Essence exists from all eternity, and in regular and harmonious
successions is either passive or active. In the poetical phraseology of Manu
these conditions are called the "Days" and the "Nights" of
Brahma. The latter is either "awake" or "asleep." The
Svabhavikas, or philosophers of the oldest school of Buddhism (which still
exists in Nepaul), speculate only upon the active condition of this
"Essence," which they call Svabhavat, and deem it foolish to theorise
upon the abstract and "unknowable" power in its passive condition.
Hence they are called atheists by both Christian theologians and modern
scientists, for neither of the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Nominalists, arguing with Berkeley
that "it is impossible . . . to form the abstract idea of motion distinct
from the body moving" ("Prin. of Human Knowledge," Introd., par.
10), may put the question, "What is that body, the producer of that
motion? Is it a substance? Then you are believers in a Personal God?"
etc., etc. This will be answered farther on, in the Addendum to this Book;
meanwhile, we claim our rights of Conceptionalists as against Roscelini's
materialistic views of Realism and Nominalism. "Has science," says
one of its ablest advocates, Edward Clodd, "revealed anything that weakens
or opposes itself to the ancient words in which the Essence of all religion,
past, present, and to come, is given; to do justly, to love mercy, to walk
humbly before thy God?" Provided we connote by the word God, not the crude
anthropomorphism which is still the backbone of our current theology, but the
symbolic conception of that which is Life and Motion of the Universe, to know
which in physical order is to know time past, present, and to come, in the
existence of successions of phenomena; to know which, in the moral, is to know
what has been, is, and will be, within human consciousness. (See "Science
and the Emotions." A Discourse delivered at South Place Chapel, Finsbury,
London, Dec. 27th, 1885.)
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two are able to understand the
profound logic of their philosophy. The former will allow of no other God than
the personified secondary powers which have worked out the visible universe,
and which became with them the anthropomorphic God of the Christians -- the
male Jehovah, roaring amid thunder and lightning. In its turn, rationalistic
science greets the Buddhists and the Svabhavikas as the "positivists"
of the archaic ages. If we take a one-sided view of the philosophy of the
latter, our materialists may be right in their own way. The Buddhists
maintained that there is no Creator, but an infinitude of creative powers,
which collectively form the one eternal substance, the essence of which is
inscrutable -- hence not a subject for speculation for any true philosopher.
Socrates invariably refused to argue upon the mystery of universal being, yet
no one would ever have thought of charging him with atheism, except those who
were bent upon his destruction. Upon inaugurating an active period, says the
Secret Doctrine, an expansion of this Divine essence from without inwardly and
from within outwardly, occurs in obedience to eternal and immutable law, and
the phenomenal or visible universe is the ultimate result of the long chain of
cosmical forces thus progressively set in motion. In like manner, when the
passive condition is resumed, a contraction of the Divine essence takes place,
and the previous work of creation is gradually and progressively undone. The
visible universe becomes disintegrated, its material dispersed; and 'darkness'
solitary and alone, broods once more over the face of the 'deep.' To use a
Metaphor from the Secret Books, which will convey the idea still more clearly,
an out-breathing of the 'unknown essence' produces the world; and an inhalation
causes it to disappear. This process has been going on from all eternity, and
our present universe is but one of an infinite series, which had no beginning
and will have no end." -- (See "Isis Unveiled"; also "The
Days and Nights of Brahma" in Part II.)
This passage will be explained, as
far as it is possible, in the present work. Though, as it now stands, it
contains nothing new to the Orientalist, its esoteric interpretation may
contain a good deal which has hitherto remained entirely unknown to the Western
student.
The first illustration being a plain
disc [[diagram]] the second one in the Archaic symbol shows [[diagram]], a disc
with a point in it -- the first differentiation in the periodical
manifestations of the ever-eternal nature, sexless and infinite "Aditi in
THAT" (Rig Veda), the point in the disc, or potential Space within
abstract Space. In its third stage the point is transformed into a diameter,
thus [[diagram]] It now symbolises a divine immaculate Mother-Nature within the
all-embracing absolute Infinitude.
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When the diameter line is crossed by
a vertical one [[diagram]], it becomes the mundane cross. Humanity has reached
its third root-race; it is the sign for the origin of human life to begin. When
the circumference disappears and leaves only the [[diagram]] it is a sign that
the fall of man into matter is accomplished, and the FOURTH race begins. The
Cross within a circle symbolises pure Pantheism; when the Cross was left
uninscribed, it became phallic. It had the same and yet other meanings as a TAU
inscribed within a circle [[diagram]] or as a "Thor's hammer," the
Jaina cross, so-called, or simply Svastica within a circle [[diagram]]
By the third symbol -- the circle
divided in two by the horizontal line of the diameter -- the first
manifestation of creative (still passive, because feminine) Nature was meant.
The first shadowy perception of man connected with procreation is feminine,
because man knows his mother more than his father. Hence female deities were
more sacred than the male. Nature is therefore feminine, and, to a degree,
objective and tangible, and the spirit Principle which fructifies it is concealed.
By adding to the circle with the horizontal line in it, a perpendicular line,
the tau was formed -- [[diagram]] -- the oldest form of the letter. It was the
glyph of the third root-race to the day of its symbolical Fall -- i.e., when
the separation of sexes by natural evolution took place -- when the figure
became [[diagram]], the circle, or sexless life modified or separated -- a
double glyph or symbol. With the races of our Fifth Race it became in symbology
the sacr', and in Hebrew n'cabvah, of the first-formed races;* then it changed
into the Egyptian [[diagram]] (emblem of life), and still later into the sign
of Venus, [[diagram]] Then comes the Svastica (Thor's hammer, or the
"Hermetic Cross" now), entirely separated from its Circle, thus becoming
purely phallic. The esoteric symbol of Kali Yuga is the five-pointed star
reversed, thus [[diagram]] -- the sign of human sorcery, with its two points
(horns) turned heavenward, a position every
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See that suggestive work, "The
Source of Measures," where the author explains the real meaning of the
word "sacr'," from which "sacred," "sacrament,"
are derived, which have now become synonyms of "holiness," though
purely phallic!
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Occultist will recognise as one of
the "left-hand," and used in ceremonial magic.*
It is hoped that during the perusal
of this work the erroneous ideas of the public in general with regard to
Pantheism will be modified. It is wrong and unjust to regard the Buddhists and
Advaitee Occultists as atheists. If not all of them philosophers, they are, at
any rate, all logicians, their objections and arguments being based on strict
reasoning. Indeed, if the Parabrahmam of the Hindus may be taken as a
representative of the hidden and nameless deities of other nations, this
absolute Principle will be found to be the prototype from which all the others
were copied. Parabrahm is not "God," because It is not a God.
"It is that which is supreme, and not supreme (paravara)," explains
Mandukya Upanishad (2.28). IT is "Supreme" as CAUSE, not supreme as
effect. Parabrahm is simply, as a "Secondless Reality," the
all-inclusive Kosmos -- or, rather, the infinite Cosmic Space -- in the highest
spiritual sense, of course. Brahma (neuter) being the unchanging, pure, free,
undecaying supreme Root, "the ONE true Existence, Paramarthika," and
the absolute Chit and Chaitanya (intelligence, consciousness) cannot be a
cogniser, "for THAT can have no subject of cognition." Can the flame
be called the essence of Fire? This Essence is "the LIFE and LIGHT of the
Universe, the visible fire and flame are destruction, death, and evil."
"Fire and Flame destroy the body of an Arhat, their essence makes him
immortal." (Bodhi-mur, Book II.) "The knowledge of the absolute
Spirit, like the effulgence of the sun, or like heat in fire, is naught else
than the absolute Essence itself," says Sankaracharya. IT -- is "the
Spirit of the Fire," not fire itself; therefore, "the attributes of
the latter, heat or flame, are not the attributes of the Spirit, but of that of
which that Spirit is the unconscious cause." Is not the above sentence the
true key-note of later Rosicrucian
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* We are told by the Western
mathematicians and some American Kabalists, that in the Kabala also "the
value of the Jehovah name is that of the diameter of a circle." Add to
this the fact that Jehovah is the third Sephiroth, Binah, a feminine word, and
you have the key to the mystery. By certain Kabalistic transformations this
name, androgynous in the first chapters of Genesis, becomes in its
transformations entirely masculine, Cainite and phallic. The fact of choosing a
deity among the pagan gods and making of it a special national God, to call
upon it as the "One living God," the "God of Gods," and
then proclaim this worship Monotheistic, does not change it into the ONE
Principle whose "Unity admits not of multiplication, change, or
form," especially in the case of a priapic deity, as Jehovah now
demonstrated to be.
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philosophy? Parabrahm is, in short,
the collective aggregate of Kosmos in its infinity and eternity, the
"THAT" and "THIS" to which distributive aggregates can not
be applied.* "In the beginning THIS was the Self, one only" (Aitareya
Upanishad); the great Sankaracharya, explains that "THIS" referred to
the Universe (Jagat); the sense of the words, "In the beginning,"
meaning before the reproduction of the phenomenal Universe.
Therefore, when the Pantheists echo
the Upanishads, which state, as in the Secret Doctrine, that "this"
cannot create, they do not deny a Creator, or rather a collective aggregate of
creators, but only refuse, very logically, to attribute "creation"
and especially formation, something finite to an Infinite Principle. With them,
Parabrahmam is a passive because an Absolute Cause, the unconditioned Mukta. It
is only limited Omniscience and Omnipotence that are refused to the latter,
because these are still attributes (as reflected in man's perceptions); and
because Parabrahm, being the "Supreme ALL," the ever invisible spirit
and Soul of Nature, changeless and eternal, can have no attributes; absoluteness
very naturally precluding any idea of the finite or conditioned from being
connected with it. And if the Vedantin postulates attributes as belonging
simply to its emanation, calling it "Iswara plus Maya," and Avidya
(Agnosticism and Nescience rather than ignorance), it is difficult to find any
Atheism in this conception.** Since there can be neither two INFINITES nor two
ABSOLUTES in a Universe supposed to be Boundless, this Self-Existence can
hardly be conceived of as creating personally. In the sense and perceptions of
finite "Beings," THAT is Non-"being," in the sense that it
is the one BE-NESS; for, in this ALL lies concealed its coeternal and coeval
emanation or inherent radiation, which, upon becoming periodically Brahma (the
male-female Potency) becomes or expands itself into the manifested Universe.
Narayana moving on the (abstract) waters of Space, is transformed into the
Waters of concrete substance moved by him, who now becomes the manifested WORD
or Logos.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See "Vedanta Sara," by
Major G. A. Jacob; as also "The Aphorisms of S'andilya," translated
by Cowell, p. 42.
** Nevertheless, prejudiced and
rather fanatical Christian Orientalists would like to prove this pure Atheism.
For proof of this, see about Major Jacob's "Vedanta Sara." Yet, the
whole Antiquity echoes this Vedantic thought:--
"Omnis enim per se divom natura
necesse est
Immortali aevo summa cum pace
fruatur."
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The orthodox Brahmins, those who rise
the most against the Pantheists and Adwaitees, calling them Atheists, are
forced, if Manu has any authority in this matter, to accept the death of
Brahma, the creator, at the expiration of every "Age" of this
(creative) deity (100 Divine years -- a period which in our years requires
fifteen figures to express it). Yet, no philosopher among them will view this
"death" in any other sense than as a temporary disappearance from the
manifested plane of existence, or as a periodical rest.
The Occultists are, therefore, at one
with the Adwaita Vedantin philosophers as to the above tenet. They show the
impossibility of accepting on philosophical grounds the idea of the absolute
ALL creating or even evolving the "Golden Egg," into which it is said
to enter in order to transform itself into Brahma -- the Creator, who expands
himself later into gods and all the visible Universe. They say that Absolute
Unity cannot pass to infinity; for infinity presupposes the limitless extension
of something, and the duration of that "something"; and the One All
is like Space -- which is its only mental and physical representation on this Earth,
or our plane of existence -- neither an object of, nor a subject to,
perception. If one could suppose the Eternal Infinite All, the Omnipresent
Unity, instead of being in Eternity, becoming through periodical manifestation
a manifold Universe or a multiple personality, that Unity would cease to be
one. Locke's idea that "pure Space is capable of neither resistance nor
Motion" -- is incorrect. Space is neither a "limitless void,"
nor a "conditioned fulness," but both: being, on the plane of
absolute abstraction, the ever-incognisable Deity, which is void only to finite
minds,* and on that of mayavic perception, the Plenum, the absolute Container
of all that is, whether manifested or unmanifested: it is, therefore, that
ABSOLUTE ALL. There is no difference between the Christian Apostle's "In
Him we live and move and have our being," and the Hindu Rishi's "The
Universe lives in, proceeds from, and will
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The very names of the two chief deities,
Brahma and Vishnu, ought to have long ago suggested their esoteric meanings.
For the root of one, Brahmam, or Brahm, is derived by some from the word Brih,
"to grow" or "to expand" (see Calcutta Review, vol. lxvi.,
p. 14); and of the other, Vishnu, from the root Vis, "to pervade," to
enter in the nature of the essence; Brahma-Vishnu being this infinite SPACE, of
which the gods, the Rishis, the Manus, and all in this universe are simply the
potencies, Vibhutayah.
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return to, Brahma (Brahma)": for
Brahma (neuter), the unmanifested, is that Universe in abscondito, and Brahma,
the manifested, is the Logos, made male-female* in the symbolical orthodox
dogmas. The God of the Apostle-Initiate and of the Rishi being both the Unseen
and the Visible SPACE. Space is called in the esoteric symbolism "the
Seven-Skinned Eternal Mother-Father." It is composed from its
undifferentiated to its differentiated surface of seven layers.
"What is that which was, is, and
will be, whether there is a Universe or not; whether there be gods or
none?" asks the esoteric Senzar Catechism. And the answer made is --
SPACE.
It is not the One Unknown
ever-present God in Nature, or Nature in abscondito, that is rejected, but the
God of human dogma and his humanized "Word." In his infinite conceit
and inherent pride and vanity, man shaped it himself with his sacrilegious hand
out of the material he found in his own small brain-fabric, and forced it upon
mankind as a direct revelation from the one unrevealed SPACE.** The Occultist
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Manu's account of Brahma separating
his body into male and female, the latter the female Vach, in whom he creates
Viraj, and compare this with the esotericism of Chapters II., III., and IV. of
Genesis.
** Occultism is indeed in the air at
the close of this our century. Among many other works recently published, we
would recommend one especially to students of theoretical Occultism who would
not venture beyond the realm of our special human plane. It is called "New
Aspects of Life and Religion," by Henry Pratt, M.D. It is full of esoteric
dogmas and philosophy, the latter rather limited, in the concluding chapters,
by what seems to be a spirit of conditioned positivism. Nevertheless, what is
said of Space as "the Unknown First Cause," merits quotation.
"This unknown something, thus recognised as, and identified with, the
primary embodiment of Simple Unity, is invisible and impalpable" --
(abstract space, granted); "and because invisible and impalpable,
therefore incognisable. And this incognisability has led to the error of
supposing it to be a simple void, a mere receptive capacity. But, even viewed
as an absolute void, space must be admitted to be either Self-existent,
infinite, and eternal, or to have had a first cause outside, behind, and beyond
itself.
"And yet could such a cause be
found and defined, this would only lead to the transferring thereto of the
attributes otherwise accruing to space, and thus merely throw the difficulty of
origination a step farther back, without gaining additional light as to primary
causation." (p. 5.)
This is precisely what has been done
by the believers in an anthropomorphic Creator, an extracosmic, instead of an
intracosmic God. Many -- most of Mr. Pratt's subjects, we may say -- are old
Kabalistic ideas and theories which he presents in quite a new garb: "New
Aspects" of the Occult in Nature, indeed. Space, however, viewed as a
"Substantial Unity" -- the "living Source of Life" -- is as
the "Un- [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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accepts revelation as coming from
divine yet still finite Beings, the manifested lives, never from the
Unmanifestable ONE LIFE; from those entities, called Primordial Man,
Dhyani-Buddhas, or Dhyan-Chohans, the "Rishi-Prajapati" of the
Hindus, the Elohim or "Sons of God," the Planetary Spirits of all
nations, who have become Gods for men. He also regards the Adi-Sakti -- the
direct emanation of Mulaprakriti, the eternal Root of THAT, and the female
aspect of the Creative Cause Brahma, in her A'kasic form of the Universal Soul
-- as philosophically a Maya, and cause of human Maya. But this view does not
prevent him from believing in its existence so long as it lasts, to wit, for
one Mahamanvantara; nor from applying Akasa, the radiation of Mulaprakriti,* to
practical purposes, connected as the World-Soul is with all natural phenomena,
known or unknown to science.
The oldest religions of the world --
exoterically, for the esoteric root or foundation is one -- are the Indian, the
Mazdean, and the Egyptian. Then comes the Chaldean, the outcome of these --
entirely lost to the world now, except in its disfigured Sabeanism as at
present rendered by the archaeologists; then, passing over a number of
religions that will be mentioned later, comes the Jewish, esoterically, as in
the Kabala, following in the line of Babylonian Magism; exoterically, as in
Genesis and the Pentateuch, a collection of allegorical legends. Read by the
light of the Zohar, the initial four chapters of Genesis are the fragment
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] known Causeless Cause," is the oldest dogma in Occultism,
millenniums earlier than the Pater-AEther of the Greeks and Latins. So are the
"Force and Matter, as Potencies of Space, inseparable, and the Unknown
revealers of the Unknown." They are all found in Aryan philosophy
personified by Visvakarman, Indra, Vishnu, etc., etc. Still they are expressed
very philosophically, and under many unusual aspects, in the work referred to.
* In contradistinction to the
manifested universe of matter, the term Mulaprakriti (from Mula, "the
root," and prakriti, "nature"), or the unmanifested primordial
matter -- called by Western alchemists Adam's Earth -- is applied by the
Vedantins to Parabrahmam. Matter is dual in religious metaphysics, and
septenary in esoteric teachings, like everything else in the universe. As
Mulaprakriti, it is undifferentiated and eternal; as Vyakta, it becomes
differentiated and conditioned, according to Svetasvatara Upanishad, I. 8, and
Devi Bhagavata Purana. The author of the Four Lectures on the Bhagavad Gita,
says, in speaking of Mulaprakriti: "From its (the Logos') objective
standpoint, Parabrahmam appears to it as Mulaprakriti. . . . Of course this
Mulaprakriti is material to it, as any material object is material to us. . . .
Parabrahmam is an unconditioned and absolute reality, and Mulaprakriti is a
sort of veil thrown over it." (Theosophist, Vol. VIII., p. 304.)
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of a highly philosophical page in the
World's Cosmogony. (See Book III., Gupta Vidya and the Zohar.) Left in their
symbolical disguise, they are a nursery tale, an ugly thorn in the side of
science and logic, an evident effect of Karma. To have let them serve as a prologue
to Christianity was a cruel revenge on the part of the Rabbis, who knew better
what their Pentateuch meant. It was a silent protest against their spoliation,
and the Jews have certainly now the better of their traditional persecutors.
The above-named exoteric creeds will be explained in the light of the Universal
doctrine as we proceed with it.
The Occult Catechism contains the
following questions and answers:
"What is it that ever is?"
"Space, the eternal Anupadaka."* "What is it that ever
was?" "The Germ in the Root." "What is it that is ever
coming and going?" "The Great Breath." "Then, there are
three Eternals?" "No, the three are one. That which ever is is one,
that which ever was is one, that which is ever being and becoming is also one:
and this is Space."
"Explain, oh Lanoo
(disciple)." -- "The One is an unbroken Circle (ring) with no
circumference, for it is nowhere and everywhere; the One is the boundless plane
of the Circle, manifesting a diameter only during the manvantaric periods; the
One is the indivisible point found nowhere, perceived everywhere during those
periods; it is the Vertical and the Horizontal, the Father and the Mother, the
summit and base of the Father, the two extremities of the Mother, reaching in
reality nowhere, for the One is the Ring as also the rings that are within that
Ring. Light in darkness and darkness in light: the 'Breath which is eternal.'
It proceeds from without inwardly, when it is everywhere, and from within
outwardly, when it is nowhere -- (i.e., maya,** one of the centres***). It
expands and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Meaning "parentless" --
see farther on.
** Esoteric philosophy, regarding as
Maya (or the illusion of ignorance) every finite thing, must necessarily view
in the same light every intra-Cosmic planet and body, as being something
organised, hence finite. The expression, therefore, "it proceeds from
without inwardly, etc." refers in the first portion of the sentence to the
dawn of the Mahamanvantaric period, or the great re-evolution after one of the
complete periodical dissolutions of every compound form in Nature (from planet
to molecule) into its ultimate essence or element; and in its second portion,
to the partial or local manvantara, which may be a solar or even a planetary
one.
*** By "centre," a centre
of energy or a Cosmic focus is meant; when the so-called "Creation,"
or formation of a planet, is accomplished by that force which is designated by
the Occultists LIFE and by Science "energy," then the process takes
place [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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contracts (exhalation and
inhalation). When it expands the mother diffuses and scatters; when it
contracts, the mother draws back and ingathers. This produces the periods of
Evolution and Dissolution, Manwantara and Pralaya. The Germ is invisible and
fiery; the Root (the plane of the circle) is cool; but during Evolution and
Manwantara her garment is cold and radiant. Hot Breath is the Father who
devours the progeny of the many-faced Element (heterogeneous); and leaves the
single-faced ones (homogeneous). Cool Breath is the Mother, who conceives,
forms, brings forth, and receives them back into her bosom, to reform them at
the Dawn (of the Day of Brahma, or Manvantara). . . . ."
For clearer understanding on the part
of the general reader, it must be stated that Occult Science recognises Seven
Cosmical Elements -- four entirely physical, and the fifth (Ether)
semi-material, as it will become visible in the air towards the end of our
Fourth Round, to reign supreme over the others during the whole of the Fifth.
The remaining two are as yet absolutely beyond the range of human perception.
These latter will, however, appear as presentments during the 6th and 7th Races
of this Round, and will become known in the 6th and 7th Rounds respectively.*
These seven elements with their numberless Sub-Elements
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] from within outwardly, every atom being said to contain in itself
creative energy of the divine breath. Hence, whereas after an absolute pralaya,
or when the pre-existing material consists but of ONE Element, and BREATH
"is everywhere," the latter acts from without inwardly: after a minor
pralaya, everything having remained in statu quo -- in a refrigerated state, so
to say, like the moon -- at the first flutter of manvantara, the planet or
planets begin their resurrection to life from within outwardly.
* It is curious to notice how, in the
evolutionary cycles of ideas, ancient thought seems to be reflected in modern
speculation. Had Mr. Herbert Spencer read and studied ancient Hindu
philosophers when he wrote a certain passage in his "First
Principles" (p. 482), or is it an independent flash of inner perception
that made him say half correctly, half incorrectly, "motion as well as
matter, being fixed in quantity (?), it would seem that the change in the
distribution of Matter which Motion effects, coming to a limit in whichever
direction it is carried (?), the indestructible Motion thereupon necessitates a
reverse distribution. Apparently, the universally co-existent forces of
attraction and repulsion which, as we have seen, necessitate rhythm in all
minor changes throughout the Universe, also necessitate rhythm in the totality
of its changes -- produce now an immeasurable period during which the
attracting forces predominating, cause universal concentration, and then an
immeasurable period, during which the repulsive forces predominating, cause
universal diffusion -- alternate eras of Evolution and dissolution."
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far more numerous than those known to
Science) are simply conditional modifications and aspects of the ONE and only
Element. This latter is not Ether,* not even A'kasa but the Source of these.
The Fifth Element, now advocated quite freely by Science, is not the Ether
hypothesised by Sir Isaac Newton -- although he calls it by that name, having
associated it in his mind probably with the AEther, "Father-Mother"
of Antiquity. As Newton intuitionally says, "Nature is a perpetual
circulatory worker, generating fluids out of solids, fixed things out of
volatile, and volatile out of fixed, subtile out of gross, and gross out of
subtile. . . . . Thus, perhaps, may all things be originated from Ether,"
(Hypoth, 1675).
The reader has to bear in mind that
the Stanzas given treat only of the Cosmogony of our own planetary System and
what is visible around it, after a Solar Pralaya. The secret teachings with
regard to the Evolution of the Universal Kosmos cannot be given, since they
could not be understood by the highest minds in this age, and there seem to be
very few Initiates, even among the greatest, who are allowed to speculate upon
this subject. Moreover the Teachers say openly that not even the highest
Dhyani-Chohans have ever penetrated the mysteries beyond those boundaries that
separate the milliards of Solar systems from the "Central Sun," as it
is called. Therefore, that which is given, relates only to our visible Kosmos,
after a "Night of Brahma."
Before the reader proceeds to the
consideration of the Stanzas from the Book of Dzyan which form the basis of the
present work, it is absolutely necessary that he should be made acquainted with
the few fundamental conceptions which underlie and pervade the entire system of
thought to which his attention is invited. These basic ideas are few in number,
and on their clear apprehension depends the understanding of all that follows;
therefore no apology is required for asking the reader to make himself familiar
with them first, before entering on the perusal of the work itself.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Whatever the views of physical
Science upon the subject, Occult Science has been teaching for ages that A'kasa
-- of which Ether is the grossest form -- the fifth universal Cosmic Principle
(to which corresponds and from which proceeds human Manas) is, cosmically, a
radiant, cool, diathermanous plastic matter, creative in its physical nature,
correlative in its grossest aspects and portions, immutable in its higher
principles. In the former condition it is called the Sub-Root; and in
conjunction with radiant heat, it recalls "dead worlds to life." In
its higher aspect it is the Soul of the World; in its lower -- the DESTROYER.
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The Secret Doctrine establishes three
fundamental propositions:--
(a) An Omnipresent, Eternal,
Boundless, and Immutable PRINCIPLE on which all speculation is impossible, since
it transcends the power of human conception and could only be dwarfed by any
human expression or similitude. It is beyond the range and reach of thought --
in the words of Mandukya, "unthinkable and unspeakable."
To render these ideas clearer to the
general reader, let him set out with the postulate that there is one absolute
Reality which antecedes all manifested, conditioned, being. This Infinite and
Eternal Cause -- dimly formulated in the "Unconscious" and
"Unknowable" of current European philosophy -- is the rootless root
of "all that was, is, or ever shall be." It is of course devoid of
all attributes and is essentially without any relation to manifested, finite
Being. It is "Be-ness" rather than Being (in Sanskrit, Sat), and is
beyond all thought or speculation.
This "Be-ness" is
symbolised in the Secret Doctrine under two aspects. On the one hand, absolute
abstract Space, representing bare subjectivity, the one thing which no human
mind can either exclude from any conception, or conceive of by itself. On the
other, absolute Abstract Motion representing Unconditioned Consciousness. Even
our Western thinkers have shown that Consciousness is inconceivable to us apart
from change, and motion best symbolises change, its essential characteristic. This
latter aspect of the one Reality, is also symbolised by the term "The
Great Breath," a symbol sufficiently graphic to need no further
elucidation. Thus, then, the first fundamental axiom of the Secret Doctrine is
this metaphysical ONE ABSOLUTE -- BE-NESS -- symbolised by finite intelligence
as the theological Trinity.
It may, however, assist the student
if a few further explanations are given here.
Herbert Spencer has of late so far
modified his Agnosticism, as to assert that the nature of the "First
Cause,"* which the Occultist more logically derives from the
"Causeless Cause," the "Eternal," and the
"Unknowable," may be essentially the same as that of the
Consciousness which wells up within us: in short, that the impersonal reality
pervading
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The "first" presupposes
necessarily something which is the "first brought forth, the first in
time, space, and rank" -- and therefore finite and conditioned. The
"first" [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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the Kosmos is the pure noumenon of
thought. This advance on his part brings him very near to the esoteric and
Vedantin tenet.*
Parabrahm (the One Reality, the
Absolute) is the field of Absolute Consciousness, i.e., that Essence which is
out of all relation to conditioned existence, and of which conscious existence
is a conditioned symbol. But once that we pass in thought from this (to us)
Absolute Negation, duality supervenes in the contrast of Spirit (or
consciousness) and Matter, Subject and Object.
Spirit (or Consciousness) and Matter
are, however, to be regarded, not as independent realities, but as the two
facets or aspects of the Absolute (Parabrahm), which constitute the basis of
conditioned Being whether subjective or objective.
Considering this metaphysical triad
as the Root from which proceeds all manifestation, the great Breath assumes the
character of precosmic Ideation. It is the fons et origo of force and of all
individual consciousness, and supplies the guiding intelligence in the vast
scheme of cosmic Evolution. On the other hand, precosmic root-substance (Mulaprakriti)
is that aspect of the Absolute which underlies all the objective planes of
Nature.
Just as pre-Cosmic Ideation is the
root of all individual consciousness, so pre-Cosmic Substance is the substratum
of matter in the various grades of its differentiation.
Hence it will be apparent that the
contrast of these two aspects of the Absolute is essential to the existence of
the "Manifested Universe." Apart from Cosmic Substance, Cosmic
Ideation could not manifest as individual consciousness, since it is only
through a vehicle** of matter that consciousness wells up as "I am
I," a physical basis being necessary to focus a ray of the Universal Mind
at a certain stage of complexity. Again, apart from Cosmic Ideation, Cosmic
Substance would remain an empty abstraction, and no emergence of consciousness
could ensue.
The "Manifested Universe,"
therefore, is pervaded by duality, which is, as it were, the very essence of
its EX-istence as "manifestation."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] cannot be the absolute, for it is a manifestation. Therefore, Eastern
Occultism calls the Abstract All the "Causeless One Cause," the
"Rootless Root," and limits the "First Cause" to the Logos,
in the sense that Plato gives to this term.
* See Mr. Subba Row's four able
lectures on the Bhagavad Gita, "Theosophist," February, 1887.
** Called in Sanskrit:
"Upadhi."
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But just as the opposite poles of
subject and object, spirit and matter, are but aspects of the One Unity in
which they are synthesized, so, in the manifested Universe, there is
"that" which links spirit to matter, subject to object.
This something, at present unknown to
Western speculation, is called by the occultists Fohat. It is the
"bridge" by which the "Ideas" existing in the "Divine
Thought" are impressed on Cosmic substance as the "laws of
Nature." Fohat is thus the dynamic energy of Cosmic Ideation; or, regarded
from the other side, it is the intelligent medium, the guiding power of all
manifestation, the "Thought Divine" transmitted and made manifest
through the Dhyan Chohans,* the Architects of the visible World. Thus from
Spirit, or Cosmic Ideation, comes our consciousness; from Cosmic Substance the
several vehicles in which that consciousness is individualised and attains to self
-- or reflective -- consciousness; while Fohat, in its various manifestations,
is the mysterious link between Mind and Matter, the animating principle
electrifying every atom into life.
The following summary will afford a
clearer idea to the reader.
(1.) The ABSOLUTE; the Parabrahm of
the Vedantins or the one Reality, SAT, which is, as Hegel says, both Absolute
Being and Non-Being.
(2.) The first manifestation, the
impersonal, and, in philosophy, unmanifested Logos, the precursor of the
"manifested." This is the "First Cause," the
"Unconscious" of European Pantheists.
(3.) Spirit-matter, LIFE; the
"Spirit of the Universe," the Purusha and Prakriti, or the second
Logos.
(4.) Cosmic Ideation, MAHAT or
Intelligence, the Universal World-Soul; the Cosmic Noumenon of Matter, the
basis of the intelligent operations in and of Nature, also called MAHA-BUDDHI.
The ONE REALITY; its dual aspects in
the conditioned Universe.
Further, the Secret Doctrine
affirms:--
(b.) The Eternity of the Universe in
toto as a boundless plane; periodically "the playground of numberless
Universes incessantly manifesting and disappearing," called "the
manifesting stars," and the "sparks of Eternity." "The
Eternity of the Pilgrim"** is like a wink
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Called by Christian theology:
Archangels, Seraphs, etc., etc.
** "Pilgrim" is the
appellation given to our Monad (the two in one) during its cycle of
incarnations. It is the only immortal and eternal principle in us, being an
indivisible part of the integral whole -- the Universal Spirit, from which it
emanates, and into which it is absorbed at the end of the cycle. When it is
said to emanate from the one [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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of the Eye of Self-Existence (Book of
Dzyan.) "The appearance and disappearance of Worlds is like a regular
tidal ebb of flux and reflux." (See Part II., "Days and Nights of
Brahma.")
This second assertion of the Secret
Doctrine is the absolute universality of that law of periodicity, of flux and
reflux, ebb and flow, which physical science has observed and recorded in all
departments of nature. An alternation such as that of Day and Night, Life and
Death, Sleeping and Waking, is a fact so common, so perfectly universal and
without exception, that it is easy to comprehend that in it we see one of the
absolutely fundamental laws of the universe.
Moreover, the Secret Doctrine
teaches:--
(c) The fundamental identity of all
Souls with the Universal Over-Soul, the latter being itself an aspect of the
Unknown Root; and the obligatory pilgrimage for every Soul -- a spark of the
former -- through the Cycle of Incarnation (or "Necessity") in
accordance with Cyclic and Karmic law, during the whole term. In other words,
no purely spiritual Buddhi (divine Soul) can have an independent (conscious)
existence before the spark which issued from the pure Essence of the Universal
Sixth principle, -- or the OVER-SOUL, -- has (a) passed through every elemental
form of the phenomenal world of that Manvantara, and (b) acquired
individuality, first by natural impulse, and then by self-induced and
self-devised efforts (checked by its Karma), thus ascending through all the
degrees of intelligence, from the lowest to the highest Manas, from mineral and
plant, up to the holiest archangel (Dhyani-Buddha). The pivotal doctrine of the
Esoteric philosophy admits no privileges or special gifts in man, save those
won by his own Ego through personal effort and merit throughout a long series
of metempsychoses and reincarnations. This is why the Hindus say that the
Universe is Brahma and Brahmâ, for Brahma is in every atom of the universe, the
six principles in Nature being all the outcome -- the variously differentiated
aspects -- of the SEVENTH and ONE, the only reality in the Universe whether
Cosmical or micro-cosmical; and also why the permutations (psychic, spiritual
and physical), on the plane of manifestation and form, of the sixth (Brahmâ the
vehicle of Brahma) are viewed by metaphysical
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] spirit, an awkward and incorrect expression has to be used, for lack of
appropriate words in English. The Vedantins call it Sutratma (Thread-Soul), but
their explanation, too, differs somewhat from that of the occultists; to
explain which difference, however, is left to the Vedantins themselves.
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antiphrasis as illusive and Mayavic.
For although the root of every atom individually and of every form
collectively, is that seventh principle or the one Reality, still, in its
manifested phenomenal and temporary appearance, it is no better than an
evanescent illusion of our senses. (See, for clearer definition, Addendum
"Gods, Monads and Atoms," and also "Theophania,"
"Bodhisatvas and Reincarnation," etc., etc.)
In its absoluteness, the One
Principle under its two aspects (of Parabrahmam and Mulaprakriti) is sexless,
unconditioned and eternal. Its periodical (manvantaric) emanation -- or primal
radiation -- is also One, androgynous and phenomenally finite. When the
radiation radiates in its turn, all its radiations are also androgynous, to
become male and female principles in their lower aspects. After Pralaya,
whether the great or the minor Pralaya (the latter leaving the worlds in statu
quo*), the first that re-awakes to active life is the plastic A'kasa,
Father-Mother, the Spirit and Soul of Ether, or the plane on the surface of the
Circle. Space is called the "Mother" before its Cosmic activity, and
Father-Mother at the first stage of re-awakening. (See Comments, Stanza II.) In
the Kabala it is also Father-Mother-Son. But whereas in the Eastern doctrine,
these are the Seventh Principle of the manifested Universe, or its
"Atma-Buddhi-Manas" (Spirit, Soul, Intelligence), the triad branching
off and dividing into the seven cosmical and seven human principles, in the
Western Kabala of the Christian mystics it is the Triad or Trinity, and with their
occultists, the male-female Jehovah, Jah-Havah. In this lies the whole
difference between the esoteric and the Christian trinities. The Mystics and
the Philosophers, the Eastern and Western Pantheists, synthesize their
pregenetic triad in the pure divine abstraction. The orthodox, anthropomorphize
it. Hiranyagarbha, Hari, and Sankara -- the three hypostases of the manifesting
"Spirit of the Supreme Spirit" (by which title Prithivi -- the Earth
-- greets Vishnu in his first Avatar) -- are the purely metaphysical abstract
qualities of formation, preservation, and destruction, and are the three divine
Avasthas (lit. hypostases) of that which "does
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is not the physical organisms
that remain in statu quo, least of all their psychical principles, during the
great Cosmic or even Solar pralayas, but only their Akasic or astral
"photographs." But during the minor pralayas, once over-taken by the "Night,"
the planets remain intact, though dead, as a huge animal, caught and embedded
in the polar ice, remains the same for ages.
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not perish with created things"
(or Achyuta, a name of Vishnu); whereas the orthodox Christian separates his
personal creative Deity into the three personages of the Trinity, and admits of
no higher Deity. The latter, in Occultism, is the abstract Triangle; with the
orthodox, the perfect Cube. The creative god or the aggregate gods are regarded
by the Eastern philosopher as Bhrantidarsanatah -- "false
apprehension," something "conceived of, by reason of erroneous appearances,
as a material form," and explained as arising from the illusive conception
of the Egotistic personal and human Soul (lower fifth principle). It is
beautifully expressed in a new translation of Vishnu Purana. "That Brahma
in its totality has essentially the aspect of Prakriti, both evolved and
unevolved (Mulaprakriti), and also the aspect of Spirit and the aspect of Time.
Spirit, O twice born, is the leading aspect of the Supreme Brahma.* The next is
a twofold aspect, -- Prakriti, both evolved and unevolved, and is the time
last." Kronos is shown in the Orphic theogony as being also a generated
god or agent.
At this stage of the re-awakening of
the Universe, the sacred symbolism represents it as a perfect Circle with the
(root) point in the Centre. This sign was universal, therefore we find it in
the Kabala also. The Western Kabala, however, now in the hands of Christian
mystics, ignores it altogether, though it is plainly shown in the Zohar. These
sectarians begin at the end, and show as the symbol of pregenetic Kosmos this
sign [[diagram]], calling it "the Union of the Rose and Cross," the
great mystery of occult generation, from whence the name -- Rosicrucians (Rose
Cross)!
As may be judged, however, from the
most important, as the best known of the Rosicrucians' symbols, there is one
which has never been hitherto understood even by modern mystics. It is that of
the "Pelican" tearing open its breast to feed its seven little ones
-- the real creed of the Brothers of the Rosie-Cross and a direct outcome from
the Eastern
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Thus Spencer, who, nevertheless,
like Schopenhauer and von Hartmann, only reflects an aspect of the old esoteric
philosophers, and hence lands his readers on the bleak shore of Agnostic
despair -- reverently formulates the grand mystery; "that which persists
unchanging in quantity, but ever changing in form, under these sensible
appearances which the Universe presents to us, is an unknown and unknowable
power, which we are obliged to recognise as without limit in Space and without
beginning or end in time." It is only daring Theology -- never Science or
philosophy -- which seeks to gauge the Infinite and unveil the Fathomless and
Unknowable.
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Secret Doctrine. Brahma (neuter) is
called Kalahansa, meaning, as explained by Western Orientalists, the Eternal
Swan or goose (see Stanza III., Comment. 8), and so is Brahma, the Creator. A
great mistake is thus brought under notice; it is Brahma (neuter) who ought to
be referred to as Hansa-vahana (He who uses the swan as his Vehicle) and not
Brahma the Creator, who is the real Kalahansa, while Brahma (neuter) is hamsa,
and "A-hamsa," as will be explained in the Commentary. Let it be
understood that the terms Brahma and Parabrahmam are not used here because they
belong to our Esoteric nomenclature, but simply because they are more familiar
to the students in the West. Both are the perfect equivalents of our one,
three, and seven vowelled terms, which stand for the ONE ALL, and the One
"All in all."
Such are the basic conceptions on
which the Secret Doctrine rests.
It would not be in place here to
enter upon any defence or proof of their inherent reasonableness; nor can I
pause to show how they are, in fact, contained -- though too often under a
misleading guise -- in every system of thought or philosophy worthy of the
name.
Once that the reader has gained a
clear comprehension of them and realised the light which they throw on every
problem of life, they will need no further justification in his eyes, because
their truth will be to him as evident as the sun in heaven. I pass on,
therefore, to the subject matter of the Stanzas as given in this volume, adding
a skeleton outline of them, in the hope of thereby rendering the task of the
student more easy, by placing before him in a few words the general conception
therein explained.
Stanza I. The history of cosmic
evolution, as traced in the Stanzas, is, so to say, the abstract algebraical
formula of that Evolution. Hence the student must not expect to find there an
account of all the stages and transformations which intervene between the first
beginnings of "Universal" evolution and our present state. To give
such an account would be as impossible as it would be incomprehensible to men
who cannot even grasp the nature of the plane of existence next to that to
which, for the moment, their consciousness is limited.
The Stanzas, therefore, give an
abstract formula which can be applied, mutatis mutandis, to all evolution: to
that of our tiny earth, to
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that of the chain of planets of which
that earth forms one, to the solar Universe to which that chain belongs, and so
on, in an ascending scale, till the mind reels and is exhausted in the effort.
The seven Stanzas given in this
volume represent the seven terms of this abstract formula. They refer to, and
describe the seven great stages of the evolutionary process, which are spoken
of in the Puranas as the "Seven Creations," and in the Bible as the
"Days" of Creation.
---------------------
The First Stanza describes the state
of the ONE ALL during Pralaya, before the first flutter of re-awakening
manifestation.
A moment's thought shows that such a
state can only be symbolised; to describe it is impossible. Nor can it be
symbolised except in negatives; for, since it is the state of Absoluteness per
se, it can possess none of those specific attributes which serve us to describe
objects in positive terms. Hence that state can only be suggested by the
negatives of all those most abstract attributes which men feel rather than
conceive, as the remotest limits attainable by their power of conception.
The stage described in Stanza II. is,
to a western mind, so nearly identical with that mentioned in the first Stanza,
that to express the idea of its difference would require a treatise in itself.
Hence it must be left to the intuition and the higher faculties of the reader
to grasp, as far as he can, the meaning of the allegorical phrases used. Indeed
it must be remembered that all these Stanzas appeal to the inner faculties
rather than to the ordinary comprehension of the physical brain.
Stanza III. describes the
Re-awakening of the Universe to life after Pralaya. It depicts the emergence of
the "Monads" from their state of absorption within the ONE; the
earliest and highest stage in the formation of "Worlds," the term
Monad being one which may apply equally to the vastest Solar System or the
tiniest atom.
Stanza IV. shows the differentiation
of the "Germ" of the Universe
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into the septenary hierarchy of conscious
Divine Powers, who are the active manifestations of the One Supreme Energy.
They are the framers, shapers, and ultimately the creators of all the
manifested Universe, in the only sense in which the name "Creator" is
intelligible; they inform and guide it; they are the intelligent Beings who
adjust and control evolution, embodying in themselves those manifestations of
the ONE LAW, which we know as "The Laws of Nature."
Generically, they are known as the
Dhyan Chohans, though each of the various groups has its own designation in the
Secret Doctrine.
This stage of evolution is spoken of
in Hindu mythology as the "Creation" of the Gods.
In Stanza V. the process of
world-formation is described:--- First, diffused Cosmic Matter, then the fiery
"whirlwind," the first stage in the formation of a nebula. That
nebula condenses, and after passing through various transformations, forms a
Solar Universe, a planetary chain, or a single planet, as the case may be.
The subsequent stages in the
formation of a "World" are indicated in Stanza VI., which brings the
evolution of such a world down to its fourth great period, corresponding to the
period in which we are now living.
Stanza VII. continues the history,
tracing the descent of life down to the appearance of Man; and thus closes the
first Book of the Secret Doctrine.
The development of "Man"
from his first appearance on this earth in this Round to the state in which we
now find him will form the subject of Book II.
---------------------
NOTE.
The Stanzas which form the thesis of
every section are given throughout in their modern translated version, as it
would be worse
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than useless to make the subject
still more difficult by introducing the archaic phraseology of the original,
with its puzzling style and words. Extracts are given from the Chinese Thibetan
and Sanskrit translations of the original Senzar Commentaries and Glosses on
the Book of DZYAN -- these being now rendered for the first time into a
European language. It is almost unnecessary to state that only portions of the
seven Stanzas are here given. Were they published complete they would remain
incomprehensible to all save the few higher occultists. Nor is there any need
to assure the reader that, no more than most of the profane, does the writer,
or rather the humble recorder, understand those forbidden passages. To
facilitate the reading, and to avoid the too frequent reference to foot-notes,
it was thought best to blend together texts and glosses, using the Sanskrit and
Tibetan proper names whenever those cannot be avoided, in preference to giving
the originals. The more so as the said terms are all accepted synonyms, the
former only being used between a Master and his chelas (or disciples).
Thus, were one to translate into
English, using only the substantives and technical terms as employed in one of
the Tibetan and Senzar versions, Verse I would read as follows:--- "Tho-ag
in Zhi-gyu slept seven Khorlo. Zodmanas zhiba. All Nyug bosom. Konch-hog not;
Thyan-Kam not; Lha-Chohan not; Tenbrel Chugnyi not; Dharmakaya ceased; Tgenchang
not become; Barnang and Ssa in Ngovonyidj; alone Tho-og Yinsin in night of
Sun-chan and Yong-grub (Parinishpanna), &c., &c.," which would
sound like pure Abracadabra.
As this work is written for the
instruction of students of Occultism, and not for the benefit of philologists,
we may well avoid such foreign terms wherever it is possible to do so. The
untranslateable terms alone, incomprehensible unless explained in their
meanings, are left, but all such terms are rendered in their Sanskrit form. Needless
to remind the reader that these are, in almost every case, the late
developments of the later language, and pertain to the Fifth Root-Race.
Sanskrit, as now known, was not spoken by the Atlanteans, and most of the
philosophical terms used in the systems of the India of the post-Mahabharatan
period are not found in the Vedas, nor are they to be met with in the original
Stanzas, but only their equivalents. The reader who is not a Theosophist, is
once more invited to regard all that which follows as a fairy tale, if he
likes; at best as one of the yet unproven speculations of
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dreamers; and, at the worst, as an
additional hypothesis to the many Scientific hypotheses past, present and
future, some exploded, others still lingering. It is not in any sense worse
than are many of the so called Scientific theories; and it is in every case
more philosophical and probable.
In view of the abundant comments and
explanations required, the references to the footnotes are given in the usual
way, while the sentences to be commented upon are marked with figures.
Additional matter will be found in the Chapters on Symbolism forming Part II.,
as well as in Part III., these being often more full of information than the
text.
---------------------
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PART I.
COSMIC EVOLUTION.
---------------------
SEVEN STANZAS TRANSLATED WITH
COMMENTARIES
FROM THE
SECRET BOOK OF DZYAN.
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Nor Aught nor Nought existed; yon
bright sky
Was not, nor heaven's broad roof
outstretched above.
What covered all? what sheltered?
what concealed?
Was it the water's fathomless abyss?
There was not death -- yet there was
nought immortal,
There was no confine betwixt day and
night;
The only One breathed breathless by
itself,
Other than It there nothing since has
been.
Darkness there was, and all at first
was veiled
In gloom profound -- an ocean without
light --
The germ that still lay covered in
the husk
Burst forth, one nature, from the
fervent heat.
. . . . . . . .
Who knows the secret? who proclaimed
it here?
Whence, whence this manifold creation
sprang?
The Gods themselves came later into
being --
Who knows from whence this great
creation sprang?
That, whence all this great creation
came,
Whether Its will created or was mute,
The Most High Seer that is in highest
heaven,
He knows it -- or perchance even He
knows not."
"Gazing into eternity . . .
Ere the foundations of the earth were
laid,
. . . . .
Thou wert. And when the subterranean
flame
Shall burst its prison and devour the
frame . . .
Thou shalt be still as Thou wert
before
And knew no change, when time shall
be no more.
Oh! endless thought, divine
ETERNITY."
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COSMIC EVOLUTION.
In Seven Stanzas translated from the
Book of Dzyan.
---------------------
STANZA I.
1. THE ETERNAL PARENT WRAPPED IN HER
EVER INVISIBLE ROBES HAD SLUMBERED ONCE AGAIN FOR SEVEN ETERNITIES.
2. TIME WAS NOT, FOR IT LAY ASLEEP IN
THE INFINITE BOSOM OF DURATION.
3. UNIVERSAL MIND WAS NOT, FOR THERE
WERE NO AH-HI TO CONTAIN IT.
4. THE SEVEN WAYS TO BLISS WERE NOT.
THE GREAT CAUSES OF MISERY WERE NOT, FOR THERE WAS NO ONE TO PRODUCE AND GET
ENSNARED BY THEM.
5. DARKNESS ALONE FILLED THE BOUNDLESS
ALL, FOR FATHER, MOTHER AND SON WERE ONCE MORE ONE, AND THE SON HAD NOT
AWAKENED YET FOR THE NEW WHEEL, AND HIS PILGRIMAGE THEREON.
6. THE SEVEN SUBLIME LORDS AND THE
SEVEN TRUTHS HAD CEASED TO BE, AND THE UNIVERSE, THE SON OF NECESSITY, WAS
IMMERSED IN PARANISHPANNA, TO BE OUTBREATHED BY THAT WHICH IS AND YET IS NOT.
NAUGHT WAS.
7. THE CAUSES OF EXISTENCE HAD BEEN
DONE AWAY WITH; THE VISIBLE THAT WAS, AND THE INVISIBLE THAT IS, RESTED IN
ETERNAL NON-BEING -- THE ONE BEING.
8. ALONE THE ONE FORM OF EXISTENCE
STRETCHED BOUNDLESS, INFINITE, CAUSELESS, IN DREAMLESS SLEEP; AND LIFE PULSATED
UNCONSCIOUS IN UNIVERSAL SPACE, THROUGHOUT THAT ALL-PRESENCE WHICH IS SENSED BY
THE OPENED EYE OF THE DANGMA.
9. BUT WHERE WAS THE DANGMA WHEN THE
ALAYA OF THE UNIVERSE WAS IN PARAMARTHA AND THE GREAT WHEEL WAS ANUPADAKA?
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STANZA II.
1. . . . WHERE WERE THE BUILDERS, THE
LUMINOUS SONS OF MANVANTARIC DAWN? . . . IN THE UNKNOWN DARKNESS IN THEIR AH-HI
PARANISHPANNA. THE PRODUCERS OF FORM FROM NO-FORM -- THE ROOT OF THE WORLD --
THE DEVAMATRI AND SVABHAVAT, RESTED IN THE BLISS OF NON-BEING.
2. . . . WHERE WAS SILENCE? WHERE THE
EARS TO SENSE IT? NO, THERE WAS NEITHER SILENCE NOR SOUND; NAUGHT SAVE
CEASELESS ETERNAL BREATH, WHICH KNOWS ITSELF NOT.
3. THE HOUR HAD NOT YET STRUCK; THE
RAY HAD NOT YET FLASHED INTO THE GERM; THE MATRIPADMA HAD NOT YET SWOLLEN.
4. HER HEART HAD NOT YET OPENED FOR
THE ONE RAY TO ENTER, THENCE TO FALL, AS THREE INTO FOUR, INTO THE LAP OF MAYA.
5. THE SEVEN SONS WERE NOT YET BORN
FROM THE WEB OF LIGHT. DARKNESS ALONE WAS FATHER-MOTHER, SVABHAVAT; AND
SVABHAVAT WAS IN DARKNESS.
6. THESE TWO ARE THE GERM, AND THE
GERM IS ONE. THE UNIVERSE WAS STILL CONCEALED IN THE DIVINE THOUGHT AND THE
DIVINE BOSOM. . . .
-------
STANZA III.
1. . . . THE LAST VIBRATION OF THE
SEVENTH ETERNITY THRILLS THROUGH INFINITUDE. THE MOTHER SWELLS, EXPANDING FROM
WITHIN WITHOUT, LIKE THE BUD OF THE LOTUS.
2. THE VIBRATION SWEEPS ALONG,
TOUCHING WITH ITS SWIFT WING THE WHOLE UNIVERSE AND THE GERM THAT DWELLETH IN
DARKNESS: THE DARKNESS THAT BREATHES OVER THE SLUMBERING WATERS OF LIFE. . .
3. DARKNESS RADIATES LIGHT, AND LIGHT
DROPS ONE SOLITARY RAY INTO THE MOTHER-DEEP. THE RAY SHOOTS THROUGH THE VIRGIN
EGG, THE RAY CAUSES THE ETERNAL EGG TO THRILL, AND DROP THE NON-ETERNAL GERM,
WHICH CONDENSES INTO THE WORLD-EGG.
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4. THEN THE THREE FALL INTO THE FOUR.
THE RADIANT ESSENCE BECOMES SEVEN INSIDE, SEVEN OUTSIDE. THE LUMINOUS EGG,
WHICH IN ITSELF IS THREE, CURDLES AND SPREADS IN MILK-WHITE CURDS THROUGHOUT
THE DEPTHS OF MOTHER, THE ROOT THAT GROWS IN THE DEPTHS OF THE OCEAN OF LIFE.
5. THE ROOT REMAINS, THE LIGHT
REMAINS, THE CURDS REMAIN, AND STILL OEAOHOO IS ONE.
6. THE ROOT OF LIFE WAS IN EVERY DROP
OF THE OCEAN OF IMMORTALITY, AND THE OCEAN WAS RADIANT LIGHT, WHICH WAS FIRE,
AND HEAT, AND MOTION. DARKNESS VANISHED AND WAS NO MORE; IT DISAPPEARED IN ITS
OWN ESSENCE, THE BODY OF FIRE AND WATER, OR FATHER AND MOTHER.
7. BEHOLD, OH LANOO! THE RADIANT
CHILD OF THE TWO, THE UNPARALLELED REFULGENT GLORY: BRIGHT SPACE SON OF DARK
SPACE, WHICH EMERGES FROM THE DEPTHS OF THE GREAT DARK WATERS. IT IS OEAOHOO
THE YOUNGER, THE * * * HE SHINES FORTH AS THE SON; HE IS THE BLAZING DIVINE
DRAGON OF WISDOM; THE ONE IS FOUR, AND FOUR TAKES TO ITSELF THREE,** AND THE
UNION PRODUCES THE SAPTA, IN WHOM ARE THE SEVEN WHICH BECOME THE TRIDASA (OR
THE HOSTS AND THE MULTITUDES). BEHOLD HIM LIFTING THE VEIL AND UNFURLING IT FROM
EAST TO WEST. HE SHUTS OUT THE ABOVE, AND LEAVES THE BELOW TO BE SEEN AS THE
GREAT ILLUSION. HE MARKS THE PLACES FOR THE SHINING ONES, AND TURNS THE UPPER
INTO A SHORELESS SEA OF FIRE, AND THE ONE MANIFESTED INTO THE GREAT WATERS.
8. WHERE WAS THE GERM AND WHERE WAS
NOW DARKNESS? WHERE IS THE SPIRIT OF THE FLAME THAT BURNS IN THY LAMP, OH
LANOO? THE GERM IS THAT, AND THAT IS LIGHT, THE WHITE BRILLIANT SON OF THE DARK
HIDDEN FATHER.
9. LIGHT IS COLD FLAME, AND FLAME IS
FIRE, AND FIRE PRODUCES HEAT, WHICH YIELDS WATER: THE WATER OF LIFE IN THE
GREAT MOTHER.
10. FATHER-MOTHER SPIN A WEB WHOSE
UPPER END IS FASTENED TO SPIRIT -- THE LIGHT OF THE ONE DARKNESS -- AND THE
LOWER ONE TO ITS SHADOWY END, MATTER; AND THIS WEB IS THE UNIVERSE SPUN OUT OF
THE TWO SUBSTANCES MADE IN ONE, WHICH IS SVABHAVAT.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
** In the English translation from
the Sanskrit the numbers are given in that language, Eka, Chatur, etc., etc. It
was thought best to give them in English.
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11. IT EXPANDS WHEN THE BREATH OF
FIRE IS UPON IT; IT CONTRACTS WHEN THE BREATH OF THE MOTHER TOUCHES IT. THEN
THE SONS DISSOCIATE AND SCATTER, TO RETURN INTO THEIR MOTHER'S BOSOM AT THE END
OF THE GREAT DAY, AND RE-BECOME ONE WITH HER; WHEN IT IS COOLING IT BECOMES
RADIANT, AND THE SONS EXPAND AND CONTRACT THROUGH THEIR OWN SELVES AND HEARTS;
THEY EMBRACE INFINITUDE.
12. THEN SVABHAVAT SENDS FOHAT TO
HARDEN THE ATOMS. EACH IS A PART OF THE WEB. REFLECTING THE "SELF-EXISTENT
LORD" LIKE A MIRROR, EACH BECOMES IN TURN A WORLD.
-------
STANZA IV.
1. . . . LISTEN, YE SONS OF THE
EARTH, TO YOUR INSTRUCTORS -- THE SONS OF THE FIRE. LEARN, THERE IS NEITHER
FIRST NOR LAST, FOR ALL IS ONE: NUMBER ISSUED FROM NO NUMBER.
2. LEARN WHAT WE WHO DESCEND FROM THE
PRIMORDIAL SEVEN, WE WHO ARE BORN FROM THE PRIMORDIAL FLAME, HAVE LEARNT FROM
OUR FATHERS. . . .
3. FROM THE EFFULGENCY OF LIGHT --
THE RAY OF THE EVER-DARKNESS -- SPRUNG IN SPACE THE RE-AWAKENED ENERGIES; THE
ONE FROM THE EGG, THE SIX, AND THE FIVE. THEN THE THREE, THE ONE, THE FOUR, THE
ONE, THE FIVE -- THE TWICE SEVEN THE SUM TOTAL. AND THESE ARE THE ESSENCES, THE
FLAMES, THE ELEMENTS, THE BUILDERS, THE NUMBERS, THE ARUPA, THE RUPA, AND THE
FORCE OF DIVINE MAN -- THE SUM TOTAL. AND FROM THE DIVINE MAN EMANATED THE
FORMS, THE SPARKS, THE SACRED ANIMALS, AND THE MESSENGERS OF THE SACRED FATHERS
WITHIN THE HOLY FOUR.
4. THIS WAS THE ARMY OF THE VOICE --
THE DIVINE MOTHER OF THE SEVEN. THE SPARKS OF THE SEVEN ARE SUBJECT TO, AND THE
SERVANTS OF, THE FIRST, THE SECOND, THE THIRD, THE FOURTH, THE FIFTH, THE
SIXTH, AND THE SEVENTH OF THE SEVEN. THESE "SPARKS" ARE CALLED
SPHERES, TRIANGLES, CUBES, LINES, AND MODELLERS; FOR THUS STANDS THE ETERNAL
NIDANA -- THE OEAOHOO, WHICH IS:
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5. "DARKNESS" THE
BOUNDLESS, OR THE NO-NUMBER, ADI-NIDANA SVABHAVAT:--
I. THE ADI-SANAT, THE NUMBER, FOR HE
IS ONE.
II. THE VOICE OF THE LORD SVABHAVAT,
THE NUMBERS, FOR HE IS ONE AND NINE.
III. THE "FORMLESS SQUARE."
AND THESE THREE ENCLOSED WITHIN THE
[[diagram]] ARE THE SACRED FOUR; AND THE TEN ARE THE ARUPA UNIVERSE. THEN COME
THE "SONS," THE SEVEN FIGHTERS, THE ONE, THE EIGHTH LEFT OUT, AND HIS
BREATH WHICH IS THE LIGHT-MAKER.
6. THEN THE SECOND SEVEN, WHO ARE THE
LIPIKA, PRODUCED BY THE THREE. THE REJECTED SON IS ONE. THE
"SON-SUNS" ARE COUNTLESS.
-------
STANZA V.
1. THE PRIMORDIAL SEVEN, THE FIRST
SEVEN BREATHS OF THE DRAGON OF WISDOM, PRODUCE IN THEIR TURN FROM THEIR HOLY
CIRCUMGYRATING BREATHS THE FIERY WHIRLWIND.
2. THEY MAKE OF HIM THE MESSENGER OF
THEIR WILL. THE DZYU BECOMES FOHAT, THE SWIFT SON OF THE DIVINE SONS WHOSE SONS
ARE THE LIPIKA, RUNS CIRCULAR ERRANDS. FOHAT IS THE STEED AND THE THOUGHT IS
THE RIDER. HE PASSES LIKE LIGHTNING THROUGH THE FIERY CLOUDS; TAKES THREE, AND
FIVE, AND SEVEN STRIDES THROUGH THE SEVEN REGIONS ABOVE, AND THE SEVEN BELOW.
HE LIFTS HIS VOICE, AND CALLS THE INNUMERABLE SPARKS, AND JOINS THEM.
3. HE IS THEIR GUIDING SPIRIT AND
LEADER. WHEN HE COMMENCES WORK, HE SEPARATES THE SPARKS OF THE LOWER KINGDOM
THAT FLOAT AND THRILL WITH JOY IN THEIR RADIANT DWELLINGS, AND FORMS THEREWITH
THE GERMS OF WHEELS. HE PLACES THEM IN THE SIX DIRECTIONS OF SPACE, AND ONE IN
THE MIDDLE -- THE CENTRAL WHEEL.
4. FOHAT TRACES SPIRAL LINES TO UNITE
THE SIXTH TO THE SEVENTH -- THE CROWN; AN ARMY OF THE SONS OF LIGHT STANDS AT
EACH ANGLE, AND THE LIPIKA IN THE MIDDLE WHEEL, THEY SAY: THIS IS GOOD, THE
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FIRST DIVINE WORLD IS READY, THE
FIRST IS NOW THE SECOND. THEN THE "DIVINE ARUPA" REFLECTS ITSELF IN
CHHAYA LOKA, THE FIRST GARMENT OF THE ANUPADAKA.
5. FOHAT TAKES FIVE STRIDES AND
BUILDS A WINGED WHEEL AT EACH CORNER OF THE SQUARE, FOR THE FOUR HOLY ONES AND
THEIR ARMIES.
6. THE LIPIKA CIRCUMSCRIBE THE
TRIANGLE, THE FIRST ONE, THE CUBE, THE SECOND ONE, AND THE PENTACLE WITHIN THE
EGG. IT IS THE RING CALLED "PASS NOT" FOR THOSE WHO DESCEND AND
ASCEND. ALSO FOR THOSE WHO DURING THE KALPA ARE PROGRESSING TOWARDS THE GREAT
DAY "BE WITH US." THUS WERE FORMED THE RUPA AND THE ARUPA: FROM ONE
LIGHT SEVEN LIGHTS; FROM EACH OF THE SEVEN, SEVEN TIMES SEVEN LIGHTS. THE
WHEELS WATCH THE RING. . . . .
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STANZA VI.
1. BY THE POWER OF THE MOTHER OF
MERCY AND KNOWLEDGE -- KWAN-YIN -- THE "TRIPLE" OF KWAN-SHAI-YIN,
RESIDING IN KWAN-YIN-TIEN, FOHAT, THE BREATH OF THEIR PROGENY, THE SON OF THE
SONS, HAVING CALLED FORTH, FROM THE LOWER ABYSS, THE ILLUSIVE FORM OF
SIEN-TCHANG AND THE SEVEN ELEMENTS:*
2. THE SWIFT AND RADIANT ONE PRODUCES
THE SEVEN LAYA CENTRES, AGAINST WHICH NONE WILL PREVAIL TO THE GREAT DAY
"BE-WITH-US," AND SEATS THE UNIVERSE ON THESE ETERNAL FOUNDATIONS
SURROUNDING TSIEN-TCHAN WITH THE ELEMENTARY GERMS.
3. OF THE SEVEN -- FIRST ONE
MANIFESTED, SIX CONCEALED, TWO MANIFESTED, FIVE CONCEALED; THREE MANIFESTED,
FOUR CONCEALED; FOUR PRODUCED, THREE HIDDEN; FOUR AND ONE TSAN REVEALED, TWO
AND ONE HALF CONCEALED; SIX TO BE MANIFESTED, ONE LAID ASIDE. LASTLY, SEVEN
SMALL WHEELS REVOLVING; ONE GIVING BIRTH TO THE OTHER.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Verse 1 of Stanza VI. is of a far
later date than the other Stanzas, though still very ancient. The old text of
this verse, having names entirely unknown to the Orientalists would give no
clue to the student.
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4. HE BUILDS THEM IN THE LIKENESS OF
OLDER WHEELS, PLACING THEM ON THE IMPERISHABLE CENTRES.
HOW DOES FOHAT BUILD THEM? HE
COLLECTS THE FIERY DUST. HE MAKES BALLS OF FIRE, RUNS THROUGH THEM, AND ROUND
THEM, INFUSING LIFE THEREINTO THEN' SETS THEM INTO MOTION; SOME ONE WAY, SOME
THE OTHER WAY. THEY ARE COLD, HE MAKES THEM HOT. THEY ARE DRY, HE MAKES THEM
MOIST. THEY SHINE, HE FANS AND COOLS THEM. THUS ACTS FOHAT FROM ONE TWILIGHT TO
THE OTHER, DURING SEVEN ETERNITIES.
5. AT THE FOURTH, THE SONS ARE TOLD
TO CREATE THEIR IMAGES. ONE THIRD REFUSES -- TWO OBEY.
THE CURSE IS PRONOUNCED; THEY WILL BE
BORN ON THE FOURTH, SUFFER AND CAUSE SUFFERING; THIS IS THE FIRST WAR.
6. THE OLDER WHEELS ROTATED DOWNWARDS
AND UPWARDS. . . . THE MOTHER'S SPAWN FILLED THE WHOLE. THERE WERE BATTLES
FOUGHT BETWEEN THE CREATORS AND THE DESTROYERS, AND BATTLES FOUGHT FOR SPACE;
THE SEED APPEARING AND RE-APPEARING CONTINUOUSLY.
7. MAKE THY CALCULATIONS, LANOO, IF
THOU WOULDEST LEARN THE CORRECT AGE OF THY SMALL WHEEL. ITS FOURTH SPOKE IS OUR
MOTHER. REACH THE FOURTH "FRUIT" OF THE FOURTH PATH OF KNOWLEDGE THAT
LEADS TO NIRVANA, AND THOU SHALT COMPREHEND, FOR THOU SHALT SEE . . . . .
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STANZA VII.
1. BEHOLD THE BEGINNING OF SENTIENT
FORMLESS LIFE.
FIRST THE DIVINE, THE ONE FROM THE
MOTHER-SPIRIT; THEN THE SPIRITUAL; THE THREE FROM THE ONE, THE FOUR FROM THE
ONE, AND THE FIVE FROM WHICH THE THREE, THE FIVE, AND THE SEVEN. THESE ARE THE
THREE-FOLD, THE FOUR-FOLD DOWNWARD; THE "MIND-BORN" SONS OF THE FIRST
LORD; THE SHINING SEVEN.
IT IS THEY WHO ARE THOU, ME, HIM, OH
LANOO. THEY, WHO WATCH OVER THEE, AND THY MOTHER EARTH.
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2. THE ONE RAY MULTIPLIES THE SMALLER
RAYS. LIFE PRECEDES FORM, AND LIFE SURVIVES THE LAST ATOM OF FORM. THROUGH THE
COUNTLESS RAYS PROCEEDS THE LIFE-RAY, THE ONE, LIKE A THREAD THROUGH MANY
JEWELS.
3. WHEN THE ONE BECOMES TWO, THE
THREEFOLD APPEARS, AND THE THREE ARE ONE; AND IT IS OUR THREAD, OH LANOO, THE
HEART OF THE MAN-PLANT CALLED SAPTASARMA.
4. IT IS THE ROOT THAT NEVER DIES;
THE THREE-TONGUED FLAME OF THE FOUR WICKS. THE WICKS ARE THE SPARKS, THAT DRAW
FROM THE THREE-TONGUED FLAME SHOT OUT BY THE SEVEN -- THEIR FLAME -- THE BEAMS
AND SPARKS OF ONE MOON REFLECTED IN THE RUNNING WAVES OF ALL THE RIVERS OF
EARTH.
5. THE SPARK HANGS FROM THE FLAME BY
THE FINEST THREAD OF FOHAT. IT JOURNEYS THROUGH THE SEVEN WORLDS OF MAYA. IT
STOPS IN THE FIRST, AND IS A METAL AND A STONE; IT PASSES INTO THE SECOND AND
BEHOLD -- A PLANT; THE PLANT WHIRLS THROUGH SEVEN CHANGES AND BECOMES A SACRED
ANIMAL. FROM THE COMBINED ATTRIBUTES OF THESE, MANU, THE THINKER IS FORMED. WHO
FORMS HIM? THE SEVEN LIVES, AND THE ONE LIFE. WHO COMPLETES HIM? THE FIVE-FOLD
LHA. AND WHO PERFECTS THE LAST BODY? FISH, SIN, AND SOMA. . . . .
6. FROM THE FIRST-BORN THE THREAD
BETWEEN THE SILENT WATCHER AND HIS SHADOW BECOMES MORE STRONG AND RADIANT WITH
EVERY CHANGE. THE MORNING SUN-LIGHT HAS CHANGED INTO NOON-DAY GLORY. . . . .
7. THIS IS THY PRESENT WHEEL, SAID
THE FLAME TO THE SPARK. THOU ART MYSELF, MY IMAGE, AND MY SHADOW. I HAVE
CLOTHED MYSELF IN THEE, AND THOU ART MY VAHAN TO THE DAY, "BE WITH
US," WHEN THOU SHALT RE-BECOME MYSELF AND OTHERS, THYSELF AND ME. THEN THE
BUILDERS, HAVING DONNED THEIR FIRST CLOTHING, DESCEND ON RADIANT EARTH AND REIGN
OVER MEN -- WHO ARE THEMSELVES. . . .
Thus ends this portion of the archaic
narrative, dark, confused, almost incomprehensible. An attempt will now be made
to throw light into this darkness, to make sense out of this apparent
NON-SENSE.
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COMMENTARIES
ON THE SEVEN STANZAS AND THEIR TERMS,
ACCORDING TO THEIR NUMERATION, IN STANZAS AND SLOKAS.
STANZA I.
1. "THE ETERNAL PARENT (Space),
WRAPPED IN HER EVER INVISIBLE ROBES, HAD SLUMBERED ONCE AGAIN FOR SEVEN
ETERNITIES (a)."
The "Parent Space" is the
eternal, ever present cause of all -- the incomprehensible DEITY, whose
"invisible robes" are the mystic root of all matter, and of the
Universe. Space is the one eternal thing that we can most easily imagine,
immovable in its abstraction and uninfluenced by either the presence or absence
in it of an objective Universe. It is without dimension, in every sense, and
self-existent. Spirit is the first differentiation from THAT, the causeless
cause of both Spirit and Matter. It is, as taught in the esoteric catechism,
neither limitless void, nor conditioned fulness, but both. It was and ever will
be. (See Proem pp. 2 et seq.)
Thus, the "Robes" stand for
the noumenon of undifferentiated Cosmic Matter. It is not matter as we know it,
but the spiritual essence of matter, and is co-eternal and even one with Space
in its abstract sense. Root-nature is also the source of the subtile invisible
properties in visible matter. It is the Soul, so to say, of the ONE infinite
Spirit. The Hindus call it Mulaprakriti, and say that it is the primordial
substance, which is the basis of the Upadhi or vehicle of every phenomenon,
whether physical, mental or psychic. It is the source from which Akasa
radiates.
(a) By the Seven
"Eternities," aeons or periods are meant. The word
"Eternity," as understood in Christian theology, has no meaning to
the Asiatic ear, except in its application to the ONE existence; nor is
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the term sempiternity, the eternal
only in futurity, anything better than a misnomer.* Such words do not and
cannot exist in philosophical metaphysics, and were unknown till the advent of
ecclesiastical Christianity. The Seven Eternities meant are the seven periods,
or a period answering in its duration to the seven periods, of a Manvantara,
and extending throughout a Maha-Kalpa or the "Great Age" -- 100 years
of Brahma -- making a total of 311,040,000,000,000 of years; each year of
Brahma being composed of 360 "days," and of the same number of
"nights" of Brahma (reckoning by the Chandrayana or lunar year); and
a "Day of Brahma" consisting of 4,320,000,000 of mortal years. These
"Eternities" belong to the most secret calculations, in which, in
order to arrive at the true total, every figure must be 7x (7 to the power of
x); x varying according to the nature of the cycle in the subjective or real
world; and every figure or number relating to, or representing all the
different cycles from the greatest to the smallest -- in the objective or
unreal world -- must necessarily be multiples of seven. The key to this cannot
be given, for herein lies the mystery of esoteric calculations, and for the
purposes of ordinary calculation it has no sense. "The number seven,"
says the Kabala, "is the great number of the Divine Mysteries;"
number ten is that of all human knowledge (Pythagorean decade); 1,000 is the
number ten to the third power, and therefore the number 7,000 is also
symbolical. In the Secret Doctrine the figure and number 4 are the male symbol
only on the highest plane of abstraction; on the plane of matter the 3 is the
masculine and the 4 the female: the upright and the horizontal in the fourth
stage of symbolism, when the symbols became the glyphs of the generative powers
on the physical plane.
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STANZA I. -- Continued.
2. TIME WAS NOT, FOR IT LAY ASLEEP IN
THE INFINITE BOSOM OF DURATION (a).
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is stated in Book II., ch.
viii., of Vishnu Purana: "By immortality is meant existence to the end of
the Kalpa;" and Wilson, the translator, remarks in a footnote: "This,
according to the Vedas, is all that is to be understood of the immortality (or
eternity) of the gods; they perish at the end of universal dissolution (or
Pralaya)." And Esoteric philosophy says: They "perish" not, but
are re-absorbed.
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(a) Time is only an illusion produced
by the succession of our states of consciousness as we travel through eternal
duration, and it does not exist where no consciousness exists in which the
illusion can be produced; but "lies asleep." The present is only a
mathematical line which divides that part of eternal duration which we call the
future, from that part which we call the past. Nothing on earth has real
duration, for nothing remains without change -- or the same -- for the
billionth part of a second; and the sensation we have of the actuality of the
division of "time" known as the present, comes from the blurring of
that momentary glimpse, or succession of glimpses, of things that our senses
give us, as those things pass from the region of ideals which we call the future,
to the region of memories that we name the past. In the same way we experience
a sensation of duration in the case of the instantaneous electric spark, by
reason of the blurred and continuing impression on the retina. The real person
or thing does not consist solely of what is seen at any particular moment, but
is composed of the sum of all its various and changing conditions from its
appearance in the material form to its disappearance from the earth. It is
these "sum-totals" that exist from eternity in the
"future," and pass by degrees through matter, to exist for eternity
in the "past." No one could say that a bar of metal dropped into the
sea came into existence as it left the air, and ceased to exist as it entered
the water, and that the bar itself consisted only of that cross-section thereof
which at any given moment coincided with the mathematical plane that separates,
and, at the same time, joins, the atmosphere and the ocean. Even so of persons
and things, which, dropping out of the to-be into the has-been, out of the
future into the past -- present momentarily to our senses a cross-section, as
it were, of their total selves, as they pass through time and space (as matter)
on their way from one eternity to another: and these two constitute that
"duration" in which alone anything has true existence, were our
senses but able to cognize it there.
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STANZA I. -- Continued.
3. . . . UNIVERSAL MIND WAS NOT, FOR
THERE WERE NO AH-HI (celestial beings) TO CONTAIN (hence to manifest) IT (a).
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(a) Mind is a name given to the sum
of the states of Consciousness grouped under Thought, Will, and Feeling. During
deep sleep, ideation ceases on the physical plane, and memory is in abeyance;
thus for the time-being "Mind is not," because the organ, through
which the Ego manifests ideation and memory on the material plane, has
temporarily ceased to function. A noumenon can become a phenomenon on any plane
of existence only by manifesting on that plane through an appropriate basis or
vehicle; and during the long night of rest called Pralaya, when all the
existences are dissolved, the "UNIVERSAL MIND" remains as a permanent
possibility of mental action, or as that abstract absolute thought, of which
mind is the concrete relative manifestation. The AH-HI (Dhyan-Chohans) are the
collective hosts of spiritual beings -- the Angelic Hosts of Christianity, the
Elohim and "Messengers" of the Jews -- who are the vehicle for the
manifestation of the divine or universal thought and will. They are the
Intelligent Forces that give to and enact in Nature her "laws," while
themselves acting according to laws imposed upon them in a similar manner by
still higher Powers; but they are not "the personifications" of the
powers of Nature, as erroneously thought. This hierarchy of spiritual Beings,
through which the Universal Mind comes into action, is like an army -- a
"Host," truly -- by means of which the fighting power of a nation
manifests itself, and which is composed of army corps, divisions, brigades,
regiments, and so forth, each with its separate individuality or life, and its
limited freedom of action and limited responsibilities; each contained in a
larger individuality, to which its own interests are subservient, and each
containing lesser individualities in itself.
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STANZA I. -- Continued.
4. THE SEVEN WAYS TO BLISS (Moksha*
or Nirvana) WERE NOT (a). THE GREAT CAUSES OF MISERY (Nidana** and Maya) WERE
NOT, FOR THERE WAS NO ONE TO PRODUCE AND GET ENSNARED BY THEM (b).
(a) There are seven "Paths"
or "Ways" to the bliss of Non-Exist-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Nippang in China; Neibban in
Burmah; or Moksha in India.
** The "12" Nidanas (in
Tibetan Ten-brel chug-nyi) the chief causes of existence, effects generated by
a concatenation of causes produced (see Comment. II).
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ence, which is absolute Being,
Existence, and Consciousness. They were not, because the Universe was, so far,
empty, and existed only in the Divine Thought. For it is . . .
(b) The twelve Nidanas or causes of
being. Each is the effect of its antecedent cause, and a cause, in its turn, to
its successor; the sum total of the Nidanas being based on the four truths, a
doctrine especially characteristic of the Hinayana System.* They belong to the
theory of the stream of catenated law which produces merit and demerit, and
finally brings Karma into full sway. It is based upon the great truth that
re-incarnation is to be dreaded, as existence in this world only entails upon
man suffering, misery and pain; Death itself being unable to deliver man from
it, since death is merely the door through which he passes to another life on
earth after a little rest on its threshold -- Devachan. The Hinayana System, or
School of the "Little Vehicle," is of very ancient growth; while the
Mahayana is of a later period, having originated after the death of Buddha. Yet
the tenets of the latter are as old as the hills that have contained such
schools from time immemorial, and the Hinayana and Mahayana Schools (the
latter, that of the "Great Vehicle") both teach the same doctrine in
reality. Yana, or Vehicle (in Sanskrit, Vahan) is a mystic expression, both
"vehicles" inculcating that man may escape the sufferings of rebirths
and even the false bliss of Devachan, by obtaining Wisdom and Knowledge, which
alone can dispel the Fruits of Illusion and Ignorance.
Maya or illusion is an element which
enters into all finite things, for everything that exists has only a relative,
not an absolute, reality, since the appearance which the hidden noumenon
assumes for any observer depends upon his power of cognition. To the untrained
eye of the savage, a painting is at first an unmeaning confusion of streaks and
daubs of color, while an educated eye sees instantly a face or a landscape.
Nothing is permanent except the one hidden absolute existence which contains in
itself the noumena of all realities. The existences belonging to every plane of
being, up to the highest Dhyan-Chohans, are, in degree, of the nature of
shadows cast by a magic lantern on a colourless screen; but all things are
relatively real, for the cogniser is also a reflection, and the things cognised
are therefore as real to him as himself. Whatever reality things possess must
be looked for in them
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Wassilief on Buddhism, pp.
97-950.
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before or after they have passed like
a flash through the material world; but we cannot cognise any such existence
directly, so long as we have sense-instruments which bring only material
existence into the field of our consciousness. Whatever plane our consciousness
may be acting in, both we and the things belonging to that plane are, for the
time being, our only realities. As we rise in the scale of development we
perceive that during the stages through which we have passed we mistook shadows
for realities, and the upward progress of the Ego is a series of progressive
awakenings, each advance bringing with it the idea that now, at last, we have reached
"reality;" but only when we shall have reached the absolute
Consciousness, and blended our own with it, shall we be free from the delusions
produced by Maya.
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STANZA I. -- Continued.
5. DARKNESS ALONE FILLED THE
BOUNDLESS ALL (a), FOR FATHER, MOTHER AND SON WERE ONCE MORE ONE, AND THE SON
HAD NOT AWAKENED YET FOR THE NEW WHEEL* AND HIS PILGRIMAGE THEREON (b).
(a) "Darkness is Father-Mother:
light their son," says an old Eastern proverb. Light is inconceivable
except as coming from some source which is the cause of it; and as, in the
instance of primordial light, that source is unknown, though as strongly
demanded by reason and logic, therefore it is called "Darkness" by
us, from an intellectual point of view. As to borrowed or secondary light,
whatever its source, it can be but of a temporary mayavic character. Darkness,
then, is the eternal
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* That which is called
"wheel" is the symbolical expression for a world or globe, which
shows that the ancients were aware that our Earth was a revolving globe, not a
motionless square as some Christian Fathers taught. The "Great Wheel"
is the whole duration of our Cycle of being, or Maha Kalpa, i.e., the whole
revolution of our special chain of seven planets or Spheres from beginning to
end; the "Small Wheels" meaning the Rounds, of which there are also
Seven.
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matrix in which the sources of light
appear and disappear. Nothing is added to darkness to make of it light, or to
light to make it darkness, on this our plane. They are interchangeable, and
scientifically light is but a mode of darkness and vice versa. Yet both are
phenomena of the same noumenon -- which is absolute darkness to the scientific
mind, and but a gray twilight to the perception of the average mystic, though
to that of the spiritual eye of the Initiate it is absolute light. How far we
discern the light that shines in darkness depends upon our powers of vision.
What is light to us is darkness to certain insects, and the eye of the
clairvoyant sees illumination where the normal eye perceives only blackness.
When the whole universe was plunged in sleep -- had returned to its one
primordial element -- there was neither centre of luminosity, nor eye to
perceive light, and darkness necessarily filled the boundless all.
(b) The Father-Mother are the male
and female principles in root-nature, the opposite poles that manifest in all
things on every plane of Kosmos, or Spirit and Substance, in a less allegorical
aspect, the resultant of which is the Universe, or the Son. They are "once
more One" when in "The Night of Brahma," during Pralaya, all in
the objective Universe has returned to its one primal and eternal cause, to
reappear at the following Dawn -- as it does periodically. "Karana"
-- eternal cause -- was alone. To put it more plainly: Karana is alone during
the "Nights of Brahma." The previous objective Universe has dissolved
into its one primal and eternal cause, and is, so to say, held in solution in
space, to differentiate again and crystallize out anew at the following Manvantaric
dawn, which is the commencement of a new "Day" or new activity of
Brahma -- the symbol of the Universe. In esoteric parlance, Brahma is
Father-Mother-Son, or Spirit, Soul and Body at once; each personage being
symbolical of an attribute, and each attribute or quality being a graduated
efflux of Divine Breath in its cyclic differentiation, involutionary and
evolutionary. In the cosmicophysical sense, it is the Universe, the planetary
chain and the earth; in the purely spiritual, the Unknown Deity, Planetary
Spirit, and Man -- the Son of the two, the creature of Spirit and Matter, and a
manifestation of them in his periodical appearances on Earth during the
"wheels," or the Manvantaras. -- (See Part II. §: "Days and
Nights of Brahma.")
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STANZA I. -- Continued.
6. THE SEVEN SUBLIME LORDS AND THE
SEVEN TRUTHS HAD CEASED TO BE (a), AND THE UNIVERSE, THE SON OF NECESSITY, WAS
IMMERSED IN PARANISHPANNA (b) (absolute perfection, Paranirvana, which is
Yong-Grub) TO BE OUT-BREATHED BY THAT WHICH IS AND YET IS NOT. NAUGHT WAS (c).
(a) The seven sublime lords are the
Seven Creative Spirits, the Dhyan-Chohans, who correspond to the Hebrew Elohim.
It is the same hierarchy of Archangels to which St. Michael, St. Gabriel, and
others belong, in the Christian theogony. Only while St. Michael, for instance,
is allowed in dogmatic Latin theology to watch over all the promontories and
gulfs, in the Esoteric System, the Dhyanis watch successively over one of the
Rounds and the great Root-races of our planetary chain. They are, moreover,
said to send their Bhodisatvas, the human correspondents of the Dhyani-Buddhas (of
whom vide infra) during every Round and Race. Out of the Seven Truths and
Revelations, or rather revealed secrets, four only have been handed to us, as
we are still in the Fourth Round, and the world also has only had four Buddhas,
so far. This is a very complicated question, and will receive more ample
treatment later on.
So far "There are only Four
Truths, and Four Vedas" -- say the Hindus and Buddhists. For a similar
reason Irenaeus insisted on the necessity of Four Gospels. But as every new
Root-race at the head of a Round must have its revelation and revealers, the
next Round will bring the Fifth, the following the Sixth, and so on.
(b) "Paranishpanna" is the
absolute perfection to which all existences attain at the close of a great
period of activity, or Maha-Manvantara, and in which they rest during the
succeeding period of repose. In Tibetan it is called Yong-Grub. Up to the day
of the Yogacharya school the true nature of Paranirvana was taught publicly,
but since then it has become entirely esoteric; hence so many contradictory
interpretations of it. It is only a true Idealist who can understand it.
Everything has to be viewed as ideal, with the exception of Paranirvana, by him
who would comprehend that state, and acquire a knowledge of how Non Ego,
Voidness, and Darkness are Three in One and alone Self-existent and perfect. It
is absolute, however, only in a relative
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sense, for it must give room to still
further absolute perfection, according to a higher standard of excellence in
the following period of activity -- just as a perfect flower must cease to be a
perfect flower and die, in order to grow into a perfect fruit, -- if a somewhat
Irish mode of expression may be permitted.
The Secret Doctrine teaches the
progressive development of everything, worlds as well as atoms; and this
stupendous development has neither conceivable beginning nor imaginable end.
Our "Universe" is only one of an infinite number of Universes, all of
them "Sons of Necessity," because links in the great Cosmic chain of
Universes, each one standing in the relation of an effect as regards its
predecessor, and being a cause as regards its successor.
The appearance and disappearance of
the Universe are pictured as an outbreathing and inbreathing of "the Great
Breath," which is eternal, and which, being Motion, is one of the three
aspects of the Absolute -- Abstract Space and Duration being the other two.
When the "Great Breath" is projected, it is called the Divine Breath,
and is regarded as the breathing of the Unknowable Deity -- the One Existence
-- which breathes out a thought, as it were, which becomes the Kosmos. (See
"Isis Unveiled.") So also is it when the Divine Breath is inspired
again the Universe disappears into the bosom of "the Great Mother,"
who then sleeps "wrapped in her invisible robes."
(c) By "that which is and yet is
not" is meant the Great Breath itself, which we can only speak of as
absolute existence, but cannot picture to our imagination as any form of
existence that we can distinguish from Non-existence. The three periods -- the
Present, the Past, and the Future -- are in the esoteric philosophy a compound
time; for the three are a composite number only in relation to the phenomenal
plane, but in the realm of noumena have no abstract validity. As said in the
Scriptures: "The Past time is the Present time, as also the Future, which,
though it has not come into existence, still is"; according to a precept
in the Prasanga Madhyamika teaching, whose dogmas have been known ever since it
broke away from the purely esoteric schools.* Our ideas, in short, on duration
and time are all derived from our
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Dzungarian "Mani
Kumbum," the "Book of the 10,000 Precepts." Also consult
Wassilief's "Der Buddhismus," pp. 327 and 357, etc.
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sensations according to the laws of
Association. Inextricably bound up with the relativity of human knowledge, they
nevertheless can have no existence except in the experience of the individual
ego, and perish when its evolutionary march dispels the Maya of phenomenal
existence. What is Time, for instance, but the panoramic succession of our
states of consciousness? In the words of a Master, "I feel irritated at
having to use these three clumsy words -- Past, Present, and Future --
miserable concepts of the objective phases of the subjective whole, they are
about as ill-adapted for the purpose as an axe for fine carving." One has
to acquire Paramartha lest one should become too easy a prey to Samvriti -- is
a philosophical axiom.*
-------
STANZA I. -- Continued.
7. THE CAUSES OF EXISTENCE HAD BEEN
DONE AWAY WITH (a); THE VISIBLE THAT WAS, AND THE INVISIBLE THAT IS, RESTED IN
ETERNAL NON-BEING, THE ONE BEING (b).
(a) "The Causes of
Existence" mean not only the physical causes known to science, but the
metaphysical causes, the chief of which is the desire to exist, an outcome of
Nidana and Maya. This desire for a sentient life shows itself in everything,
from an atom to a sun, and is a reflection of the Divine Thought propelled into
objective existence, into a law that the Universe should exist. According to
esoteric teaching, the real cause of that supposed desire, and of all
existence, remains for ever hidden, and its first emanations are the most
complete abstractions mind can conceive. These abstractions must of necessity
be postulated as the cause of the material Universe which presents itself to
the senses and intellect; and they underlie the secondary and subordinate
powers of Nature, which, anthropomorphized, have been worshipped as God and
gods by the common herd of every age. It is impossible to conceive anything without
a cause; the attempt to do so makes the mind a blank.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In clearer words: "One has to
acquire true Self-Consciousness in order to understand Samvriti, or the 'origin
of delusion.'" Paramartha is the synonym of the Sanskrit term
Svasam-vedana, or "the reflection which analyses itself." There is a
difference in the interpretation of the meaning of "Paramartha"
between the Yogacharyas and the Madhyamikas, neither of whom, however, explain
the real and true esoteric sense of the expression. See further, sloka No. 9.
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This is virtually the condition to
which the mind must come at last when we try to trace back the chain of causes
and effects, but both science and religion jump to this condition of blankness
much more quickly than is necessary; for they ignore the metaphysical
abstractions which are the only conceivable cause of physical concretions.
These abstractions become more and more concrete as they approach our plane of
existence, until finally they phenomenalise in the form of the material
Universe, by a process of conversion of metaphysics into physics, analogous to
that by which steam can be condensed into water, and the water frozen into ice.
(b) The idea of Eternal Non-Being,
which is the One Being, will appear a paradox to anyone who does not remember
that we limit our ideas of being to our present consciousness of existence;
making it a specific, instead of a generic term. An unborn infant, could it
think in our acceptation of that term, would necessarily limit its conception
of being, in a similar manner, to the intrauterine life which alone it knows;
and were it to endeavour to express to its consciousness the idea of life after
birth (death to it), it would, in the absence of data to go upon, and of
faculties to comprehend such data, probably express that life as
"Non-Being which is Real Being." In our case the One Being is the
noumenon of all the noumena which we know must underlie phenomena, and give
them whatever shadow of reality they possess, but which we have not the senses
or the intellect to cognize at present. The impalpable atoms of gold scattered
through the substance of a ton of auriferous quartz may be imperceptible to the
naked eye of the miner, yet he knows that they are not only present there but
that they alone give his quartz any appreciable value; and this relation of the
gold to the quartz may faintly shadow forth that of the noumenon to the
phenomenon. But the miner knows what the gold will look like when extracted
from the quartz, whereas the common mortal can form no conception of the reality
of things separated from the Maya which veils them, and in which they are
hidden. Alone the Initiate, rich with the lore acquired by numberless
generations of his predecessors, directs the "Eye of Dangma" toward
the essence of things in which no Maya can have any influence. It is here that
the teachings of esoteric philosophy in relation to the Nidanas and the Four
Truths become of the greatest importance; but they are secret.
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STANZA I. -- Continued.
8. ALONE, THE ONE FORM OF EXISTENCE
STRETCHED BOUNDLESS, INFINITE, CAUSELESS, IN DREAMLESS SLEEP (a); AND LIFE
PULSATED UNCONSCIOUS IN UNIVERSAL SPACE, THROUGHOUT THAT ALL-PRESENCE WHICH IS
SENSED BY THE "OPENED EYE"* OF THE DANGMA (b).**
(a) The tendency of modern thought is
to recur to the archaic idea of a homogeneous basis for apparently widely
different things -- heterogeneity developed from homogeneity. Biologists are
now searching for their homogeneous protoplasm and chemists for their protyle,
while science is looking for the force of which electricity, magnetism, heat,
and so forth, are the differentiations. The Secret Doctrine carries this idea
into the region of metaphysics and postulates a "One Form of
Existence" as the basis and source of all things. But perhaps the phrase,
the "One Form of Existence," is not altogether correct. The Sanskrit
word is Prabhavapyaya, "the place, or rather plane, whence emerges the
origination, and into which is the resolution of all things," says a
commentator. It is not the "Mother of the World," as translated by
Wilson (see Book I., Vishnu Purana); for Jagad Yoni (as shown by FitzEdward Hall)
is scarcely so much "the Mother of the World" or "the Womb of
the World" as the "Material Cause of the Universe." The Puranic
Commentators explain it by Karana -- "Cause" -- but the Esoteric
philosophy, by the ideal spirit of that cause. It is, in its secondary stage,
the Svabhavat of the Buddhist philosopher, the eternal cause and effect,
omnipresent yet abstract, the self-existent plastic Essence and the root of all
things, viewed in the same dual light as the Vedantin views his Parabrahm and
Mulaprakriti, the one under two aspects. It seems indeed extraordinary to find
great scholars speculating on the possibility of the Vedanta, and the
Uttara-Mimansa especially, having been "evoked by the teachings of the
Buddhists,"
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* In India it is called "The Eye
of Siva," but beyond the great range it is known as "Dangma's opened
eye" in esoteric phraseology.
** Dangma means a purified soul, one
who has become a Jivanmukta, the highest adept, or rather a Mahatma so-called.
His "opened eye" is the inner spiritual eye of the seer, and the
faculty which manifests through it is not clairvoyance as ordinarily
understood, i.e., the power of seeing at a distance, but rather the faculty of
spiritual intuition, through which direct and certain knowledge is obtainable.
This faculty is intimately connected with the "third eye," which
mythological tradition ascribes to certain races of men. Fuller explanations
will be found in Book II.
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whereas, it is on the contrary
Buddhism (of Gautama, the Buddha) that was "evoked" and entirely
upreared on the tenets of the Secret Doctrine, of which a partial sketch is
here attempted, and on which, also, the Upanishads are made to rest.* The
above, according to the teachings of Sri Sankaracharya,** is undeniable.
(b) Dreamless sleep is one of the
seven states of consciousness known in Oriental esotericism. In each of these
states a different portion of the mind comes into action; or as a Vedantin
would express it, the individual is conscious in a different plane of his
being. The term "dreamless sleep," in this case is applied
allegorically to the Universe to express a condition somewhat analogous to that
state of consciousness in man, which, not being remembered in a waking state,
seems a blank, just as the sleep of the mesmerised subject seems to him an unconscious
blank when he returns to his normal condition, although he has been talking and
acting as a conscious individual would.
-------
STANZA I. -- Continued.
9. BUT WHERE WAS THE DANGMA WHEN THE
ALAYA OF THE UNIVERSE (Soul as the basis of all, Anima Mundi) WAS IN PARAMARTHA
(a) (Absolute Being and Consciousness which are Absolute Non-Being and
Unconsciousness) AND THE GREAT WHEEL WAS ANUPADAKA (b)?
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* And yet, one, claiming authority,
namely, Sir Monier Williams, Boden Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford, has just
denied this fact. This is what he taught his audience, on June the 4th, 1888,
in his annual address before the Victoria Institute of Great Britain:
"Originally, Buddhism set its face against all solitary asceticism . . .
to attain sublime heights of knowledge. It had no occult, no esoteric system of
doctrine . . . withheld from ordinary men" (!!) And, again: " . . .
When Gautama Buddha began his career, the later and lower form of Yoga seems to
have been little known." And then, contradicting himself, the learned
lecturer forthwith informs his audience that "We learn from Lalita-Vistara
that various forms of bodily torture, self-maceration, and austerity were
common in Gautama's time." (!!) But the lecturer seems quite unaware that
this kind of torture and self-maceration is precisely the lower form of Yoga,
Hatha Yoga, which was "little known" and yet so "common" in
Gautama's time.
** It is even argued that all the Six
Darsanas (Schools of philosophy) show traces of Buddha's influence, being
either taken from Buddhism or due to Greek teaching! (See Weber, Max Muller,
etc.) We labour under the impression that Colebrooke, "the highest
authority" in such matters, had long ago settled the question by showing,
that "the Hindus were in this instance the teachers, not the
learners."
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(a) Here we have before us the
subject of centuries of scholastic disputations. The two terms
"Alaya" and "Paramartha" have been the causes of dividing
schools and splitting the truth into more different aspects than any other
mystic terms. Alaya is literally the "Soul of the World" or Anima
Mundi, the "Over-Soul" of Emerson, and according to esoteric teaching
it changes periodically its nature. Alaya, though eternal and changeless in its
inner essence on the planes which are unreachable by either men or Cosmic Gods
(Dhyani Buddhas), alters during the active life-period with respect to the
lower planes, ours included. During that time not only the Dhyani-Buddhas are
one with Alaya in Soul and Essence, but even the man strong in the Yoga (mystic
meditation) "is able to merge his soul with it" (Aryasanga, the
Bumapa school). This is not Nirvana, but a condition next to it. Hence the
disagreement. Thus, while the Yogacharyas (of the Mahayana school) say that
Alaya is the personification of the Voidness, and yet Alaya (Nyingpo and Tsang
in Tibetan) is the basis of every visible and invisible thing, and that, though
it is eternal and immutable in its essence, it reflects itself in every object
of the Universe "like the moon in clear tranquil water"; other
schools dispute the statement. The same for Paramartha: the Yogacharyas
interpret the term as that which is also dependent upon other things
(paratantra); and the Madhyamikas say that Paramartha is limited to
Paranishpanna or absolute perfection; i.e., in the exposition of these
"two truths" (out of four), the former believe and maintain that (on
this plane, at any rate) there exists only Samvritisatya or relative truth; and
the latter teach the existence of Paramarthasatya, the "absolute
truth."* "No Arhat, oh mendicants, can reach absolute knowledge
before he becomes one with Paranirvana. Parikalpita and Paratantra are his two
great enemies" (Aphorisms of the Bodhisattvas). Parikalpita (in Tibetan
Kun-ttag) is error, made by those unable to realize the emptiness and
illusionary nature of all; who believe something to exist which does not --
e.g., the Non-Ego. And
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Paramartha" is
self-consciousness in Sanskrit, Svasamvedana, or the "self-analysing
reflection" -- from two words, parama (above everything) and artha
(comprehension), Satya meaning absolute true being, or Esse. In Tibetan
Paramarthasatya is Dondampaidenpa. The opposite of this absolute reality, or
actuality, is Samvritisatya -- the relative truth only -- "Samvriti"
meaning "false conception" and being the origin of illusion, Maya; in
Tibetan Kundzabchi-denpa, "illusion-creating appearance."
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Paratantra is that, whatever it is,
which exists only through a dependent or causal connexion, and which has to
disappear as soon as the cause from which it proceeds is removed -- e.g., the
light of a wick. Destroy or extinguish it, and light disappears.
Esoteric philosophy teaches that
everything lives and is conscious, but not that all life and consciousness are
similar to those of human or even animal beings. Life we look upon as "the
one form of existence," manifesting in what is called matter; or, as in
man, what, incorrectly separating them, we name Spirit, Soul and Matter. Matter
is the vehicle for the manifestation of soul on this plane of existence, and
soul is the vehicle on a higher plane for the manifestation of spirit, and
these three are a trinity synthesized by Life, which pervades them all. The
idea of universal life is one of those ancient conceptions which are returning
to the human mind in this century, as a consequence of its liberation from
anthropomorphic theology. Science, it is true, contents itself with tracing or
postulating the signs of universal life, and has not yet been bold enough even
to whisper "Anima Mundi!" The idea of "crystalline life,"
now familiar to science, would have been scouted half a century ago. Botanists
are now searching for the nerves of plants; not that they suppose that plants
can feel or think as animals do, but because they believe that some structure,
bearing the same relation functionally to plant life that nerves bear to animal
life, is necessary to explain vegetable growth and nutrition. It hardly seems
possible that science can disguise from itself much longer, by the mere use of
terms such as "force" and "energy," the fact that things
that have life are living things, whether they be atoms or planets.
But what is the belief of the inner
esoteric Schools? the reader may ask. What are the doctrines taught on this
subject by the Esoteric "Buddhists"? With them "Alaya" has
a double and even a triple meaning. In the Yogacharya system of the contemplative
Mahayana school, Alaya is both the Universal Soul (Anima Mundi) and the Self of
a progressed adept. "He who is strong in the Yoga can introduce at will
his Alaya by means of meditation into the true Nature of Existence." The
"Alaya has an absolute eternal existence," says Aryasanga -- the
rival of Nagarjuna.* In one sense it is Pradhana; which
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Aryasanga was a pre-Christian Adept
and founder of a Buddhist esoteric school, though Csoma di Koros places him,
for some reasons of his own, in the seventh century [[Footnote continued on
next page]]
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is explained in Vishnu Purana as:
"that which is the unevolved cause, is emphatically called by the most
eminent sages Pradhana, original base, which is subtile Prakriti, viz., that
which is eternal, and which at once is (or comprehends) what is and what is
not, or is mere process." "Prakriti," however, is an incorrect
word, and Alaya would explain it better; for Prakriti is not the
"uncognizable Brahma."* It is a mistake of those who know nothing of
the Universality of the Occult doctrines from the very cradle of the human
races, and especially so of those scholars who reject the very idea of a
"primordial revelation," to teach that the Anima Mundi, the One Life
or "Universal Soul," was made known only by Anaxagoras, or during his
age. This philosopher brought the teaching forward simply to oppose the too
materialistic conceptions on Cosmogony of Democritus, based on his exoteric
theory of blindly driven atoms. Anaxagoras of Clazomene was not its inventor
but only its propagator, as also was Plato. That which he called Mundane
Intelligence, the nous ([[nous]]), the principle that according to his views is
absolutely separated and free from matter and acts on design,** was called
Motion, the ONE LIFE, or Jivatma, ages before the year 500 B.C. in India. Only
the Aryan philosophers never endowed the principle, which with them is
infinite, with the finite "attribute" of "thinking."
This leads the reader naturally to
the "Supreme Spirit" of Hegel and the German Transcendentalists as a
contrast that it may be useful to point out. The schools of Schelling and
Fichte have diverged widely from the primitive archaic conception of an
ABSOLUTE principle, and have mirrored only an aspect of the basic idea of the
Vedanta. Even the "Absoluter Geist" shadowed forth by von Hartman in
his pessimistic philosophy of the Unconscious, while it is, perhaps, the
closest approximation made by European speculation to the Hindu Adwaitee
Doctrines, similarly falls far short of the reality.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] A.D. There was another Aryasanga, who lived during the first centuries
of our era and the Hungarian scholar most probably confuses the two.
* "The indiscreet cause which is
uniform, and both cause and effect, and which those who are acquainted with
first principles call Pradhana and Prakriti, is the incognizable Brahma who was
before all" (Vayu Purana); i.e., Brahma does not put forth evolution
itself or create, but only exhibits various aspects of itself, one of which is
Prakriti, an aspect of Pradhana.
** Finite Self-consciousness, I mean.
For how can the absolute attain it otherwise than as simply an aspect, the
highest of which known to us is human consciousness?
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According to Hegel, the
"Unconscious" would never have undertaken the vast and laborious task
of evolving the Universe, except in the hope of attaining clear
Self-consciousness. In this connection it is to be borne in mind that in
designating Spirit, which the European Pantheists use as equivalent to
Parabrahm, as unconscious, they do not attach to that expression of
"Spirit" -- one employed in the absence of a better to symbolise a
profound mystery -- the connotation it usually bears.
The "Absolute
Consciousness," they tell us, "behind" phenomena, which is only
termed unconsciousness in the absence of any element of personality, transcends
human conception. Man, unable to form one concept except in terms of empirical
phenomena, is powerless from the very constitution of his being to raise the
veil that shrouds the majesty of the Absolute. Only the liberated Spirit is
able to faintly realise the nature of the source whence it sprung and whither
it must eventually return. . . . As the highest Dhyan Chohan, however, can but
bow in ignorance before the awful mystery of Absolute Being; and since, even in
that culmination of conscious existence -- "the merging of the individual
in the universal consciousness" -- to use a phrase of Fichte's -- the
Finite cannot conceive the Infinite, nor can it apply to it its own standard of
mental experiences, how can it be said that the "Unconscious" and the
Absolute can have even an instinctive impulse or hope of attaining clear
self-consciousness?* A Vedantin would never admit this Hegelian idea; and the
Occultist would say that it applies perfectly to the awakened MAHAT, the
Universal Mind already projected into the phenomenal world as the first aspect
of the changeless ABSOLUTE, but never to the latter. "Spirit and Matter,
or Purusha and Prakriti are but the two primeval aspects of the One and Secondless,"
we are taught.
The matter-moving Nous, the animating
Soul, immanent in every atom, manifested in man, latent in the stone, has
different degrees of power; and this pantheistic idea of a general Spirit-Soul
pervading all Nature is the oldest of all the philosophical notions. Nor was
the Archaeus a discovery of Paracelsus nor of his pupil Van Helmont; for it is
again the same Archaeus or "Father-Ether," -- the manifested basis
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Schwegler's "Handbook of
the History of Philosophy" in Sterling's translation, p. 28.
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and source of the innumerable
phenomena of life -- localised. The whole series of the numberless speculations
of this kind are but variations on this theme, the key-note of which was struck
in this primeval Revelation. (See Part II., "Primordial Substance.")
(b) The term Anupadaka,
"parentless," or without progenitors, is a mystical designation
having several meanings in the philosophy. By this name celestial beings, the
Dhyan-Chohans or Dhyani-Buddhas, are generally meant. But as these correspond mystically
to the human Buddhas and Bodhisattwas, known as the "Manushi (or human)
Buddhas," the latter are also designated "Anupadaka," once that
their whole personality is merged in their compound sixth and seventh
principles -- or Atma-Buddhi, and that they have become the
"diamond-souled" (Vajra-sattvas),* the full Mahatmas. The
"Concealed Lord" (Sangbai Dag-po), "the one merged with the
absolute," can have no parents since he is Self-existent, and one with the
Universal Spirit (Svayambhu),** the Svabhavat in the highest aspect. The
mystery in the hierarchy of the Anupadaka is great, its apex being the
universal Spirit-Soul, and the lower rung the Manushi-Buddha; and even every
Soul-endowed man is an Anupadaka in a latent state. Hence, when speaking of the
Universe in its formless, eternal, or absolute condition, before it was
fashioned by the "Builders" -- the expression, "the Universe was
Anupadaka." (See Part II., "Primordial Substance.")
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Vajra -- diamond-holder. In Tibetan
Dorjesempa; sempa meaning the soul, its adamantine quality referring to its
indestructibility in the hereafter. The explanation with regard to the
"Anupadaka" given in the Kala Chakra, the first in the Gyu(t) division
of the Kanjur, is half esoteric. It has misled the Orientalists into erroneous
speculations with respect to the Dhyani-Buddhas and their earthly
correspondencies, the Manushi-Buddhas. The real tenet is hinted at in a
subsequent Volume, (see "The Mystery about Buddha"), and will be more
fully explained in its proper place.
** To quote Hegel again, who with
Schelling practically accepted the Pantheistic conception of periodical Avatars
(special incarnations of the World-Spirit in Man, as seen in the case of all
the great religious reformers) . . . . "the essence of man is spirit . . .
. only by stripping himself of his finiteness and surrendering himself to pure
self-consciousness does he attain the truth. Christ-man, as man in whom the
Unity of God-man (identity of the individual with the Universal consciousness
as taught by the Vedantins and some Adwaitees) appeared, has, in his death and
history generally, himself presented the eternal history of Spirit -- a history
which every man has to accomplish in himself, in order to exist as
Spirit." -- Philosophy of History. Sibree's English translation, p. 340.
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STANZA II.
COMMENTARY.
1. . . . . WHERE WERE THE BUILDERS,
THE LUMINOUS SONS OF MANVANTARIC DAWN (a)? . . . . IN THE UNKNOWN DARKNESS IN
THEIR AH-HI (Chohanic, Dhyani-Buddhic) PARANISHPANNA, THE PRODUCERS OF FORM
(rupa) FROM NO-FORM (arupa), THE ROOT OF THE WORLD -- THE DEVAMATRI* AND
SVABHAVAT, RESTED IN THE BLISS OF NON-BEING (b).
(a) The "Builders," the
"Sons of Manvantaric Dawn," are the real creators of the Universe;
and in this doctrine, which deals only with our Planetary System, they, as the
architects of the latter, are also called the "Watchers" of the Seven
Spheres, which exoterically are the Seven planets, and esoterically the seven
earths or spheres (planets) of our chain also. The opening sentence of Stanza
I., when mentioning "Seven Eternities," is made to apply both to the
Maha-Kalpa or "the (great) Age of Brahma," as well as to the Solar
pralaya and subsequent resurrection of our Planetary System on a higher plane.
There are many kinds of pralaya (dissolution of a thing visible), as will be
shown elsewhere.
(b) Paranishpanna, remember, is the
summum bonum, the Absolute, hence the same as Paranirvana. Besides being the
final state it is that condition of subjectivity which has no relation to
anything but the one absolute truth (Para-marthasatya) on its plane. It is that
state which leads one to appreciate correctly the full meaning of Non-Being,
which, as explained, is absolute Being. Sooner or later, all that now seemingly
exists, will be in reality and actually in the state of Paranishpanna. But
there is a great difference between conscious and unconscious
"being." The condition of Paranishpanna, without Paramartha, the
Self-analys-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
"Mother of the Gods,"
Aditi, or Cosmic Space. In the Zohar, she is called Sephira the Mother of the
Sephiroth, and Shekinah in her primordial form, in abscondito.
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ing consciousness (Svasamvedana), is
no bliss, but simply extinction (for Seven Eternities). Thus, an iron ball
placed under the scorching rays of the sun will get heated through, but will
not feel or appreciate the warmth, while a man will. It is only "with a
mind clear and undarkened by personality, and an assimilation of the merit of
manifold existences devoted to being in its collectivity (the whole living and
sentient Universe)," that one gets rid of personal existence, merging
into, becoming one with, the Absolute,* and continuing in full possession of
Paramartha.
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STANZA II. -- Continued.
2. . . . . WHERE WAS SILENCE? WHERE
WERE THE EARS TO SENSE IT? NO! THERE WAS NEITHER SILENCE, NOR SOUND (a). NAUGHT
SAVE CEASELESS, ETERNAL BREATH (Motion) WHICH KNOWS ITSELF NOT (b).
(a) The idea that things can cease to
exist and still BE, is a fundamental one in Eastern psychology. Under this
apparent contradiction in terms, there rests a fact of Nature to realise which
in the mind, rather than to argue about words, is the important thing. A
familiar instance of a similar paradox is afforded by chemical combination. The
question whether Hydrogen and Oxygen cease to exist, when they combine to form
water, is still a moot one, some arguing that since they are found again when
the water is decomposed they must be there all the while; others contending
that as they actually turn into something totally different they must cease to
exist as themselves for the time being; but neither side is able to form the
faintest conception of the real condition of a thing, which has become
something else and yet has not ceased to be itself. Existence as water may be
said to be, for Oxygen and Hydrogen, a state of Non-being which is "more
real being" than their existence as gases; and it may faintly symbolise
the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Hence Non-being is "ABSOLUTE
Being," in esoteric philosophy. In the tenets of the latter even Adi-Budha
(first or primeval wisdom) is, while manifested, in one sense an illusion,
Maya, since all the gods, including Brahma, have to die at the end of the
"Age of Brahma"; the abstraction called Parabrahm alone -- whether we
call it Ensoph, or Herbert Spencer's Unknowable -- being "the One
Absolute" Reality. The One secondless Existence is ADWAITA, "Without
a Second," and all the rest is Maya, teaches the Adwaita philosophy.
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condition of the Universe when it
goes to sleep, or ceases to be, during the "Nights of Brahma" -- to
awaken or reappear again, when the dawn of the new Manvantara recalls it to
what we call existence.
(b) The "Breath" of the One
Existence is used in its application only to the spiritual aspect of Cosmogony
by Archaic esotericism; otherwise, it is replaced by its equivalent in the
material plane -- Motion. The One Eternal Element, or element-containing
Vehicle, is Space, dimensionless in every sense; co-existent with which are --
endless duration, primordial (hence indestructible) matter, and motion --
absolute "perpetual motion" which is the "breath" of the
"One" Element. This breath, as seen, can never cease, not even during
the Pralayic eternities. (See "Chaos, Theos, Kosmos," in Part II.)
But the "Breath of the One
Existence" does not, all the same, apply to the One Causeless Cause or the
"All Be-ness" (in contradistinction to All-Being, which is Brahma, or
the Universe). Brahma (or Hari) the four-faced god who, after lifting the Earth
out of the waters, "accomplished the Creation," is held to be only
the instrumental, and not, as clearly implied, the ideal Cause. No Orientalist,
so far, seems to have thoroughly comprehended the real sense of the verses in
the Purana, that treat of "creation."
Therein Brahma is the cause of the
potencies that are to be generated subsequently for the work of
"creation." When a translator says, "And from him proceed the
potencies to be created, after they had become the real cause": "and
from IT proceed the potencies that will create as they become the real
cause" (on the material plane) would perhaps be more correct? Save that
one (causeless) ideal cause there is no other to which the universe can be
referred. "Worthiest of ascetics! through its potency -- i.e., through the
potency of that cause -- every created thing comes by its inherent or proper
nature." If, in the Vedanta and Nyaya, nimitta is the efficient cause, as
contrasted with upadana, the material cause, (and in the Sankhya, pradhana
implies the functions of both); in the Esoteric philosophy, which reconciles
all these systems, and the nearest exponent of which is the Vedanta as
expounded by the Advaita Vedantists, none but the upadana can be speculated
upon; that which is in the minds of the Vaishnavas (the Vasishta-dvaita) as the
ideal in contradistinction to the real -- or Parabrahm and Isvara -- can find
no room in published speculations, since
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that ideal even is a misnomer, when
applied to that of which no human reason, even that of an adept, can conceive.
To know itself or oneself,
necessitates consciousness and perception (both limited faculties in relation
to any subject except Parabrahm), to be cognized. Hence the "Eternal
Breath which knows itself not." Infinity cannot comprehend Finiteness. The
Boundless can have no relation to the bounded and the conditioned. In the
occult teachings, the Unknown and the Unknowable MOVER, or the Self-Existing,
is the absolute divine Essence. And thus being Absolute Consciousness, and
Absolute Motion -- to the limited senses of those who describe this
indescribable -- it is unconsciousness and immoveableness. Concrete
consciousness cannot be predicated of abstract Consciousness, any more than the
quality wet can be predicated of water -- wetness being its own attribute and
the cause of the wet quality in other things. Consciousness implies limitations
and qualifications; something to be conscious of, and someone to be conscious
of it. But Absolute Consciousness contains the cognizer, the thing cognized and
the cognition, all three in itself and all three one. No man is conscious of
more than that portion of his knowledge that happens to have been recalled to
his mind at any particular time, yet such is the poverty of language that we
have no term to distinguish the knowledge not actively thought of, from
knowledge we are unable to recall to memory. To forget is synonymous with not
to remember. How much greater must be the difficulty of finding terms to
describe, and to distinguish between, abstract metaphysical facts or
differences. It must not be forgotten, also, that we give names to things
according to the appearances they assume for ourselves. We call absolute
consciousness "unconsciousness," because it seems to us that it must
necessarily be so, just as we call the Absolute, "Darkness," because
to our finite understanding it appears quite impenetrable, yet we recognize fully
that our perception of such things does not do them justice. We involuntarily
distinguish in our minds, for instance, between unconscious absolute
consciousness, and unconsciousness, by secretly endowing the former with some
indefinite quality that corresponds, on a higher plane than our thoughts can
reach, with what we know as consciousness in ourselves. But this is not any
kind of consciousness that we can manage to distinguish from what appears to us
as unconsciousness.
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STANZA II. -- Continued.
3. THE HOUR HAD NOT YET STRUCK; THE
RAY HAD NOT YET FLASHED INTO THE GERM (a); THE MATRI-PADMA (mother lotus) HAD
NOT YET SWOLLEN (b).*
(a) The ray of the "Ever
Darkness" becomes, as it is emitted, a ray of effulgent light or life, and
flashes into the "Germ" -- the point in the Mundane Egg, represented
by matter in its abstract sense. But the term "Point" must not be
understood as applying to any particular point in Space, for a germ exists in
the centre of every atom, and these collectively form "the Germ;" or
rather, as no atom can be made visible to our physical eye, the collectivity of
these (if the term can be applied to something which is boundless and infinite)
forms the noumenon of eternal and indestructible matter.
(b) One of the symbolical figures for
the Dual creative power in Nature (matter and force on the material plane) is
Padma, the water-lily of India. The Lotus is the product of heat (fire) and
water (vapour or Ether); fire standing in every philosophical and religious
system as a representation of the Spirit of Deity,** the active, male,
generative principle; and Ether, or the Soul of matter, the light of the fire,
for the passive female principle from which everything in this Universe
emanated. Hence, Ether or Water is the Mother, and Fire is the Father. Sir W.
Jones (and before him archaic botany) showed that the seeds of the Lotus
contain -- even before they germinate -- perfectly formed leaves, the miniature
shape of what one day, as perfect plants, they will become: nature thus giving
us a specimen of the preformation of its production . . . the seed of all
phanerogamous plants bearing proper flowers containing an embryo plantlet ready
formed.*** (See Part II., "The Lotus Flower as an Universal Symbol.")
This explains the sentence "The Mother had not yet swollen" -- the
form being usually sacrificed to the inner or root idea in Archaic symbology.
The Lotus, or Padma, is, moreover, a
very ancient and favourite
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* An unpoetical term, yet still very
graphic. (See foot-note to Stanza III.)
** Even in Christianity. (See Part
II., "Primordial Substance and Divine Thought.")
*** Gross, "The Heathen
Religion," p. 195.
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simile for the Kosmos itself, and
also for man. The popular reasons given are, firstly, the fact just mentioned,
that the Lotus-seed contains within itself a perfect miniature of the future
plant, which typifies the fact that the spiritual prototypes of all things
exist in the immaterial world before those things become materialised on Earth.
Secondly, the fact that the Lotus plant grows up through the water, having its
root in the Ilus, or mud, and spreading its flower in the air above. The Lotus thus
typifies the life of man and also that of the Kosmos; for the Secret Doctrine
teaches that the elements of both are the same, and that both are developing in
the same direction. The root of the Lotus sunk in the mud represents material
life, the stalk passing up through the water typifies existence in the astral
world, and the flower floating on the water and opening to the sky is
emblematical of spiritual being.
-------
STANZA II. -- Continued.
4. HER HEART HAD NOT YET OPENED FOR
THE ONE RAY TO ENTER, THENCE TO FALL AS THREE INTO FOUR IN THE LAP OF MAYA (a).
(a) The Primordial Substance had not
yet passed out of its precosmic latency into differentiated objectivity, or
even become the (to man, so far,) invisible Protyle of Science. But, as the
hour strikes and it becomes receptive of the Fohatic impress of the Divine
Thought (the Logos, or the male aspect of the Anima Mundi, Alaya) -- its heart
opens. It differentiates, and the THREE (Father, Mother, Son) are transformed
into four. Herein lies the origin of the double mystery of the Trinity and the
immaculate Conception. The first and Fundamental dogma of Occultism is
Universal Unity (or Homogeneity) under three aspects. This led to a possible
conception of Deity, which as an absolute unity must remain forever
incomprehensible to finite intellects. "If thou wouldest believe in the
Power which acts within the root of a plant, or imagine the root concealed
under the soil, thou hast to think of its stalk or trunk and of its leaves and
flowers. Thou canst not imagine that Power independently of these objects. Life
can be known only by the Tree of Life. . . ." (Precepts for Yoga). The
idea of Absolute Unity
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would be broken entirely in our
conception, had we not something concrete before our eyes to contain that
Unity. And the deity being absolute, must be omnipresent, hence not an atom but
contains IT within itself. The roots, the trunk and its many branches are three
distinct objects, yet they are one tree. Say the Kabalists: "The Deity is
one, because It is infinite. It is triple, because it is ever manifesting."
This manifestation is triple in its aspects, for it requires, as Aristotle has
it, three principles for every natural body to become objective: privation,
form, and matter.* Privation meant in the mind of the great philosopher that
which the Occultists call the prototypes impressed in the Astral Light -- the
lowest plane and world of Anima Mundi. The union of these three principles
depends upon a fourth -- the LIFE which radiates from the summits of the
Unreachable, to become an universally diffused Essence on the manifested planes
of Existence. And this QUATERNARY (Father, Mother, Son, as a UNITY, and a
quaternary, as a living manifestation) has been the means of leading to the
very archaic Idea of Immaculate Conception, now finally crystallized into a
dogma of the Christian Church, which carnalized this metaphysical idea beyond
any common sense. For one has but to read the Kabala and study its numerical
methods of interpretation to find the origin of that dogma. It is purely
astronomical, mathematical, and pre-eminently metaphysical: the Male element in
Nature (personified by the male deities and Logoi -- Viraj, or Brahma; Horus,
or Osiris, etc., etc.) is born through, not from, an immaculate source,
personified by the "Mother"; because that Male having a Mother cannot
have a "Father" -- the abstract Deity being sexless, and not even a
Being but Be-ness, or Life itself. Let us render this in the mathematical
language of the author of "The Source of Measures." Speaking of the
"Measure of a Man" and his numerical (Kabalistic) value, he writes
that in Genesis, ch. iv., v. 1, "It is called the 'Man even Jehovah'
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* A Vedantin of the Visishtadwaita
philosophy would say that, though the only independent Reality, Parabrahmam is
inseparable from his trinity. That He is three, "Parabrahmam, Chit, and
Achit," the last two being dependent realities unable to exist separately;
or, to make it clearer, Parabrahmam is the SUBSTANCE -- changeless, eternal,
and incognizable -- and Chit (Atma), and Achit (Anatma) are its qualities, as
form and colour are the qualities of any object. The two are the garment, or
body, or rather attribute (Sarira) of Parabrahmam. But an Occultist would find
much to say against this claim, and so would the Adwaitee Vedantin.
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Measure, and this is obtained in this
way, viz.: 113 x 5 = 565, and the value 565 can be placed under the form of
expression 56.5 x 10 = 565. Here the Man-number 113 becomes a factor of 56.5 x
10, and the (Kabalistic) reading of this last numbered expression is Jod, He,
Vau, He, or Jehovah. . . . The expansion of 565 into 56.5 x 10 is purposed to
show the emanation of the male (Jod) from the female (Eva) principle; or, so to
speak, the birth of a male element from an immaculate source, in other words,
an immaculate conception."
Thus is repeated on Earth the mystery
enacted, according to the Seers, on the divine plane. The "Son" of
the immaculate Celestial Virgin (or the undifferentiated cosmic protyle, Matter
in its infinitude) is born again on Earth as the Son of the terrestrial Eve --
our mother Earth, and becomes Humanity as a total -- past, present, and future
-- for Jehovah or Jod-he-vau-he is androgyne, or both male and female. Above,
the Son is the whole KOSMOS; below, he is MANKIND. The triad or triangle
becomes Tetraktis, the Sacred Pythagorean number, the perfect Square, and a
6-faced cube on Earth. The Macroprosopus (the Great Face) is now Microprosopus
(the lesser face); or, as the Kabalists have it, the "Ancient of
Days," descending on Adam Kadmon whom he uses as his vehicle to manifest through,
gets transformed into Tetragrammaton. It is now in the "Lap of Maya,"
the Great Illusion, and between itself and the Reality has the Astral Light,
the great Deceiver of man's limited senses, unless Knowledge through
Paramarthasatya comes to the rescue.
-------
STANZA II. -- Continued.
5. THE SEVEN (Sons) WERE NOT YET BORN
FROM THE WEB OF LIGHT. DARKNESS ALONE WAS FATHER-MOTHER, SVABHAVAT, AND
SVABHAVAT WAS IN DARKNESS (a).
(a) The Secret Doctrine, in the
Stanzas given here, occupies itself chiefly, if not entirely, with our Solar
System, and especially with our planetary chain. The "Seven Sons,"
therefore, are the creators of the latter. This teaching will be explained more
fully hereafter. (See Part II., "Theogony of the Creative Gods.")
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Svabhavat, the "Plastic
Essence" that fills the Universe, is the root of all things. Svabhavat is,
so to say, the Buddhistic concrete aspect of the abstraction called in Hindu
philosophy Mulaprakriti. It is the body of the Soul, and that which Ether would
be to Akasa, the latter being the informing principle of the former. Chinese
mystics have made of it the synonym of "being." In the
Ekasloka-Shastra of Nagarjuna (the Lung-shu of China) called by the Chinese the
Yih-shu-lu-kia-lun, it is said that the original word of Yeu is
"Being" or "Subhava," "the Substance giving substance to
itself," also explained by him as meaning " without action and with
action," "the nature which has no nature of its own." Subhava,
from which Svabhavat, is composed of two words: Su "fair,"
"handsome," "good"; Sva, "self"; and bhava,
"being" or "states of being."
-------
STANZA II. -- Continued.
6. THESE TWO ARE THE GERM, AND THE
GERM IS -- ONE. THE UNIVERSE WAS STILL CONCEALED IN THE DIVINE THOUGHT AND THE
DIVINE BOSOM.
The "Divine Thought" does
not imply the idea of a Divine thinker. The Universe, not only past, present,
and future -- which is a human and finite idea expressed by finite thought --
but in its totality, the Sat (an untranslateable term), the absolute being,
with the Past and Future crystallized in an eternal Present, is that Thought
itself reflected in a secondary or manifest cause. Brahma (neuter) as the
Mysterium Magnum of Paracelsus is an absolute mystery to the human mind.
Brahma, the male-female, its aspect and anthropomorphic reflection, is
conceivable to the perceptions of blind faith, though rejected by human
intellect when it attains its majority. (See Part II., "Primordial
Substance and Divine Thought.")
Hence the statement that during the
prologue, so to say, of the drama of Creation, or the beginning of cosmic evolution,
the Universe or the "Son" lies still concealed "in the Divine
Thought," which had not yet penetrated "into the Divine Bosom."
This idea, note well, is at the root, and forms the origin of all the
allegories about the "Sons of God" born of immaculate virgins.
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STANZA III.
COMMENTARY.
1. THE LAST VIBRATION OF THE SEVENTH
ETERNITY THRILLS THROUGH INFINITUDE (a). THE MOTHER SWELLS, EXPANDING FROM
WITHIN WITHOUT LIKE THE BUD OF THE LOTUS (b).
(a) The seemingly paradoxical use of
the sentence "Seventh Eternity," thus dividing the indivisible, is
sanctified in esoteric philosophy. The latter divides boundless duration into
unconditionally eternal and universal Time and a conditioned one (Khandakala).
One is the abstraction or noumenon of infinite time (Kala); the other its
phenomenon appearing periodically, as the effect of Mahat (the Universal
Intelligence limited by Manvantaric duration). With some schools, Mahat is
"the first-born" of Pradhana (undifferentiated substance, or the
periodical aspect of Mulaprakriti, the root of Nature), which (Pradhana) is
called Maya, the Illusion. In this respect, I believe, esoteric teaching
differs from the Vedantin doctrines of both the Adwaita and the Visishtadwaita
schools. For it says that, while Mulaprakriti, the noumenon, is self-existing
and without any origin -- is, in short, parentless, Anupadaka (as one with
Brahmam) -- Prakriti, its phenomenon, is periodical and no better than a
phantasm of the former, so Mahat, with the Occultists, the first-born of Gnana
(or gnosis) knowledge, wisdom or the Logos -- is a phantasm reflected from the
Absolute NIRGUNA (Parabrahm, the one reality, "devoid of attributes and
qualities"; see Upanishads); while with some Vedantins Mahat is a
manifestation of Prakriti, or Matter.
(b) Therefore, the "last
vibration of the Seventh Eternity" was "fore-ordained" -- by no
God in particular, but occurred in virtue of the eternal and changeless LAW
which causes the great periods of Activity and Rest, called so graphically, and
at the same time so poetically, the "Days and Nights of Brahma." The
expansion "from within without" of the Mother, called elsewhere the
"Waters of Space," "Universal Matrix," etc., does not
allude to an expansion from a small centre or focus, but, without reference to
size or limitation or area, means the development of limitless subjectivity
into as limitless objectivity. "The ever (to us) invisible and immaterial
Substance present in eternity, threw its periodical shadow from its own plane
into the lap
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of Maya." It implies that this
expansion, not being an increase in size -- for infinite extension admits of no
enlargement -- was a change of condition. It "expanded like the bud of the
Lotus"; for the Lotus plant exists not only as a miniature embryo in its
seed (a physical characteristic), but its prototype is present in an ideal form
in the Astral Light from "Dawn" to "Night" during the
Manvantaric period, like everything else, as a matter of fact, in this
objective Universe; from man down to mite, from giant trees down to the tiniest
blades of grass.
All this, teaches the hidden Science,
is but the temporary reflection, the shadow of the eternal ideal prototype in
Divine Thought -- the word "Eternal," note well again, standing here
only in the sense of "AEon," as lasting throughout the seemingly
interminable, but still limited cycle of activity, called by us Manvantara. For
what is the real esoteric meaning of Manvantara, or rather a Manu-Antara? It
means, esoterically, "between two Manus," of whom there are fourteen
in every "Day of Brahma," such a "Day" consisting of 1,000
aggregates of four ages, or 1,000 "Great Ages," Mahayugas. Let us now
analyse the word or name Manu. Orientalists and their Dictionaries tell us that
the term "Manu" is from the root Man, "to think"; hence
"the thinking man." But, esoterically, every Manu, as an
anthropomorphized patron of his special cycle (or Round), is but the
personified idea of the "Thought Divine" (as the Hermetic
"Pymander"); each of the Manus, therefore, being the special god, the
creator and fashioner of all that appears during his own respective cycle of
being or Manvantara. Fohat runs the Manus' (or Dhyan-Chohans') errands, and
causes the ideal prototypes to expand from within without -- viz., to cross
gradually, on a descending scale, all the planes from the noumenon to the
lowest phenomenon, to bloom finally on the last into full objectivity -- the
acme of illusion, or the grossest matter.
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STANZA III. -- continued.
2. THE VIBRATION SWEEPS ALONG,
TOUCHING WITH ITS SWIFT WING (simultaneously) THE WHOLE UNIVERSE, AND THE GERM
THAT DWELLETH IN DARKNESS: THE DARKNESS THAT BREATHES (moves) OVER THE
SLUMBERING WATERS OF LIFE (a).
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(a) The Pythagorean Monad is also
said to dwell in solitude and darkness like the "germ." The idea of
the "breath" of Darkness moving over "the slumbering Waters of
life," which is primordial matter with the latent Spirit in it, recalls
the first chapter of Genesis. Its original is the Brahminical Narayana (the
mover on the Waters), who is the personification of the eternal Breath of the
unconscious All (or Parabrahm) of the Eastern Occultists. The Waters of Life,
or Chaos -- the female principle in symbolism -- are the vacuum (to our mental
sight) in which lie the latent Spirit and Matter. This it was that made
Democritus assert, after his instructor Leucippus, that the primordial
principles of all were atoms and a vacuum, in the sense of space, but not of
empty space, as "Nature abhors a vacuum" according to the
Peripatetics, and every ancient philosopher.
In all Cosmogonies "Water"
plays the same important part. It is the base and source of material existence.
Scientists, mistaking the word for the thing, understood by water the definite
chemical combination of oxygen and hydrogen, thus giving a specific meaning to
a term used by Occultists in a generic sense, and which is used in Cosmogony
with a metaphysical and mystical meaning. Ice is not water, neither is steam,
although all three have precisely the same chemical composition.
-------
STANZA III. -- Continued.
2. [[3.]] "DARKNESS"
RADIATES LIGHT, AND LIGHT DROPS ONE SOLITARY RAY INTO THE WATERS, INTO THE
MOTHER DEEP. THE RAY SHOOTS THROUGH THE VIRGIN-EGG; THE RAY CAUSES THE ETERNAL
EGG TO THRILL, AND DROP THE NON-ETERNAL (periodical) GERM, WHICH CONDENSES INTO
THE WORLD EGG (a).
(a) The solitary ray dropping into
the mother deep may be taken as meaning Divine Thought or Intelligence,
impregnating chaos. This, however, occurs on the plane of metaphysical
abstraction, or rather the plane whereon that which we call a metaphysical
abstraction is a reality. The Virgin-egg being in one sense abstract Egg-ness,
or the power of becoming developed through fecundation, is eternal and for ever
the same. And just as the fecundation of an egg takes place before it is
dropped; so the non-eternal periodical germ which becomes later in
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symbolism the mundane egg, contains
in itself, when it emerges from the said symbol, "the promise and
potency" of all the Universe. Though the idea per se is, of course, an
abstraction, a symbolical mode of expression, it is a symbol truly, as it
suggests the idea of infinity as an endless circle. It brings before the mind's
eye the picture of Kosmos emerging from and in boundless space, a Universe as
shoreless in magnitude if not as endless in its objective manifestation. The
simile of an egg also expresses the fact taught in Occultism that the
primordial form of everything manifested, from atom to globe, from man to
angel, is spheroidal, the sphere having been with all nations the emblem of
eternity and infinity -- a serpent swallowing its tail. To realize the meaning,
however, the sphere must be thought of as seen from its centre. The field of
vision or of thought is like a sphere whose radii proceed from one's self in
every direction, and extend out into space, opening up boundless vistas all
around. It is the symbolical circle of Pascal and the Kabalists, "whose
centre is everywhere and circumference nowhere," a conception which enters
into the compound idea of this emblem.
The "Mundane Egg" is, perhaps,
one of the most universally adopted symbols, highly suggestive as it is,
equally in the spiritual, physiological, and cosmological sense. Therefore, it
is found in every world-theogony, where it is largely associated with the
serpent symbol; the latter being everywhere, in philosophy as in religious
symbolism, an emblem of eternity, infinitude, regeneration, and rejuvenation,
as well as of wisdom. (See Part II. "Tree and Serpent and Crocodile
Worship.") The mystery of apparent self-generation and evolution through
its own creative power repeating in miniature the process of Cosmic evolution
in the egg, both being due to heat and moisture under the efflux of the unseen
creative spirit, justified fully the selection of this graphic symbol. The
"Virgin Egg" is the microcosmic symbol of the macrocosmic prototype
-- the "Virgin Mother" -- Chaos or the Primeval Deep. The male
Creator (under whatever name) springs forth from the Virgin female, the
immaculate root fructified by the Ray. Who, if versed in astronomy and natural
sciences, can fail to see its suggestiveness? Cosmos as receptive Nature is an
Egg fructified -- yet left immaculate; once regarded as boundless, it could
have no other representation than a spheroid. The Golden Egg was surrounded by
seven natural elements (ether, fire, air, water), "four ready, three
secret." It may be found
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stated in Vishnu Purana, where
elements are translated "Envelopes" and a secret one is added:
"Aham-kara" (see Wilson's Vishnu Purana, Book I., p. 40). The
original text has no "Aham-kara;" it mentions seven Elements without
specifying the last three (see Part II. on "The Mundane Egg").
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STANZA III. -- Continued.
4. (Then) THE THREE (triangle) FALL
INTO THE FOUR (quaternary). THE RADIANT ESSENCE BECOMES SEVEN INSIDE, SEVEN
OUTSIDE (a). THE LUMINOUS EGG (Hiranyagarbha), WHICH IN ITSELF IS THREE (the
triple hypostases of Brahma, or Vishnu, the three "Avasthas"),
CURDLES AND SPREADS IN MILK-WHITE CURDS THROUGHOUT THE DEPTHS OF MOTHER, THE
ROOT THAT GROWS IN THE OCEAN OF LIFE (b).
The use of geometrical figures and
the frequent allusions to figures in all ancient scriptures (see Puranas,
Egyptian papyri, the "Book of the Dead" and even the Bible) must be
explained. In the "Book of Dzyan," as in the Kabala, there are two
kinds of numerals to be studied -- the figures, often simple blinds, and the
Sacred Numbers, the values of which are all known to the Occultists through
Initiation. The former is but a conventional glyph, the latter is the basic
symbol of all. That is to say, that one is purely physical, the other purely
metaphysical, the two standing in relation to each other as matter stands to
spirit -- the extreme poles of the ONE Substance.
As Balzac, the unconscious Occultist
of French literature, says somewhere, the Number is to Mind the same as it is
to matter: "an incomprehensible agent;" (perhaps so to the profane,
never to the Initiated mind). Number is, as the great writer thought, an
Entity, and, at the same time, a Breath emanating from what he called God and
what we call the ALL; the breath which alone could organize the physical
Kosmos, "where naught obtains its form but through the Deity, which is an
effect of Number." It is instructive to quote Balzac's words upon this
subject:--
"The smallest as the most
immense creations, are they not to be distinguished from each other by their
quantities, their qualities, their dimensions, their forces and attributes, all
begotten by the NUMBER? The infinitude of the Numbers is a fact proven to our
mind, but of which no proof can be physically
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given. The mathematician will tell us
that the infinitude of the numbers exists but is not to be demonstrated. God is
a Number endowed with motion, which is felt but not demonstrated. As Unity, it
begins the Numbers, with which it has nothing in common. . . . . The existence
of the Number depends on Unity, which, without a single Number, begets them
all. . . . . What! unable either to measure the first abstraction yielded to
you by the Deity, or to get hold of it, you still hope to subject to your
measurements the mystery of the Secret Sciences which emanate from that Deity?
. . . . And what would you feel, were I to plunge you into the abysses of
MOTION, the Force which organizes the Number? What would you think, were I to
add that Motion and Number* are begotten by the WORD, the Supreme Reason of the
Seers and Prophets, who, in days of old, sensed the mighty Breath of God, a
witness to which is the Apocalypse?"
(b) "The radiant essence curdled
and spread throughout the depths" of Space. From an astronomical point of
view this is easy of explanation: it is the "milky way," the
world-stuff, or primordial matter in its first form. It is more difficult,
however, to explain it in a few words or even lines, from the standpoint of
Occult Science and Symbolism, as it is the most complicated of glyphs. Herein
are enshrined more than a dozen symbols. To begin with, the whole pantheon of
mysterious objects,** every one of them having some definite Occult meaning,
extracted from the allegorical "churning of the ocean" by the Hindu
gods. Besides Amrita, the water of life or immortality, "Surabhi" the
"cow of plenty," called "the fountain of milk and curds,"
was extracted from this "Sea of Milk." Hence the universal adoration
of the cow and bull, one the productive, the other the generative power in
Nature: symbols connected with both the Solar and the Cosmic deities. The
specific properties, for occult purposes, of the "fourteen precious
things," being explained only at the fourth Initiation, cannot be given
here; but the following may be remarked. In the "Satapatha Brahmana"
it is stated that the churning of the "Ocean of Milk" took place in
the Satya Yug, the first age which immediately followed the "Deluge."
As, however, neither the Rig-Veda nor
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Number, truly; but never MOTION. It
is Motion which begets the Logos, the Word, in occultism.
** The "Fourteen precious
things." The narrative or allegory is found in the Satapatha Brahmana and
others. The Japanese Secret Science of the Buddhist Mystics, the Yamabooshi,
has "seven precious things." We will speak of them, hereafter.
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Manu -- both preceding Vaivasvata's
"deluge," that of the bulk of the Fourth Race -- mention this deluge,
it is evident that it is not the "great" deluge, nor that which
carried away Atlantis, nor even the deluge of Noah, which is meant here. This
"churning" relates to a period before the earth's formation, and is
in direct connection with that other universal legend, the various and
contradictory versions of which culminated in the Christian dogma of the
"War in Heaven," and the fall of the Angels (see Book II., also
Revelations chap. xii.). The Brahmanas, reproached by the Orientalists with
their versions on the same subjects, often clashing with each other, are
pre-eminently occult works, hence used purposely as blinds. They were allowed
to survive for public use and property only because they were and are
absolutely unintelligible to the masses. Otherwise they would have disappeared
from circulation as long ago as the days of Akbar.
-------
STANZA III. -- Continued.
5. THE ROOT REMAINS, THE LIGHT
REMAINS, THE CURDS REMAIN, AND STILL OEAOHOO (a) IS ONE (b).
(a) OEAOHOO is rendered
"Father-Mother of the Gods" in the Commentaries, or the SIX IN ONE,
or the septenary root from which all proceeds. All depends upon the accent
given to these seven vowels, which may be pronounced as one, three, or even seven
syllables by adding an e after the letter "o." This mystic name is
given out, because without a thorough mastery of the triple pronunciation it
remains for ever ineffectual.
(b) This refers to the
Non-Separateness of all that lives and has its being, whether in active or
passive state. In one sense, Oeaohoo is the "Rootless Root of All";
hence, one with Parabrahmam; in another sense it is a name for the manifested
ONE LIFE, the Eternal living Unity. The "Root" means, as already explained,
pure knowledge (Sattva),*
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The original for Understanding is
Sattva, which Sankara (acharya) renders antahkarana. "Refined," he
says, "by sacrifices and other sanctifying operations." In the Katha,
at p. 148, Sattva is said by Sankara to mean buddhi -- a common use of the
word. ("The BHAGAVATGITA with The Sanatsugatiya and The Anugita,"
trans- [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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eternal (Nitya) unconditioned reality
or SAT (Satya), whether we call it Parabrahmam or Mulaprakriti, for these are
the two aspects of the ONE. The "Light" is the same Omnipresent
Spiritual Ray, which has entered and now fecundated the Divine Egg, and calls
cosmic matter to begin its long series of differentiations. The curds are the
first differentiation, and probably refer also to that cosmic matter which is
supposed to be the origin of the "Milky Way" -- the matter we know.
This "matter," which, according to the revelation received from the
primeval Dhyani-Buddhas, is, during the periodical sleep of the Universe, of
the ultimate tenuity conceivable to the eye of the perfect Bodhisatva -- this
matter, radical and cool, becomes, at the first reawakening of cosmic motion,
scattered through Space; appearing, when seen from the Earth, in clusters and
lumps, like curds in thin milk. These are the seeds of the future worlds, the
"Star-stuff."
-------
STANZA III. -- Continued.
6. THE ROOT OF LIFE WAS IN EVERY DROP
OF THE OCEAN OF IMMORTALITY (Amrita)* AND THE OCEAN WAS RADIANT LIGHT, WHICH
WAS FIRE AND HEAT AND MOTION. DARKNESS VANISHED AND WAS NO MORE.** IT
DISAPPEARED IN ITS OWN ESSENCE, THE BODY OF FIRE AND WATER, OF FATHER AND
MOTHER (a).
(a) The essence of darkness being
absolute light, Darkness is taken as the appropriate allegorical representation
of the condition of the Universe during Pralaya, or the term of absolute rest,
or non-being, as it appears to our finite minds. The "fire,"
"heat," and "motion" here spoken of, are, of course, not the
fire, heat, and motion of physical science, but the underlying abstractions,
the noumena, or the soul, of the essence of these material manifestations --
the "things in themselves," which, as modern science confesses,
entirely elude the instru-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] lated by Kashinath Trimbak Telang, M.A.; edited by Max Muller.) Whatever
meaning various schools may give the term, Sattva is the name given among
Occult students of the Aryasanga School to the dual Monad or Atma-buddhi, and
Atma-buddhi on this plane corresponds to Parabrahm and Mulaprakriti on the
higher plane.
* Amrita is "immortality."
** See Commentary No. 1 to this
Stanza.
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ments of the laboratory, and which
even the mind cannot grasp, although it can equally little avoid the conclusion
that these underlying essences of things must exist. Fire and Water, or Father*
and Mother, may be taken here to mean the divine Ray and Chaos. "Chaos,
from this union with Spirit obtaining sense, shone with pleasure, and thus was
produced the Protogonos (the first-born light)," says a fragment of
Hermas. Damascius calls it Dis in "Theogony" -- "The disposer of
all things." (See Cory's "Ancient Fragments," p. 314.)
According to the Rosicrucian tenets,
as handled and explained by the profane for once correctly, if only partially,
so "Light and Darkness are identical in themselves, being only divisible
in the human mind"; and according to Robert Fludd, "Darkness adopted
illumination in order to make itself visible" (On Rosenkranz). According
to the tenets of Eastern Occultism, DARKNESS is the one true actuality, the
basis and the root of light, without which the latter could never manifest
itself, nor even exist. Light is matter, and DARKNESS pure Spirit. Darkness, in
its radical, metaphysical basis, is subjective and absolute light; while the
latter in all its seeming effulgence and glory, is merely a mass of shadows, as
it can never be eternal, and is simply an illusion, or Maya.
Even in the mind-baffling and
science-harassing Genesis, light is created out of darkness "and darkness
was upon the face of the deep" (ch. i. v. 2.) -- and not vice versa.
"In him (in darkness) was life; and the life was the light of men"
(John i. 4). A day may come when the eyes of men will be opened; and then they
may comprehend better than they do now, that verse in the Gospel of John that
says "And the light shineth in darkness; and the darkness comprehendeth it
not." They will see then that the word "darkness" does not apply
to man's spiritual eyesight, but indeed to "Darkness," the absolute,
that comprehendeth not (cannot cognize) transient light, however transcendent
to human eyes. Demon est Deus inversus. The devil is now called Darkness by the
Church, whereas, in the Bible he is called the "Son of God" (see
Job), the bright star of the early morning, Lucifer (see Isaiah). There is a
whole philosophy of dogmatic craft in the reason why the first Archangel, who
sprang from the depths of Chaos, was called Lux (Lucifer), the "Luminous
Son of the Morning," or man-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See "Kwan-Shai-Yin." The
real name from the text cannot be given.
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vantaric Dawn. He was transformed by
the Church into Lucifer or Satan, because he is higher and older than Jehovah,
and had to be sacrificed to the new dogma. (See Book II.)
---------
STANZA III. -- Continued.
7. BEHOLD, OH LANOO!** THE RADIANT
CHILD OF THE TWO, THE UNPARALLELED REFULGENT GLORY, BRIGHT SPACE, SON OF DARK
SPACE, WHO EMERGES FROM THE DEPTHS OF THE GREAT DARK WATERS. IT IS OEAOHOO, THE
YOUNGER, THE * * * (whom thou knowest now as Kwan-Shai-Yin. -- Comment) (a). HE
SHINES FORTH AS THE SUN. HE IS THE BLAZING DIVINE DRAGON OF WISDOM. THE EKA IS
CHATUR (four), AND CHATUR TAKES TO ITSELF THREE, AND THE UNION PRODUCES THE
SAPTA (seven) IN WHOM ARE THE SEVEN WHICH BECOME THE TRIDASA*** (the thrice
ten) THE HOSTS AND THE MULTITUDES (b). BEHOLD HIM LIFTING THE VEIL, AND
UNFURLING IT FROM EAST TO WEST. HE SHUTS OUT THE ABOVE AND LEAVES THE BELOW TO
BE SEEN AS THE GREAT ILLUSION. HE MARKS THE PLACES FOR THE SHINING ONES (stars)
AND TURNS THE UPPER (space) INTO A SHORELESS SEA OF FIRE, AND THE ONE
MANIFESTED (element) INTO THE GREAT WATERS (c).
"Bright Space, son of dark
Space," corresponds to the Ray dropped at the first thrill of the new
"Dawn" into the great Cosmic depths, from which it re-emerges
differentiated as Oeaohoo the younger, (the "new LIFE"), to become,
to the end of the life-cycle, the germ of all things. He is "the
Incorporeal man who contains in himself the divine Idea," -- the generator
of Light and Life, to use an expression of Philo Judaeus. He is called the
"Blazing Dragon of Wisdom,"
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
** Lanoo is a student, a chela who
studies practical Esotericism.
*** "Tri-dasa," or three
times ten (30), alludes to the Vedic deities, in round numbers, or more
accurately 33 -- a sacred number. They are the 12 Adityas, the 8 Vasus, the 11
Rudras, and 2 Aswins -- the twin sons of the Sun and the Sky. This is the
root-number of the Hindu Pantheon, which enumerates 33 crores or over three
hundred millions of gods and goddesses.
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because, firstly, he is that which
the Greek philosophers called the Logos, the Verbum of the Thought Divine; and
secondly, because in Esoteric philosophy this first manifestation, being the
synthesis or the aggregate of Universal Wisdom, Oeaohoo, "the Son of the
Son," contains in himself the Seven Creative Hosts (The Sephiroth), and is
thus the essence of manifested Wisdom. "He who bathes in the light of
Oeaohoo will never be deceived by the veil of Maya."
Kwan-Shai-Yin is identical with, and
an equivalent of the Sanskrit Avalokiteshwara, and as such he is an androgynous
deity, like the Tetragrammaton and all the Logoi* of antiquity. It is only by
some sects in China that he is anthropomorphized and represented with female
attributes,** when, under his female aspect, he becomes Kwan-Yin, the goddess
of mercy, called the "Divine Voice."*** The latter is the patron
deity of Thibet and of the island of Puto in China, where both deities have a
number of monasteries.**** (See Part II. Kwan-Shai-Yin and Kwan-yin.)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Hence all the higher gods of
antiquity are all "Sons of the Mother" before they become those of
the "Father." The Logoi, like Jupiter or Zeus, Son of Kronos-Saturn,
"Infinite Time" (or Kala), in their origin were represented as
male-female. Zeus is said to be the "beautiful Virgin," and Venus is
made bearded. Apollo is originally bisexual, so is Brahma-Vach in Manu and the
Puranas. Osiris is interchangeable with Isis, and Horus is of both sexes.
Finally St. John's vision in Revelation, that of the Logos, who is now
connected with Jesus -- is hermaphrodite, for he is described as having female
breasts. So is the Tetragrammaton = Jehovah. But there are two Avalokiteshwaras
in Esotericism; the first and the second Logos.
** No religious symbol can escape
profanation and even derision in our days of politics and Science. In Southern
India the writer has seen a converted native making pujah with offerings before
a statue of Jesus clad in woman's clothes and with a ring in his nose. When
asking the meaning of the masquerade we were answered that it was Jesu-Maria
blended in one, and that it was done by the permission of the Padri, as the
zealous convert had no money to purchase two statues or "idols" as
they, very properly, were called by a witness -- another but a non-converted
Hindu. Blasphemous this will appear to a dogmatic Christian, but the
Theosophist and the Occultist must award the palm of logic to the converted
Hindu. The esoteric Christos in the gnosis is, of course, sexless, but in
exoteric theology he is male and female.
*** The Gnostic Sophia,
"Wisdom" who is "the Mother" of the Ogdoad (Aditi, in a
certain sense, with her eight sons), is the Holy Ghost and the Creator of all,
as in the ancient systems. The "father" is a far later invention. The
earliest manifested Logos was female everywhere -- the mother of the seven
planetary powers.
**** See "Chinese
Buddhism," by the Rev. J. C. Edkins, who always gives correct facts,
although his conclusions are very frequently erroneous.
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(b) "The "Dragon of
Wisdom" is the One, the "Eka" (Sanskrit) or Saka. It is curious
that Jehovah's name in Hebrew should also be One, Echod. "His name is
Echod": say the Rabbins. The philologists ought to decide which of the two
is derived from the other -- linguistically and symbolically: surely, not the
Sanskrit? The "One" and the Dragon are expressions used by the
ancients in connection with their respective Logoi. Jehovah -- esoterically (as
Elohim) -- is also the Serpent or Dragon that tempted Eve, and the
"Dragon" is an old glyph for "Astral Light" (Primordial
Principle), "which is the Wisdom of Chaos." Archaic philosophy,
recognizing neither Good nor Evil as a fundamental or independent power, but
starting from the Absolute ALL (Universal Perfection eternally), traced both
through the course of natural evolution to pure Light condensing gradually into
form, hence becoming Matter or Evil. It was left with the early and ignorant
Christian fathers to degrade the philosophical and highly scientific idea of
this emblem (the Dragon) into the absurd superstition called the "Devil."
They took it from the later Zoroastrians, who saw devils or the Evil in the
Hindu Devas, and the word Evil thus became by a double transmutation D'Evil in
every tongue (Diabolos, Diable, Diavolo, Teufel). But the Pagans have always
shown a philosophical discrimination in their symbols. The primitive symbol of
the serpent symbolised divine Wisdom and Perfection, and had always stood for
psychical Regeneration and Immortality. Hence -- Hermes, calling the serpent
the most spiritual of all beings; Moses, initiated in the wisdom of Hermes,
following suit in Genesis; the Gnostic's Serpent with the seven vowels over its
head, being the emblem of the seven hierarchies of the Septenary or Planetary
Creators. Hence, also, the Hindu serpent Sesha or Ananta, "the Infinite,"
a name of Vishnu, whose first Vahan or vehicle on the primordial waters is this
serpent.* Yet they all made a difference between the good and the bad Serpent
(the Astral Light of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Like the logoi and the Hierarchies
of Powers, however, the "Serpents" have to be distinguished one from
the other. Sesha or Ananta, "the couch of Vishnu," is an allegorical
abstraction, symbolizing infinite Time in Space, which contains the germ and
throws off periodically the efflorescence of this germ, the manifested
Universe; whereas, the gnostic Ophis contained the same triple symbolism in its
seven vowels as the One, Three and Seven-syllabled Oeaohoo of the Archaic
doctrine; i.e., the One Unmanifested Logos, the Second manifested, the triangle
concreting into the Quaternary or Tetragrammaton, and the rays of the latter on
the material plane.
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the Kabalists) -- between the former,
the embodiment of divine Wisdom in the region of the Spiritual, and the latter,
Evil, on the plane of matter.* Jesus accepted the serpent as a synonym of Wisdom,
and this formed part of his teaching: "Be ye wise as serpents," he
says. "In the beginning, before Mother became Father-Mother, the fiery
Dragon moved in the infinitudes alone" (Book of Sarparajni.) The Aitareya
Brahmana calls the Earth Sarparajni, "the Serpent Queen," and
"the Mother of all that moves." Before our globe became egg-shaped
(and the Universe also) "a long trail of Cosmic dust (or fire mist) moved
and writhed like a serpent in Space." The "Spirit of God moving on
Chaos" was symbolized by every nation in the shape of a fiery serpent
breathing fire and light upon the primordial waters, until it had incubated
cosmic matter and made it assume the annular shape of a serpent with its tail
in its mouth -- which symbolises not only Eternity and Infinitude, but also the
globular shape of all the bodies formed within the Universe from that fiery
mist. The Universe, as well as the Earth and Man, cast off periodically,
serpent-like, their old skins, to assume new ones after a time of rest. The
serpent is, surely, a not less graceful or a more unpoetical image than the
caterpillar and chrysalis from which springs the butterfly, the Greek emblem of
Psyche, the human soul. The "Dragon" was also the symbol of the Logos
with the Egyptians, as with the Gnostics. In the "Book of Hermes,"
Pymander, the oldest and the most spiritual of the Logoi of the Western
Continent, appears to Hermes in the shape of a Fiery Dragon of "Light,
Fire, and Flame." Pymander, the "Thought Divine" personified,
says: The Light is me, I am the Nous (the mind or Manu), I am thy God, and I am
far older than the human principle which escapes from the shadow
("Darkness," or the concealed Deity). I am the germ of thought, the
resplendent Word, the Son of God. All that thus sees and hears in thee is the
Verbum of the Master, it is the Thought (Mahat) which is God, the Father.**
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Astral Light, or the AEther, of
the ancient pagans (for the name of Astral Light is quite modern) is
Spirit-Matter. Beginning with the pure spiritual plane, it becomes grosser as
it descends until it becomes the Maya or the tempting and deceitful serpent on
our plane.
** By "God, the Father,"
the seventh principle in Man and Kosmos are here unmistakeably meant, this
principle being inseparable in its Esse and Nature from the seventh Cosmic
principle. In one sense it is the Logos of the Greeks and the Avalokiteswara of
the esoteric Buddhists.
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The celestial Ocean, the 'Ether . . .
. is the Breath of the Father, the life-giving principle, the Mother, the Holy
Spirit, . . . . for these are not separated, and their union is LIFE."
Here we find the unmistakeable echo
of the Archaic Secret Doctrine, as now expounded. Only the latter does not
place at the head and Evolution of Life "the Father," who comes third
and is the "Son of the Mother," but the "Eternal and Ceaseless
Breath of the ALL." The Mahat (Understanding, Universal Mind, Thought,
etc.), before it manifests itself as Brahma or Siva, appears as Vishnu, says
Sankhya Sara (p. 16); hence Mahat has several aspects, just as the logos has.
Mahat is called the Lord, in the Primary Creation, and is, in this sense,
Universal Cognition or Thought Divine; but, "That Mahat which was first
produced is (afterwards) called Ego-ism, when it is born as "I," that
is said to be the second Creation" (Anugita, ch. xxvi.). And the
translator (an able and learned Brahmin, not a European Orientalist) explains
in a foot-note (6), "i.e., when Mahat develops into the feeling of
Self-Consciousness -- I -- then it assumes the name of Egoism," which,
translated into our esoteric phraseology, means when Mahat is transformed into
the human Manas (or even that of the finite gods), and becomes Aham-ship. Why
it is called the Mahat of the Second creation (or the ninth, that of the Kumara
in Vishnu Purana) will be explained in Book II. The "Sea of Fire" is
then the Super-Astral (i.e., noumenal) Light, the first radiation from the
Root, the Mulaprakriti, the undifferentiated Cosmic Substance, which becomes
Astral Matter. It is also called the "Fiery Serpent," as above
described. If the student bears in mind that there is but One Universal
Element, which is infinite, unborn, and undying, and that all the rest -- as in
the world of phenomena -- are but so many various differentiated aspects and
transformations (correlations, they are now called) of that One, from Cosmical
down to microcosmical effects, from super-human down to human and sub-human
beings, the totality, in short, of objective existence -- then the first and
chief difficulty will disappear and Occult Cosmology may be mastered.* All the
Kabalists and Occultists, Eastern and Western, recognise (a)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In the Egyptian as in the Indian
theogony there was a concealed deity, the ONE, and the creative, androgynous
god. Thus Shoo is the god of creation and Osiris is, in his original primary
form, the "god whose name is unknown." (See Mariette's Abydos II., p.
63, and Vol. III., pp. 413, 414, No. 1122.)
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the identity of
"Father-Mother" with primordial AEther or Akasa, (Astral Light)*; and
(b) its homogeneity before the evolution of the "Son," cosmically
Fohat, for it is Cosmic Electricity. "Fohat hardens and scatters the seven
brothers" (Book III. Dzyan); which means that the primordial Electric
Entity -- for the Eastern Occultists insist that Electricity is an Entity --
electrifies into life, and separates primordial stuff or pregenetic matter into
atoms, themselves the source of all life and consciousness. "There exists
an universal agent unique of all forms and of life, that is called Od,** Ob,
and Aour, active and passive, positive and negative, like day and night: it is
the first light in Creation" (Eliphas Levi's Kabala):--- the first Light
of the primordial Elohim -- the Adam, "male and female" -- or
(scientifically) ELECTRICITY AND LIFE.
(c) The ancients represented it by a
serpent, for "Fohat hisses as he glides hither and thither" (in
zigzags). The Kabala figures it with the Hebrew letter Teth [[hebrew]], whose
symbol is the serpent which played such a prominent part in the Mysteries. Its
universal value is nine, for it is the ninth letter of the alphabet and the
ninth door of the fifty portals or gateways that lead to the concealed
mysteries of being. It is the magical agent par excellence, and designates in
Hermetic philosophy "Life infused into primordial matter," the
essence that composes all things, and the spirit that determines their form.
But there are two secret Hermetical operations, one spiritual, the other
material-correlative, and for ever united. "Thou shalt separate the earth
from the fire, the subtile from the solid . . . that which ascends from earth
to heaven and descends again from heaven to earth. It (the subtile light), is
the strong force of every force, for it conquers every subtile thing and
penetrates into every solid. Thus was the world formed" (Hermes).
It was not Zeno alone, the founder of
the Stoics, who taught that the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See next note.
** Od is the pure life-giving Light,
or magnetic fluid; Ob the messenger of death used by the sorcerers, the
nefarious evil fluid; Aour is the synthesis of the two, Astral Light proper.
Can the Philologists tell why Od -- a term used by Reichenbach to denominate
the vital fluid -- is also a Tibetan word meaning light, brightness, radiancy?
It equally means "Sky" in an occult sense. Whence the root of the
word? But Akasa is not quite Ether, but far higher than that, as will be shown.
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Universe evolves, when its primary
substance is transformed from the state of fire into that of air, then into
water, etc. Heracleitus of Ephesus maintained that the one principle that
underlies all phenomena in Nature is fire. The intelligence that moves the
Universe is fire, and fires is intelligence. And while Anaximenes said the same
of air, and Thales of Miletus (600 years B.C.) of water, the Esoteric Doctrine
reconciles all those philosophers by showing that though each was right the
system of none was complete.
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STANZA III. -- Continued.
8. WHERE WAS THE GERM, AND WHERE WAS
NOW DARKNESS? WHERE IS THE SPIRIT OF THE FLAME THAT BURNS IN THY LAMP, OH
LANOO? THE GERM IS THAT, AND THAT IS LIGHT; THE WHITE BRILLIANT SON OF THE DARK
HIDDEN FATHER (a).
(a) The answer to the first question,
suggested by the second, which is the reply of the teacher to the pupil,
contains in a single phrase one of the most essential truths of occult
philosophy. It indicates the existence of things imperceptible to our physical
senses which are of far greater importance, more real and more permanent, than
those that appeal to these senses themselves. Before the Lanoo can hope to
understand the transcendentally metaphysical problem contained in the first
question he must be able to answer the second, while the very answer he gives
to the second will furnish him with the clue to the correct reply to the first.
In the Sanscrit Commentary on this
Stanza, the terms used for the concealed and the unrevealed Principle are many.
In the earliest MSS. of Indian literature this Unrevealed, Abstract Deity has
no name. It is called generally "That" (Tad in Sanskrit), and means
all that is, was, and will be, or that can be so received by the human mind.
Among such appellations, given, of
course, only in esoteric philosophy, as the "Unfathomable Darkness,"
the "Whirlwind," etc. -- it is also called the "It of the
Kalahansa, the Kala-ham-sa," and even the "Kali Hamsa," (Black
swan). Here the m and the n are convertible, and
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both sound like the nasal French an
or am, or, again, en or em (Ennui, Embarras, etc.) As in the Hebrew Bible, many
a mysterious sacred name in Sanscrit conveys to the profane ear no more than
some ordinary, and often vulgar word, because it is concealed anagrammatically
or otherwise. This word of Hansa or esoterically "hamsa" is just such
a case. Hamsa is equal to a-ham-sa, three words meaning "I am he" (in
English), while divided in still another way it will read "So-ham,"
"he (is) I" -- Soham being equal to Sah, "he," and aham,
"I," or "I am he." In this alone is contained the universal
mystery, the doctrine of the identity of man's essence with god-essence, for
him who understands the language of wisdom. Hence the glyph of, and the
allegory about, Kalahansa (or hamsa), and the name given to Brahma neuter
(later on, to the male Brahma) of "Hansa-Vahana," he who uses the
Hansa as his vehicle." The same word may be read "Kalaham-sa" or
"I am I" in the eternity of Time, answering to the Biblical, or
rather Zoroastrian "I am that I am." The same doctrine is found in
the Kabala, as witness the following extract from an unpublished MS. by Mr. S.
Liddell McGregor Mathers, the learned Kabalist: "The three pronouns
[[hebrew]], Hoa, Atah, Ani; He, Thou, I; are used to symbolize the ideas of
Macroprosopus and Microprosopus in the Hebrew Qabalah. Hoa, "He," is
applied to the hidden and concealed Macroprosopus; Atah, "Thou," to
Microprosopus; and Ani, "I," to the latter when He is represented as speaking.
(See Lesser Holy Assembly, 204 et seq.) It is to be noted that each of these
names consists of three letters, of which the letter Aleph [[hebrew]], A, forms
the conclusion of the first word Hoa, and the commencement of Atah and Ani, as
if it were the connecting link between them. But [[hebrew]] is the symbol of
the Unity and consequently of the unvarying Idea of the Divine operating
through all these. But behind the [[hebrew]] in the name Hoa are the letters
[[hebrew]] and [[hebrew]], the symbols of the numbers Six and Five, the Male
and the Female, the Hexagram and the Pentagram. And the numbers of these three
words, Hoa Atah Ani, are 12, 406, and 61, which are resumed in the key numbers
of 3, 10, and 7, by the Qabalah of the Nine Chambers, which is a form of the
exegetical rule of Temura."
It is useless to attempt to explain
the mystery in full. Materialists and the men of modern Science will never
understand it, since, in order
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to obtain clear perception of it, one
has first of all to admit the postulate of a universally diffused, omnipresent,
eternal Deity in Nature; secondly, to have fathomed the mystery of electricity
in its true essence; and thirdly, to credit man with being the septenary
symbol, on the terrestrial plane, of the One Great UNIT (the Logos), which is
Itself the Seven-vowelled sign, the Breath crystallized into the WORD.* He who
believes in all this, has also to believe in the multiple combination of the
seven planets of Occultism and of the Kabala, with the twelve zodiacal signs;
to attribute, as we do, to each planet and to each constellation an influence
which, in the words of Ely Star (a French Occultist), "is proper to it,
beneficent or maleficent, and this, after the planetary Spirit which rules it,
who, in his turn, is capable of influencing men and things which are found in
harmony with him and with which he has any affinity." For these reasons,
and since few believe in the foregoing, all that can now be given is that in
both cases the symbol of Hansa (whether "I," "He," Goose or
Swan) is an important symbol, representing, for instance, Divine Wisdom, Wisdom
in darkness beyond the reach of men. For all exoteric purposes, Hansa, as every
Hindu knows, is a fabulous bird, which, when given milk mixed with water for
its food (in the allegory) separated the two, drinking the milk and leaving the
water; thus showing inherent wisdom -- milk standing symbolically for spirit,
and water for matter.
That this allegory is very ancient
and dates from the very earliest archaic period, is shown by the mention (in
Bhagavata Purana) of a certain caste named "Hamsa" or
"Hansa," which was the "one caste" par excellence; when far
back in the mists of a forgotten past there was among the Hindus only "One
Veda, One Deity, One Caste." There is also a range in the Himalayas,
described in the old books as being situated north of Mount Meru, called
"Hamsa," and connected with episodes pertaining to the history of
religious mysteries and initiations. As to the name of Kala-Hansa being the
supposed vehicle of Brahma-Prajapati, in the exoteric texts and translations of
the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This is again similar to the
doctrine of Fichte and German Pantheists. The former reveres Jesus as the great
teacher who inculcated the unity of the spirit of man with the God-Spirit (the
Adwaita doctrine) or universal Principle. It is difficult to find a single
speculation in Western metaphysics which has not been anticipated by Archaic
Eastern philosophy. From Kant to Herbert Spencer, it is all a more or less
distorted echo of the Dwaita, Adwaita, and Vedantic doctrines generally.
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Orientalists, it is quite a mistake.
Brahma, the neuter, is called by them Kala-Hansa and Brahma, the male,
Hansa-Vahana, because forsooth "his vehicle or Vahan is a swan or
goose" (vide "the Hindu Classical Dictionary.") This is a purely
exoteric gloss. Esoterically and logically, if Brahma, the infinite, is all
that is described by the Orientalists, namely, agreeably with the Vedantic
texts, an abstract deity in no way characterised by the description of any
human attributes, and it is still maintained that he or it is called Kala-Hansa
-- then how can it ever become the Vahan of Brahma, the manifested finite god?
It is quite the reverse. The "Swan or goose" (Hansa) is the symbol of
that male or temporary deity, as he, the emanation of the primordial Ray, is
made to serve as a Vahan or vehicle for that divine Ray, which otherwise could
not manifest itself in the Universe, being, antiphrastically, itself an
emanation of "Darkness" -- for our human intellect, at any rate. It
is Brahma, then, who is Kala-Hansa, and the Ray, the Hansa-Vahana.
As to the strange symbol chosen, it
is equally suggestive; the true mystic significance being the idea of a
universal matrix, figured by the primordial waters of the "deep," or
the opening for the reception, and subsequently for the issue, of that one ray
(the Logos), which contains in itself the other seven procreative rays or
powers (the logoi or builders). Hence the choice by the Rosecroix of the
aquatic fowl -- whether swan or pelican,* with seven young ones for a symbol,
modified and adapted to the religion of every country. En-Soph is called the
"Fiery Soul of the Pelican" in the Book of Numbers.** (See Part II.
"The Hidden Deity and its Symbols and Glyphs.") Appearing with every
Manvantara as Narayan, or Swayambhuva (the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Whether the genus of the bird be
cygnus, anser, or pelecanus, it is no matter, as it is an aquatic bird floating
or moving on the waters like the Spirit, and then issuing from those waters to
give birth to other beings. The true significance of the symbol of the
Eighteenth Degree of the Rose-Croix is precisely this, though poetised later on
into the motherly feeling of the Pelican rending its bosom to feed its seven
little ones with its blood.
** The reason why Moses forbids
eating the pelican and swan, classing the two among the unclean fowls, and
permits eating "bald locusts, beetles, and the grasshopper after his
kind" (Leviticus xi. and Deuteronomy xiv.) is a purely physiological one,
and has to do with mystic symbology only in so far as the word
"unclean," like every other word, ought not to be read and understood
literally, as it is esoteric like all the [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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Self-Existent), and penetrating into
the Mundane Egg, it emerges from it at the end of the divine incubation as
Brahma or Prajapati, a progenitor of the future Universe into which he expands.
He is Purusha (spirit), but he is also Prakriti (matter). Therefore it is only
after separating himself into two halves -- Brahma-vach (the female) and
Brahma-Viraj (the male), that the Prajapati becomes the male Brahma.
-------
STANZA III. -- Continued.
9. LIGHT IS COLD FLAME, AND FLAME IS
FIRE, AND THE FIRE PRODUCES HEAT, WHICH YIELDS WATER, THE WATER OF LIFE IN THE
GREAT MOTHER (Chaos) (a).
(a) It must be remembered that the
words "Light," "Fire," and "Flame" used in the
Stanzas have been adopted by the translators thereof from the vocabulary of the
old "Fire philosophers,"** in order to render better the meaning of
the archaic terms and symbols employed in the original. Otherwise they would
have remained entirely unintelligible to a European reader. But to a student of
the Occult the terms used will be sufficiently clear.
All these -- "Light,"
"Flame," "Hot," "Cold," "Fire,"
"Heat," "Water," and the "water of life" are all,
on our plane, the progeny; or as a modern physicist would say, the correlations
of ELECTRICITY. Mighty word, and a still mightier symbol! Sacred generator of a
no less sacred progeny; of fire -- the creator, the preserver and the
destroyer; of light -- the essence of our divine ancestors; of flame -- the
Soul of things. Electricity, the ONE Life at the upper rung of Being, and
Astral Fluid, the Athanor of the Alchemists, at its lowest; GOD and DEVIL, GOOD
and EVIL. . . .
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] rest, and may as well mean "holy" as not. It is a blind, very
suggestive in connection with certain superstitions -- e.g., that of the
Russian people who will not use the pigeon for food; not because it is
"unclean," but because the "Holy Ghost" is credited with
having appeared under the form of a Dove.
** Not the Mediaeval Alchemists, but
the Magi and Fire-Worshippers, from whom the Rosicrucians or the Philosophers
per ignem, the successors of the theurgists borrowed all their ideas concerning
Fire, as a mystic and divine element.
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Now, why is Light called in the
Stanzas "cold flame"? Because in the order of Cosmic evolution (as
taught by the Occultist), the energy that actuates matter after its first
formation into atoms is generated on our plane by Cosmic heat; and because
Kosmos, in the sense of dissociated matter, was not, before that period. The
first primordial matter, eternal and coeval with Space, "which has neither
a beginning nor an end," is "neither hot nor cold, but is of its own
special nature," says the Commentary (Book II). Heat and cold are relative
qualities and pertain to the realms of the manifested worlds, which all proceed
from the manifested Hyle, which, in its absolutely latent aspect, is referred
to as the "cold Virgin," and when awakened to life, as the
"Mother." The ancient Western Cosmogonic myths state that at first
there was but cold mist which was the Father, and the prolific slime (the
Mother, Ilus or Hyle), from which crept forth the Mundane snake-matter, (Isis,
vol. i., p. 146). Primordial matter, then, before it emerges from the plane of
the never-manifesting, and awakens to the thrill of action under the impulse of
Fohat, is but "a cool Radiance, colourless, formless, tasteless, and
devoid of every quality and aspect." Even such are her first-born, the
"four sons," who "are One, and become Seven," -- the
entities, by whose qualifications and names the ancient Eastern Occultists
called the four of the seven primal "centres of Forces," or atoms,
that develop later into the great Cosmic "Elements," now divided into
the seventy or so sub-elements, known to science. The four primal natures of
the first Dhyan Chohans, are the so-called (for want of better terms)
"Akasic," "Ethereal," "Watery," and
"Fiery," answering, in the terminology of practical occultism, to
scientific definitions of gases, which, to convey a clear idea to both
Occultists and laymen, must be defined as Parahydrogenic,* Paraoxygenic,
Oxyhydrogenic, and Ozonic, or perhaps Nitr-ozonic; the latter forces or gases
(in Occultism, supersensuous, yet atomic substances) being the most effective
and active when energising on the plane of more grossly differentiated
matter.** These are both electro-positive and electro-negative.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* [[para]], "beyond,"
outside.
** Each of these and many more are
probably the missing links of chemistry. They are known by other names in
Alchemy and to the Occultists who practise in phenomenal powers. It is by
combining and recombining in a certain way (or dissociating) the
"Elements" by means of astral fire that the greatest phenomena are
produced.
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STANZA III. -- Continued.
10. FATHER-MOTHER SPIN A WEB WHOSE
UPPER END IS FASTENED TO SPIRIT (Purusha), THE LIGHT OF THE ONE DARKNESS, AND
THE LOWER ONE TO MATTER (Prakriti) ITS (the Spirit's) SHADOWY END; AND THIS WEB
IS THE UNIVERSE SPUN OUT OF THE TWO SUBSTANCES MADE IN ONE, WHICH IS SWABHAVAT
(a).
(a) In the Mandukya (Mundaka)
Upanishad it is written, "As a spider throws out and retracts its web, as
herbs spring up in the ground . . . so is the Universe derived from the
undecaying one" (I. 1. 7). Brahma, as "the germ of unknown
Darkness," is the material from which all evolves and develops "as
the web from the spider, as foam from the water," etc. This is only
graphic and true, if Brahma the "Creator" is, as a term, derived from
the root brih, to increase or expand. Brahma "expands" and becomes
the Universe woven out of his own substance.
The same idea has been beautifully
expressed by Goethe, who says:
"Thus at the roaring loom of
Time I ply,
And weave for God the garment thou
see'st Him by."
-------
STANZA III. -- Continued.
11. IT (the Web) EXPANDS WHEN THE
BREATH OF FIRE (the Father) IS UPON IT; IT CONTRACTS WHEN THE BREATH OF THE
MOTHER (the root of Matter) TOUCHES IT. THEN THE SONS (the Elements with their
respective Powers, or Intelligences) DISSOCIATE AND SCATTER, TO RETURN INTO
THEIR MOTHER'S BOSOM AT THE END OF THE "GREAT DAY" AND REBECOME ONE
WITH HER (a). WHEN IT (the Web) IS COOLING, IT BECOMES RADIANT, ITS SONS EXPAND
AND CONTRACT THROUGH THEIR OWN SELVES AND HEARTS; THEY EMBRACE INFINITUDE. (b)
The expanding of the Universe under
the breath of FIRE is very suggestive in the light of the "Fire mist"
period of which modern science speaks so much, and knows in reality so little.
Great heat breaks up the compound
elements and resolves the
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heavenly bodies into their primeval
one element, explains the commentary. "Once disintegrated into its primal
constituent by getting within the attraction and reach of a focus, or centre of
heat (energy), of which many are carried about to and fro in space, a body,
whether alive or dead, will be vapourised and held in "the bosom of the
Mother" until Fohat, gathering a few of the clusters of Cosmic matter
(nebulae) will, by giving it an impulse, set it in motion anew, develop the
required heat, and then leave it to follow its own new growth.
The expanding and contracting of the
Web -- i.e., the world stuff or atoms -- expresses here the pulsatory movement;
for it is the regular contraction and expansion of the infinite and shoreless
Ocean of that which we may call the noumenon of matter emanated by Swabhavat,
which causes the universal vibration of atoms. But it is also suggestive of
something else. It shows that the ancients were acquainted with that which is
now the puzzle of many scientists and especially of astronomers: the cause of
the first ignition of matter or the world-stuff, the paradox of the heat
produced by the refrigerative contraction and other such Cosmic riddles. For it
points unmistakeably to a knowledge by the ancients of such phenomena.
"There is heat internal and heat external in every atom," say the
manuscript Commentaries, to which the writer has had access; "the breath
of the Father (or Spirit) and the breath (or heat) of the Mother
(matter);" and they give explanations which show that the modern theory of
the extinction of the solar fires by loss of heat through radiation, is
erroneous. The assumption is false even on the Scientists' own admission. For
as Professor Newcomb points out (Popular Astronomy, pp. 506-508), "by
losing heat, a gaseous body contracts, and the heat generated by the
contraction exceeds that which it had to lose in order to produce the
contraction." This paradox, that a body gets hotter as the shrinking
produced by its getting colder is greater, led to long disputes. The surplus of
heat, it was argued, was lost by radiation, and to assume that the temperature
is not lowered pari passu with a decrease of volume under a constant pressure,
is to set at nought the law of Charles (Nebular Theory, Winchell). Contraction
develops heat, it is true; but contraction (from cooling) is incapable of
developing the whole amount of heat at any time existing in the mass, or even
of maintaining a body at a constant temperature, etc. Professor Winchell tries
to reconcile the paradox -- only a seeming one in fact, as
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Homer Lanes proved, -- by suggesting
"something besides heat." "May it not be," he asks,
"simply a repulsion among the molecules, which varies according to some
law of the distance?" But even this will be found irreconcileable, unless
this "something besides heat" is ticketed "Causeless Heat,"
the "Breath of Fire," the all-creative Force Plus ABSOLUTE
INTELLIGENCE, which physical science is not likely to accept.
However it may be, the reading of
this Stanza shows it, notwithstanding its archaic phraseology, to be more
scientific than even modern science.
-------
STANZA III. -- Continued.
12. THEN SVABHAVAT SENDS FOHAT TO
HARDEN THE ATOMS. EACH (of these) IS A PART OF THE WEB (Universe). REFLECTING
THE "SELF-EXISTENT LORD" (Primeval Light) LIKE A MIRROR, EACH BECOMES
IN TURN A WORLD.* . . .
"Fohat hardens the atoms";
i.e., by infusing energy into them: he scatters the atoms or primordial matter.
"He scatters himself while scattering matter into atoms" (MSS.
Commentaries.)
It is through Fohat that the ideas of
the Universal Mind are impressed upon matter. Some faint idea of the nature of
Fohat may be gathered from the appellation "Cosmic Electricity"
sometimes applied to it; but to the commonly known properties of electricity
must, in this case, be added others, including intelligence. It is of interest
to note that modern science has come to the conclusion, that all cerebration
and brain-activity are attended by electrical phenomena. (For further details
as to "Fohat" See Stanza V. and Comments.")
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This is said in the sense that the
flame from a fire is endless, and that the lights of the whole Universe could
be lit at one simple rush-light without diminishing its flame.
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STANZA IV.
COMMENTARY.
1. LISTEN, YE SONS OF THE EARTH, TO
YOUR INSTRUCTORS -- THE SONS OF THE FIRE (a). LEARN THERE IS NEITHER FIRST NOR
LAST; FOR ALL IS ONE NUMBER, ISSUED FROM NO NUMBER (b).
(a) These terms, the "Sons of
the Fire," the "Sons of the Fire-Mist," and the like, require
explanation. They are connected with a great primordial and universal mystery,
and it is not easy to make it clear. There is a passage in the Bhagavatgita
(ch. viii.) wherein Krishna, speaking symbolically and esoterically, says:
"I will state the times (conditions) . . . at which devotees departing
(from this life) do so never to return (be reborn), or to return (to incarnate
again). The Fire, the Flame, the day, the bright (lucky) fortnight, the six
months of the Northern solstice, departing (dying) in these, those who know the
Brahman (Yogis) go to the Brahman. Smoke, night, the dark (unlucky) fortnight,
the six months of the Southern solstice, (dying) in these, the devotee goes to
the lunar light (or mansion the astral light also) and returns (is reborn).
These two paths, bright and dark, are said to be eternal in this world (or
great kalpa, 'Age'). By the one a man goes never to come back, by the other he
returns." Now these names, "Fire," "Flame,"
"Day," the "bright fortnight," etc., as "Smoke,"
"Night," and so on, leading only to the end of the lunar path are
incomprehensible without a knowledge of Esotericism. These are all names of
various deities which preside over the Cosmo-psychic Powers. We often speak of
the Hierarchy of "Flames" (see Book II.) of the "Sons of
Fire," etc. Sankaracharya the greatest of the Esoteric masters of India,
says that fire means a deity which presides over Time (kala). The able
translator of Bhagavatgita, Kashinath Trimbak Telang, M.A., of Bombay,
confesses he has "no clear notion of the meaning of these verses" (p.
81, footnote). It seems quite clear, on the contrary, to him who knows the
occult doctrine. With these verses the mystic sense of the solar and lunar
symbols are connected: the Pitris are lunar deities and our ancestors, because
they created the physical man.
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The Agnishwatha, the Kumara (the
seven mystic sages), are solar deities, though the former are Pitris also; and
these are the "fashioners of the Inner Man." (See Book II.) They
are:--
"The Sons of Fire" --
because they are the first Beings (in the Secret Doctrine they are called
"Minds"), evolved from Primordial Fire. "The Lord is a consuming
Fire" (Deuteronomy iv. 24); "The Lord (Christos) shall be revealed
with his mighty angels in flaming fire" (2 Thessal. i. 7, 8). The Holy
Ghost descended on the Apostles like "cloven tongues of fire," (Acts
ii. v. 3); Vishnu will return on Kalki, the White Horse, as the last Avatar
amid fire and flames; and Sosiosh will be brought down equally on a White Horse
in a "tornado of fire." "And I saw heaven open and behold a
white horse, and he that sat upon him . . . . is called the Word of God,"
(Rev. xix. 13) amid flaming Fire. Fire is AEther in its purest form, and hence
is not regarded as matter, but it is the unity of Aether -- the second
manifested deity -- in its universality. But there are two "Fires"
and a distinction is made between them in the Occult teachings. The first, or the
purely Formless and invisible Fire concealed in the Central Spiritual Sun, is
spoken of as "triple" (metaphysically); while the Fire of the
manifested Kosmos is Septenary, throughout both the Universe and our Solar
System. "The fire or knowledge burns up all action on the plane of
illusion," says the commentary. "Therefore, those who have acquired
it and are emancipated, are called 'Fires.' " Speaking of the seven senses
symbolised as Hotris, priests, the Brahmana says in Anugita: "Thus these seven
(senses, smell and taste, and colour, and sound, etc., etc.) are the causes of
emancipation;" and the commentator adds: "It is from these seven from
which the Self is to be emancipated. 'I' (am here devoid of qualities) must
mean the Self, not the Brahmana who speaks." ("Sacred Books of the
East," ed. by Max Muller, Vol. VIII., 278.)
(b) The expression "All is One
Number, issued from No Number" relates again to that universal and
philosophical tenet just explained in Stanza III. (Comm. 4). That which is
absolute is of course No Number; but in its later significance it has an
application in Space as in Time. It means that not only every increment of time
is part of a larger increment, up to the most indefinitely prolonged duration
conceivable by the human intellect, but also that no manifested thing can
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be thought of except as part of a
larger whole: the total aggregate being the One manifested Universe that issues
from the unmanifested or Absolute -- called Non-Being or "No-Number,"
to distinguish it from BEING or "the One Number."
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STANZA IV. -- Continued.
(2) LEARN WHAT WE, WHO DESCEND FROM THE
PRIMORDIAL SEVEN, WE, WHO ARE BORN FROM THE PRIMORDIAL FLAME, HAVE LEARNED FROM
OUR FATHERS (a).
(a) This is explained in Book II.,
and this name, "Primordial Flame," corroborates what is said in the
first paragraph of the preceding commentary on Stanza IV.
The distinction between the
"Primordial" and the subsequent seven Builders is this: The former
are the Ray and direct emanation of the first "Sacred Four," the
Tetraktis, that is, the eternally Self-Existent One (Eternal in Essence note
well, not in manifestation, and distinct from the universal ONE). Latent,
during Pralaya, and active, during Manvantara, the "Primordial"
proceed from "Father-Mother" (Spirit-Hyle, or Ilus); whereas the
other manifested Quaternary and the Seven proceed from the Mother alone. It is
the latter who is the immaculate Virgin-Mother, who is overshadowed, not
impregnated, by the Universal MYSTERY -- when she emerges from her state of
Laya or undifferentiated condition. In reality, they are, of course, all one;
but their aspects on the various planes of being are different. (See Part II.,
"Theogony of the Creative Gods.")
The first "Primordial" are
the highest Beings on the Scale of Existence. They are the Archangels of
Christianity, those who refuse -- as Michael did in the latter system, and as
did the eldest "Mind-born sons" of Brahma (Veddhas) -- to create or
rather to multiply.
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STANZA IV. -- Continued.
3. FROM THE EFFULGENCY OF LIGHT --
THE RAY OF THE EVER-DARKNESS -- SPRUNG IN SPACE THE RE-AWAKENED ENERGIES (Dhyan
Chohans): THE ONE FROM THE EGG, THE SIX AND THE FIVE (a); THEN THE THREE, THE
ONE,
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THE FOUR, THE ONE, THE FIVE -- THE
TWICE SEVEN, THE SUM TOTAL (b). AND THESE ARE: THE ESSENCES, THE FLAMES, THE
ELEMENTS, THE BUILDERS, THE NUMBERS, THE ARUPA (formless), THE RUPA (with
bodies), AND THE FORCE OR DIVINE MAN -- THE SUM TOTAL. AND FROM THE DIVINE MAN
EMANATED THE FORMS, THE SPARKS, THE SACRED ANIMALS, AND THE MESSENGERS OF THE
SACRED FATHERS (the Pitris) WITHIN THE HOLY FOUR.*
(a) This relates to the sacred
Science of the Numerals: so sacred, indeed, and so important in the study of
Occultism that the subject can hardly be skimmed, even in such a large work as
the present. It is on the Hierarchies and correct numbers of these Beings
invisible (to us) except upon very rare occasions, that the mystery of the
whole Universe is built. The Kumaras, for instance, are called the
"Four" though in reality seven in number, because Sanaka, Sananda,
Sanatana and Sanat-Kumara are the chief Vaidhatra (their patronymic name), as
they spring from the "four-fold mystery." To make the whole clearer
we have to turn for our illustrations to tenets more familiar to some of our
readers, namely, the Brahminical.
According to Manu, Hiranyagarbha is
Brahma the first male formed by the undiscernible Causeless CAUSE in a
"Golden Egg resplendent as the Sun," as states the Hindu Classical
Dictionary. "Hiranyagarbha" means the golden, or rather the
"Effulgent Womb" or Egg. The meaning tallies awkwardly with the
epithet of "male." Surely the esoteric meaning of the sentence is
clear enough. In the Rig Veda it is said:-- "THAT, the one Lord of all
beings . . . . the one animating principle of gods and man," arose, in the
beginning, in the Golden Womb, Hiranyagarbha -- which is the Mundane Egg or
sphere of our Universe. That Being is surely androgynous, and the allegory of
Brahma separating into two and recreating in one of his halves (the female
Vach) himself as Viraj, is a proof of it.
"The One from the Egg, the Six
and the Five," give the number 1065, the value of the first-born (later on
the male and female Brahma-Prajapati), who answers to the numbers 7, and 14,
and 21 respectively. The Prajapati are, like the Sephiroth, only seven,
including the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The 4, represented in the Occult
numerals by the Tetraktis, the Sacred or Perfect Square, is a Sacred Number
with the mystics of every nation and race. It has one and the same significance
in Brahmanism, Buddhism, the Kabala and in the Egyptian, Chaldean and other
numerical systems.
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synthetic Sephira of the triad from
which they spring. Thus from Hiranyagarbha or Prajapati, the triune (primeval
Vedic Trimurti, Agni, Vayu, and Surya), emanate the other seven, or again ten,
if we separate the first three which exist in one, and one in three, all,
moreover, being comprehended within that one "supreme" Parama, called
Guhya or " secret," and Sarvatma, the "Super-Soul."
"The seven Lords of Being lie concealed in Sarvatma like thoughts in one
brain." So are the Sephiroth. It is either seven when counting from the
upper Triad headed by Kether, or ten -- exoterically. In the Mahabharata the
Prajapati are 21 in number, or ten, six, and five (1065), thrice seven.*
(b) "The Three, the One, the
Four, the One, the Five" (in their totality -- twice seven) represent
31415 -- the numerical hierarchy of the Dhyan-Chohans of various orders, and of
the inner or circumscribed world.** When placed on the boundary of the great
circle of "Pass not" (see Stanza V.), called also the Dhyanipasa, the
"rope of the Angels," the "rope" that hedges off the phenomenal
from the noumenal Kosmos, (not falling within the range of our present
objective consciousness); this number, when not enlarged by permutation and
expansion, is ever 31415 anagrammatically and Kabalistically, being both the
number of the circle and the mystic Svastica, the twice seven once more; for
whatever way the two sets of figures are counted, when added separately, one
figure after another, whether crossways, from right or from left, they will
always yield fourteen. Mathematically they represent the well-known calculation,
namely, that the ratio of the diameter to the circumference of a circle is as 1
to 3.1415, or the value of the (pi), as this ratio is called -- the symbol
being always used in
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In the Kabala the same numbers are
a value of Jehovah, viz., 1065, since the numerical values of the three letters
which compose his name -- Jod, Vau and twice He -- are respectively 10 (
[[hebrew]]), 6 ( [[hebrew]]) and 5 ( [[hebrew]]); or again thrice seven, 21. "Ten
is the Mother of the Soul, for Life and Light are therein united," says
Hermes. "For number one is born of the Spirit and the number ten from
matter (chaos, feminine); the unity has made the ten, the ten the unity"
(Book of the Keys). By the means of the Temura, the anagrammatical method of
the Kabala, and the knowledge of 1065 (21), a universal science may be obtained
regarding Kosmos and its mysteries" (Rabbi Yogel). The Rabbis regard the
numbers 10, 6, and 5 as the most sacred of all.
** The reader may be told that an
American Kabalist has now discovered the same number for the Elohim. It came to
the Jews from Chaldaea. See "Hebrew Metrology" in the Masonic Review,
July, 1885, McMillan Lodge, No. 141.
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mathematical formulae to express it.
This set of figures must have the same meaning, since the 1 : 314,159, and then
again 1 : 3 : 1,415,927 are worked out in the secret calculations to express
the various cycles and ages of the "first born," or
311,040,000,000,000 with fractions, and yield the same 13,415 by a process we
are not concerned with at present. And it may be shown that Mr. Ralston
Skinner, author of The Source of Measures, reads the Hebrew word Alhim in the
same number values, by omitting, as said, the ciphers and by permutation --
13,514: since [[hebrew]] (a) is 1 : [[hebrew]] (l) is 3 (or 30); [[hebrew]] (h)
is 5; [[hebrew]] (i) 1 for 10; and [[hebrew]] (m) is 4 (40), and
anagrammatically -- 31,415 as explained by him.
Thus, while in the metaphysical
world, the circle with the one central Point in it has no number, and is called
Anupadaka (parentless and numberless) -- viz., it can fall under no
calculation, -- in the manifested world the mundane Egg or Circle is
circumscribed within the groups called the Line, the Triangle, the Pentacle,
the second Line and the Cube (or 13514); and when the Point having generated a
Line, thus becomes a diameter which stands for the androgynous Logos, then the
figures become 31415, or a triangle, a line, a cube, the second line, and a
pentacle. "When the Son separates from the Mother he becomes the
Father," the diameter standing for Nature, or the feminine principle.
Therefore it is said: "In the world of being, the one Point fructifies the
Line -- the Virgin Matrix of Kosmos (the egg-shaped zero) -- and the immaculate
Mother gives birth to the form that combines all forms." Prajapati is
called the first procreating male, and "his Mother's husband."* This
gives the key-note to all the later divine sons from immaculate mothers. It is
greatly corroborated by the significant fact that Anna (the name of the Mother
of the Virgin Mary) now represented by the Roman Catholic church as having
given birth to her daughter in an immaculate way ("Mary conceived without
sin"), is derived from the Chaldean Ana, heaven, or Astral Light, Anima
Mundi; whence Anaitia, Devi-durga, the wife of Siva, is also called Annapurna,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* We find the same expression in
Egypt. Mout signifies, for one thing, "Mother," and shows the
character assigned to her in the triad of that country. "She was no less
the mother than the wife of Ammon, one of the principle titles of the god being
"the husband of his mother." The goddess Mout, or Mut, is addressed
as "our lady," the "queen of Heaven" and of "the
Earth," thus "sharing these titles with the other mother goddesses,
Isis, Hathor, etc." (Maspero).
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and Kanya, the Virgin;
"Uma-Kanya" being her esoteric name, and meaning the "Virgin of
light," Astral Light in one of its multitudinous aspects.
(c) The Devas, Pitris, Rishis; the
Suras and the Asuras; the Daityas and Adityas; the Danavas and Gandharvas,
etc., etc., have all their synonyms in our Secret Doctrine, as well as in the
Kabala and the Hebrew Angelology; but it is useless to give their ancient
names, as it would only create confusion. Many of these may be also found now,
even in the Christian hierarchy of divine and celestial powers. All those
Thrones and Dominions, Virtues and Principalities, Cherubs, Seraphs and demons,
the various denizens of the Sidereal World, are the modern copies of archaic
prototypes. The very symbolism in their names, when transliterated and arranged
in Greek and Latin, are sufficient to show it, as will be proved in several
cases further on.
The "Sacred Animals" are
found in the Bible as well as in the Kabala, and they have their meaning (a
very profound one, too) on the page of the origins of Life. In the Sepher
Jezirah it is stated that "God engraved in the Holy Four the throne of his
glory, the Ophanim (Wheels or the World-Spheres), the Seraphim,* the Sacred
Animals, and the ministering angels, and from these three (the Air, Water, and
Fire or Ether) he formed his habitation." Thus was the world made
"through three Seraphim -- Sepher, Saphar, and Sipur," or
"through Number, Numbers, and Numbered." With the astronomical key
these "Sacred Animals" become the signs of the Zodiac.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* This is the literal translation
from the IXth and Xth Sections: "Ten numbers without what? One: the spirit
of the living God . . . . who liveth in eternities! Voice and Spirit and Word,
and this is the Holy Spirit. Two: Spirit out of Spirit. He designed and hewed
therewith twenty-two letters of foundation, three Mothers and seven double and
Twelve single, and one spirit out of them. Three: Water out of spirit; he
designed and hewed with them the barren and the void, mud and earth. He
designed them as a flowerbed, hewed them as a wall, covered them as a paving.
Four: Fire out of water. He designed and hewed therewith the throne of glory
and the wheels, and the seraphim and the holy animals and the ministering angels,
and of the three He founded his dwelling, as it is said, He makes his angels
spirits and his servants fiery flames!" Which words "founded his
dwelling" show clearly that in the Kabala, as in India, the Deity was
considered as the Universe, and was not, in his origin, the extra-cosmic God he
is now.
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STANZA IV. -- Continued.
4. THIS WAS THE ARMY OF THE VOICE --
THE DIVINE SEPTENARY. THE SPARKS OF THE SEVEN ARE SUBJECT TO, AND THE SERVANTS
OF, THE FIRST, SECOND, THIRD, FOURTH, FIFTH, SIXTH, AND THE SEVENTH OF THE
SEVEN (a). THESE ("sparks") ARE CALLED SPHERES, TRIANGLES, CUBES,
LINES, AND MODELLERS; FOR THUS STANDS THE ETERNAL NIDANA -- THE OI-HA-HOU (the
Permutation of Oeaohoo) (b).*
(a) This Sloka gives again a brief
analysis of the Hierarchies of the Dhyan Chohans, called Devas (gods) in India,
or the conscious intelligent powers in Nature. To this Hierarchy correspond the
actual types into which humanity may be divided; for humanity, as a whole, is
in reality a materialized though as yet imperfect expression thereof. The
"army of the Voice" is a term closely connected with the mystery of
Sound and Speech, as an effect and corollary of the cause -- Divine Thought. As
beautifully expressed by P. Christian, the learned author of "The History
of Magic" and of "L'Homme Rouge des Tuileries," the word spoken
by, as well as the name of, every individual largely determine his future fate.
Why? Because --
-- "When our Soul (mind) creates
or evokes a thought, the representative sign of that thought is self-engraved
upon the astral fluid, which is the receptacle and, so to say, the mirror of
all the manifestations of being.
"The sign expresses the thing:
the thing is the (hidden or occult) virtue of the sign.
"To pronounce a word is to evoke
a thought, and make it present: the magnetic potency of the human speech is the
commencement of every manifestation in the Occult World. To utter a Name is not
only to define a Being (an Entity), but to place it under and condemn it
through the emission of the Word (Verbum), to the influence of one or more
Occult potencies. Things are, for every one of us, that which it (the Word)
makes them while naming them. The Word (Verbum) or the speech of every man is,
quite unconsciously to himself, a BLESSING or a CURSE; this is why our present
ignorance about the properties or attributes of the IDEA as well as about the
attributes and properties of MATTER, is often fatal to us.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The literal signification of the
word is, among the Eastern Occultists of the North, a circular wind, whirlwind;
but in this instance, it is a term to denote the ceaseless and eternal Cosmic
Motion; or rather the Force that moves it, which Force is tacitly accepted as
the Deity but never named. It is the eternal Karana, the ever-acting Cause.
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"Yes, names (and words) are
either BENEFICENT or MALEFICENT; they are, in a certain sense, either venomous
or health-giving, according to the hidden influences attached by Supreme Wisdom
to their elements, that is to say, to the LETTERS which compose them, and the
NUMBERS correlative to these letters."
This is strictly true as an esoteric
teaching accepted by all the Eastern Schools of Occultism. In the Sanskrit, as
also in the Hebrew and all other alphabets, every letter has its occult meaning
and its rationale; it is a cause and an effect of a preceding cause and a
combination of these very often produces the most magical effect. The vowels,
especially, contain the most occult and formidable potencies. The Mantras
(esoterically, magical rather than religious) are chanted by the Brahmins and
so are the Vedas and other Scriptures.
The "Army of the Voice," is
the prototype of the "Host of the Logos," or the "WORD" of
the Sepher Jezirah, called in the Secret Doctrine "the One Number issued
from No-Number" -- the One Eternal Principle. The esoteric theogony begins
with the One, manifested, therefore not eternal in its presence and being, if
eternal in its essence; the number of the numbers and numbered -- the latter
proceeding from the Voice, the feminine Vach, Satarupa "of the hundred
forms," or Nature. It is from this number 10, or creative nature, the
Mother (the occult cypher, or "nought," ever procreating and
multiplying in union with the Unit "I," one, or the Spirit of Life),
that the whole Universe proceeded.
In the Anugita a conversation is
given (ch. vi., 15) between a Brahmana and his wife, on the origin of Speech
and its occult properties.* The wife asks how Speech came into existence, and
which was prior to the other, Speech or Mind. The Brahmana tells her that the
Apana (inspirational breath) becoming lord, changes that intelligence, which does
not understand Speech or Words, into the state of Apana, and thus opens the
mind. Thereupon he tells her a story, a dialogue between Speech and Mind.
"Both went to the Self of Being (i.e., to the individual Higher Self, as
Nilakantha thinks, to Prajapati, according to the commentator Arjuna Misra),
and asked him to destroy their doubts and decide which of them preceded and was
superior to the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Anugita forms part of the Asvamedha
Parvan of the "Mahabharata." The translator of the Bhagavatgita,
edited by Max Muller, regards it as a continuation of the Bhagavatgita. Its
original is one of the oldest Upanishads.
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other. To this the lord said: 'Mind
is Superior.' But Speech answered the Self of Being, by saying: 'I verily yield
(you) your desires,' meaning that by speech he acquired what he desired.
Thereupon again, the Self told her that there are two minds, the 'movable' and
the 'immovable.' 'The immovable is with me,' he said, 'the movable is in your
dominion' (i.e. of Speech) on the plane of matter. To that you are superior.
But inasmuch, O beautiful one, as you came personally to speak to me (in the
way you did, i.e. proudly), therefore, O, Sarasvati! you shall never speak
after (hard) exhalation." "The goddess Speech" (Sarasvati, a
later form or aspect of Vach, the goddess also of secret learning or Esoteric
Wisdom), "verily, dwelt always between the Prana and the Apana. But O
noble one! going with the Apana wind (vital air), though impelled, without the
Prana (expirational breath), she ran up to Prajapati (Brahma), saying, 'Be
pleased, O venerable sir!' Then the Prana appeared again, nourishing Speech.
And, therefore, Speech never speaks after (hard or inspirational) exhalation.
It is always noisy or noiseless. Of these two, the noiseless is the superior to
the noisy (Speech). . . . . The (speech) which is produced in the body by means
of the Prana, and which then goes (is transformed) into Apana, and then
becoming assimilated with the Udana (physical organs of Speech) . . . then
finally dwells in the Samana ('at the navel in the form of sound, as the
material cause of all words,' says Arjuna Misra). So Speech formerly spoke.
Hence the mind is distinguished by reason of its being immovable, and the
Goddess (Speech) by reason of her being movable."
This allegory is at the root of the
Occult law, which prescribes silence upon the knowledge of certain secret and
invisible things perceptible only to the spiritual mind (the 6th sense), and
which cannot be expressed by "noisy" or uttered speech. This chapter
of Anugita explains, says Arjuna Misra, Pranayama, or regulation of the breath
in Yoga practices. This mode, however, without the previous acquisition of, or
at least full understanding of the two higher senses, of which there are seven,
as will be shown, pertains rather to the lower Yoga. The Hatha so called was
and still is discountenanced by the Arhats. It is injurious to the health and
alone can never develop into Raj Yoga. This story is quoted to show how
inseparably connected are, in the metaphysics of old, intelligent beings, or
rather "Intelligences," with every sense or
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function whether physical or mental.
The Occult claim that there are seven senses in man, as in nature, as there are
seven states of consciousness, is corroborated in the same work, chapter vii.,
on Pratyahara (the restraint and regulation of the senses, Pranayama being that
of the "vital winds" or breath). The Brahmana speaks in it "of
the institution of the seven sacrificial Priests (Hotris). He says: "The
nose and the eyes, and the tongue, and the skin and the ear as the fifth (or
smell, sight, taste, touch and hearing), mind and understanding are the seven
sacrificial priests separately stationed"; and which "dwelling in a
minute space (still) do not perceive each other" on this sensuous plane,
none of them except mind. For mind says: "The nose smells not without me,
the eye does not take in colour, etc., etc. I am the eternal chief among all
elements (i.e., senses). Without me, the senses never shine, like an empty
dwelling, or like fires the flames of which are extinct. Without me, all
beings, like fuel half dried and half moist, fail to apprehend qualities or
objects even with the senses exerting themselves."*
This, of course, with regard only to
mind on the sensuous plane. Spiritual mind (the upper portion or aspect of the
impersonal MANAS) takes no cognisance of the senses in physical man. How well
the ancients were acquainted with the correlation of forces and all the
recently discovered phenomena of mental and physical faculties and functions,
with many more mysteries also -- may be found in reading chapters vii. and
viii. of this (in philosophy and mystic learning) priceless work. See the
quarrel of the senses about their respective superiority and their taking the
Brahman, the lord of all creatures, for their arbiter. "You are all greatest
and not greatest," or superior to objects, as A. Misra says, none being
independent of the other. "You are all possessed of one another's
qualities. All are greatest in their own spheres and all support one another.
There is one unmoving (life-wind or breath, the 'Yoga inhalation,' so called,
which is the breath of the One or Higher SELF). That is the (or my) own Self,
accumulated in numerous (forms)."
This Breath, Voice, Self or
"Wind" (pneuma?) is the Synthesis of the Seven Senses, noumenally all
minor deities and esoterically -- the septenary and the "Army of the
VOICE."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This shows the modern
metaphysicians, added to all past and present Haegels, Berkeleys,
Schopenhauers, Hartmanns, Herbert Spencers, and even the modern Hylo-Idealists
to boot, no better than the pale copyists of hoary antiquity.
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(b) Next we see Cosmic matter
scattering and forming itself into elements; grouped into the mystic four
within the fifth element -- Ether, the lining of Akasa, the Anima Mundi or
Mother of Kosmos. "Dots, Lines, Triangles, Cubes, Circles" and
finally "Spheres" -- why or how? Because, says the Commentary, such
is the first law of Nature, and because Nature geometrizes universally in all
her manifestations. There is an inherent law -- not only in the primordial, but
also in the manifested matter of our phenomenal plane -- by which Nature
correlates her geometrical forms, and later, also, her compound elements; and
in which there is no place for accident or chance. It is a fundamental law in
Occultism, that there is no rest or cessation of motion in Nature.* That which
seems rest is only the change of one form into another; the change of substance
going hand in hand with that of form -- as we are taught in Occult physics,
which thus seem to have anticipated the discovery of the "Conservation of
matter" by a considerable time. Says the ancient Commentary** to Stanza
IV.:--
"The Mother is the fiery Fish of
Life. She scatters her spawn and the Breath (Motion) heats and quickens it. The
grains (of spawn) are soon attracted to each other and form the curds in the
Ocean (of Space). The larger lumps coalesce and receive new spawn -- in fiery
dots, triangles and cubes, which ripen, and at the appointed time some of the
lumps detach themselves and assume spheroidal form, a process which they effect
only when not interfered with by the others. After which, law No. * * * comes
into operation. Motion (the Breath) becomes the whirlwind and sets them into
rotation."***
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is the knowledge of this law
that permits and helps the Arhat to perform his Siddhis, or various phenomena,
such as disintegration of matter, the transport of objects from one place to
another.
** These are ancient Commentaries
attached with modern Glossaries to the Stanzas, as the Commentaries in their
symbolical language are usually as difficult to understand as the Stanzas
themselves.
*** In a polemical scientific work,
"The Modern Genesis," the author, the Rev. W. B. Slaughter,
criticising the position assumed by the astronomers, asks:-- "It is to be
regretted that the advocates of this (nebular) theory have not entered more
largely into the discussion of it (the beginning of rotation). No one
condescends to give us the rationale of it. How does the process of cooling and
contracting the mass impart to it a rotatory motion?" The question is
amply treated in the Addendum. It is not materialistic science that can ever
solve it. "Motion is eternal in the unmanifested, and periodical in the manifest,"
says an Occult teaching. It is "when heat caused [[Footnote continued on
next page]]
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STANZA IV. -- Continued.
5. . . . . . WHICH IS:----
"DARKNESS," THE BOUNDLESS
OR THE NO-NUMBER, ADI-NIDANA SVABHAVAT: THE [[diagram]] (for x, unknown
quantity):
I. THE ADI-SANAT, THE NUMBER, FOR HE
IS ONE (a).
II. THE VOICE OF THE WORD, SVABHAVAT,
THE NUMBERS, FOR HE IS ONE AND NINE.*
III. THE "FORMLESS SQUARE."
(Arupa.) (b).
AND THESE THREE ENCLOSED WITHIN THE
[[diagram]] (boundless circle), ARE THE SACRED FOUR, AND THE TEN ARE THE ARUPA
(subjective, formless) UNIVERSE (c); THEN COME THE "SONS," THE SEVEN
FIGHTERS, THE ONE, THE EIGHTH LEFT OUT, AND HIS BREATH WHICH IS THE LIGHT-MAKER
(Bhaskara) (d).
(a) "Adi-Sanat," translated
literally is the First or "primeval" ancient, which name identifies
the Kabalistic "Ancient of Days" and the "Holy Aged" (Sephira
and Adam Kadmon) with Brahma the Creator, called also Sanat among his other
names and titles.
Svabhavat is the mystic Essence, the
plastic root of physical Nature -- "Numbers" when manifested; the
Number, in its Unity of Substance, on the highest plane. The name is of
Buddhist use and a Synonym for the four-fold Anima Mundi, the Kabalistic
"Archetypal World," from whence proceed the "Creative,
Formative, and the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] by the descent of FLAME into primordial matter causes its particles to
move, which motion becomes Whirlwind." A drop of liquid assumes a
spheroidal form owing to its atoms moving around themselves in their ultimate,
unresolvable, and noumenal essence; unresolvable for physical science, at any
rate.
* Which makes ten, or the perfect
number applied to the "Creator," the name given to the totality of
the Creators blended by the Monotheists into One, as the "Elohim,"
Adam Kadmon or Sephira -- the Crown -- are the androgyne synthesis of the 10
Sephiroth, who stand for the symbol of the manifested Universe in the
popularised Kabala. The esoteric Kabalists, however, following the Eastern
Occultists, divide the upper Sephirothal triangle from the rest (or Sephira,
Chochmah and Binah), which leaves seven Sephiroth. As for Svabhavat, the
Orientalists explain the term as meaning the Universal plastic matter diffused
through Space, with, perhaps, half an eye to the Ether of Science. But the Occultists
identify it with "FATHER-MOTHER" on the mystic plane. (Vide supra.)
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Material Worlds"; the Scintillae
or Sparks, -- the various other worlds contained in the last three. The Worlds
are all subject to Rulers or Regents -- Rishis and Pitris with the Hindus,
Angels with the Jews and Christians, Gods, with the Ancients in general.
(b) [[diagram]] This means that the
"Boundless Circle" (Zero) becomes a figure or number, only when one
of the nine figures precedes it, and thus manifests its value and potency, the
Word or Logos in union with VOICE and Spirit* (the expression and source of
Consciousness) standing for the nine figures and thus forming, with the Cypher,
the Decade which contains in itself all the Universe. The triad forms within
the circle the Tetraktis or Sacred Four, the Square within the Circle being the
most potent of all the magical figures.
(c) The "One Rejected" is
the Sun of our system. The exoteric version may be found in the oldest Sanskrit
Scriptures. In the Rig Veda, Aditi, "The Boundless" or infinite
Space, translated by Mr. Max Muller, "the visible infinite, visible by the
naked eye (!!); the endless expanse beyond the Earth, beyond the clouds, beyond
the sky," is the equivalent of "Mother-Space" coeval with
"Darkness." She is very properly called "The Mother of the
Gods," DEVA-MATRI, as it is from her Cosmic matrix that all the heavenly
bodies of our system were born -- Sun and Planets. Thus she is described,
allegorically, in this wise: "Eight Sons were born from the body of Aditi;
she approached the gods with seven, but cast away the eighth, Martanda,"
our sun. The seven sons called the Aditya are, cosmically or astronomically,
the seven planets; and the Sun being excluded from their number shows plainly
that the Hindus may have known, and in fact knew of a seventh planet, without
calling it Uranus.** But esoterically and theologically,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "In union with the Spirit and
the Voice," referring to the Abstract Thought and concrete Voice, or the
manifestation thereof, the effect of the Cause. Adam Kadmon or Tetragrammaton
is the Logos in the Kabala; therefore this triad answers in the latter to the
highest triangle of Kether, Chochmah and Binah, the last a female potency and
at the same time the male Jehovah, as partaking of the nature of Chochmah, or
the male Wisdom.
** The Secret Doctrine teaches that
the Sun is a central Star and not a planet. Yet the Ancients knew of and
worshipped seven great gods, excluding the Sun and Earth. Which was that
"Mystery God" they set apart? Of course not Uranus, discovered only
by Herschel in 1781. But could it not be known by another name? Says the
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
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so to say, the Adityas are, in their
primitive most ancient meanings, the eight, and the twelve great gods of the
Hindu Pantheon. "The Seven allow the mortals to see their dwellings, but
show themselves only to the Arhats," says an old proverb, "their
dwellings" standing here for planets. The ancient Commentary gives an
allegory and explains it:--
"Eight houses were built by
Mother. Eight houses for her Eight Divine sons; four large and four small ones.
Eight brilliant suns, according to their age and merits. Bal-ilu (Martanda) was
not satisfied, though his house was the largest. He began (to work) as the huge
elephants do. He breathed (drew in) into his stomach the vital airs of his
brothers. He sought to devour them. The larger four were far away; far, on the
margin of their kingdom.* They were not robbed (affected), and laughed. Do your
worst, Sir, you cannot reach us, they said. But the smaller wept. They complained
to the Mother. She exiled Bal-i-lu to the centre of her Kingdom, from whence he
could not move. (Since then) he (only) watches and threatens. He pursues them,
turning slowly around himself, they turning swiftly from him, and he following
from afar the direction in which his brothers move on the path that encircles
their houses.** From that day he feeds on the sweat of the Mother's body. He
fills himself with her breath and refuse. Therefore, she rejected him."
Thus the "rejected Son"
being our Sun, evidently, as shown above, the "Sun-Sons" refer not
only to our planets but to the heavenly bodies in general. Himself only a
reflection of the Central Spiritual Sun, Surya is the prototype of all those
bodies that evolved after him. In the Vedas he is called Loka-Chakshuh,
"the Eye of the World" (our
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] author of "Maconnerie Occulte":-- "Occult Sciences having
discovered through astronomical calculations that the number of the planets
must be seven, the ancients were led to introduce the Sun into the scale of the
celestial harmonies, and make him occupy the vacant place. Thus, every time
they perceived an influence that pertained to none of the six planets known,
they attributed it to the Sun. The error only seems important, but was not so
in practical results, if the ancient astrologers replaced Uranus by the Sun,
which is a central Star relatively motionless, turning only on its axis and
regulating time and measure; and which cannot be turned aside from its true
functions." . . . . . . The nomenclature of the days of the week is thus
faulty. "The Sun-Day ought to be Uranus-day (Urani dies, Urandi),"
adds the learned writer, Ragon.
* Planetary System.
** "The Sun rotates on his axis
always in the same direction in which the planets revolve in their respective
orbits," astronomy teaches us.
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planetary world), and he is one of
the three chief deities. He is called indifferently the Son of Dyaus and of
Aditi, because no distinction is made with reference to, or scope allowed for,
the esoteric meaning. Thus he is depicted as drawn by seven horses, and by one
horse with seven heads; the former referring to his seven planets, the latter
to their one common origin from the One Cosmic Element. This "One
Element" is called figuratively "FIRE." The Vedas
(Aitareya-Brahmana of Haug also; p. i) teach "that the fire verily is all
the deities." (Narada in Anugita).
The meaning of the allegory is plain,
for we have both the Dzyan Commentary and modern science to explain it, though
the two differ in more than one particular. The Occult Doctrine rejects the
hypothesis born out of the Nebular Theory, that the (seven) great planets have
evolved from the Sun's central mass, not of this our visible Sun, at any rate.
The first condensation of Cosmic matter of course took place about a central
nucleus, its parent Sun; but our sun, it is taught, merely detached itself
earlier than all the others, as the rotating mass contracted, and is their
elder, bigger brother therefore, not their father. The eight Adityas, "the
gods," are all formed from the eternal substance (Cometary matter* -- the
Mother) or the "World-Stuff " which is both the fifth and the sixth
COSMIC Principle, the Upadhi or basis of the Universal Soul, just as in man,
the Microcosm, Manas** is the Upadhi of Buddhi.***
(d) There is a whole poem on the
pregenetic battles fought by the growing planets before the final formation of
Kosmos, thus accounting for the seemingly disturbed position of the systems of
several planets, the plane of the satellites of some (of Neptune and Uranus,
for instance, of which the ancients knew nothing, it is said) being tilted
over, thus giving them an appearance of retrograde motion. These planets are
called the warriors, the Architects, and are accepted by the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This Essence of Cometary matter,
Occult Science teaches, is totally different from any of the chemical or
physical characteristics with which modern science is acquainted. It is homogeneous
in its primitive form beyond the Solar Systems, and differentiates entirely
once it crosses the boundaries of our Earth's region, vitiated by the
atmospheres of the planets and the already compound matter of the
interplanetary stuff, heterogeneous only in our manifested world.
** Manas -- the Mind-Principle, or
the human Soul.
*** Buddhi -- the divine Soul.
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Roman Church as the leaders of the
heavenly Hosts, thus showing the same traditions. Having evolved from Cosmic
Space, and before the final formation of the primaries and the annulation of
the planetary nebula, the Sun, we are taught, drew into the depths of its mass
all the Cosmic vitality he could, threatening to engulf his weaker
"brothers" before the law of attraction and repulsion was finally
adjusted; after which he began feeding on "The Mother's refuse and
sweat"; in other words, on those portions of Ether (the "breath of
the Universal Soul") of the existence and constitution of which science is
as yet absolutely ignorant. A theory of this kind having been propounded by Sir
William Grove (see "Correlation of the Physical Forces," 1843, p. 81;
and "Address to the British Association, 1866"), who theorized that
the systems "are gradually changing by atmospheric additions or
subtractions, or by accretions and diminutions arising from nebular substances"
. . . and again that "the Sun may condense gaseous matter as it travels in
Space and so heat may be produced" -- the archaic teaching seems
scientific enough, even in this age.* Mr. W. Mattieu Williams suggested that
the diffused matter or Ether which is the recipient of the heat radiations of
the Universe is thereby drawn into the depths of the solar mass. Expelling
thence the previously condensed and thermally exhausted Ether, it becomes
compressed and gives up its heat, to be in turn itself driven out in a rarified
and cooled state, to absorb a fresh supply of heat, which he supposes to be in
this way taken up by the Ether, and again concentrated and redistributed by the
Suns of the Universe.**
This is about as close an
approximation to the Occult teachings as Science ever imagined; for Occultism
explains it by "the dead breath" given back by Martanda and his
feeding on the "sweat and refuse" of "Mother Space." What
could affect Neptune,*** Saturn and Jupiter,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Very similar ideas in Mr. W.
Mattieu Williams' "The Fuel of the Sun;" in Dr. C. William Siemens'
"On the Conservation of Solar Energy" (Nature, XXV., p. 440-444,
March 9, 1882); and also in Dr. P. Martin Duncan's "Address of the
President of the Geological Society," London, May, 1877.
** See "Comparative
Geology," by Alexander Winchell, LL.D., p. 56.
*** When we speak of Neptune it is
not as an Occultist but as a European. The true Eastern Occultist will maintain
that, whereas there are many yet undiscovered planets in our system, Neptune
does not belong to it, his apparent connection with our sun and the influence
of the latter upon Neptune notwithstanding. This connection is mayavic,
imaginary, they say.
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but little, would have killed such
comparatively small "Houses" as Mercury, Venus and Mars. As Uranus
was not known before the end of the eighteenth century, the name of the fourth
planet mentioned in the allegory must remain to us, so far, a mystery.
The "Breath" of all the
"seven" is said to be Bhaskara (light-making), because they (the
planets) were all comets and suns in their origin. They evolve into Manvantaric
life from primaeval Chaos (now the noumenon of irresolvable nebulae) by
aggregation and accumulation of the primary differentiations of the eternal
matter, according to the beautiful expression in the Commentary, "Thus the
Sons of Light clothed themselves in the fabric of Darkness." They are
called allegorically "the Heavenly Snails," on account of their (to
us) formless INTELLIGENCES inhabiting unseen their starry and planetary homes,
and, so to speak, carrying them as the snails do along with themselves in their
revolution. The doctrine of a common origin for all the heavenly bodies and
planets, was, as we see, inculcated by the Archaic astronomers, before Kepler,
Newton, Leibnitz, Kant, Herschel and Laplace. Heat (the Breath), attraction and
repulsion -- the three great factors of Motion -- are the conditions under
which all the members of all this primitive family are born, developed, and
die, to be reborn after a "Night of Brahma," during which eternal
matter relapses periodically into its primary undifferentiated state. The most
attenuated gases can give no idea of its nature to the modern physicist.
Centres of Forces at first, the invisible sparks of primordial atoms
differentiate into molecules, and become Suns -- passing gradually into
objectivity gaseous, radiant, cosmic, the one "Whirlwind" (or motion)
finally giving the impulse to the form, and the initial motion, regulated and
sustained by the never-resting Breaths -- the Dhyan Chohans.
-------
STANZA IV. -- Continued.
6. . . . . THEN THE SECOND SEVEN, WHO
ARE THE LIPIKA, PRODUCED BY THE THREE (Word, Voice, and Spirit). THE REJECTED
SON IS ONE, THE "SON-SUNS" ARE COUNTLESS.
The Lipi-ka, from the word lipi,
"writing," means literally the
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"Scribes."* Mystically,
these Divine Beings are connected with Karma, the Law of Retribution, for they
are the Recorders or Annalists who impress on the (to us) invisible tablets of
the Astral Light, "the great picture-gallery of eternity" -- a
faithful record of every act, and even thought, of man, of all that was, is, or
ever will be, in the phenomenal Universe. As said in "Isis," this
divine and unseen canvas is the BOOK OF LIFE. As it is the Lipika who project
into objectivity from the passive Universal Mind the ideal plan of the
universe, upon which the "Builders" reconstruct the Kosmos after
every Pralaya, it is they who stand parallel to the Seven Angels of the
Presence, whom the Christians recognise in the Seven "Planetary
Spirits" or the "Spirits of the Stars;" for thus it is they who
are the direct amanuenses of the Eternal Ideation -- or, as called by Plato,
the "Divine Thought." The Eternal Record is no fantastic dream, for
we meet with the same records in the world of gross matter. "A shadow
never falls upon a wall without leaving thereupon a permanent trace which might
be made visible by resorting to proper processes," says Dr. Draper. . . .
"The portraits of our friends or landscape-views may be hidden on the
sensitive surface from the eye, but they are ready to make their appearance as
soon as proper developers are resorted to. A spectre is concealed on a silver
or a glassy surface, until, by our necromancy, we make it come forth into the
visible world. Upon the walls of our most private apartments, where we think
the eye of intrusion is altogether shut out, and our retirement can never be
profaned, there exist the vestiges of all our acts, silhouettes of whatever we
have done."** Drs. Jevons and Babbage believe that every thought,
displacing the particles of the brain and setting them in motion, scatters them
throughout the Universe, and they think that "each particle of the
existing matter must be a register of all that has happened." (Principles
of Science, Vol. II. p. 455.) Thus the ancient doctrine has begun to acquire
rights of citizenship in the speculations of the scientific world.
The forty "Assessors" who
stand in the region of Amenti as the accusers of the Soul before Osiris, belong
to the same class of deities as the Lipika, and might stand paralleled, were
not the Egyptian gods so
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* These are the four
"Immortals" which are mentioned in Atharva Veda as the
"Watchers" or Guardians of the four quarters of the sky (see ch.
lxxvi., 1-4, et seq.).
** "Conflict between Religion
and Science." -- Draper, pp. 132 and 133.
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little understood in their esoteric
meaning. The Hindu Chitra-Gupta who reads out the account of every Soul's life
from his register, called Agra-Sandhani; the "Assessors" who read
theirs from the heart of the defunct, which becomes an open book before
(whether) Yama, Minos, Osiris, or Karma -- are all so many copies of, and
variants from the Lipika, and their Astral Records. Nevertheless, the Lipi-ka
are not deities connected with Death, but with Life Eternal.
Connected as the Lipika are with the
destiny of every man and the birth of every child, whose life is already traced
in the Astral Light not fatalistically, but only because the future, like the
PAST, is ever alive in the PRESENT -- they may also be said to exercise an
influence on the Science of Horoscopy. We must admit the truth of the latter
whether we will or not. For, as observed by one of the modern adepts of
Astrology, "Now that photography has revealed to us the chemical influence
of the Sidereal system, by fixing on the sensitized plate of the apparatus
milliards of stars and planets that had hitherto baffled the efforts of the
most powerful telescopes to discover them, it becomes easier to understand how
our solar system can, at the birth of a child, influence his brain -- virgin of
any impression -- in a definite manner and according to the presence on the
zenith of such or another zodiacal constellation."**
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
** Les Mysteres de l'Horoscope, p.
XI.
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STANZA V.
1. THE PRIMORDIAL SEVEN, THE FIRST
SEVEN BREATHS OF THE DRAGON OF WISDOM, PRODUCE IN THEIR TURN FROM THEIR HOLY
CIRCUMGYRATING BREATHS THE FIERY WHIRLWIND (a).
COMMENTARY.
(a) This is, perhaps, the most
difficult of all the Stanzas to explain. Its language is comprehensible only to
him who is thoroughly versed in Eastern allegory and its purposely obscure
phraseology. The question will surely be asked, "Do the Occultists believe
in all these 'Builders,' 'Lipika,' and 'Sons of Light' as Entities, or are they
merely imageries?" To this the answer is given as plainly: "After due
allowance for the imagery of personified Powers, we must admit the existence of
these Entities, if we would not reject the existence of spiritual humanity
within physical mankind. For the hosts of these Sons of Light and 'Mind-born
Sons' of the first manifested Ray of the UNKNOWN ALL, are the very root of
spiritual man." Unless we want to believe the unphilosophical dogma of a
specially created soul for every human birth -- a fresh supply of these pouring
in daily, since "Adam" -- we have to admit the occult teachings. This
will be explained in its place. Let us see, now, what may be the occult meaning
of this Stanza.
The Doctrine teaches that, in order
to become a divine, fully conscious god, -- aye, even the highest -- the
Spiritual primeval INTELLIGENCES must pass through the human stage. And when we
say human, this does not apply merely to our terrestrial humanity, but to the
mortals that inhabit any world, i.e., to those Intelligences that have reached
the appropriate equilibrium between matter and spirit, as we have now, since
the middle point of the Fourth Root Race of the Fourth Round was passed. Each
Entity must have won for itself the right of becoming divine, through
self-experience. Hegel, the great German thinker, must have known or sensed
intuitionally this truth when saying, as he did, that the Unconscious evolved
the Universe only "in the hope of attaining clear
self-consciousness," of becoming, in other words, MAN; for this is also
the secret meaning of the usual Puranic phrase about
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Brahma being constantly "moved
by the desire to create." This explains also the hidden Kabalistic meaning
of the saying: "The Breath becomes a stone; the stone, a plant; the plant,
an animal; the animal, a man; the man, a spirit; and the spirit, a god."
The Mind-born Sons, the Rishis, the Builders, etc., were all men -- of whatever
forms and shapes -- in other worlds and the preceding Manvantaras.
This subject, being so very mystical,
is therefore the most difficult to explain in all its details and bearings;
since the whole mystery of evolutionary creation is contained in it. A sentence
or two in it vividly recalls to mind similar ones in the Kabala and the
phraseology of the King Psalmist (civ.), as both, when speaking of God, show
him making the wind his messenger and his "ministers a flaming fire."
But in the Esoteric doctrine it is used figuratively. The "fiery
Wind" is the incandescent Cosmic dust which only follows magnetically, as
the iron filings follow the magnet, the directing thought of the "Creative
Forces." Yet, this cosmic dust is something more; for every atom in the
Universe has the potentiality of self-consciousness in it, and is, like the
Monads of Leibnitz, a Universe in itself, and for itself. It is an atom and an
angel.
In this connection it should be noted
that one of the luminaries of the modern Evolutionist School, Mr. A. R.
Wallace, when discussing the inadequacy of "natural selection" as the
sole factor in the development of physical man, practically concedes the whole
point here discussed. He holds that the evolution of man was directed and
furthered by superior Intelligences, whose agency is a necessary factor in the scheme
of Nature. But once the operation of these Intelligences is admitted in one
place, it is only a logical deduction to extend it still further. No hard and
fast line can be drawn.
-------
STANZA V. -- Continued.
2. THEY MAKE OF HIM THE MESSENGER OF
THEIR WILL (a). THE DZYU BECOMES FOHAT; THE SWIFT SON OF THE DIVINE SONS, WHOSE
SONS ARE THE LIPIKA,* RUNS CIRCULAR ERRANDS. HE IS THE STEED, AND
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The difference between the
"Builders," the Planetary Spirits, and the Lipika must not be lost
sight of. (See Nos. 5 and 6 of this Commentary.)
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THE THOUGHT IS THE RIDER (i.e., he is
under the influence of their guiding thought). HE PASSES LIKE LIGHTNING THROUGH
THE FIERY CLOUDS (cosmic mists) (b); TAKES THREE, AND FIVE, AND SEVEN STRIDES
THROUGH THE SEVEN REGIONS ABOVE AND THE SEVEN BELOW (the world to be). HE LIFTS
HIS VOICE, AND CALLS THE INNUMERABLE SPARKS (atoms) AND JOINS THEM TOGETHER
(c).
(a) This shows the "Primordial
Seven" using for their Vahan (vehicle, or the manifested subject which
becomes the symbol of the Power directing it), Fohat, called in consequence,
the "Messenger of their will" -- the fiery whirlwind.
"Dzyu becomes Fohat" -- the
expression itself shows it. Dzyu is the one real (magical) knowledge, or Occult
Wisdom; which, dealing with eternal truths and primal causes, becomes almost
omnipotence when applied in the right direction. Its antithesis is Dzyu-mi,
that which deals with illusions and false appearances only, as in our exoteric
modern sciences. In this case, Dzyu is the expression of the collective Wisdom
of the Dhyani-Buddhas.
(b) As the reader is supposed not to
be acquainted with the Dhyani-Buddhas, it is as well to say at once that,
according to the Orientalists, there are five Dhyanis who are the
"celestial" Buddhas, of whom the human Buddhas are the manifestations
in the world of form and matter. Esoterically, however, the Dhyani-Buddhas are
seven, of whom five only have hitherto manifested,* and two are to come in the
sixth and seventh Root-races. They are, so to speak, the eternal prototypes of
the Buddhas who appear on this earth, each of whom has his particular divine
prototype. So, for instance, Amitabha is the Dhyani-Buddha of Gautama
Sakyamuni, manifesting through him whenever this great Soul incarnates on earth
as He did in Tzon-kha-pa.** As the synthesis of the seven Dhyani-Buddhas,
Avalokiteswara was the first Buddha (the Logos), so Amitabha is the inner
"God" of Gautama, who, in China, is called Amita(-Buddha). They are,
as Mr. Rhys Davids
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See A. P. Sinnett's "Esoteric
Buddhism," 5th annotated edition, pp. 171-173.
** The first and greatest Reformer
who founded the "Yellow-Caps," Gyalugpas. He was born in the year
1355 A.D. in Amdo, and was the Avatar of Amitabha, the celestial name of
Gautama Buddha.
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correctly states, "the glorious
counterparts in the mystic world, free from the debasing conditions of this
material life" of every earthly mortal Buddha -- the liberated
Manushi-Buddhas appointed to govern the Earth in this Round. They are the
"Buddhas of Contemplation," and are all Anupadaka (parentless), i.e.,
self-born of divine essence. The exoteric teaching which says that every
Dhyani-Buddha has the faculty of creating from himself, an equally celestial
son -- a Dhyani-Bodhisattva -- who, after the decease of the Manushi (human)
Buddha, has to carry out the work of the latter, rests on the fact that owing
to the highest initiation performed by one overshadowed by the "Spirit of
Buddha" -- (who is credited by the Orientalists with having created the five
Dhyani-Buddhas!), -- a candidate becomes virtually a Bodhisattva, created such
by the High Initiator.
(c) Fohat, being one of the most, if
not the most important character in esoteric Cosmogony, should be minutely
described. As in the oldest Grecian Cosmogony, differing widely from the later
mythology, Eros is the third person in the primeval trinity: Chaos, Gaea, Eros:
answering to the Kabalistic En-Soph (for Chaos is SPACE, [[chaino]],
"void") the Boundless ALL, Shekinah and the Ancient of Days, or the
Holy Ghost; so Fohat is one thing in the yet unmanifested Universe and another
in the phenomenal and Cosmic World. In the latter, he is that Occult, electric,
vital power, which, under the Will of the Creative Logos, unites and brings
together all forms, giving them the first impulse which becomes in time law.
But in the unmanifested Universe, Fohat is no more this, than Eros is the later
brilliant winged Cupid, or LOVE. Fohat has naught to do with Kosmos yet, since
Kosmos is not born, and the gods still sleep in the bosom of
"Father-Mother." He is an abstract philosophical idea. He produces
nothing yet by himself; he is simply that potential creative power in virtue of
whose action the NOUMENON of all future phenomena divides, so to speak, but to
reunite in a mystic supersensuous act, and emit the creative ray. When the
"Divine Son" breaks forth, then Fohat becomes the propelling force,
the active Power which causes the ONE to become TWO and THREE -- on the Cosmic
plane of manifestation. The triple One differentiates into the many, and then
Fohat is transformed into that force which brings together the elemental atoms
and makes them aggregate and combine. We find an echo of this primeval teaching
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in early Greek mythology. Erebos and
Nux are born out of Chaos, and, under the action of Eros, give birth in their
turn to Ether and Hemera, the light of the superior and the light of the
inferior or terrestrial regions. Darkness generates light. See in the Puranas
Brahma's "Will" or desire to create; and in the Phoenician Cosmogony
of Sanchoniathon the doctrine that Desire, [[pothos]], is the principle of
creation.
Fohat is closely related to the
"ONE LIFE." From the Unknown One, the Infinite TOTALITY, the
manifested ONE, or the periodical, Manvantaric Deity, emanates; and this is the
Universal Mind, which, separated from its Fountain-Source, is the Demiurgos or
the creative Logos of the Western Kabalists, and the four-faced Brahma of the
Hindu religion. In its totality, viewed from the standpoint of manifested
Divine Thought in the esoteric doctrine, it represents the Hosts of the higher
creative Dhyan Chohans. Simultaneously with the evolution of the Universal
Mind, the concealed Wisdom of Adi-Buddha -- the One Supreme and eternal --
manifests itself as Avalokiteshwara (or manifested Iswara), which is the Osiris
of the Egyptians, the Ahura-Mazda of the Zoroastrians, the Heavenly Man of the
Hermetic philosopher, the Logos of the Platonists, and the Atman of the
Vedantins.* By the action of the manifested Wisdom, or Mahat, represented by
these innumerable centres of spiritual Energy in the Kosmos, the reflection of
the Universal Mind, which is Cosmic Ideation and the intellectual Force
accompanying such ideation, becomes objectively the Fohat of the Buddhist
esoteric philosopher. Fohat, running along the seven principles of AKASA, acts
upon manifested substance or the One Element, as declared above, and by
differentiating it into various centres of Energy, sets in motion the law of
Cosmic Evolution, which, in obedience to the Ideation of the Universal Mind,
brings into existence all the various states of being in the manifested Solar
System.
The Solar System, brought into
existence by these agencies, consists of Seven Principles, like everything else
within these centres. Such is the teaching of the trans-Himalayan Esotericism.
Every philosophy, however, has its own way of dividing these principles.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Mr. Subba Row seems to identify him
with, and to call him, the LOGOS. (See his four lectures on the
"Bhagavadgita" in the Theosophist.)
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Fohat, then, is the personified
electric vital power, the transcendental binding Unity of all Cosmic Energies,
on the unseen as on the manifested planes, the action of which resembles -- on
an immense scale -- that of a living Force created by WILL, in those phenomena
where the seemingly subjective acts on the seemingly objective and propels it
to action. Fohat is not only the living Symbol and Container of that Force, but
is looked upon by the Occultists as an Entity -- the forces he acts upon being
cosmic, human and terrestrial, and exercising their influence on all those planes
respectively. On the earthly plane his influence is felt in the magnetic and
active force generated by the strong desire of the magnetizer. On the Cosmic,
it is present in the constructive power that carries out, in the formation of
things -- from the planetary system down to the glow-worm and simple daisy --
the plan in the mind of nature, or in the Divine Thought, with regard to the
development and growth of that special thing. He is, metaphysically, the
objectivised thought of the gods; the "Word made flesh," on a lower
scale, and the messenger of Cosmic and human ideations: the active force in
Universal Life. In his secondary aspect, Fohat is the Solar Energy, the
electric vital fluid,* and the preserving fourth
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In 1882 the President of the
Theosophical Society, Col. Olcott, was taken to task for asserting in one of
his lectures that Electricity is matter. Such, nevertheless, is the teaching of
the Occult Doctrine. "Force," "Energy," may be a better
name for it, so long as European Science knows so little about its true nature;
yet matter it is, as much as Ether is matter, since it is as atomic, though
several removes from the latter. It seems ridiculous to argue that because a
thing is imponderable to Science, therefore it cannot be called matter.
Electricity is "immaterial" in the sense that its molecules are not
subject to perception and experiment; yet it may be -- and Occultism says it is
-- atomic; therefore it is matter. But even supposing it were unscientific to
speak of it in such terms, once Electricity is called in Science a source of
Energy, Energy simply, and a Force -- where is that Force or that Energy which
can be thought of without thinking of matter? Maxwell, a mathematician and one
of the greatest authorities upon Electricity and its phenomena, said, years
ago, that Electricity was matter, not motion merely. "If we accept the
hypothesis that the elementary substances are composed of atoms we cannot avoid
concluding that electricity also, positive as well as negative, is divided into
definite elementary portions, which behave like atoms of electricity."
(Helmholtz, Faraday Lecture, 1881). We will go further than that, and assert
that Electricity is not only Substance but that it is an emanation from an
Entity, which is neither God nor Devil, but one of the numberless Entities that
rule and guide our world according to the eternal Law of KARMA. (See the
Addendum to this Book.)
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principle, the animal Soul of Nature,
so to say, or -- Electricity. In India, Fohat is connected with Vishnu and
Surya in the early character of the (first) God; for Vishnu is not a high god
in the Rig Veda. The name Vishnu is from the root vish, "to pervade,"
and Fohat is called the "Pervader" and the Manufacturer, because he
shapes the atoms from crude material.* In the sacred texts of the Rig Veda,
Vishnu, also, is "a manifestation of the Solar Energy," and he is
described as striding through the Seven regions of the Universe in three steps,
the Vedic God having little in common with the Vishnu of later times. Therefore
the two are identical in this particular feature, and one is the copy of the
other.
The "three and seven"
strides refer to the Seven spheres inhabited by man, of the esoteric Doctrine,
as well as to the Seven regions of the Earth. Notwithstanding the frequent
objections made by would-be Orientalists, the Seven Worlds or spheres of our
planetary chain are distinctly referred to in the exoteric Hindu scriptures.
But how strangely all these numbers are connected with like numbers in other
Cosmogonies and with their symbols, can be seen from comparisons and
parallelisms made by students of old religions. The "three strides of
Vishnu" through the "seven regions of the Universe," of the Rig
Veda, have been variously explained by commentators as meaning "fire,
lightning and the Sun" cosmically; and as having been taken in the Earth,
the atmosphere, and the sky; also as the "three steps" of the dwarf
(Vishnu's incarnation), though more philosophically -- and in the astronomical
sense, very correctly -- they are explained by Aurnavabha as being the various
positions of the sun, rising, noon, and setting. Esoteric philosophy alone
explains it clearly, and the Zohar laid it down very philosophically and
comprehensively. It is said and plainly demonstrated therein that in the
beginning the Elohim (Elhim) were called Echod, "one," or the
"Deity is one in many," a very simple idea in a pantheistic
conception (in its philosophical sense, of course). Then came the change, "Jehovah
is Elohim," thus unifying the multiplicity and taking the first step
towards Monotheism. Now to the query, "How is Jehovah Elohim?" the
answer is, "By three Steps" from below.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is well known that sand, when
placed on a metal plate in vibration assumes a series of regular curved figures
of various descriptions. Can Science give a complete explanation of this fact?
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The meaning is plain.* They are all
symbols, and emblematic, mutually and correlatively, of Spirit, Soul and Body
(MAN); of the circle transformed into Spirit, the Soul of the World, and its
body (or Earth). Stepping out of the Circle of Infinity, that no man
comprehendeth, Ain-Soph (the Kabalistic synonym for Parabrahm, for the Zeroana
Akerne, of the Mazdeans, or for any other "UNKNOWABLE") becomes
"One" -- the ECHOD, the EKA, the AHU -- then he (or it) is
transformed by evolution into the One in many, the Dhyani-Buddhas or the
Elohim, or again the Amshaspends, his third Step being taken into generation of
the flesh, or "Man." And from man, or Jah-Hova, "male female,"
the inner divine entity becomes, on the metaphysical plane, once more the
Elohim.
The Kabalistic idea is identical with
the Esotericism of the Archaic period. This esotericism is the common property
of all, and belongs neither to the Aryan 5th Race, nor to any of its numerous
Sub-races. It cannot be claimed by the Turanians, so-called, the Egyptians,
Chinese, Chaldeans, nor any of the Seven divisions of the Fifth Root Race, but
really belongs to the Third and Fourth Root Races, whose descendants we find in
the Seed of the Fifth, the earliest Aryans. The Circle was with every nation
the symbol of the Unknown -- "Boundless Space," the abstract garb of
an ever present abstraction -- the Incognisable Deity. It represents limitless
Time in Eternity. The Zeroana Akerne is also the "Boundless Circle of the
Unknown Time," from which Circle issues the radiant light -- the Universal
SUN, or Ormazd** -- and the latter
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The numbers 3, 5, and 7 are
prominent in speculative masonry, as shown in "Isis." A mason
writes:-- "There are the 3, 5, and 7 steps to show a circular walk. The
three faces of 3, 3; 5, 3; and 7, 3; etc., etc. Sometimes it comes in this form
-- 753/2 = 376.5 and 7635/2 = 3817.5 and the ratio of 20612/6561 feet for cubit
measure gives the Great Pyramid measures," etc., etc. Three, five and
seven are mystical numbers, and the last and the first are as greatly honoured
by Masons as by the Parsis -- the triangle being a symbol of Deity everywhere.
(See the Masonic Cyclopedia, and "Pythagorean Triangle," Oliver.) As
a matter of course, doctors of divinity (Cassel, for instance) show the Zohar
explaining and supporting the Christian trinity (!). It is the latter, however,
that had its origin from the [[diagram]] of the Heathen, in the Archaic
Occultism and Symbology. The three strides relate metaphysically to the descent
of Spirit into matter, of the Logos falling as a ray into the Spirit, then into
the Soul, and finally into the human physical form of man, in which it becomes
LIFE.
** Ormazd is the Logos, the
"First Born" and the Sun.
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is identical with Kronos, in his
AEolian form, that of a Circle. For the circle is Sar, and Saros, or cycle, and
was the Babylonian god whose circular horizon was the visible symbol of the
invisible, while the sun was the ONE Circle from which proceeded the Cosmic
orbs, and of which he was considered the leader. Zero-ana, is the Chakra or
circle of Vishnu, the mysterious emblem which is, according to the definition
of a mystic, "a curve of such a nature that as to any, the least possible
part thereof, if the curve be protracted either way it will proceed and finally
re-enter upon itself, and form one and the same curve -- or that which we call
the circle." No better definition could thus be given of the natural
symbol and the evident nature of Deity, which having its circumference
everywhere (the boundless) has, therefore, its central point also everywhere;
in other words, is in every point of the Universe. The invisible Deity is thus
also the Dhyan Chohans, or the Rishis, the primitive seven, and the nine,
without, and ten, including, their synthetical unit; from which IT steps into
Man. Returning to the Commentary (4) of Stanza IV. the reader will understand
why, while the trans-Himalayan Chackra has inscribed within it [[diagram]] | [[diagram]]
| [[diagram]] (triangle, first line, cube second line, and a pentacle with a
dot in the centre thus: [[diagram]], and some other variations), the Kabalistic
circle of the Elohim reveals, when the letters of the word [[hebrew]] (Alhim or
Elohim) are numerically read, the famous numerals 13514, or by anagram 31415 --
the astronomical (pi) number, or the hidden meaning of Dhyani-Buddhas, of the
Gebers, the Geborim, the Kabeiri, and the Elohim, all signifying "great
men," "Titans," "Heavenly Men," and, on earth,
"the giants."
The Seven was a Sacred Number with
every nation; but none applied it to more physiologically materialistic uses
than the Hebrews. With these it was pre-eminently the generative number and 9
the male causative one, forming as shown by the Kabalists the [[hebrew with
numbers above]] or otz -- "the Tree of the Garden of Eden,"* the
"double hermaphrodite rod" of the fourth race. Whereas with the
Hindus and Aryans generally, the significance was manifold, and related almost
entirely to purely metaphysical
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This was the symbol of the
"Holy of Holies," the 3 and the 4 of sexual separation. Nearly every
one of the 22 Hebrew letters are merely phallic symbols. Of the two letters --
as shown above -- one, the ayin, is a negative female letter, symbolically an
eye; the other a male letter, tza, a fish-hook or a dart.
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and astronomical truths.* Their
Rishis and gods, their Demons and Heroes, have historical and ethical meanings,
and the Aryans never made their religion rest solely on physiological symbols,
as the old Hebrews have done. This is found in the exoteric Hindu Scriptures.
That these accounts are blinds is shown by their contradicting each other, a
different construction being found in almost every Purana and epic poem. Read esoterically
-- they will all yield the same meaning. Thus one account enumerates Seven
worlds, exclusive of the nether worlds, also seven in number; these fourteen
upper and nether worlds have
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* We are told by a Kabalist, who in a
work not yet published contrasts the Kabala and Zohar with Aryan Esotericism,
that "The Hebrew clear, short, terse and exact modes far and beyond
measure surpass the toddling word-talk of the Hindus -- just as by parallelisms
the Psalmist says, 'My mouth speaks with my tongue, I know not thy numbers'
(lxxi., 15). . . . The Hindu Glyph shows by its insufficiency in the large
admixture of adventitious sides the same borrowed plumage that the Greeks (the
lying Greeks) had, and that Masonry has: which in the rough monosyllabic (and
apparent) poverty of the Hebrew, shows the latter to have come down from a far
more remote antiquity than any of these, and to have been the source (!?), or
nearer the old original source than any of them." This is entirely
erroneous. Our learned brother and correspondent judges apparently the Hindu
religious systems by their Shastras and Puranas, probably the latter, and in
their modern translation moreover, which is disfigured out of all recognition,
by the Orientalists. It is to their philosophical systems that one has to turn,
to their esoteric teaching, if he would make a point of comparison. No doubt
the symbology of the Pentateuch and even of the New Testament, comes from the
same source. But surely the Pyramid of Cheops, whose measurements are all found
repeated by Professor Piazzi Smythe in Solomon's alleged and mythical temple,
is not of a later date than the Mosaic books? Hence, if there is any such great
identity as claimed, it must be due to servile copying on the part of the Jews,
not on that of the Egyptians. The Jewish glyphs -- and even their language, the
Hebrew -- are not original. They are borrowed from the Egyptians, from whom
Moses got his Wisdom; from the Coptic, the probable kinsman, if not parent, of
the old Phoenician and from the Hyksos, their (alleged) ancestors, as Josephus
shows in his "Against Apion," I., 25. Aye; but who are the Hyksos
shepherds? And who the Egyptians? History knows nothing of the question, and
speculates and theorizes out of the depths of the respective consciousnesses of
her historians. (See Isis Unveiled, vol. II., p. 430-438.) "Khamism, or
old Coptic," says Bunsen, "is from Western Asia, and contains some
germ of the Semitic, thus bearing witness to the primitive cognate unity of the
Aryan and Semitic races"; and he places the great events in Egypt 9,000
years B.C. The fact is that in archaic Esotericism and Aryan thought we find a
grand philosophy, whereas in the Hebrew records we find only the most
surprising ingenuity in inventing apotheoses for phallic worship and sexual
theogony.
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nothing to do with the classification
of the septenary chain and belong to the purely aethereal, invisible worlds.
These will be noticed elsewhere. Suffice for the present to show that they are
purposely referred to as though they belonged to the chain. "Another
enumeration calls the Seven worlds -- earth, sky, heaven, middle region, place
of birth, mansion of the blest, and abode of truth; placing the 'Sons of
Brahma' in the sixth division, and stating the fifth, or Jana Loka, to be that where
animals destroyed in the general conflagration are born again." (see Hindu
Classical Dictionary.) Some real esoteric teaching is given in the
"Symbolism." He who is prepared for it will understand the hidden
meaning.
-------
STANZA V. -- Continued.
3. HE IS THEIR GUIDING SPIRIT AND
LEADER. WHEN HE COMMENCES WORK, HE SEPARATES THE SPARKS OF THE LOWER KINGDOM
(mineral atoms) THAT FLOAT AND THRILL WITH JOY IN THEIR RADIANT DWELLINGS
(gaseous clouds), AND FORMS THEREWITH THE GERMS OF WHEELS. HE PLACES THEM IN
THE SIX DIRECTIONS OF SPACE AND ONE IN THE MIDDLE -- THE CENTRAL WHEEL (a).
(a) "Wheels," as already
explained, are the centres of force, around which primordial Cosmic matter
expands, and, passing through all the six stages of consolidation, becomes spheroidal
and ends by being transformed into globes or spheres. It is one of the
fundamental dogmas of Esoteric Cosmogony, that during the Kalpas (or aeons) of
life, MOTION, which, during the periods of Rest "pulsates and thrills
through every slumbering atom"* (Commentary on Dzyan), assumes an
evergrowing
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It may be asked, as also the writer
has not failed to ask, "Who is there to ascertain the difference in that
motion, since all nature is reduced to its primal essence, and there can be no
one -- not even one of the Dhyani-Chohans, who are all in Nirvana -- to see
it?" The answer to this is: "Everything in Nature has to be judged by
analogy. Though the highest Deities (Archangels or Dhyani-Buddhas) are unable
to penetrate the mysteries too far beyond our planetary system and the visible
Kosmos, yet there were great seers and prophets in olden times who were enabled
to perceive the mystery of Breath and Motion retrospectively, when the systems
of worlds were at rest and plunged in their periodic sleep."
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tendency, from the first awakening of
Kosmos to a new "Day," to circular movement. The "Deity becomes
a WHIRLWIND." They are also called Rotae -- the moving wheels of the
celestial orbs participating in the world's creation -- when the meaning refers
to the animating principle of the stars and planets; for in the Kabala, they
are represented by the Ophanim, the Angels of the Spheres and stars, of which
they are the informing Souls. (See Kabala Denudata, "De Anima," p.
113.)
This law of vortical movement in
primordial matter, is one of the oldest conceptions of Greek philosophy, whose
first historical Sages were nearly all Initiates of the Mysteries. The Greeks
had it from the Egyptians, and the latter from the Chaldeans, who had been the
pupils of Brahmins of the esoteric school. Leucippus, and Democritus of Abdera
-- the pupil of the Magi -- taught that this gyratory movement of the atoms and
spheres existed from eternity.* Hicetas, Heraclides, Ecphantus, Pythagoras, and
all his pupils, taught the rotation of the earth; and Aryabhata of India,
Aristarchus, Seleucus, and Archimedes calculated its revolution as
scientifically as the astronomers do now; while the theory of the Elemental
Vortices was known to Anaxagoras, and maintained by him 500 years B.C., or
nearly 2,000 before it was taken up by Galileo, Descartes, Swedenborg, and
finally, with slight modifications, by Sir W. Thomson. (See his "Vortical
Atoms.") All such knowledge, if justice be only done to it, is an echo of
the archaic doctrine, an attempt to explain which is now being made. How men of
the last few centuries have come to the same ideas and conclusions that were
taught as axiomatic truths in the secrecy of the Adyta dozens of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "The doctrine of the rotation
of the earth about an axis is taught by the Pythagorean Hicetas, probably as
early as 500 B.C. It was also taught by his pupil Ecphantus, and by Heraclides,
a pupil of Plato. The immobility of the Sun and the orbital rotation of the
earth were shown by Aristarchus of Samos as early as 281 B.C. to be
suppositions accordant with facts of observation. The Heliocentric theory was
taught about 150 B.C., by Seleucus of Seleucia on the Tigris. -- [It was taught
500 B.C. by Pythagoras. -- H. P. B.] It is said also that Archimedes, in a work
entitled Psammites, inculcated the Heliocentric theory. The sphericity of the
earth was distinctly taught by Aristotle, who appealed for proof to the figure
of the Earth's shadow on the moon in eclipses (Aristotle, De Coelo, lib. II,
cap. XIV.). The same idea was defended by Pliny (Nat. Hist., II., 65). These
views seem to have been lost from knowledge for more than a thousand years. . .
." (Comparative Geology, Part IV., "Pre-Kantian Speculation," p.
551, by Alex. Winchell, LL.D.).
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millenniums ago, is a question that
is treated separately. Some were led to it by the natural progress in physical
science and by independent observation; others -- such as Copernicus,
Swedenborg, and a few more -- their great learning notwithstanding, owed their
knowledge far more to intuitive than to acquired ideas, developed in the usual
way by a course of study.* (See "A Mystery about Buddha.")
By the "Six directions of
Space" is here meant the "Double Triangle," the junction and
blending together of pure Spirit and Matter, of the Arupa and the Rupa, of
which the Triangles are a Symbol. This double Triangle is a sign of Vishnu, as
it is Solomon's seal, and the Sri-Antara of the Brahmins.
-------
STANZA V. -- (Continued.)
4. FOHAT TRACES SPIRAL LINES TO UNITE
THE SIX TO THE SEVENTH -- THE CROWN (a); AN ARMY OF THE SONS OF LIGHT STANDS AT
EACH ANGLE (and) THE LIPIKA -- IN THE MIDDLE WHEEL. THEY (the Lipika) SAY,
"THIS IS GOOD" (b). THE FIRST DIVINE WORLD IS READY, THE FIRST (is
now), THE SECOND (world), THEN THE "DIVINE ARUPA" (the formless
Universe
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* That Swedenborg, who could not
possibly have known anything of the esoteric ideas of Buddhism, came
independently near the Occult teaching in his general conceptions, is shown by
his essay on the Vortical Theory. In Clissold's translation of it, quoted by
Prof. Winchell, we find the following resume:-- "The first Cause is the
Infinite or Unlimited. This gives existence to the First Finite or
Limited." (The Logos in His manifestation and the Universe.) "That
which produces a limit is analogous to motion. (See first Stanza, supra.) The
limit produced is a point, the Essence of which is Motion; but being without
parts, this Essence is not actual Motion, but only a connatus to it." (In
our Doctrine it is not a "connatus," but a change from eternal
vibration in the unmanifested, to Vortical Motion in the phenomenal or
manifested World). . . "From this first proceed Extension, Space, Figure,
and Succession, or Time. As in Geometry a point generates a line, a line a
surface, and a surface a solid, so here the connatus of a point tends towards
lines, surfaces and solids. In other words, the Universe is contained in ovo in
the first natural point . . . the Motion toward which the connatus tends, is
circular, since the circle is the most perfect of all figures . . . The most
perfect figure of a Motion . . . must be the perpetually circular, that is to say,
it must proceed from the centre to the periphery and from the periphery to the
centre." (Quoted from Principia Rerum Naturalia.) This is Occultism pure
and simple.
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of Thought) REFLECTS ITSELF IN
CHHAYALOKA (the shadowy world of primal form, or the intellectual) THE FIRST
GARMENT OF (the) ANUPADAKA (c).
(a) This tracing of "Spiral
lines" refers to the evolution of man's as well as Nature's principles; an
evolution which takes place gradually (as will be seen in Book II., on
"The origin of the Human Races"), as does everything else in nature.
The Sixth principle in Man (Buddhi, the Divine Soul) though a mere breath, in
our conceptions, is still something material when compared with divine
"Spirit" (Atma) of which it is the carrier or vehicle. Fohat, in his
capacity of DIVINE LOVE (Eros), the electric Power of affinity and sympathy, is
shown allegorically as trying to bring the pure Spirit, the Ray inseparable
from the ONE absolute, into union with the Soul, the two constituting in Man
the MONAD, and in Nature the first link between the ever unconditioned and the
manifested. "The first is now the second" (world) -- of the Lipikas
-- has reference to the same.
(b) The "Army" at each
angle is the Host of angelic Beings (Dhyan-Chohans) appointed to guide and
watch over each respective region from the beginning to the end of Manvantara.
They are the "Mystic Watchers" of the Christian Kabalists and
Alchemists, and relate, symbolically as well as cosmogonically, to the
numerical system of the Universe. The numbers with which these celestial Beings
are connected are extremely difficult to explain, as each number refers to
several groups of distinct ideas, according to the particular group of
"Angels" which it is intended to represent. Herein lies the nodus in
the study of symbology, with which, unable to untie by disentangling it, so
many scholars have preferred dealing as Alexander dealt with the Gordian knot;
hence erroneous conceptions and teachings, as a direct result.
The "First is the Second,"
because the "First" cannot really be numbered or regarded as the
First, as that is the realm of noumena in its primary manifestation: the
threshold to the World of Truth, or SAT, through which the direct energy that
radiates from the ONE REALITY -- the Nameless Deity -- reaches us. Here again,
the untranslateable term SAT (Be-ness) is likely to lead into an erroneous
conception, since that which is manifested cannot be SAT, but is something
phenomenal, not everlasting, nor, in truth, even sempiternal. It is coeval and
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coexistent with the One Life,
"Secondless," but as a manifestation it is still a Maya -- like the
rest. This "World of Truth" can be described only in the words of the
Commentary as "A bright star dropped from the heart of Eternity; the
beacon of hope on whose Seven Rays hang the Seven Worlds of Being." Truly
so; since those are the Seven Lights whose reflections are the human immortal
Monads -- the Atma, or the irradiating Spirit of every creature of the human
family. First, this septenary Light; then:--
(c) The "Divine World" --
the countless Lights lit at the primeval Light -- the Buddhis, or formless
divine Souls, of the last Arupa (formless) world; the "Sum Total," in
the mysterious language of the old Stanza. In the Catechism, the Master is made
to ask the pupil:--
"Lift thy head, oh Lanoo; dost
thou see one, or countless lights above thee, burning in the dark midnight
sky?"
"I sense one Flame, oh Gurudeva,
I see countless undetached sparks shining in it."
"Thou sayest well. And now look
around and into thyself. That light which burns inside thee, dost thou feel it
different in anywise from the light that shines in thy Brother-men?"
"It is in no way different,
though the prisoner is held in bondage by Karma, and though its outer garments
delude the ignorant into saying, 'Thy Soul and My Soul.' "
The radical unity of the ultimate
essence of each constituent part of compounds in Nature -- from Star to mineral
Atom, from the highest Dhyan Chohan to the smallest infusoria, in the fullest
acceptation of the term, and whether applied to the spiritual, intellectual, or
physical worlds -- this is the one fundamental law in Occult Science. "The
Deity is boundless and infinite expansion," says an Occult axiom; and
hence, as remarked, the name of Brahma.* There is a deep philosophy underlying
the earliest worship in the world, that of the Sun and of Fire. Of all the
Elements known to physical science, Fire is the one that has ever eluded
definite analysis. It is confidently asserted that
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In the Rig Veda we find the names
Brahmanaspati and Brihaspati alternating and equivalent to each other. Also see
"Brihad Upanishad"; Brihaspati is a deity called "the Father of
the gods."
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Air is a mixture containing the gases
Oxygen and Nitrogen. We view the Universe and the Earth as matter composed of
definite chemical molecules. We speak of the primitive ten Earths, endowing
each with a Greek or Latin name. We say that water is, chemically, a compound
of Oxygen and Hydrogen. But what is FIRE? It is the effect of combustion, we
are gravely answered. It is heat and light and motion, and a correlation of
physical and chemical forces in general. And this scientific definition is
philosophically supplemented by the theological one in Webster's Dictionary,
which explains fire as "the instrument of punishment, or the punishment of
the impenitent in another state" -- the "state," by the bye,
being supposed to be spiritual; but, alas! the presence of fire would seem to
be a convincing proof of its material nature. Yet, speaking of the illusion of
regarding phenomena as simple, because they are familiar, Professor Bain says
(Logic. Part II.): "Very familiar facts seem to stand in no need of
explanation themselves and to be the means of explaining whatever can be
assimilated to them. Thus, the boiling and evaporation of a liquid is supposed
to be a very simple phenomenon requiring no explanation, and a satisfactory
explanation of rarer phenomena. That water should dry up is, to the
uninstructed mind, a thing wholly intelligible; whereas to the man acquainted
with physical science the liquid state is anomalous and inexplicable. The
lighting of a fire by a flame is a GREAT SCIENTIFIC DIFFICULTY, yet few people
think so" (p. 125).
What says the esoteric teaching with
regard to fire? "Fire," it says, "is the most perfect and
unadulterated reflection, in Heaven as on Earth, of the ONE FLAME. It is Life
and Death, the origin and the end of every material thing. It is divine
'SUBSTANCE.' " Thus, not only the FIRE-WORSHIPPER, the Parsee, but even
the wandering savage tribes of America, which proclaim themselves "born of
fire," show more science in their creeds and truth in their superstitions,
than all the speculations of modern physics and learning. The Christian who
says: "God is a living Fire," and speaks of the Pentecostal
"Tongues of Fire" and of the "burning bush" of Moses, is as
much a fire-worshipper as any other "heathen." The Rosicrucians,
among all the mystics and Kabalists, were those who defined Fire in the right
and most correct way. Procure a sixpenny lamp, keep it only supplied with oil,
and you will be able to light at its flame the lamps, candles,
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and fires of the whole globe without
diminishing that flame. If the Deity, the radical One, is eternal and an
infinite substance ("the Lord thy God is a consuming fire") and never
consumed, then it does not seem reasonable that the Occult teaching should be
held as unphilosophical when it says: "Thus were the Arupa and Rupa worlds
formed: from ONE light seven lights; from each of the seven, seven times
seven," etc., etc.
-------
STANZA V. -- Continued.
5. FOHAT TAKES FIVE STRIDES (having
already taken the first three) (a), AND BUILDS A WINGED WHEEL AT EACH CORNER OF
THE SQUARE FOR THE FOUR HOLY ONES . . . . . AND THEIR ARMIES (hosts) (b).
(a) The "strides," as
already explained (see Commentary on Stanza IV.), refer to both the Cosmic and
the Human principles -- the latter of which consist, in the exoteric division,
of three (Spirit, Soul, and Body), and, in the esoteric calculation, of seven
principles -- three rays of the Essence and four aspects.* Those who have
studied Mr. Sinnett's "Esoteric Buddhism" can easily grasp the
nomenclature. There are two esoteric schools -- or rather one school, divided
into two parts -- one for the inner Lanoos, the other for the outer or semi-lay
chelas beyond the Himalayas; the first teaching a septenary, the other a
six-fold division of human principles.
From a Cosmic point of view, Fohat
taking "five strides" refers here to the five upper planes of
Consciousness and Being, the sixth and the seventh (counting downwards) being
the astral and the terrestrial, or the two lower planes.
(b) "Four winged wheels at each
corner . . . . . for the four holy ones and their armies (hosts)" . . . .
. These are the "four Maharajahs" or great Kings of the
Dhyan-Chohans, the Devas who preside, each over one of the four cardinal
points. They are the Regents or Angels who rule over the Cosmical Forces of
North, South,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The four aspects are the body, its
life or vitality, and the "Double" of the body, the triad which
disappears with the death of the person, and the Kama-rupa which disintegrates
in Kama-loka.
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East and West, Forces having each a
distinct occult property. These BEINGS are also connected with Karma, as the
latter needs physical and material agents to carry out her decrees, such as the
four kinds of winds, for instance, professedly admitted by Science to have
their respective evil and beneficent influences upon the health of Mankind and
every living thing. There is occult philosophy in that Roman Catholic doctrine
which traces the various public calamities, such as epidemics of disease, and
wars, and so on, to the invisible "Messengers" from North and West. "The
glory of God comes from the way of the East" says Ezekiel; while Jeremiah,
Isaiah, and the Psalmist assure their readers that all the evil under the Sun
comes from the North and the West -- which proposition, when applied to the
Jewish nation, sounds like an undeniable prophecy for themselves. And this
accounts also for St. Ambrose (On Amos, ch. iv.) declaring that it is precisely
for that reason that "we curse the North-Wind, and that during the
ceremony of baptism we begin by turning towards the West (Sidereal), to
renounce the better him who inhabits it; after which we turn to the East."
Belief in the "Four
Maharajahs" -- the Regents of the Four cardinal points -- was universal
and is now that of Christians,* who call them, after St. Augustine,
"Angelic Virtues," and "Spirits" when enumerated by
themselves, and "Devils" when named by Pagans. But where is the
difference between the Pagans and the Christians in this cause? Following
Plato, Aristotle explained that the term [[stoicheia]] was understood only as
meaning the incorporeal principles placed at each of the four great divisions
of our Cosmical world to supervise them. Thus, no more than the Christians did,
do they adore and worship the Elements and the cardinal (imaginary) points, but
the "gods" that ruled these respectively. For the Church there are
two kinds of Sidereal beings, the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Says the scholarly Vossius, in his
Theol. Cir. I. VII.: "Though St. Augustine has said that every visible thing
in this world had an angelic virtue as an overseer near it, it is not
individuals but entire species of things that must be understood, each such
species having indeed its particular angel to watch it. He is at one in this
with all the philosophers . . . For us these angels are spirits separated from
the objects . . . whereas for the philosophers (pagan) they were gods."
Considering the Ritual established by the Roman Catholic Church for
"Spirits of the Stars," the latter look suspiciously like
"Gods," and were no more honoured and prayed to by the ancient and
modern pagan rabble than they are now at Rome by the highly cultured Catholic
Christians.
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Angels and the Devils. For the
Kabalist and Occultist there is but one; and neither of them makes any
difference between "the Rectors of Light" and the Cosmocratores, or
"Rectores tenebrarum harum," whom the Roman Church imagines and
discovers in a "Rector of Light" as soon as he is called by another
name than the one she addresses him by. It is not the "Rector" or
"Maharajah" who punishes or rewards, with or without
"God's" permission or order, but man himself -- his deeds or Karma,
attracting individually and collectively (as in the case of whole nations
sometimes), every kind of evil and calamity. We produce CAUSES, and these
awaken the corresponding powers in the sidereal world; which powers are
magnetically and irresistibly attracted to -- and react upon -- those who
produced these causes; whether such persons are practically the evil-doers, or
simply Thinkers who brood mischief. Thought is matter,* we are taught by modern
Science; and "every particle of the existing matter must be a register of
all that has happened," as in their "Principles of Science"
Messrs. Jevons and Babbage tell the profane. Modern Science is drawn more every
day into the maelstrom of Occultism; unconsciously, no doubt, still very
sensibly. The two main theories of science -- re the relations between Mind and
Matter -- are Monism and Materialism. These two cover the whole ground of
negative psychology with the exception of the quasi-occult views of the
pantheistic German schools.**
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Not of course in the sense of the
German Materialist Moleschott, who assures us that "Thought is the
movement of matter," a statement of almost unequalled absurdity. Mental
states and bodily states are utterly contrasted as such. But that does not
affect the position that every thought, in addition to its physical
accompaniment (brain-change), exhibits an objective -- though to us
supersensuously objective -- aspect on the astral plane. (See "The Occult
World," pp. 89, 90.)
** The views of our present-day
scientific thinkers as to the relations between mind and matter may be reduced
to two hypotheses. These show that both views equally exclude the possibility
of an independent Soul, distinct from the physical brain through which it
functions. They are:--
(1.) MATERIALISM, the theory which
regards mental phenomena as the product of molecular change in the brain; i.e.,
as the outcome of a transformation of motion into feeling (!). The cruder
school once went so far as to identify mind with a "peculiar mode of
motion" (!!), but this view is now happily regarded as absurd by most of
the men of science themselves.
(2.) MONISM, or the Single Substance
Doctrine, is the more subtle form of negative psychology, which one of its
advocates, Professor Bain, ably terms "guarded [[Footnote continued on
next page]]
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In the Egyptian temples, according to
Clemens Alexandrinus, an immense curtain separated the tabernacle from the
place for the congregation. The Jews had the same. In both, the curtain was
drawn over five pillars (the Pentacle) symbolising our five senses and five
Root-races esoterically, while the four colours of the curtain represented the
four cardinal points and the four terrestrial elements. The whole was an
allegorical symbol. It is through the four high Rulers over the four points and
Elements that our five senses may become cognisant of the hidden truths of
Nature; and not at all, as Clemens would have it, that it is the elements per
se that furnished the Pagans with divine Knowledge or the knowledge of God.*
While the Egyptian emblem was spiritual, that of the Jews was purely
materialistic, and, indeed, honoured only the blind Elements and the imaginary
"Points." For what was the meaning of the square tabernacle raised by
Moses in the wilderness, if it had not the same cosmical significance?
"Thou shalt make an hanging . . . of blue, purple, and scarlet" and
"five pillars of shittim wood for the hanging . . . four brazen rings in
the four corners thereof . . . boards of fine wood for the four sides, North,
South, West, and East . . . of the Tabernacle . . . with Cherubims of cunning
work." (Exodus, ch. xxvi., xxvii.) The Tabernacle and the square
courtyard, Cherubim and all, were precisely the same as those in the Egyptian
temples. The square form of the Tabernacle meant just the same thing as it
still means, to this day, in the exoteric worship of the Chinese and Tibetans
-- the four cardinal points signifying that which the four sides of the
pyramids, obelisks, and other such square erections mean. Josephus takes care
to explain the whole thing. He declares that the Tabernacle pillars are the
same
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] Materialism." This doctrine, which commands a very wide assent,
counting among its upholders such men as Lewis, Spencer, Ferrier, and others,
while positing thought and mental phenomena generally as radically contrasted
with matter, regards both as equal to the two sides, or aspects, of one and the
same substance in some of its conditions. Thought as thought, they say, is
utterly contrasted with material phenomena, but it must be also regarded as
only "the subjective side of nervous motion" whatever our learned men
may mean by this.
* Thus the sentence, "Natura
Elementorum obtinet revelationem Dei," (In Clemens's Stromata, R. IV.,
para. 6), is applicable to both or neither. Consult the Zends, vol II., p. 228,
and Plutarch De Iside, as compared by Layard, Academie des Inscriptions, 1854,
Vol. XV.
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as those raised at Tyre to the four
Elements, which were placed on pedestals whose four angles faced the four
cardinal points: adding that "the angles of the pedestals had equally the
four figures of the Zodiac" on them, which represented the same
orientation (Antiquities I., VIII., ch. xxii.).
The idea may be traced in the
Zoroastrian caves, in the rock-cut temples of India, as in all the sacred
square buildings of antiquity that have survived to this day. This is shown
definitely by Layard, who finds the four cardinal points, and the four
primitive elements, in the religion of every country, under the shape of square
obelisks, the four sides of the pyramids, etc., etc. Of these elements and
their points the four Maharajahs were the regents and the directors.
If the student would know more of
them, he has but to compare the Vision of Ezekiel (chap. i.) with what is known
of Chinese Buddhism (even in its exoteric teachings); and examine the outward
shape of these "Great Kings." In the opinion of the Rev. Joseph
Edkins, they are "the Devas who preside each over one of the four
continents into which the Hindus divide the world."* Each leads an army of
spiritual beings to protect mankind and Buddhism. With the exception of
favouritism towards Buddhism, the four celestial beings are precisely this.
They are the protectors of mankind and also the Agents of Karma on Earth,
whereas the Lipika are concerned with Humanity's hereafter. At the same time
they are the four living creatures "who have the likeness of a man"
of Ezekiel's visions, called by the translators of the Bible,
"Cherubim," "Seraphim," etc.; and by the Occultists,
"the winged Globes," the "Fiery Wheels," and in the Hindu
Pantheon by a number of different names. All these Gandharvas, the "Sweet
Songsters," the Asuras, Kinnaras, and Nagas, are the allegorical
descriptions of the "four Maharajahs." The Seraphim are the fiery
Serpents of Heaven which we find in a passage describing Mount Meru as:
"the exalted mass of glory, the venerable haunt of gods and heavenly
choristers . . . . not to be reached by sinful men . . . . because guarded by
Serpents." They are called the Avengers, and the "Winged
Wheels."
Their mission and character being
explained, let us see what the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Hindus happen to divide the
world into seven continents, exoterically as esoterically; and their four
cosmic Devas are eight, presiding over the eight points of the compass and not
the Continents. (Compare "Chinese Buddhism," p. 216.)
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Christian Bible-interpreters say of
the Cherubim:-- "The word signifies in Hebrew, fullness of knowledge;
these angels are so called from their exquisite Knowledge, and were therefore
used for the punishment of men who affected divine Knowledge."
(Interpreted by Cruden in his Concordance, from Genesis iii., 24.) Very well;
and vague as the information is, it shows that the Cherub placed at the gate of
the garden of Eden after the "Fall," suggested to the venerable
Interpreters the idea of punishment connected with forbidden Science or divine
Knowledge -- one that generally leads to another "Fall," that of the
gods, or "God," in man's estimation. But as the good old Cruden knew
nought of Karma, he may be forgiven. Yet the allegory is suggestive. From Meru,
the abode of gods, to Eden, the distance is very small, and from the Hindu
Serpents to the Ophite Cherubim, the third out of the seven of which was the
Dragon, the separation is still smaller, for both watched the entrance to the
realm of Secret Knowledge. But Ezekiel plainly describes the four Cosmic
Angels: "I looked, and behold, a whirlwind, a cloud and fire infolding it
. . . also out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four living creatures
. . . they had the likeness of a man. And every one had four faces and four
wings . . . the face of a man, and the face of a lion, the face of an ox, and the
face of an eagle . . . " ("Man" was here substituted for
"Dragon." Compare the "Ophite Spirits."*) . . . "Now
as I beheld the living creatures behold one wheel upon the Earth with his four
faces . . . as it were a wheel in the middle of a wheel . . . for the support
of the living creature was in the wheel . . . their appearance was like coals
of fire . . ." etc. (Ezekiel, ch. i.)
There are three chief groups of
Builders and as many of the Planetary Spirits and the Lipika, each group being
again divided into Seven sub-groups. It is impossible, even in such a large
work as this, to enter into a minute examination of even the three principal
groups, as it would demand an extra volume. The "Builders" are the
representatives of the first "Mind-Born" Entities, therefore of the
primeval Rishi-Prajapati: also of the Seven great Gods of Egypt, of which
Osiris is the chief: of the Seven Amshaspends of the Zoroastrians, with
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Angels recognised by the Roman
Catholic Church who correspond to these "Faces" were with the
Ophites:-- Dragon -- Raphael; Lion -- Michael; Bull, or ox -- Uriel; and Eagle
-- Gabriel. The four keep company with the four Evangelists, and preface the
Gospels.
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Ormazd at their head: or the
"Seven Spirits of the Face": the Seven Sephiroth separated from the
first Triad, etc., etc.*
They build or rather rebuild every
"System" after the "Night." The Second group of the
Builders is the Architect of our planetary chain exclusively; and the third,
the progenitor of our Humanity -- the Macrocosmic prototype of the microcosm.
The Planetary Spirits are the
informing spirits of the Stars in general, and of the Planets especially. They
rule the destinies of men who are all born under one or other of their
constellations; the second and third groups pertaining to other systems have
the same functions, and all rule various departments in Nature. In the Hindu
exoteric Pantheon they are the guardian deities who preside over the eight
points of the compass -- the four cardinal and the four intermediate points --
and are called Loka-Palas, "Supporters or guardians of the World" (in
our visible Kosmos), of which Indra (East), Yama (South), Varuna (West), and
Kuvera (North) are the chief; their elephants and their spouses pertaining of
course to fancy and afterthought, though all of them have an occult
significance.
The Lipika (a description of whom is
given in the Commentary on Stanza IV. No. 6) are the Spirits of the Universe,
whereas the Builders are only our own planetary deities. The former belong to
the most occult portion of Cosmogenesis, which cannot be given here. Whether
the Adepts (even the highest) know this angelic order in the completeness of
its triple degrees, or only the lower one connected with the records of our
world, is something which the writer is unprepared to say, and she would
incline rather to the latter supposition. Of its highest grade one thing only
is taught: the Lipika are connected with Karma -- being its direct Recorders.**
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Jews, save the Kabalists,
having no names for East, West, South, and North, expressed the idea by words
signifying before, behind, right and left, and very often confounded the terms
exoterically, thus making the blinds in the Bible more confused and difficult
to interpret. Add to this the fact that out of the forty-seven translators of
King James I. of England's Bible "only three understood Hebrew, and of
these two died before the Psalms were translated" (Royal Masonic
Cyclopaedia), and one may easily understand what reliance can be placed on the
English version of the Bible. In this work the Douay Roman Catholic version is
generally followed.
** The Symbol for Sacred and Secret
Knowledge was universally in antiquity, a Tree, by which a Scripture or a
Record was also meant. Hence the word Lipika, the [[Footnote continued on next
page]]
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STANZA V. -- Continued.
6. THE LIPIKA CIRCUMSCRIBE THE
TRIANGLE, THE FIRST ONE (the vertical line or the figure 1.), THE CUBE, THE
SECOND ONE, AND THE PENTACLE WITHIN THE EGG (circle) (a). IT IS THE RING CALLED
"PASS NOT," FOR THOSE WHO DESCEND AND ASCEND (as also for those) WHO,
DURING THE KALPA, ARE PROGRESSING TOWARD THE GREAT DAY "BE WITH US"
(b). . . . THUS WERE FORMED THE ARUPA AND THE RUPA (the Formless World and the
World of Forms); FROM ONE LIGHT SEVEN LIGHTS; FROM EACH OF THE SEVEN SEVEN
TIMES SEVEN LIGHTS. THE "WHEELS" WATCH THE RING.
The Stanza proceeds with a minute
classification of the Orders of Angelic Hierarchy. From the group of Four and
Seven emanates the "mind-born" group of Ten, of Twelve, of
Twenty-one, etc., all these divided again into sub-groups of septenaries,
novenaries, duodecimals, and so on, until the mind is lost in this endless
enumeration of celestial hosts and Beings, each having its distinct task in the
ruling of the visible Kosmos during its existence.
(a) The esoteric meaning of the first
sentence of the Sloka is, that those who have been called Lipikas, the
Recorders of the Karmic ledger, make an impassible barrier between the personal
EGO and the impersonal SELF, the Noumenon and Parent-Source of the former.
Hence the allegory. They circumscribe the manifested world of matter within the
RING "Pass-Not." This world is the symbol (objective) of the ONE
divided into the many, on the planes of Illusion, of Adi (the
"First") or of Eka (the "One"); and this One is the
collective aggregate, or totality, of the principal Creators or Architects of
this visible universe. In Hebrew Occultism their name is both Achath, feminine,
"One," and Achod, "One" again, but masculine. The
monotheists have taken (and are still taking) advantage of the profound
esotericism of the Kabala to apply the name by which the One Supreme Essence is
known to ITS manifestation, the Sephiroth-Elohim, and call it Jehovah. But this
is
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] "writers" or scribes; the "Dragons," symbols of
wisdom, who guard the Trees of Knowledge; the "golden" apple Tree of
the Hesperides; the "Luxuriant Trees" and vegetation of Mount Meru
guarded by a Serpent. Juno giving to Jupiter, on her marriage with him, a Tree
with golden fruit is another form of Eve offering Adam the apple from the Tree
of Knowledge.
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quite arbitrary and against all
reason and logic, as the term Elohim is a plural noun, identical with the
plural word Chiim, often compounded with the Elohim.* Moreover, in Occult
metaphysics there are, properly speaking, two "ONES" -- the One on
the unreachable plane of Absoluteness and Infinity, on which no speculation is
possible, and the Second "One" on the plane of Emanations. The former
can neither emanate nor be divided, as it is eternal, absolute, and immutable.
The Second, being, so to speak, the reflection of the first One (for it is the
Logos, or Eswara, in the Universe of Illusion), can do all this.** It emanates
from itself -- as the upper Sephirothal Triad emanates the lower seven
Sephiroth -- the seven Rays or Dhyan Chohans; in other words, the Homogeneous
becomes the Heterogeneous, the "Protyle" differentiates into the
Elements. But these, unless they return into their primal Element, can never
cross beyond the Laya, or zero-point.
Hence the allegory. The Lipika
separate the world (or plane) of pure spirit from that of Matter. Those who
"descend and ascend" -- the incarnating Monads, and men striving
towards purification and "ascending," but still not having quite
reached the goal -- may cross the "circle of the Pass-Not," only on
the day "Be-With-Us"; that day when man, freeing himself from the
trammels of ignorance, and recog-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The sentence in the Sepher Jezirah
and elsewhere: "Achath-Ruach-Elohim-Chiim" denotes the Elohim as
androgynous at best, the feminine element almost predominating, as it would
read: "ONE is She the Spirit of the Elohim of Life." As said above,
Echath (or Achath) is feminine, and Echod (or Achod) masculine, both meaning
ONE.
** This metaphysical tenet can hardly
be better described than Mr. Subba Row's in "Bhagavadgita" lectures:
"Mulaprakriti (the veil of Parabrahmam) acts as the one energy through the
Logos (or 'Eswara'). Now Parabrahmam, is the one essence from which starts into
existence a centre of energy, which I shall for the present call the Logos. . .
. It is called the Verbum . . . by the Christians, and it is the divine
Christos who is eternal in the bosom of his father. It is called
Avalokiteshwara by the Buddhists. . . . In almost every doctrine, they have
formulated the existence of a centre of spiritual energy which is unborn and
eternal, and which exists in the bosom of Parabrahmam at the time of Pralaya,
and starts as a centre of conscious energy at the time of Cosmic activity. . .
." For, as the lecturer premised by saying, Parabraham is not this or
that, it is not even consciousness, as it cannot be related to matter or
anything conditioned. It is not Ego nor is it Non-ego, not even Atma, but
verily the one source of all manifestations and modes of existence.
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nising fully the non-separateness of
the Ego within his personality -- erroneously regarded as his own -- from the
UNIVERSAL EGO (Anima Supra-Mundi), merges thereby into the One Essence to
become not only one "with us" (the manifested universal lives which
are "ONE" LIFE), but that very life itself.
Astronomically, the "Ring
PASS-NOT" that the Lipika trace around the Triangle, the First One, the
Cube, the Second One, and the Pentacle to circumscribe these figures, is thus
shown to contain the symbol of 31415 again, or the coefficient constantly used
in mathematical tables (the value of, pi), the geometrical figures standing
here for numerical figures. According to the general philosophical teachings,
this ring is beyond the region of what are called nebulae in astronomy. But
this is as erroneous a conception as that of the topography and the
descriptions, given in Puranic and other exoteric Scriptures, about the 1008
worlds of the Devaloka worlds and firmaments. There are worlds, of course, in
the esoteric as well as in the profane scientific teachings, at such
incalculable distances that the light of the nearest of them which has just
reached our modern Chaldees, had left its luminary long before the day on which
the words "Let there be Light" were pronounced; but these are no
worlds on the Devaloka plane, but in our Kosmos.
The chemist goes to the laya or zero
point of the plane of matter with which he deals, and then stops short. The
physicist or the astronomer counts by billions of miles beyond the nebulae, and
then they also stop short; the semi-initiated Occultist will represent this
laya-point to himself as existing on some plane which, if not physical, is
still conceivable to the human intellect. But the full Initiate knows that the
ring "Pass-Not" is neither a locality nor can it be measured by
distance, but that it exists in the absoluteness of infinity. In this
"Infinity" of the full Initiate there is neither height, breadth nor
thickness, but all is fathomless profundity, reaching down from the physical to
the "para-para-metaphysical." In using the word "down,"
essential depth -- "nowhere and everywhere" -- is meant, not depth of
physical matter.
If one searches carefully through the
exoteric and grossly anthropomorphic allegories of popular religions, even in
these the doctrine embodied in the circle of "Pass-Not" thus guarded
by the Lipika, may be dimly perceived. Thus one finds it even in the teachings
of
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the Vedantin sect of the
Visishtadwaita, the most tenaciously anthropomorphic in all India. For we read
of the released soul that:--
After reaching Moksha (a state of
bliss meaning "release from Bandha" or bondage), bliss is enjoyed by
it in a place called PARAMAPADHA, which place is not material, but made of
Suddasatwa (the essence, of which the body of Iswara -- "the Lord" --
is formed). There, Muktas or Jivatmas (Monads) who have attained Moksha, are
never again subject to the qualities of either matter or Karma. "But if
they choose, for the sake of doing good to the world, they may incarnate on
Earth."* The way to Paramapadha, or the immaterial worlds, from this
world, is called Devayana. When a person has attained Moksha and the body
dies:--
"The Jiva (Soul) goes with
Sukshma Sarira** from the heart of the body, to the Brahmarandra in the crown
of the head, traversing Sushumna, a nerve connecting the heart with the
Brahmarandra. The Jiva breaks through the Brahmarandra and goes to the region
of the Sun (Suryamandala) through the solar Rays. Then it goes, through a dark
spot in the Sun, to Paramapadha. The Jiva is directed on its way by the Supreme
Wisdom acquired by Yoga.*** The Jiva thus proceeds to Paramapadha by the aid of
Athivahikas (bearers in transit), known by the names of Archi-Ahas . . .
Aditya, Prajapati, etc. The Archis here mentioned are certain pure Souls, etc.,
etc." (Visishtadwaita Catechism, by Pundit Bhashyacharya, F.T.S.)
No Spirit except the
"Recorders" (Lipika) has ever crossed its forbidden line, nor will
any do so until the day of the next Pralaya, for it is the boundary that
separates the finite -- however infinite in man's sight -- from the truly
INFINITE. The Spirits referred to, therefore, as those who "ascend and
descend" are the "Hosts" of what we loosely call "celestial
Beings." But they are, in fact, nothing of the kind.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* These voluntary re-incarnations are
referred to in our Doctrine as Nirmanakayas (the surviving spiritual principles
of men).
** Sukshma-sarira,
"dream-like" illusive body, with which are clothed the inferior
Dhyanis of the celestial Hierarchy.
*** Compare this esoteric tenet with
the Gnostic doctrine found in "Pistis-Sophia" (Knowledge = Wisdom),
in which treatise Sophia Achamoth is shown lost in the waters of Chaos
(matter), on her way to Supreme Light, and Christos delivering and helping her
on the right Path. Note well, "Christos" with the Gnostics meant the
impersonal principal, the Atman of the Universe, and the Atma within every
man's soul -- not Jesus; though in the old Coptic MSS. in the British Museum
"Christos" is almost constantly replaced by "Jesus."
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They are Entities of the higher
worlds in the hierarchy of Being, so immeasurably high that, to us, they must
appear as Gods, and collectively -- GOD. But so we, mortal men, must appear to
the ant, which reasons on the scale of its special capacities. The ant may
also, for all we know, see the avenging finger of a personal God in the hand of
the urchin who, in one moment, under the impulse of mischief, destroys its
anthill, the labour of many weeks -- long years in the chronology of insects.
The ant, feeling it acutely, and attributing the undeserved calamity to a
combination of Providence and sin, may also, like man, see in it the result of
the sin of its first parent. Who knows and who can affirm or deny? The refusal
to admit in the whole Solar system of any other reasonable and intellectual
beings on the human plane, than ourselves, is the greatest conceit of our age.
All that science has a right to affirm, is that there are no invisible
Intelligences living under the same conditions as we do. It cannot deny
point-blank the possibility of there being worlds within worlds, under totally
different conditions to those that constitute the nature of our world; nor can
it deny that there may be a certain limited communication* between some of
those worlds and our own. To the highest, we are taught, belong the seven
orders of the purely divine Spirits; to the six lower ones belong hierarchies
that can occasionally be seen and heard by men, and who do communicate with their
progeny of the Earth; which progeny is indissolubly linked with them, each
principle in man having its direct source in the nature of those great Beings,
who furnish us with the respective invisible elements in us. Physical Science
is welcome to speculate upon the physiological mechanism of living beings, and
to continue her fruitless efforts in trying to resolve our feelings, our
sensations, mental and spiritual, into functions of their inorganic vehicles.
Nevertheless, all that will ever be accomplished in this direction has already
been done, and Science will go no farther.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The greatest philosopher of
European birth, Imanuel Kant, assures us that such a communication is in no way
improbable. "I confess I am much disposed to assert the existence of
Immaterial natures in the world, and to place my own soul in the class of these
beings. It will hereafter, I know not where, or when, yet be proved that the
human soul stands even in this life in indissoluble connection with all
immaterial natures in the spirit-world, that it reciprocally acts upon these
and receives impressions from them." (Traume eines Geistersehers, quoted
by C. C. Massey, in his preface to Von Hartmann's "Spiritismus.")
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She is before a dead wall, on the
face of which she traces, as she imagines, great physiological and psychic
discoveries, but every one of which will be shown later on to be no better than
the cobwebs spun by her scientific fancies and illusions. The tissues of our
objective framework alone are subservient to the analysis and researches of
physiological science.* The six higher principles in them will evade for ever
the hand that is guided by an animus that purposely ignores and rejects the
Occult Sciences.
The "Great Day of
BE-WITH-US," then, is an expression the only merit of which lies in its
literal translation. Its significance is not so easily revealed to a public,
unacquainted with the mystic tenets of Occultism, or rather of Esoteric Wisdom
or "Budhism." It is an expression peculiar to the latter, and as hazy
for the profane as that of the Egyptians who called the same the "Day of
COME-TO-US,"** which
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* E.g., all that modern physiological
research in connection with psychological problems has, and owing to the nature
of things, could have shown, is, that every thought, sensation, and emotion is
attended with a re-marshalling of the molecules of certain nerves. The
inference drawn by scientists of the type of Buchner, Vogt, and others, that
thought is molecular motion, necessitates a complete abstraction being made of
the fact of our subjective consciousness.
** See "Le Livre des
Morts," by Paul Pierret; "Le Jour de 'Viens a nous' . . . c'est le
jour ou Osiris a dit au Soleil: Viens! Je le vois rencontrant le Soleil dans
l'Amenti." (Chap. xvii., p. 61.) The Sun here stands for the Logos (or
Christos, or Horus) as central Essence synthetically, and as a diffused essence
of radiated Entities, different in substance, but not in essence. As expressed
by the Bhagavadgita lecturer, "it must not be supposed that the Logos is
but a single centre of energy manifested from Parabrahmam; there are
innumerable other centres . . . and their number is almost infinite in the
bosom of Parabrahmam." Hence the expressions, "The Day of Come to
us" and "The Day of Be with us," etc. Just as the square is the
Symbol of the Four sacred Forces or Powers -- Tetraktis -- so the Circle shows
the boundary within the Infinity that no man can cross, even in spirit, nor
Deva nor Dhyan Chohan. The Spirits of those who "descend and ascend"
during the course of cyclic evolution shall cross the "iron-bound
world" only on the day of their approach to the threshold of Paranirvana.
If they reach it -- they will rest in the bosom of Parabrahmam, or the
"Unknown Darkness," which shall then become for all of them Light --
during the whole period of Mahapralaya, the "Great NIGHT," namely,
311,040,000,000,000 years of absorption in Brahm. The day of
"Be-With-Us" is this period of rest or Paranirvana. See also for
other data on this peculiar expression, the day of "Come-To-Us," The
Funerary Ritual of the Egyptians, by Viscount de Rouge. It corresponds to the
Day of the Last Judgment of the Christians, which has been sorely materialised
by their religion.
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is identical with the former, though
the verb "be" in this sense, might be still better replaced with
either of the two words "Remain" or "Rest-with-us," as it
refers to that long period of REST which is called Paranirvana. As in the
exoteric interpretation of the Egyptian rites the soul of every defunct person
-- from the Hierophant down to the sacred bull Apis -- became an Osiris, was
Osirified, though the Secret Doctrine had always taught, that the real
Osirification was the lot of every Monad only after 3,000 cycles of Existences;
so in the present case. The "Monad," born of the nature and the very
Essence of the "Seven" (its highest principle becoming immediately
enshrined in the Seventh Cosmic Element), has to perform its septenary gyration
throughout the Cycle of Being and forms, from the highest to the lowest; and
then again from man to God. At the threshold of Paranirvana it reassumes its
primeval Essence and becomes the Absolute once more.
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STANZA VI.
1. BY THE POWER OF THE MOTHER OF
MERCY AND KNOWLEDGE (a), KWAN-YIN,* THE "TRIPLE" OF KWAN-SHAI-YIN,
RESIDING IN KWAN-YIN-TIEN (b), FOHAT, THE BREATH OF THEIR PROGENY, THE SON OF
THE SONS, HAVING CALLED FORTH FROM THE LOWER ABYSS (chaos) THE ILLUSIVE FORM OF
SIEN-TCHAN (our Universe) AND THE SEVEN ELEMENTS:--
(a.) The Mother of Mercy and
Knowledge is called "the triple" of Kwan-Shai-Yin because in her
correlations, metaphysical and cosmical, she is the "Mother, the Wife and
the Daughter" of the Logos, just as in the later theological translations
she became "the Father, Son and (the female) Holy Ghost" -- the Sakti
or Energy -- the Essence of the three. Thus in the Esotericism of the Vedantins,
Daiviprakriti, the Light manifested through Eswara, the Logos,** is at one and
the same time the Mother and also the Daughter of the Logos or Verbum of
Parabrahmam; while in that of the trans-Himalayan teachings it is -- in the
hierarchy of allegorical and metaphysical theogony -- "the MOTHER" or
abstract, ideal matter, Mulaprakriti, the Root of Nature; -- from the
metaphysical standpoint, a correlation of Adi-Bhuta, manifested in the Logos,
Avalokiteshwara; -- and from the purely occult and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This stanza is translated from the
Chinese text, and the names, as the equivalents of the original terms, are
preserved. The real esoteric nomenclature cannot be given, as it would only
confuse the reader. The Brahmanical doctrine has no equivalent to these. Vach
seems, in many an aspect, to approach the Chinese Kwan-yin, but there is no
regular worship of Vach under this name in India, as there is of Kwan-Yin in
China. No exoteric religious system has ever adopted a female Creator, and thus
woman was regarded and treated, from the first dawn of popular religions, as
inferior to man. It is only in China and Egypt that Kwan-Yin and Isis were
placed on a par with the male gods. Esotericism ignores both sexes. Its highest
Deity is sexless as it is formless, neither Father nor Mother; and its first
manifested beings, celestial and terrestrial alike, become only gradually
androgynous and finally separate into distinct sexes.
** The "Theosophist" of February,
1887, p. 305, first lecture on the Bhagavadgita.
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Cosmical, Fohat,* the "Son of
the Son," the androgynous energy resulting from this "Light of the
Logos," and which manifests in the plane of the objective Universe as the
hidden, as much as the revealed, Electricity -- which is LIFE.
(b) Kwan-Yin-Tien means the "melodious
heaven of Sound," the abode of Kwan-Yin, or the "Divine Voice"
literally. This "Voice" is a synonym of the Verbum or the Word:
"Speech," as the expression of thought. Thus may be traced the
connection with, and even the origin of the Hebrew Bath-Kol, the "daughter
of the Divine Voice," or Verbum, or the male and female Logos, the
"Heavenly Man" or Adam Kadmon, who is at the same time Sephira. The
latter was surely anticipated by the Hindu Vach, the goddess of Speech, or of
the Word. For Vach -- the daughter and the female portion, as is stated, of
Brahma, one "generated by the gods" -- is, in company with Kwan-Yin,
with Isis (also the daughter, wife and sister of Osiris) and other goddesses,
the female Logos, so to speak, the goddess of the active forces in Nature, the
Word, Voice or Sound, and Speech. If Kwan-Yin is the "melodious
Voice," so is Vach; "the melodious cow who milked forth sustenance
and water" (the female principle) -- "who yields us nourishment and
sustenance," as Mother-Nature. She is associated in the work of creation
with the Prajapati. She is male and female ad libitum, as Eve is with Adam. And
she is a form of Aditi -- the principle higher than Ether -- in Akasa, the
synthesis of all the forces in Nature; thus Vach and Kwan-Yin are both the
magic potency of Occult sound in Nature and Ether -- which "Voice"
calls forth Sien-Tchan, the illusive form of the Universe out of Chaos and the
Seven Elements.
Thus in Manu Brahma (the Logos also)
is shown dividing his body into two parts, male and female, and creating in the
latter, who is Vach, Viraj, who is himself, or Brahma again -- it is in this
way a learned Vedantin Occultist speaks of that "goddess," explaining
the reason why Eswara (or Brahma) is called Verbum or Logos; why in fact it is
called Sabda Brahmam:--
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Says the lecturer on p. 306:
"Evolution is commenced by the intellectual energy of the Logos, not
merely on account of the potentialities locked up in Mulaprakriti. This light
of the Logos is the link . . . between objective matter and the subjective
thought of Eswara (or Logos). It is called in several Buddhist books Fohat. It
is the one instrument with which the Logos works."
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"The explanation I am going to
give you will appear thoroughly mystical; but if mystical, it has a tremendous
significance when properly understood. Our old writers said that Vach is of
four kinds (see Rig Veda and the Upanishads). Vaikhari-Vach is what we utter.
Every kind of Vaikhari-Vach exists in its Madhyama, further in its Pasyanti,
and ultimately in its Para form.* The reason why this Pranava is called Vach is
this, that the four principles of the great Kosmos correspond to these four
forms of Vach. Now the whole manifested solar System exists in its Sukshma form
in the light or energy of the Logos, because its energy is caught up and
transferred to Cosmic matter. . . . The whole Kosmos in its objective form is
Vaikhari-Vach, the light of the Logos is the Madhyama form, and the Logos
itself the Pasyanti form, and Parabrahm the Para form or aspect of that Vach.
It is by the light of this explanation that we must try to understand certain
statements made by various philosophers to the effect that the manifested
Kosmos is the Verbum manifested as Kosmos" (see Lecture on the
Bhagavadgita, referred to above).
-------
STANZA VI. -- (Continued.)
2. THE SWIFT AND THE RADIANT ONE
PRODUCES THE SEVEN Layu** (a) CENTRES, AGAINST WHICH NONE WILL PREVAIL TO THE
GREAT DAY "BE WITH US" -- AND SEATS THE UNIVERSE ON THESE ETERNAL
FOUNDATIONS, SURROUNDING SIEN-TCHAN WITH THE ELEMENTARY GERMS (b).
(a.) The seven Layu centres are the
seven Zero points, using the term Zero in the same sense that Chemists do, to
indicate a point at which, in Esotericism, the scale of reckoning of
differentiation begins. From the Centres -- beyond which Esoteric philosophy
allows us to perceive the dim metaphysical outlines of the "Seven
Sons" of Life and Light, the Seven Logoi of the Hermetic and all other
philosophers -- begins
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Madhya is said of something whose
commencement and end are unknown, and Para means infinite. These expressions
all relate to infinitude and to division of time.
** From the Sanskrit Laya, the point
of matter where every differentiation has ceased.
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the differentiation of the elements
which enter into the constitution of our Solar System. It has often been asked
what was the exact definition of Fohat and his powers and functions, as he
seems to exercise those of a Personal God as understood in the popular
religions. The answer has just been given in the comment on Stanza V. As well
said in the Bhagavadgita Lectures, "The whole Kosmos must necessarily
exist in the One Source of energy from which this light (Fohat) emanates."
Whether we count the principles in Kosmos and man as seven or only as four, the
forces of, and in, physical Nature are Seven; and it is stated by the same
authority that "Pragna, or the capacity of perception, exists in seven
different aspects corresponding to the seven conditions of matter"
(Personal and impersonal God). For, "just as a human being is composed of
seven principles, differentiated matter in the Solar System exists in seven
different conditions" (ibid). So does Fohat.* He is One and Seven, and on
the Cosmic plane is behind all such manifestations as light, heat, sound,
adhesion, etc., etc., and is the "spirit" of ELECTRICITY, which is
the LIFE of the Universe. As an abstraction, we call it the ONE LIFE; as an
objective and evident Reality, we speak of a septenary scale of manifestation,
which begins at the upper rung with the One Unknowable CAUSALITY, and ends as
Omnipresent Mind and Life immanent in every atom of Matter. Thus, while science
speaks of its evolution through brute matter, blind force, and senseless
motion, the Occultists point to intelligent LAW and sentient LIFE, and add that
Fohat is the guiding Spirit of all this. Yet he is no personal god at all, but
the emanation of those other Powers behind him whom the Christians call the
"Messengers" of their God (who is in reality only the Elohim, or
rather one of the Seven Creators called Elohim), and we, the "Messenger of
the primordial Sons of Life and Light."
(b.) The "Elementary Germs"
with which he fills Sien-Tchan (the "Universe") from Tien-Sin (the
"Heaven of Mind," literally, or that which is absolute) are the Atoms
of Science and the Monads of Leibnitz.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Fohat" has several
meanings. (See Stanza V., Commentary et infra). He is called the "Builder
of the Builders," the Force that he personifies having formed our
Septenary chain.
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STANZA VI. -- Continued.
3. OF THE SEVEN (elements) -- FIRST
ONE MANIFESTED, SIX CONCEALED; TWO MANIFESTED -- FIVE CONCEALED; THREE
MANIFESTED -- FOUR CONCEALED; FOUR PRODUCED -- THREE HIDDEN; FOUR AND ONE TSAN
(fraction) REVEALED -- TWO AND ONE HALF CONCEALED; SIX TO BE MANIFESTED -- ONE
LAID ASIDE (a). LASTLY, SEVEN SMALL WHEELS REVOLVING; ONE GIVING BIRTH TO THE
OTHER (b).
(a.) Although these Stanzas refer to
the whole Universe after a Mahapralaya (universal destruction), yet this
sentence, as any student of Occultism may see, refers also by analogy to the
evolution and final formation of the primitive (though compound) Seven Elements
on our Earth. Of these, four elements are now fully manifested, while the fifth
-- Ether -- is only partially so, as we are hardly in the second half of the
Fourth Round, and consequently the fifth Element will manifest fully only in
the Fifth Round. The Worlds, including our own, were of course, as germs,
primarily evolved from the ONE Element in its second stage ("Father-Mother,"
the differentiated World's Soul, not what is termed the "Over-Soul"
by Emerson), whether we call it, with modern Science, Cosmic dust and Fire
Mist, or with Occultism -- Akasa, Jivatma, divine Astral Light, or the
"Soul of the World." But this first stage of Evolution was in due
course of time followed by the next. No world, as no heavenly body, could be
constructed on the objective plane, had not the Elements been sufficiently
differentiated already from their primeval Ilus, resting in Laya. The latter term
is a synonym of Nirvana. It is, in fact, the Nirvanic dissociation of all
substances, merged after a life-cycle into the latency of their primary
conditions. It is the luminous but bodiless shadow of the matter that was, the
realm of negativeness -- wherein lie latent during their period of rest the
active Forces of the Universe. Now, speaking of Elements, it is made the
standing reproach of the Ancients, that they "supposed their Elements
simple and undecomposable."* Once more this is an unwarrantable state-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The shades of our pre-historical
ancestors might return the compliment to modern physicists, now that new
discoveries in chemistry have led Mr. Crookes, F.R.S., to admit that Science is
yet a thousand leagues from the knowledge of the compound nature of the
simplest molecule. From him we learn that such a thing as a really simple
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
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ment; as, at any rate, their
initiated philosophers can hardly come under such an imputation, since it is
they who have invented allegories and religious myths from the beginning. Had
they been ignorant of the Heterogeneity of their Elements they would have had
no personifications of Fire, Air, Water, Earth, and AEther; their Cosmic gods
and goddesses would never have been blessed with such posterity, with so many
sons and daughters, elements born from and within each respective Element.
Alchemy and occult phenomena would have been a delusion and a snare, even in
theory, had the Ancients been ignorant of the potentialities and correlative
functions and attributes of every element that enters into the composition of
Air, Water, Earth, and even Fire -- the latter a terra incognita to this day to
modern Science, which is obliged to call it Motion, evolution of light and heat,
state of ignition, -- defining it by its outward aspects in short, and
remaining ignorant of its nature. But that which
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] molecule entirely homogeneous is terra incognita in chemistry.
"Where are we to draw the line?" he asks; "is there no way out
of this perplexity? Must we either make the elementary examinations so stiff
that only 60 or 70 candidates can pass, or must we open the examination doors
so wide that the number of admissions is limited only by the number of
applicants?" And then the learned gentleman gives striking instances. He
says: "Take the case of yttrium. It has its definite atomic weight, it
behaved in every respect as a simple body, an element, to which we might indeed
add, but from which we could not take away. Yet this yttrium, this supposed
homogeneous whole, on being submitted to a certain method of fractionation, is
resolved into portions not absolutely identical among themselves, and
exhibiting a gradation of properties. Or take the case of didymium. Here was a
body betraying all the recognised characters of an element. It had been
separated with much difficulty from other bodies which approximated closely to
it in their properties, and during this crucial process it had undergone very
severe treatment and very close scrutiny. But then came another chemist, who,
treating this assumed homogeneous body by a peculiar process of fractionation,
resolved it into the two bodies praseodymium and neodymium, between which
certain distinctions are perceptible. Further, we even now have no certainty
that neodymium and praseodymium are simple bodies. On the contrary, they
likewise exhibit symptoms of splitting up. Now, if one supposed element on
proper treatment is thus found to comprise dissimilar molecules, we are surely
warranted in asking whether similar results might not be obtained in other
elements, perhaps in all elements, if treated in the right way. We may even ask
where the process of sorting-out is to stop -- a process which of course
pre-supposes variations between the individual molecules of each species. And
in these successive separations we naturally find bodies approaching more and
more closely to each other." (Presidential address before the Royal
Society of Chemists, March, 1888.)
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modern Science seems to fail to
perceive is that, differentiated as may have been those simple chemical atoms
-- which archaic philosophy called "the creators of their respective
Parents," fathers, brothers, husbands of their mothers, and those mothers
the daughters of their own sons, like Aditi and Daksha, for example --
differentiated as these elements were in the beginning, still, they were not
the compound bodies known to science, as they are now. Neither Water, Air,
Earth (synonym for solids generally) existed in their present form,
representing the three states of matter alone recognised by Science; for all
these are the productions already recombined by the atmospheres of globes
completely formed -- even to fire -- so that in the first periods of the earth's
formation they were something quite sui generis. Now that the conditions and
laws ruling our solar system are fully developed; and that the atmosphere of
our earth, as of every other globe, has become, so to say, a crucible of its
own, Occult Science teaches that there is a perpetual exchange taking place in
space of molecules, or of atoms rather, correlating, and thus changing their
combining equivalents on every planet. Some men of Science, and those among the
greatest physicists and chemists, begin to suspect this fact, which has been
known for ages to the Occultists. The spectroscope only shows the probable
similarity (on external evidence) of terrestrial and sidereal substance; it is
unable to go any farther, or to show whether atoms gravitate towards one
another in the same way and under the same conditions as they are supposed to
do on our planet, physically and chemically. The scale of temperature, from the
highest degree to the lowest that can be conceived of, may be imagined to be
one and the same in and for the whole Universe; nevertheless, its properties,
other than those of dissociation and reassociation, differ on every planet; and
thus atoms enter into new forms of existence, undreamt of, and incognizable to,
physical Science. As already expressed in "Five Years of Theosophy,"
the essence of Cometary matter, for instance, "is totally different from
any of the chemical or physical characteristics with which the greatest
chemists and physicists of the earth are acquainted" (p. 242). And even
that matter, during rapid passage through our atmosphere, undergoes a certain
change in its nature. Thus not alone the elements of our planets, but even
those of all its sisters in the Solar System, differ as widely from each other
in their combinations, as from the Cosmic elements beyond our
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Solar limits.* Therefore, they cannot
be taken as a standard for comparison with the same in other worlds.**
Enshrined in their virgin, pristine state within the bosom of the Eternal
Mother, every atom born beyond the threshold of her realm is doomed to
incessant differentiation. "The Mother sleeps, yet is ever
breathing." And every breath sends out into the plane of manifestation her
Protean products, which, carried on by the wave of the efflux, are scattered by
Fohat, and driven toward and beyond this or another planetary atmosphere. Once
caught by the latter, the atom is lost; its pristine purity is gone for ever,
unless Fate dissociates it by leading it to "a current of EFFLUX" (an
occult term meaning quite a different process from that which the ordinary term
implies); when it may be carried once more to the borderland where it had
perished, and taking its flight, not into Space above but into Space within, it
will be brought under a state of differential equilibrium and happily
re-absorbed. Were a truly learned Occultist-alchemist to write the "Life
and Adventures of an Atom" he would secure thereby the eternal scorn of
the modern chemist, perchance also his subsequent
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This is again corroborated by the
same man of science in the same lecture, who quotes Clerk Maxwell, saying
"that the elements are not absolutely homogeneous." He writes:
"It is difficult to conceive of selection and elimination of intermediate
varieties, for where can these eliminated molecules have gone to, if, as we
have reason to believe, the hydrogen, &c. of the fixed stars is composed of
molecules identical in all respects with our own." And he adds: "In
the first place we may call in question this absolute molecular identity, since
we have hitherto had no means for coming to a conclusion save the means
furnished by the spectroscope, while it is admitted that, for accurately
comparing and discriminating the spectra of two bodies, they should be examined
under identical states of temperature, pressure, and all other physical
conditions. We have certainly seen, in the spectrum of the sun, rays which we
have not been able to identify."
** "Each world has its Fohat,
who is omnipresent in his own sphere of action. But there are as many Fohats as
there are worlds, each varying in power and degree of manifestations. The
individual Fohats make one Universal, Collective Fohat -- the aspect-Entity of
the one absolute Non-Entity, which is absolute Be-Ness, 'SAT.' "Millions
and billions of worlds are produced at every Manvantara" -- it is said.
Therefore there must be many Fohats, whom we consider as conscious and
intelligent Forces. This, no doubt, to the disgust of scientific minds.
Nevertheless the Occultists, who have good reasons for it, consider all the
forces of Nature as veritable, though supersensuous, states of Matter; and as
possible objects of perception to Beings endowed with the requisite senses.
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gratitude.* However it may be,
"The Breath of the Father-Mother issues cold and radiant and gets hot and
corrupt, to cool once more, and be purified in the eternal bosom of inner
Space," says the Commentary. Man absorbs cold pure air on the
mountain-top, and throws it out impure, hot and transformed. Thus -- the higher
atmosphere being the mouth, and the lower one the lungs of every globe -- the
man of our planet breathes only the refuse of "Mother"; therefore,
"he is doomed to die on it."**
(b) The process referred to as
"the small wheels giving birth, one to the other," takes place in the
sixth region from above, and on the plane of the most material world of all in
the manifested Kosmos -- our terrestrial plane. These "Seven Wheels"
are our planetary chain (see Commentary Nos. 5 and 6). By "Wheels"
the various spheres and centres of forces are generally meant; but in this case
they refer to our septenary ring.
-------
STANZA VI. -- Continued.
4. HE BUILDS THEM IN THE LIKENESS OF
OLDER WHEELS (worlds), PLACING THEM ON THE IMPERISHABLE CENTRES (a).
HOW DOES FOHAT BUILD THEM? HE
COLLECTS THE FIERY DUST. HE MAKES BALLS OF FIRE, RUNS THROUGH THEM AND ROUND
THEM, INFUSING LIFE THEREINTO; THEN SETS THEM INTO MOTION, SOME ONE, SOME THE
OTHER WAY. THEY ARE COLD -- HE MAKES THEM HOT. THEY ARE DRY -- HE MAKES THEM
MOIST. THEY SHINE -- HE FANS AND COOLS THEM (b).
THUS ACTS FOHAT FROM ONE Twilight TO
THE OTHER DURING SEVEN ETERNITIES.***
(a) The Worlds are built "in the
likeness of older Wheels" -- i.e., those that existed in preceding
Manvantaras and went into Pralaya,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Indeed, if such an imaginary
Chemist happened to be intuitional, and would for a moment step out of the
habitual groove of strictly "Exact Science," as the Alchemists of old
did, he might be repaid for his audacity.
** He who would allotropise sluggish
oxygen into Ozone to a measure of alchemical activity, reducing it to its pure
essence (for which there are means), would discover thereby a substitute for an
"Elixir of Life" and prepare it for practical use.
*** A period of 311,040,000,000,000
years, according to Brahminical calculations.
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because the LAW for the birth, growth,
and decay of everything in Kosmos, from the Sun to the glow-worm in the grass,
is ONE. It is an everlasting work of perfection with every new appearance, but
the Substance-Matter and Forces are all one and the same. But this LAW acts on
every planet through minor and varying laws. The "imperishable Laya
Centres" have a great importance, and their meaning must be fully
understood if we would have a clear conception of the Archaic Cosmogony, whose
theories have now passed into Occultism. At present, one thing may be stated.
The worlds are built neither upon, nor over, nor in the Laya centres, the
zero-point being a condition, not any mathematical point.
(b) Bear in mind that Fohat, the
constructive Force of Cosmic Electricity, is said, metaphorically, to have
sprung like Rudra from Brahma "from the brain of the Father and the bosom
of the Mother," and then to have metamorphosed himself into a male and a
female, i.e., polarity, into positive and negative electricity. He has seven
sons who are his brothers; and Fohat is forced to be born time after time
whenever any two of his son-brothers indulge in too close contact -- whether an
embrace or a fight. To avoid this, he binds together and unites those of unlike
nature and separates those of similar temperaments. This, of course, relates,
as any one can see, to electricity generated by friction and to the law
involving attraction between two objects of unlike, and repulsion between those
of like polarity. The Seven "Sons-brothers," however, represent and
personify the seven forms of Cosmic magnetism called in practical Occultism the
"Seven Radicals," whose co-operative and active progeny are, among
other energies, Electricity, Magnetism, Sound, Light, Heat, Cohesion, etc.
Occult Science defines all these as Super-sensuous effects in their hidden
behaviour, and as objective phenomena in the world of senses; the former
requiring abnormal faculties to perceive them -- the latter, our ordinary
physical senses. They all pertain to, and are the emanations of, still more supersensuous
spiritual qualities, not personated by, but belonging to, real and conscious
CAUSES. To attempt a description of such ENTITIES would be worse than useless.
The reader must bear in mind that, according to our teaching which regards this
phenomenal Universe as a great Illusion, the nearer a body is to the UNKNOWN
SUBSTANCE, the more it approaches reality, as being removed the farther
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from this world of Maya. Therefore,
though the molecular constitution of their bodies is not deducible from their
manifestations on this plane of consciousness, they nevertheless (from the standpoint
of the adept Occultist) possess a distinctive objective if not material
structure, in the relatively noumenal -- as opposed to the phenomenal --
Universe. Men of science may term them Force or Forces generated by matter, or
"modes of its motion," if they will; Occultism sees in the effects
"Elemental" (forces), and, in the direct causes producing them,
intelligent DIVINE Workmen. The intimate connection of those Elementals (guided
by the unerring hand of the Rulers) -- their correlation we might call it --
with the elements of pure Matter, results in our terrestrial phenomena, such as
light, heat, magnetism, etc., etc. Of course we shall never agree with the
American Substantialists* who call every Force and Energy -- whether Light,
Heat, Electricity or Cohesion -- an "Entity"; for this would be
equivalent to calling the noise produced by the rolling of the wheels of a
vehicle an Entity -- thus confusing and identifying that "noise" with
the driver outside, and the guiding Master Intelligence within the vehicle. But
we certainly give that name to the "drivers" and to these guiding
Intelligences -- the ruling Dhyan Chohans, as shown. The
"Elementals," the Nature-Forces, are the acting, though invisible, or
rather imperceptible, secondary Causes and in themselves the effects of primary
Causes behind the Veil of all terrestrial phenomena. Electricity, light, heat,
etc., have been aptly termed the "Ghost or Shadow of Matter in
Motion," i.e., supersensuous states of matter whose effects only we are
able to cognize. To expand, then, the simile given above. The sensation of
light is like the sound of the rolling wheels -- a purely phenomenal effect,
having no existence outside the observer; the proximate exciting cause of the
sensation is comparable to the driver -- a supersensuous state of matter in
motion, a Nature-Force or Elemental. But, behind even this, stand -- just as
the owner of the carriage directs the driver from within -- the higher and
noumenal causes, the Intelligences from whose essence radiate these States of
"Mother," generating the countless milliards of Elementals or psychic
Nature-Spirits, just as every drop of water generates its physical
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See "Scientific Arena," a
monthly Journal devoted to current philosophical teaching and its bearing upon
the religious thought of the Age. New York: A. Wilford Hall, Ph.D., LL.D.,
Editor. (1886, July, August, and September.)
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infinitesimal Infusoria. (See
"Gods, Monads, and Atoms," in Part III.) It is Fohat who guides the
transfer of the principles from one planet to the other, from one star to
another -- child-star. When a planet dies, its informing principles are
transferred to a laya or sleeping centre, with potential but latent energy in
it, which is thus awakened into life and begins to form itself into a new
sidereal body. (Vide infra, "A Few Theosophical Misconceptions,
etc.")
It is most remarkable that, while
honestly confessing their entire ignorance of the true Nature of even
terrestrial matter -- primordial substance being regarded more as a dream than
as a sober reality -- the physicists should set themselves up as judges,
nevertheless, of that matter, and claim to know what it is able and is not able
to do, in various combinations. Scientists know it (matter) hardly skin-deep,
and yet they will dogmatise. It is "a mode of motion" and nothing
else. But the force that is inherent in a living person's breath, when blowing
a speck of dust from the table, is also, and undeniably, "a mode of
motion"; and it is as undeniably not a quality of the matter, or the
particles of that speck, and it emanates from the living and thinking Entity
that breathed, whether the impulse originated consciously or unconsciously.
Indeed, to endow matter -- something of which nothing is known so far -- with
an inherent quality called Force, of the nature of which still less is known,
is to create a far more serious difficulty than that which lies in the
acceptation of the intervention of our "Nature-Spirits" in every
natural phenomenon.
The Occultists, who do not say -- if
they would express themselves correctly -- that matter, but only the substance
or essence of matter, is indestructible and eternal, (i.e., the Root of all,
Mulaprakriti): assert that all the so-called Forces of Nature, Electricity,
Magnetism, Light, Heat, etc., etc., far from being modes of motion of material
particles, are in esse, i.e., in their ultimate constitution, the
differentiated aspects of that Universal Motion which is discussed and
explained in the first pages of this volume (See Proem). When Fohat is said to
produce "Seven Laya Centres," it means that for formative or creative
purposes, the GREAT LAW (Theists may call it God) stops, or rather modifies its
perpetual motion on seven invisible points within the area of the manifested
Universe. "The great Breath digs through Space seven holes into Laya to
cause them to circumgyrate during Manvantara" (Occult Catechism). We
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have said that Laya is what Science
may call the Zero-point or line; the realm of absolute negativeness, or the one
real absolute Force, the NOUMENON of the Seventh State of that which we
ignorantly call and recognise as "Force"; or again the Noumenon of
Undifferentiated Cosmic Substance which is itself an unreachable and unknowable
object to finite perception; the root and basis of all states of objectivity
and subjectivity too; the neutral axis, not one of the many aspects, but its
centre. It may serve to elucidate the meaning if we attempt to imagine a
neutral centre -- the dream of those who would discover perpetual motion. A
"neutral centre" is, in one aspect, the limiting point of any given
set of senses. Thus, imagine two consecutive planes of matter as already
formed; each of these corresponding to an appropriate set of perceptive organs.
We are forced to admit that between these two planes of matter an incessant
circulation takes place; and if we follow the atoms and molecules of (say) the
lower in their transformation upwards, these will come to a point where they
pass altogether beyond the range of the faculties we are using on the lower
plane. In fact, to us the matter of the lower plane there vanishes from our
perception into nothing -- or rather it passes on to the higher plane, and the
state of matter corresponding to such a point of transition must certainly
possess special and not readily discoverable properties. Such "Seven
Neutral Centres,"* then, are produced by Fohat, who, when, as Milton has
it --
"Fair foundations (are) laid
whereon to build . . ."
quickens matter into activity and
evolution.
The Primordial Atom (anu) cannot be
multiplied either in its pregenetic state, or its primogeneity; therefore it is
called "SUM TOTAL," figuratively, of course, as that "SUM
TOTAL" is boundless. (See Addendum to this Book.) That which is the abyss
of nothingness to the physicist, who knows only the world of visible causes and
effects, is the boundless Space of the Divine Plenum to the Occultist. Among
many other objections to the doctrine of an endless evolution and re-involution
(or re-absorption) of the Kosmos, a process which, according to the Brahminical
and Esoteric Doctrine, is without a beginning or an end, the Occultist is told
that it cannot be, since "by all the admissions of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Such, we believe, is the name
applied by Mr. Keely, of Philadelphia, the inventor of the famous
"Motor" -- destined, as his admirers have hoped, to revolutionise the
motor power of the world -- to what he again calls the "Etheric
Centres."
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modern scientific philosophy it is a
necessity of Nature to run down." If the tendency of Nature "to run
down" is to be considered so forcible an objection to Occult Cosmogony,
"How," we may ask, "do your Positivists and Free-thinkers and
Scientists account for the phalanx around us of active stellar systems?"
They had eternity to "run down" in; why, then, is not the Kosmos a
huge inert mass? Even the moon is only hypothetically believed to be a dead
planet, "run down," and astronomy does not seem to be acquainted with
many such dead planets.* The query is unanswerable. But apart from this it must
be noted that the idea of the amount of "transformable energy" in our
little system coming to an end is based purely on the fallacious conception of
a "white-hot, incandescent Sun" perpetually radiating away his heat
without compensation into Space. To this we reply that nature runs down and
disappears from the objective plane, only to re-emerge after a time of rest out
of the subjective and to reascend once more. Our Kosmos and Nature will run
down only to reappear on a more perfect plane after every PRALAYA. The matter
of the Eastern philosophers is not the "matter" and Nature of the
Western metaphysicians. For what is Matter? And above all, what is our
scientific philosophy but that which was so justly and so politely defined by
Kant as "the Science of the limits to our Knowledge"? Where have the
many attempts made by Science to bind, to connect, and define all the phenomena
of organic life by mere physical and chemical manifestations, brought it to? To
speculation generally -- mere soap-bubbles, that burst one after the other
before the men of Science were permitted to discover real facts. All this would
have been avoided, and the progress of knowledge would have proceeded with
gigantic strides, had only Science and its philosophy abstained from accepting
hypotheses on the mere one-sided Knowledge of their Matter.**
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The moon is dead only so far as
regards her inner "principles" -- i.e., psychically and spiritually,
however absurd the statement may seem. Physically, she is only as a
semi-paralysed body may be. She is aptly referred to in Occultism as the
"insane mother," the great sidereal lunatic.
** The instance of Uranus and
Neptune, whose satellites, four and one respectively, revolved, it was thought,
in their orbits from East to West, whereas all the other satellites rotate from
West to East, is a very good one, as showing how unreliable are all a priori
speculations even when based on the strictest mathematical analysis. The famous
hypothesis of the formation of our Solar System out of the nebulous rings, put
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
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If no physical intellect is capable
of counting the grains of sand covering a few miles of sea-shore; or to fathom
the ultimate nature and essence of those grains, palpable and visible on the
palm of the naturalist, how can any materialist limit the laws changing the
conditions and being of the atoms in primordial chaos, or know anything certain
about the capabilities and potency of their atoms and molecules before and
after their formation into worlds? These changeless and eternal molecules --
far thicker in space than the grains on the ocean shore -- may differ in their
constitution along the line of their planes of existence, as the soul-substance
differs from its vehicle, the body. Each atom has seven planes of being or
existence, we are taught; and each plane is governed by its specific laws of
evolution and absorption. Ignorant of any, even approximate, chronological data
from which to start in attempting to decide the age of our planet or the origin
of the solar system, astronomers, geologists, and physicists are drifting with
each new hypothesis farther and farther away from the shores of fact into the
fathomless depths of speculative ontology.* The Law of Analogy in the plan of
structure between the trans-Solar systems and the intra-Solar planets, does not
necessarily bear upon the finite conditions to which every visible body is
subject, in this our plane of being. In Occult Science this law is the first
and most important key to Cosmic physics; but it has to be studied in its
minutest details and, "to be
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] forward by Kant and Laplace, was chiefly based on the above fact that
all the planets revolved in the same direction. It is on this fact,
mathematically demonstrated during the time of Laplace, that this great
astronomer, calculating on the theory of probabilities, offered to bet three
milliards to one that the next planet discovered would have in its system the
same peculiarity of motion Eastward. The immutable laws of scientific
mathematics got "worsted by further experiments and observations," it
was said. This idea of Laplace's mistake prevails generally to this day; but
some astronomers have finally succeeded in demonstrating (?) that the mistake
had been in accepting Laplace's assertion for a mistake; and steps to correct
it without attracting general attention to the bevue are now being taken. Many
such unpleasant surprises are in store for hypotheses of even a purely physical
character. What further disillusions, then, may there not be in questions of a
transcendental, Occult Nature? At any rate, Occultism teaches that the
so-called "reverse rotation" is a fact.
* The Occultists, having most perfect
faith in their own exact records, astronomical and mathematical, calculate the
age of Humanity, and assert that the latter (as separate sexes) has existed in
this Round just 18,618,727 years, as the Brahmanical teachings and even some
Hindu calendars declare.
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turned seven times," before one
comes to understand it. Occult philosophy is the only science that can teach
it. How, then, can anyone hang the truth or the untruth of the Occultist's
proposition that "the Kosmos is eternal in its unconditioned collectivity,
and finite but in its conditioned manifestations" on this one-sided
physical enunciation that "it is a necessity of Nature to run down?"
---------------------
With these verses -- the 4th Sloka of
Stanza VI. -- ends that portion of the Stanzas which relates to the Universal
Cosmogony after the last Mahapralaya or Universal destruction, which, when it
comes, sweeps out of Space every differentiated thing, Gods as atoms, like so
many dry leaves. From this verse onwards, the Stanzas are concerned only with
our Solar System in general, with the planetary chains therein, inferentially,
and with the history of our globe (the 4th and its chain) especially. All the
Stanzas and verses which follow in this Book I. refer only to the evolution of,
and on, our Earth. With regard to the latter, a strange tenet -- strange from
the modern scientific stand-point only, of course -- is held, which ought to be
made known.
But before entirely new and rather
startling theories are presented to the reader, they must be prefaced by a few
words of explanation. This is absolutely necessary, as these theories clash not
only with modern science, but contradict, on certain points, earlier statements
made by other Theosophists, who claim to base their explanations and renderings
of these teachings on the same authority as we do.*
This may give rise to the idea that
there is a decided contradiction between the expounders of the same doctrine;
whereas the difference, in reality, arises from the incompleteness of the
information given to earlier writers, who thus drew some erroneous conclusions
and indulged in premature speculations, in their endeavour to present a
complete system to the public. Thus the reader, who is already a student of
Theosophy, must not be surprised to find in these pages the rectification of
certain statements made in various Theosophical works, and also the explanation
of certain points which have remained obscure, because they were necessarily
left incomplete. Many are the questions upon which even the author of
"Esoteric Buddhism" (the best and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Esoteric Buddhism" and
"Man."
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most accurate of all such works) has
not touched. On the other hand, even he has introduced several mistaken notions
which must now be presented in their true mystic light, as far as the present
writer is capable of doing so.
Let us then make a short break
between the Slokas just explained and those which follow, for the Cosmic
periods which separate them are of immense duration. This will afford us ample
time to take a bird's eye view of some points pertaining to the Secret
Doctrine, which have been presented to the public under a more or less
uncertain and sometimes mistaken light.
-------
A FEW EARLY THEOSOPHICAL
MISCONCEPTIONS CONCERNING PLANETS, ROUNDS, AND MAN.
Among the eleven Stanzas omitted*
there is one which gives a full description of the formation of the planetary
chains one after another, after the first Cosmic and Atomic differentiation had
commenced in the primitive Acosmism. It is idle to speak of "laws arising
when Deity prepares to create" for (a) laws or rather LAW is eternal and
uncreated; and (b) that Deity is Law, and vice versa. Moreover, the one eternal
LAW unfolds everything in the (to be) manifested Nature on a sevenfold
principle; among the rest, the countless circular chains of worlds, composed of
seven globes, graduated on the four lower planes of the world of formation (the
three others belonging to the Archetypal Universe). Out of these seven only
one, the lowest and the most material of those globes, is within our plane or
means of perception, the six others lying outside of it and being therefore
invisible to the terrestrial eye. Every such chain of worlds is the progeny and
creation of another, lower, and dead chain -- its reincarnation, so to say. To
make it clearer: we are told of the planets -- of which seven only were held as
sacred, as being ruled by the highest regents or gods, and not at all because
the ancients knew nothing of the others** -- that each of these, whether known
or unknown, is a septenary, as is the chain to which the Earth belongs (see
"Esoteric
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See the note which follows the
Commentary on the preceding page, and also the summary of the Stanzas in the
Proem, page 22.
** Many more planets are enumerated
in the Secret Books than in modern astronomical works.
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Buddhism"). For instance, all
such planets as Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, etc., etc., or our
Earth, are as visible to us as our globe, probably, is to the inhabitants of
the other planets, if any, because they are all on the same plane; while the
superior fellow-globes of these planets are on other planes quite outside that
of our terrestrial senses. As their relative position is given further on, and
also in the diagram appended to the Comments on Verse 7 of Stanza VI., a few
words of explanation is all that is needed at present. These invisible
companions correspond curiously to that which we call "the principles in
Man." The seven are on three material planes and one spiritual plane,
answering to the three Upadhis (material bases) and one spiritual vehicle
(Vahan) of our seven principles in the human division. If, for the sake of a
clearer mental conception, we imagine the human principles to be arranged as in
the following scheme, we shall obtain the annexed diagram of correspondences:--
HUMAN PRINCIPLES.
(1) Spirit*
(2) Soul
Vehicle of Spirit
(3) Mind
(4) Animal Soul
Upadhi of Mind
(5) Life
(6) Astral Body
Upadhi of Life
(7) Physical Body**
The Upadhi of all the 6 Princ.
PLANETARY DIVISION.
Descending into matter
1
2
3
4 D Our Earth or any (Visible) Planet
Ascending to Spirit
4 D Our Earth or any (Visible) Planet
5
6
7
DIAGRAM I.
[[above is in diagram format in the
original text]]
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* As we are proceeding here from
Universals to Particulars, instead of using the inductive or Aristotelean
method, the numbers are reversed. Spirit is enumerated the first instead of
seventh, as is usually done, but, in truth, ought not to be done.
** Or as usually named after the
manner of Esoteric Buddhism and others: 1, Atma; 2, Buddhi (or Spiritual Soul);
3, Manas (Human Soul); 4, Kama Rupa (Vehicle of Desires and Passions); 5, Linga
Sarira; 6, Prana; 7, Sthula Sarira.
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The dark horizontal lines of the
lower planes are the Upadhis in one case, and the planes in the case of the
planetary chain. Of course, as regards the human principles, the diagram does
not place them quite in order, yet it shows the correspondence and analogy to
which attention is now drawn. As the reader will see, it is a case of descent
into matter, the adjustment -- in both the mystic and the physical senses -- of
the two, and their interblending for the great coming "struggle of
life" that awaits both the entities. "Entity" may be thought a
strange term to use in the case of a globe; but the ancient philosophers, who
saw in the earth a huge "animal," were wiser in their generation than
our modern geologists are in theirs; and Pliny, who called the Earth our kind
nurse and mother, the only element which is not inimical to man, spoke more
truly than Watts, who fancied that he saw in her the footstool of God. For
Earth is only the footstool of man in his ascension to higher regions; the
vestibule --
". . . . . . . to glorious
mansions,
Through which a moving crowd for ever
press."
But this only shows how admirably the
occult philosophy fits everything in Nature, and how much more logical are its
tenets than the lifeless hypothetical speculations of physical science.
Having learned thus much, the mystic
will be better prepared to understand the occult teaching, though every formal
student of modern science may, and probably will, regard it as preposterous
nonsense. The student of occultism, however, holds that the theory at present
under discussion is far more philosophical and probable than any other. It is
more logical, at any rate, than the theory recently advanced which made of the
moon the projection of a portion of our Earth extruded when the latter was but
a globe in fusion, a molten plastic mass.*
It is said that the planetary chains
having their "Days" and their
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Says the author of "Modern
Science and Modern Thought," Mr. Samuel Laing: "The astronomical
conclusions are theories based on data so uncertain, that while in some cases
they give results incredibly short, like that of 15 millions of years for the
whole past process of formation of the solar system, in others they give
results almost incredibly long, as in that which supposes the moon to have been
thrown off when the Earth was rotating in three hours, while the utmost actual
retardation obtained from observation would require 600 millions of years to
make it rotate in twenty-three hours instead of twenty-four" (p. 48). And
if physicists persist, why should the chronology of the Hindus be laughed at as
exaggerated?
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"Nights" -- i.e., periods
of activity or life, and of inertia or death -- and behave in heaven as do men
on Earth: they generate their likes, get old, and become personally extinct,
their spiritual principles only living in their progeny as a survival of
themselves.
Without attempting the very difficult
task of giving out the whole process in all its cosmic details, enough may be
said to give an approximate idea of it. When a planetary chain is in its last
Round, its Globe 1 or A, before finally dying out, sends all its energy and
"principles" into a neutral centre of latent force, a "laya
centre," and thereby informs a new nucleus of undifferentiated substance
or matter, i.e., calls it into activity or gives it life. Suppose such a
process to have taken place in the lunar "planetary" chain; suppose
again, for argument's sake (though Mr. Darwin's theory quoted below has lately
been upset, even if the fact has not yet been ascertained by mathematical
calculation) that the moon is far older than the Earth. Imagine the six
fellow-globes of the moon -- aeons before the first globe of our seven was
evolved -- just in the same position in relation to each other as the
fellow-globes of our chain occupy in regard to our Earth now. (See in
"Esoteric Buddhism," "The Constitution of Man," and the
"Planetary Chain.") And now it will be easy to imagine further Globe
A of the lunar chain informing Globe A of the terrestrial chain, and -- dying;
Globe B of the former sending after that its energy into Globe B of the new
chain; then Globe C of the lunar, creating its progeny sphere C of the terrene
chain; then the Moon (our Satellite*) pouring forth into
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* She is the satellite, undeniably,
but this does not invalidate the theory that she has given to the Earth all but
her corpse. For Darwin's theory to hold good, besides the hypothesis just upset
(vide last footnote), other still more incongruous speculations had to be
invented. The Moon, it is said, has cooled nearly six times as rapidly as the
Earth (Winchell's "World-Life"): "The Moon, if the earth is
14,000,000 years old since its incrustation, is only eleven and two thirds
millions of years old since that stage . . ." etc. And if our Moon is but
a splash from our Earth, why can no similar inference be established for the
Moons of other planets? The Astronomers "do not know." Why should
Venus and Mercury have no satellites, and by what, when they exist, were they
formed? Because, we say, science has only one key -- the key of matter -- to
open the mysteries of nature withal, while occult philosophy has seven keys and
explains that which science fails to see. Mercury and Venus have no satellites
but they had "parents" just as the earth had. Both are far older than
the Earth and, before the latter reaches her seventh Round, her mother Moon
will have dissolved [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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the lowest globe of our planetary
ring -- Globe D, our Earth -- all its life, energy and powers; and, having
transferred them to a new centre becoming virtually a dead planet, in which
rotation has almost ceased since the birth of our globe. The Moon is now the
cold residual quantity, the shadow dragged after the new body, into which her
living powers and "principles" are transfused. She now is doomed for
long ages to be ever pursuing the Earth, to be attracted by and to attract her
progeny. Constantly vampirised by her child, she revenges herself on it by
soaking it through and through with the nefarious, invisible, and poisoned
influence which emanates from the occult side of her nature. For she is a dead,
yet a living body. The particles of her decaying corpse are full of active and
destructive life, although the body which they had formed is soulless and
lifeless. Therefore its emanations are at the same time beneficent and
maleficent -- this circumstance finding its parallel on earth in the fact that
the grass and plants are nowhere more juicy and thriving than on the graves;
while at the same time it is the graveyard or corpse-emanations, which kill.
And like all ghouls or vampires, the moon is the friend of the sorcerers and
the foe of the unwary. From the archaic aeons and the later times of the
witches of Thessaly, down to some of the present tantrikas of Bengal, her
nature and properties were known to every Occultist, but have remained a closed
book for physicists.
Such is the moon from the
astronomical, geological, and physical standpoints. As to her metaphysical and
psychic nature it must remain an occult secret in this work, as it was in the
volume on "Esoteric Buddhism," notwithstanding the rather sanguine
statement made therein on p. 113 (5th edition) that "there is not much
mystery left now in the riddle of the eighth sphere." These are topics,
indeed, "on which the adepts are very reserved in their communications to
uninitiated pupils," and since they have, moreover, never sanctioned or
permitted any published speculations upon them, the less said the better.
Yet without treading upon the
forbidden ground of the "eighth sphere," it may be useful to state
some additional facts with regard to ex-monads of the lunar chain -- the
"lunar ancestors" -- as they play a
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] into thin air, as the "Moons" of the other planets have, or
have not, as the case may be, since there are planets which have several moons
-- a mystery again which no OEdipus of astronomy has solved.
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leading part in the coming
Anthropogenesis. This brings us directly to the septenary constitution of man;
and as some discussion has arisen of late about the best classification to be
adopted for the division of the microcosmic entity, two systems are now
appended with a view to facilitate comparison. The subjoined short article is
from the pen of Mr. T. Subba Row, a learned Vedantin scholar. He prefers the
Brahmanical division of the Raja Yoga, and from a metaphysical point of view he
is quite right. But, as it is a question of simple choice and expediency, we
hold in this work to the "time-honoured" classification of the
trans-Himalayan "Arhat Esoteric School." The following table and its
explanatory text are reprinted from the "Theosophist" of Madras, and
they are also contained in "Five Years of Theosophy":--
SEPTENARY DIVISION IN DIFFERENT
INDIAN SYSTEMS.
"We give below in a tabular form
the classifications adopted by the Buddhist and Vedantic teachers of the
principles of man:--
CLASSIFICATION IN ESOTERIC BUDDHISM.
1. Sthula Sarira.
2. Prana.**
3. The vehicle of Prana.***
4. Kama Rupa.
5. Mind
(a) Volitions and feelings, etc.
(b) Vignanam.
6. Spiritual Soul.*****
7. Atma.
VEDANTIC CLASSIFICATION.
[[1.]] Annamaya kosa.*
[[2., 3.]] Pranamaya kosa.
[[4., 5.(a)]] Manomaya kosa.
[[5.(b)]] Vignanamaya kosa.
[[6.]] Anandamaya kosa.
[[7.]] Atma.
CLASSIFICATION IN TARAKA RAJA YOGA
[[1., 2.]] Sthulopadhi.****
[[5.(a), (b)]] Sukshmopadhi.
[[6.]] Karanopadhi.
[[7.]] Atma.
[[above is in table format in the
original text.]]
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Kosa (kosha) is "Sheath"
literally, the sheath of every principle.
** "Life."
*** The astral body or Linga Sarira.
**** Sthula-Upadhi, or basis of the
principle.
***** Buddhi.
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From the foregoing table it will be
seen that the third principle in the Buddhist classification is not separately
mentioned in the Vedantic division, as it is merely the vehicle of Prana. It
will also be seen that the Fourth principle is included in the third Kosa
(Sheath), as the same principle is but the vehicle of will-power, which is but
an energy of the mind. It must also be noticed that the Vignanamaya Kosa is
considered to be distinct from the Manomaya Kosa, as a division is made after
death between the lower part of the mind, as it were, which has a closer
affinity with the fourth principle than with the sixth; and its higher part,
which attaches itself to the latter, and which is, in fact, the basis for the
higher spiritual individuality of man.
We may also here point out to our
readers that the classification mentioned in the last column is, for all
practical purposes, connected with Raja Yoga, the best and simplest. Though
there are seven principles in man, there are but three distinct Upadhis
(bases), in each of which his Atma may work independently of the rest. These
three Upadhis can be separated by an Adept without killing himself. He cannot
separate the seven principles from each other without destroying his
constitution."
The student will now be better
prepared to see that between the three Upadhis of the Raja Yoga and its Atma,
and our three Upadhis, Atma, and the additional three divisions, there is in
reality but very little difference. Moreover, as every adept in cis-Himalayan
or trans-Himalayan India, of the Patanjali, the Aryasanga or the Mahayana
schools, has to become a Raja Yogi, he must, therefore, accept the Taraka Raja
classification in principle and theory whatever classification he resorts to
for practical and occult purposes. Thus, it matters very little whether one
speaks of the three Upadhis with their three aspects and Atma, the eternal and
immortal synthesis, or calls them the "seven principles."
For the benefit of those who may not
have read, or, if they have, may not have clearly understood, in Theosophical
writings, the doctrine of the septenary chains of worlds in the Solar Kosmos,
the teaching is briefly thus:--
1. Everything in the metaphysical as
in the physical Universe is septenary. Hence every sidereal body, every planet,
whether visible
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or invisible, is credited with six
companion globes. (See Diagram No. 3, after verse 6 of this commentary.) The
evolution of life proceeds on these seven globes or bodies from the 1st to the
7th in Seven ROUNDS or Seven Cycles.
2. These globes are formed by a
process which the Occultists call the "rebirth of planetary chains (or
rings)." When the seventh and last Round of one of such rings has been
entered upon, the highest or first globe "A," followed by all the
others down to the last, instead of entering upon a certain time of rest -- or "obscuration,"
as in their previous Rounds -- begins to die out. The "planetary"
dissolution (pralaya) is at hand, and its hour has struck; each globe has to
transfer its life and energy to another planet. (See diagram No. 2 infra,
"The Moon and the Earth.")
3. Our Earth, as the visible
representative of its invisible superior fellow globes, its "lords"
or "principles" (see diagram No. 1), has to live, as have the others,
through seven Rounds. During the first three, it forms and consolidates; during
the fourth it settles and hardens; during the last three it gradually returns
to its first ethereal form: it is spiritualised, so to say.
4. Its Humanity develops fully only
in the Fourth -- our present Round. Up to this fourth Life-Cycle, it is
referred to as "humanity" only for lack of a more appropriate term.
Like the grub which becomes chrysalis and butterfly, Man, or rather that which
becomes man, passes through all the forms and kingdoms during the first Round
and through all the human shapes during the two following Rounds. Arrived on
our Earth at the commencement of the Fourth in the present series of
life-cycles and races, MAN is the first form that appears thereon, being
preceded only by the mineral and vegetable kingdoms -- even the latter having
to develop and continue its further evolution through man. This will be
explained in Book II. During the three Rounds to come, Humanity, like the globe
on which it lives, will be ever tending to reassume its primeval form, that of
a Dhyan Chohanic Host. Man tends to become a God and then -- GOD, like every
other atom in the Universe.
"Beginning so early as with the
2nd round, Evolution proceeds already on quite a different plan. It is only
during the 1st round that (heavenly) man becomes a human being on globe A
(rebecomes) a mineral, a plant, an animal, on globe B and C, etc. The process
changes
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entirely from the second round -- but
you have learned prudence . . . and I advise you to say nothing before the time
for saying it has come. . ." (Extract from the Teacher's letters on
various topics.)
5. Every life-cycle on Globe D (our
Earth)* is composed of seven root-races. They commence with the Ethereal and
end with the spiritual on the double line of physical and moral evolution --
from the beginning of the terrestrial round to its close. (One is a
"planetary round" from Globe A to Globe G, the seventh; the other,
the "globe round," or the terrestrial).
This is very well described in
"Esoteric Buddhism" and needs no further elucidation for the time
being.
6. The first root-race, i.e., the
first "men" on earth (irrespective of form) were the progeny of the
"celestial men," called rightly in Indian philosophy the "Lunar
Ancestors" or the Pitris, of which there are seven classes or Hierarchies.
As all this will be sufficiently explained in the following sections and in
Book II., no more need be said of it here.
But the two works already mentioned,
both of which treat of subjects from the occult doctrine, need particular
notice. "Esoteric Buddhism" is too well known in Theosophical
circles, and even to the outside world, for it to be necessary to enter at length
upon its merits here. It is an excellent book, and has done still more
excellent work. But this does not alter the fact that it contains some mistaken
notions, and that it has led many Theosophists and lay-readers to form an
erroneous conception of the Secret Eastern Doctrines. Moreover it seems,
perhaps, a little too materialistic.
"MAN," which came later,
was an attempt to present the archaic doctrine from a more ideal standpoint, to
translate some visions in and from the Astral Light, to render some teachings
partly gathered from a Master's thoughts, but unfortunately misunderstood. This
work also speaks of the evolution of the early Races of men on Earth, and
contains some excellent pages of a philosophical character. But so far it is
only an interesting little mystical romance. It has failed in its mission,
because the conditions required for a correct translation of these visions were
not present. Hence the reader must not wonder if our Volumes contradict these
earlier descriptions in several particulars.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* We are not concerned with the other
Globes in this work except incidentally.
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Esoteric "Cosmogony" in
general, and the evolution of the human Monad especially, differ so essentially
in these two books and in other Theosophical works written independently by
beginners, that it becomes impossible to proceed with the present work without
special mention of these two earlier volumes, for both have a number of
admirers -- "Esoteric Buddhism" especially. The time has arrived for
the explanation of some matters in this direction. Mistakes have now to be
checked by the original teachings and corrected. If one of the said works has
too pronounced a bias toward materialistic science, the other is decidedly too
idealistic, and is, at times, fantastic.
From the doctrine -- rather
incomprehensible to western minds -- which deals with the periodical
"obscurations" and successive "Rounds" of the Globes along
their circular chains, were born the first perplexities and misconceptions. One
of such has reference to the "Fifth-" and even
"Sixth-Rounders." Those who knew that a Round was preceded and
followed by a long Pralaya, a pause of rest which created an impassable gulf
between two Rounds until the time came for a renewed cycle of life, could not
understand the "fallacy" of talking about "fifth and sixth
Rounders" in our Fourth Round. Gautama Buddha, it was held, was a
Sixth-Rounder, Plato and some other great philosophers and minds,
"Fifth-Rounders." How could it be? One Master taught and affirmed that
there were such "Fifth-Rounders" even now on Earth; and though
understood to say that mankind was yet "in the Fourth Round," in
another place he seemed to say that we were in the Fifth. To this an
"apocalyptic answer" was returned by another Teacher:-- "A few
drops of rain do not make a Monsoon, though they presage it." . . .
"No, we are not in the Fifth Round, but Fifth Round men have been coming
in for the last few thousand years." This was worse than the riddle of the
Sphinx! Students of Occultism subjected their brains to the wildest work of
speculation. For a considerable time they tried to outvie OEdipus and reconcile
the two statements. And as the Masters kept as silent as the stony Sphinx
herself, they were accused of inconsistency, "contradiction," and "discrepancies."
But they were simply allowing the speculations to go on, in order to teach a
lesson which the Western mind sorely needs. In their conceit and arrogance, as
in their habit of materializing every metaphysical conception and term without
allowing any margin for Eastern
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metaphor and allegory, the
Orientalists have made a jumble of the Hindu exoteric philosophy, and the
Theosophists were now doing the same with regard to esoteric teachings. To this
day it is evident that the latter have utterly failed to understand the meaning
of the term "Fifth and Sixth Rounders." But it is simply this: every
"Round" brings about a new development and even an entire change in
the mental, psychic, spiritual and physical constitution of man, all these
principles evoluting on an ever ascending scale. Thence it follows that those
persons who, like Confucius and Plato, belonged psychically, mentally and
spiritually to the higher planes of evolution, were in our Fourth Round as the
average man will be in the Fifth Round, whose mankind is destined to find
itself, on this scale of Evolution, immensely higher than is our present
humanity. Similarly Gautama Buddha -- Wisdom incarnate -- was still higher and
greater than all the men we have mentioned, who are called Fifth Rounders,
while Buddha and Sankaracharya are termed Sixth Rounders, allegorically. Thence
again the concealed wisdom of the remark, pronounced at the time
"evasive" -- that a few drops of rain do not make the Monsoon, though
they presage it."
And now the truth of the remark made
in "Esoteric Buddhism" by its author will be fully apparent:--
"It is impossible, when the
complicated facts of an entirely unfamiliar science are being presented to
untrained minds for the first time, to put them forward with all their
appropriate qualifications . . . and abnormal developments. . . . We must be
content to take the broad rules first and deal with the exceptions afterwards,
and especially is this the case with study, in connection with which the
traditional methods of teaching, generally followed, aim at impressing every
fresh idea on the memory by provoking the perplexity it at last relieves."
As the author of the remark was
himself, as he says, "an untrained mind" in Occultism, his own
inferences, and his better knowledge of modern astronomical speculations than
of archaic doctrines led him quite naturally, and as unconsciously to himself,
to commit a few mistakes of detail rather than of any "broad rule."
One such will now be noticed. It is a trifling one, still it is calculated to lead
many a beginner into erroneous conceptions. But as the mistaken notions of the
earlier editions were corrected in the annotations of the fifth edition, so the
sixth may be revised and perfected. There were several reasons
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for such mistakes. (1) They were due
to the necessity under which the teachers laboured of giving what were considered
as "evasive answers": the questions being too persistently pressed to
be left unnoticed, while, on the other hand, they could only be partially
answered. (2) This position notwithstanding, the confession that "half a
loaf is better than no bread" was but too often misunderstood and hardly
appreciated as it ought to have been. As a result thereof gratuitous
speculations were sometimes indulged in by the European lay-chelas. Among such
were (a) the "Mystery of the Eighth Sphere" in its relation to the Moon;
and (b) the erroneous statement that two of the superior Globes of the
terrestrial chain were two of our well-known planets: "besides the Earth .
. . there are only two other worlds of our chain which are visible. . . . Mars
and Mercury. . . ." (Esoteric Buddhism; p. 136.)
This was a great mistake. But the
blame for it is to be attached as much to the vagueness and incompleteness of
the Master's answer as to the question of the learner itself, which was equally
vague and indefinite.
It was asked: "What planets, of
those known to ordinary science, besides Mercury, belong to our system of
worlds?" Now if by "System of Worlds" our terrestrial chain or
"string" was intended in the mind of the querist, instead of the
"Solar System of Worlds," as it should have been, then of course the
answer was likely to be misunderstood. For the reply was: "Mars, etc., and
four other planets of which astronomy knows nothing. Neither A, B, nor YZ are
known nor can they be seen through physical means however perfected." This
is plain: (a) Astronomy as yet knows nothing in reality of the planets, neither
the ancient ones, nor those discovered in modern times. (b) No companion
planets from A to Z, i.e., no upper globes of any chain in the Solar System,
can be seen.* As to Mars, Mercury, and "the four other planets," they
bear
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* With the exception of course of all
the planets which come fourth in number, as our earth, the moon, etc., etc.
Copies of all the letters ever received or sent, with the exception of a few
private ones -- "in which there was no teaching" the Master says --
are with the writer. As it was her duty, in the beginning, to answer and
explain certain points not touched upon, it is more than likely that
notwithstanding the many annotations on these copies, the writer, in her
ignorance of English and her fear of saying too much, may have bungled the
information given. She takes the whole blame for it upon herself in any and
every case. But it is impossible for her to allow students to remain any longer
under erroneous impressions, or to believe that the fault lies with the
esoteric system.
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a relation to Earth of which no
master or high Occultist will ever speak, much less explain the nature.*
Let it now be distinctly stated,
then, that the theory broached is impossible, with or without the additional
evidence furnished by modern Astronomy. Physical Science can supply
corroborative, though still very uncertain, evidence, but only as regards
heavenly bodies on the same plane of materiality as our objective Universe.
Mars and Mercury, Venus and Jupiter, like every hitherto discovered planet (or
those still to be discovered), are all, per se, the representatives on our
plane of such chains. As distinctly stated in one of the numerous letters of
Mr. Sinnett's "Teacher," "there are other and innumerable
Manvantaric chains of globes which bear intelligent Beings both in and outside
our solar system." But neither Mars nor Mercury belong to our chain. They
are, along with the other planets, septenary Units in the great host of "chains"
of our system, and all are as visible as their upper globes are invisible.
If it is still argued that certain
expressions in the Teacher's letters were liable to mislead, the answer
comes:-- Amen; so it was. The author of "Esoteric Buddhism"
understood it well when he wrote that such are "the traditional modes of
teaching . . . by provoking the perplexity" . . . they do, or do not
relieve -- as the case may be. At all events, if it is urged that this might
have been explained earlier, and the true nature of the planets given out as
they now are, the answer comes that: "it was not found expedient to do so
at the time, as it would have opened the way to a series of additional
questions which could never be answered on account of their esoteric nature, and
thus would only become embarrassing." It had been declared from the first
and has been repeatedly asserted since that (1st) no Theosophist, not even as
an accepted chela -- let alone lay students -- could expect to have the secret
teachings explained to him thoroughly and completely, before he had
irretrievably pledged himself to the Brotherhood and passed through at least
one initiation, because no figures and numbers could be given to the public,
for figures and numbers are the key to the esoteric system. (2.) That
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In this same letter the
impossibility is distinctly stated:-- . . . "Try to understand that you
are putting me questions pertaining to the highest initiation; that I can give
you (only) a general view, but that I dare not nor will I enter upon details .
. ." wrote one of the Teachers to the author of "Esoteric
Buddhism."
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what was revealed was merely the
esoteric lining of that which is contained in almost all the exoteric
Scriptures of the world-religions -- pre-eminently in the Brahmanas, and the
Upanishads of the Vedas and even in the Puranas. It was a small portion of what
is divulged far more fully now in the present volumes; and even this is very
incomplete and fragmentary.
When the present work was commenced,
the writer, feeling sure that the speculation about Mars and Mercury was a
mistake, applied to the Teachers by letter for explanation and an authoritative
version. Both came in due time, and verbatim extracts from these are now given.
". . . . . It is quite correct
that Mars is in a state of obscuration at present, and Mercury just beginning
to get out of it. You might add that Venus is in her last Round. . . . . . . .
. . . If neither Mercury nor Venus have satellites, it is because of the
reasons . . . (vide footnote supra, where those reasons are given), and also
because Mars has two satellites to which he has no right. . . . . Phobos, the
supposed INNER satellite, is no satellite at all. As remarked long ago by
Laplace and now by Faye (see COMPTES RENDUS, Tome XC., p. 569), Phobos keeps a
too short periodic time, and therefore there 'must exist some defect in the
mother idea of the theory' as Faye justly observes. . . . . Again, both (Mars
and Mercury) are septenary chains, as independent of the Earth's sidereal lords
and superiors as you are independent of the 'principles' of Daumling (Tom
Thumb) -- which were perhaps his six brothers, with or without night-caps. . .
. . . . . . . 'Gratification of curiosity is the end of knowledge for some
men,' was said by Bacon, who was as right in postulating this truism, as those
who were familiar with it before him were right in hedging off WISDOM from
Knowledge, and tracing limits to that which is to be given out at one time. . .
. Remember:--
'. . . . . . . . . . . knowledge
dwells
In heads replete with thoughts of
other men,
Wisdom in minds attentive to their
own. . . .'
You can never impress it too
profoundly on the minds of those to whom you impart some of the esoteric
teachings. . ."
Again, here are more extracts from
another letter written by the same authority. This time it is in answer to some
objections laid before the Teachers. They are based upon extremely scientific,
and as
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futile, reasonings about the
advisability of trying to reconcile the Esoteric theories with the speculations
of Modern Science, and were written by a young Theosophist as a warning against
the "Secret Doctrine" and in reference to the same subject. He had
declared that if there were such companion Earths "they must be only a wee
bit less material than our globe." How then was it that they could not be
seen? The answer was:--
". . . . Were psychic and
spiritual teachings more fully understood, it would become next to impossible
to even imagine such an incongruity. Unless less trouble is taken to reconcile
the irreconcileable -- that is to say, the metaphysical and spiritual sciences
with physical or natural philosophy, 'natural' being a synonym to them (men of
science) of that matter which falls under the perception of their corporeal
senses -- no progress can be really achieved. Our Globe, as taught from the
first, is at the bottom of the arc of descent, where the matter of our
perceptions exhibits itself in its grossest form. . . . . . . Hence it only
stands to reason that the globes which overshadow our Earth must be on
different and superior planes. In short, as Globes, they are in CO-ADUNITION
but not IN CONSUBSTANTIALITY WITH OUR EARTH and thus pertain to quite another
state of consciousness. Our planet (like all those we see) is adapted to the
peculiar state of its human stock, that state which enables us to see with our
naked eye the sidereal bodies which are co-essential with our terrene plane and
substance, just as their respective inhabitants, the Jovians, Martians and
others can perceive our little world: because our planes of consciousness,
differing as they do in degree but being the same in kind, are on the same
layer of differentiated matter. . . . . What I wrote was 'The minor Pralaya
concerns only our little STRINGS OF GLOBES.' (We called chains 'Strings' in
those days of lip-confusion.) . . . 'To such a string our Earth belongs.' This
ought to have shown plainly that the other planets were also 'strings' or
CHAINS. . . If he (meaning the objector) would perceive even the dim silhouette
of one of such 'planets' on the higher planes, he has to first throw off even
the thin clouds of the astral matter that stands between him and the next
plane. . . . ."
It becomes patent why we could not
perceive, even with the help of the best earthly telescopes, that which is
outside our world of matter. Those alone, whom we call adepts, who know how to
direct their mental vision and to transfer their consciousness -- physical and
psychic both --
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to other planes of being, are able to
speak with authority on such subjects. And they tell us plainly:--
"Lead the life necessary for the
acquisition of such knowledge and powers, and Wisdom will come to you
naturally. Whenever your are able to attune your consciousness to any of the
seven chords of 'Universal Consciousness,' those chords that run along the
sounding-board of Kosmos, vibrating from one Eternity to another; when you have
studied thoroughly 'the music of the Spheres,' then only will you become quite
free to share your knowledge with those with whom it is safe to do so.
Meanwhile, be prudent. Do not give out the great Truths that are the
inheritance of the future Races, to our present generation. Do not attempt to
unveil the secret of being and non-being to those unable to see the hidden
meaning of Apollo's HEPTACHORD -- the lyre of the radiant god, in each of the
seven strings of which dwelleth the Spirit, Soul and Astral body of the Kosmos,
whose shell only has now fallen into the hands of Modern Science. . . . . . Be
prudent, we say, prudent and wise, and above all take care what those who learn
from you believe in; lest by deceiving themselves they deceive others . . . . .
for such is the fate of every truth with which men are, as yet, unfamiliar. . .
. Let rather the planetary chains and other super- and sub-cosmic mysteries
remain a dreamland for those who can neither see, nor yet believe that others
can. . . ."
It is to be regretted that few of us
have followed the wise advice; and that many a priceless pearl, many a jewel of
wisdom, has been cast to an enemy unable to understand its value and who has
turned round and rent us.
" 'Let us imagine,' wrote the
same Master to his two 'lay chelas,' as he called the author of 'Esoteric
Buddhism' and another gentleman, his co-student for some time -- 'let us
imagine THAT OUR EARTH IS ONE OF A GROUP OF SEVEN PLANETS OR MAN-BEARING
WORLDS. . . . . . (The SEVEN planets are the sacred planets of antiquity, and
are all septenary.) Now the life-impulse reaches A, or rather that which is
destined to become A, and which so far is but cosmic dust (a "laya
centre") . . etc.' "
In these early letters, in which the
terms had to be invented and words coined, the "Rings" very often
became "Rounds," and the "Rounds" life-cycles, and vice
versa. To a correspondent who called a "Round" a
"World-Ring," the Teacher wrote: "I believe this will lead to a
further confusion. A Round we are agreed to call the passage
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of a monad from Globe A to Globe G or
Z. . . The 'World-Ring' is correct. . . Advise Mr. . . . strongly, to agree
upon a nomenclature before going any further. . . "
Notwithstanding this agreement, many
mistakes, owing to this confusion, crept into the earliest teachings. The Races
even were occasionally mixed up with the "Rounds" and
"Rings," and led to similar mistakes in "Man." From the
first the Master had written --
"Not being permitted to give you
the whole truth, or divulge the number of isolated fractions . . . I am unable
to satisfy you."
This in answer to the questions,
"If we are right, then the total existence prior to the man-period is
637," etc., etc. To all the queries relating to figures, the reply was,
"Try to solve the problem of 777 incarnations. . . . Though I am obliged
to withhold information . . . yet if you should work out the problem by
yourself, it will be my duty to tell you so."
But they never were so worked out,
and the results were -- never-ceasing perplexity and mistakes.
Even the teaching about the Septenary
constitution of the sidereal bodies and of the macrocosm -- from which the
septenary division of the microcosm, or Man -- has until now been among the
most esoteric. In olden times it used to be divulged only at the Initiation and
along with the most sacred figures of the cycles. Now, as stated in one of the
Theosophical journals,* the revelation of the whole system of Cosmogony had not
been contemplated, nor even thought for one moment possible, at a time when a
few bits of information were sparingly given out in answer to letters written by
the author of "Esoteric Buddhism," in which he put forward a
multiplicity of questions. Among these were questions on such problems as no
MASTER, however high and independent he might be, would have the right to
answer, thus divulging to the world the most time-honoured and archaic of the
mysteries of the ancient college-temples. Hence only a few of the doctrines
were revealed in their broad outlines, while details were constantly withheld,
and all the efforts made to elicit more information about them were
systematically eluded from the beginning. This is perfectly natural. Of the
four Vidyas -- out of the seven branches of Knowledge mentioned in the Puranas
-- namely, "Yajna-Vidya" (the performance of religious rites in order
to
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "Lucifer," May, 1888.
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produce certain results);
"Maha-Vidya," the great (Magic) knowledge, now degenerated into
Tantrika worship; "Guhya-Vidya," the science of Mantras and their
true rhythm or chanting, of mystical incantations, etc. -- it is only the last
one, "Atma-Vidya," or the true Spiritual and Divine wisdom, which can
throw absolute and final light upon the teachings of the three first named.
Without the help of Atma-Vidya, the other three remain no better than surface
sciences, geometrical magnitudes having length and breadth, but no thickness.
They are like the soul, limbs, and mind of a sleeping man: capable of
mechanical motions, of chaotic dreams and even sleep-walking, of producing
visible effects, but stimulated by instinctual not intellectual causes, least
of all by fully conscious spiritual impulses. A good deal can be given out and
explained from the three first-named sciences. But unless the key to their
teachings is furnished by Atma-Vidya, they will remain for ever like the
fragments of a mangled text-book, like the adumbrations of great truths, dimly
perceived by the most spiritual, but distorted out of all proportion by those
who would nail every shadow to the wall.
Then, again, another great perplexity
was created in the minds of students by the incomplete exposition of the
doctrine of the evolution of the Monads. To be fully realised, both this
process and that of the birth of the Globes must be examined far more from
their metaphysical aspect than from what one might call a statistical
standpoint, involving figures and numbers which are rarely permitted to be
broadly used. Unfortunately, there are few who are inclined to handle these
doctrines only metaphysically. Even the best of the Western writers upon our
doctrine declares in his work that "on pure metaphysics of that sort we
are not now engaged," when speaking of the evolution of the Monads
("Esoteric Buddhism," p. 46). And in such case, as the Teacher
remarks in a letter to him, "Why this preaching of our doctrines, all this
uphill work and swimming in adversum flumen? Why should the West . . . learn .
. . from the East . . . that which can never meet the requirements of the
special tastes of the aesthetics?" And he draws his correspondent's attention
"to the formidable difficulties encountered by us (the Adepts) in every
attempt we make to explain our metaphysics to the Western mind."
And well he may; for outside of
metaphysics no occult philosophy, no esotericism is possible. It is like trying
to explain the aspirations and affections, the love and hatred, the most
private and sacred workings in
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the soul and mind of the living man,
by an anatomical description of the chest and brain of his dead body.
Let us now examine two tenets
mentioned above and hardly alluded to in "Esoteric Buddhism," and
supplement them as far as lies in our power.
---------------------
ADDITIONAL FACTS AND EXPLANATIONS
CONCERNING THE GLOBES AND THE MONADS.
Two statements made in "Esoteric
Buddhism" must be noticed and the author's opinions quoted. On p. 47
(fifth edition) it is said:--
" . . . the spiritual monads . .
. do not fully complete their mineral existence on Globe A, then complete it on
Globe B, and so on. They pass several times round the whole circle as minerals,
and then again several times round as vegetables, and several times as animals.
We purposely refrain for the present from going into figures," etc., etc.
This was a wise course to adopt in
view of the great secrecy maintained with regard to figures and numbers. This
reticence is now partially relinquished; but it would perhaps have been better
had the real numbers concerning Rounds and evolutional gyrations been either
entirely divulged at the time, or as entirely withheld. Mr. Sinnett understood
this difficulty well when saying (p. 140) that: "For reasons which are not
easy for the outsider to divine, the possessors of occult knowledge are
especially reluctant to give out facts relating to Cosmogony, though it is hard
for the uninitiated to understand why they should be withheld."
That there were such reasons is
evident. Nevertheless, it is to this reticence that most of the confused ideas
of some Eastern as well as Western pupils are due. The difficulties in the way
of the acceptance of the two particular tenets under consideration seemed great,
just because of the absence of any data to go upon. But there it was. For the
figures belonging to the Occult calculations cannot be given -- as the Masters
have many times declared -- outside the circle of pledged chelas, and not even
these can break the rules.
To make things plainer, without
touching upon the mathematical aspects of the doctrine, the teaching given may
be expanded and some obscure
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points solved. As the evolution of
the Globes and that of the Monads are so closely interblended, we will make of
the two teachings one. In reference to the Monads, the reader is asked to bear
in mind that Eastern philosophy rejects the Western theological dogma of a
newly-created soul for every baby born, as being as unphilosophical as it is
impossible in the economy of Nature. There must be a limited number of Monads evolving
and growing more and more perfect through their assimilation of many successive
personalities, in every new Manvantara. This is absolutely necessary in view of
the doctrines of Rebirth, Karma, and the gradual return of the human Monad to
its source -- absolute Deity. Thus, although the hosts of more or less
progressed Monads are almost incalculable, they are still finite, as is
everything in this Universe of differentiation and finiteness.
As shown in the double diagram of the
human "principles" and the ascending Globes of the world-chains,
there is an eternal concatenation of causes and effects, and a perfect analogy
which runs through, and links together, all the lines of evolution. One begets
the other -- globes as personalities. But, let us begin at the beginning.
The general outline of the process by
which the successive planetary chains are formed has just been given. To
prevent future misconceptions, some further details may be offered which will
also throw light on the history of humanity on our own chain, the progeny of
that of the Moon.
In the diagrams on p. 172, Fig. 1
represents the "lunar-chain" of seven planets at the outset of its
seventh or last Round; while Fig. 2 represents the "earth-chain"
which will be, but is not yet in existence. The seven Globes of each chain are
distinguished in their cyclic order by the letters A to G, the Globes of the
Earth-chain being further marked by a cross -- + -- the symbol of the Earth.
Now, it must be remembered that the
Monads cycling round any septenary chain are divided into seven classes or
hierarchies according to their respective stages of evolution, consciousness,
and merit. Let us follow, then, the order of their appearance on planet A, in
the first Round. The time-spaces between the appearances of these hierarchies
on any one Globe are so adjusted that when Class 7, the last, appears on Globe
A, Class 1, the first, has just passed on to Globe B, and so on, step by step,
all round the chain.
Again, in the Seventh Round on the
Lunar chain, when Class 7, the
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last, quits Globe A, that Globe,
instead of falling asleep, as it had done in previous Rounds, begins to die (to
go into its planetary pralaya);* and in dying it transfers successively, as
just said, its "principles," or life-elements and energy, etc., one
after the other to a new "laya-centre," which commences the formation
of Globe A of the Earth Chain. A similar process takes place for each of the
Globes of the "lunar chain" one after the other, each forming a fresh
Globe of the "earth-chain." Our Moon was the fourth Globe of the
series, and was
EARTH CHAIN.
FIG. 2.
A+ G+
B+ F+
C+ E+
D+ (Our Earth)
LUNAR CHAIN.
FIG. 1.
A G
B F
C E
D (Our Moon)
DIAGRAM II.
[[above is in diagram format in the
original text]]
on the same plane of perception as
our Earth. But Globe A of the lunar chain is not fully "dead" till
the first Monads of the first class have passed from Globe G or Z, the last of
the "lunar chain," into the Nirvana
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Occultism divides the periods of
Rest (Pralaya) into several kinds; there is the individual pralaya of each
Globe, as humanity and life pass on to the next; seven minor Pralayas in each
Round; the planetary Pralaya, when seven Rounds are completed; the Solar
Pralaya, when the whole system is at an end; and finally the Universal Maha --
or Brahma -- Pralaya at the close of the "Age of Brahma." These are
the three chief pralayas or "destruction periods." There are many
other minor ones, but with these we are not concerned at present.
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which awaits them between the two
chains; and similarly for all the other Globes as stated, each giving birth to
the corresponding globe of the "earth-chain."
Further, when Globe A of the new
chain is ready, the first class or Hierarchy of Monads from the Lunar chain
incarnate upon it in the lowest kingdom, and so on successively. The result of
this is, that it is only the first class of Monads which attains the human
state of development during the first Round, since the second class, on each
planet, arriving later, has not time to reach that stage. Thus the Monads of
Class 2 reach the incipient human stage only in the Second Round, and so on up
to the middle of the Fourth Round. But at this point -- and on this Fourth
Round in which the human stage will be fully developed -- the "Door"
into the human kingdom closes; and henceforward the number of "human"
Monads, i.e., Monads in the human stage of development, is complete. For the
Monads which had not reached the human stage by this point will, owing to the
evolution of humanity itself, find themselves so far behind that they will
reach the human stage only at the close of the seventh and last Round. They
will, therefore, not be men on this chain, but will form the humanity of a
future Manvantara and be rewarded by becoming "Men" on a higher chain
altogether, thus receiving their Karmic compensation. To this there is but one
solitary exception, for very good reasons, of which we shall speak farther on.
But this accounts for the difference in the races.
It thus becomes apparent how perfect
is the analogy between the processes of Nature in the Kosmos and in the
individual man. The latter lives through his life-cycle, and dies. His
"higher principles," corresponding in the development of a planetary
chain to the cycling Monads, pass into Devachan, which corresponds to the
"Nirvana" and states of rest intervening between two chains. The
Man's lower "principles" are disintegrated in time and are used by
Nature again for the formation of new human principles, and the same process
takes place in the disintegration and formation of Worlds. Analogy is thus the
surest guide to the comprehension of the Occult teachings.
This is one of the "seven
mysteries of the Moon," and it is now revealed. The seven
"mysteries" are called by the Japanese Yamaboosis, the mystics of the
Lao-Tze sect and the ascetic monks of Kioto, the Dzenodoo -- the "seven
jewels." Only the Japanese and the Chinese
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Buddhist ascetics and Initiates are,
if possible, even more reticent in giving out their "Knowledge" than
are the Hindus.
But the reader must not be allowed to
lose sight of the Monads, and must be enlightened as to their nature, as far as
permitted, without trespassing upon the highest mysteries, of which the writer
does not in any way pretend to know the last or final word.
The Monadic Host may be roughly
divided into three great classes:--
1. The most developed Monads (the
Lunar Gods or "Spirits," called, in India, the Pitris), whose
function it is to pass in the first Round through the whole triple cycle of the
mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms in their most ethereal, filmy, and
rudimentary forms, in order to clothe themselves in, and assimilate, the nature
of the newly formed chain. They are those who first reach the human form (if
there can be any form in the realm of the almost subjective) on Globe A in the
first Round. It is they, therefore, who lead and represent the human element during
the second and third Rounds, and finally evolve their shadows at the beginning
of the Fourth Round for the second class, or those who come behind them.
2. Those Monads that are the first to
reach the human stage during the three and a half Rounds, and to become men.*
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* We are forced to use here the
misleading word "Men," and this is a clear proof of how little any
European language is adapted to express these subtle distinctions.
It stands to reason that these
"Men" did not resemble the men of to-day, either in form or nature.
Why then, it may be asked, call them "Men" at all? Because there is
no other term in any Western language which approximately conveys the idea
intended. The word "Men" at least indicates that these beings were
"MANUS," thinking entities, however they differed in form and
intellection from ourselves. But in reality they were, in respect of
spirituality and intellection, rather "gods" than "Men."
The same difficulty of language is
met with in describing the "stages" through which the Monad passes.
Metaphysically speaking, it is of course an absurdity to talk of the
"development" of a Monad, or to say that it becomes "Man."
But any attempt to preserve metaphysical accuracy of language in the use of
such a tongue as the English would necessitate at least three extra volumes of
this work, and would entail an amount of verbal repetition which would be
wearisome in the extreme. It stands to reason that a MONAD cannot either
progress or develop, or even be affected by the changes of states it passes
through. It is not of this world or plane, and may be compared only to an
indestructible star of divine light and fire, thrown down on to our [[Footnote
continued on next page]]
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3. The laggards; the Monads which are
retarded, and which will not reach, by reason of Karmic impediments, the human
stage at all during this cycle or Round, save one exception which will be
spoken of elsewhere as already promised.
Now the evolution of the external
form or body round the astral is produced by the terrestrial forces, just as in
the case of the lower kingdoms; but the evolution of the internal or real MAN
is purely spiritual. It is now no more a passage of the impersonal Monad
through many and various forms of matter -- endowed at best with instinct and
consciousness on quite a different plane -- as in the case of external
evolution, but a journey of the "pilgrim-soul" through various states
of not only matter but Self-consciousness and self-perception, or of perception
from apperception. (See "Gods, Monads and Atoms.")
The MONAD emerges from its state of
spiritual and intellectual unconsciousness; and, skipping the first two planes
-- too near the ABSOLUTE to permit of any correlation with anything on a lower
plane -- it gets direct into the plane of Mentality. But there is no plane in
the whole universe with a wider margin, or a wider field of action in its
almost endless gradations of perceptive and apperceptive qualities, than this
plane, which has in its turn an appropriate smaller plane for every
"form," from the "mineral" monad up to the time when that
monad blossoms forth by evolution into the DIVINE MONAD. But all the time it is
still one and the same Monad, differing only in its incarnations, throughout
its ever succeeding cycles of partial or total obscuration of spirit, or the
partial or total obscuration of matter -- two polar antitheses -- as it ascends
into the realms of mental spirituality, or descends into the depths of
materiality.
To return to "Esoteric
Buddhism." It is there stated with regard to the enormous period
intervening between the mineral epoch on Globe A, and the man-epoch,* that:
"The full development of the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] Earth as a plank of salvation for the personalities in which it
indwells. It is for the latter to cling to it; and thus partaking of its divine
nature, obtain immortality. Left to itself the Monad will cling to no one; but,
like the "plank," be drifted away to another incarnation by the
unresting current of evolution.
* The term "Man epoch" is
here used because of the necessity of giving a name to that fourth kingdom
which follows the animal. But in truth the "Man" on Globe A during
the First Round is no Man, but only his prototype or dimensionless image from
the astral regions.
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mineral epoch on Globe A, prepares
the way for the vegetable development, and, as soon as this begins, the mineral
life-impulse overflows into Globe B. Then, when the vegetable development on
Globe A is complete and the animal development begins, the vegetable
life-impulse overflows to Globe B, and the mineral impulse passes on to Globe
C. Then finally comes the human life-impulse on Globe A." (Page 49.)
And so it goes on for three Rounds,
when it slackens, and finally stops at the threshold of our Globe, at the
Fourth Round; because the human period (of the true physical men to be), the
seventh, is now reached. This is evident, for as said, " . . . there are
processes of evolution which precede the mineral kingdom, and thus a wave of
evolution, indeed several waves of evolution, precede the mineral wave in its
progress round the spheres" (ibid).
And now we have to quote from another
article, "The Mineral Monad" in "Five Years of Theosophy,"
p. 273 et seq.
"There are seven kingdoms. The
first group comprises three degrees of elementals, or nascent centres of forces
-- from the first stage of differentiation of (from) Mulaprakriti (or rather
Pradhana, primordial homogeneous matter) to its third degree -- i.e., from full
unconsciousness to semi-perception; the second or higher group embraces the
kingdoms from vegetable to man; the mineral kingdom thus forming the central or
turning point in the degrees of the "Monadic Essence," considered as
an evoluting energy. Three stages (sub-physical) on the elemental side; the
mineral kingdom; three stages on the objective physical* side -- these are the
(first or preliminary) seven links of the evolutionary chain."
"Preliminary" because they
are preparatory, and though belonging in fact to the natural, they yet would be
more correctly described as sub-natural evolution. This process makes a halt in
its stages at the Third, at the threshold of the Fourth stage, when it becomes,
on the plane of the natural evolution, the first really manward stage, thus
forming with the three elemental kingdoms, the ten, the Sephirothal number. It
is at this point that begins:--
"A descent of spirit into matter
equivalent to an ascent in physical
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "Physical" here means
differentiated for cosmical purposes and work; that "physical side,"
nevertheless, if objective to the apperception of beings from other planes, is
yet quite subjective to us on our plane.
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evolution; a re-ascent from the
deepest depths of materiality (the mineral) towards its status quo ante, with a
corresponding dissipation of concrete organism -- up to Nirvana, the vanishing
point of differentiated matter." ("Five Years of Theosophy," p.
276.)
Therefore it becomes evident why that
which is pertinently called in Esoteric Buddhism "Wave of Evolution,"
and mineral-, vegetable-, animal- and man-"impulse," stops at the
door of our Globe, at its Fourth cycle or Round. It is at this point that the
Cosmic Monad (Buddhi) will be wedded to and become the vehicle of the Atmic
Ray, i.e., it (Buddhi) will awaken to an apperception of it (Atman); and thus
enter on the first step of a new septenary ladder of evolution, which will lead
it eventually to the tenth (counting from the lowest upwards) of the Sephirothal
tree, the Crown.
Everything in the Universe follows
analogy. "As above, so below"; Man is the microcosm of the Universe.
That which takes place on the spiritual plane repeats itself on the Cosmic
plane. Concretion follows the lines of abstraction; corresponding to the
highest must be the lowest; the material to the spiritual. Thus, corresponding
to the Sephirothal Crown (or upper triad) there are the three elemental
Kingdoms, which precede the Mineral (see diagram on p. 277 in Five Years of
Theosophy), and which, using the language of the Kabalists, answer in the
Cosmic differentiation to the worlds of Form and Matter from the
Super-Spiritual to the Archetypal.
Now what is a "Monad?" And
what relation does it bear to an Atom? The following reply is based upon the
explanations given in answer to these questions in the above-cited article:
"The Mineral Monad," written by the author.
"None whatever," is
answered to the second question, "to the atom or molecule as existing in
the scientific conception at present. It can neither be compared with the
microscopic organism, once classed among polygastric infusoria, and now
regarded as vegetable, and classed among Algae; nor is it quite the Monas of
the Peripatetics. Physically or constitutionally the mineral monad differs, of
course, from the human monad, which is neither physical nor can its
constitution be rendered by chemical symbols and elements." In short, as
the spiritual Monad is One, Universal, Boundless and Impartite, whose rays,
nevertheless, form what we, in our ignorance, call the "Individual
Monads" of men,
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so the Mineral Monad -- being at the
opposite point of the circle -- is also One -- and from it proceed the
countless physical atoms, which Science is beginning to regard as
individualized.
Otherwise how could one account for
and explain mathematically the evolutionary and spiral progress of the Four
Kingdoms? The "Monad" is the combination of the last two
"principles" in man, the 6th and the 7th, and, properly speaking, the
term "human monad" applies only to the dual soul (Atma-Buddhi), not
to its highest spiritual vivifying Principle, Atma, alone. But since the
Spiritual Soul, if divorced from the latter (Atma) could have no existence, no
being, it has thus been called . . . . Now the Monadic, or rather Cosmic,
Essence (if such a term be permitted) in the mineral, vegetable, and animal,
though the same throughout the series of cycles from the lowest elemental up to
the Deva Kingdom, yet differs in the scale of progression. It would be very
misleading to imagine a Monad as a separate Entity trailing its slow way in a
distinct path through the lower Kingdoms, and after an incalculable series of
transformations flowering into a human being; in short, that the Monad of a
Humboldt dates back to the Monad of an atom of horneblende. Instead of saying a
"Mineral Monad," the more correct phraseology in physical Science,
which differentiates every atom, would of course have been to call it "the
Monad manifesting in that form of Prakriti called the Mineral Kingdom."
The atom, as represented in the ordinary scientific hypothesis, is not a particle
of something, animated by a psychic something, destined after aeons to blossom
as a man. But it is a concrete manifestation of the Universal Energy which
itself has not yet become individualized; a sequential manifestation of the one
Universal Monas. The ocean (of matter) does not divide into its potential and
constituent drops until the sweep of the life-impulse reaches the evolutionary
stage of man-birth. The tendency towards segregation into individual Monads is
gradual, and in the higher animals comes almost to the point. The Peripatetics
applied the word Monas to the whole Kosmos, in the pantheistic sense; and the
Occultists, while accepting this thought for convenience sake, distinguish the
progressive stages of the evolution of the concrete from the abstract by terms
of which the "Mineral, Vegetable, Animal, (etc.), Monad" are
examples. The term merely means that the tidal wave of spiritual evolution is
passing through that arc of its circuit. The "Monadic
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Essence" begins to imperceptibly
differentiate towards individual consciousness in the Vegetable Kingdom. As the
Monads are uncompounded things, as correctly defined by Leibnitz, it is the
spiritual essence which vivifies them in their degrees of differentiation,
which properly constitutes the Monad -- not the atomic aggregation, which is only
the vehicle and the substance through which thrill the lower and the higher
degrees of intelligence.
Leibnitz conceived of the Monads as
elementary and indestructible units endowed with the power of giving and
receiving with respect to other units, and thus of determining all spiritual
and physical phenomena. It is he who invented the term apperception, which
together with nerve- (not perception, but rather) -- sensation, expresses the
state of the Monadic consciousness through all the Kingdoms up to Man.
Thus it may be wrong on strictly
metaphysical lines to call Atma-Buddhi a MONAD, since in the materialistic view
it is dual and therefore compound. But as Matter is Spirit, and vice versa; and
since the Universe and the Deity which informs it are unthinkable apart from
each other; so in the case of Atma-Buddhi. The latter being the vehicle of the
former, Buddhi stands in the same relation to Atma, as Adam-Kadmon, the
Kabalistic Logos, does to En-Soph, or Mulaprakriti to Parabrahm.
A few words more of the Moon.
What, it may be asked, are the
"Lunar Monads," just spoken of? The description of the seven classes
of Pitris will come later, but now some general explanations may be given. It
must be plain to everyone that they are Monads, who, having ended their
life-cycle on the lunar chain, which is inferior to the terrestrial chain, have
incarnated on this one. But there are some further details which may be added,
though they border too closely on forbidden ground to be treated of fully. The
last word of the mystery is divulged only to the adepts, but it may be stated
that our satellite is only the gross body of its invisible principles. Seeing
then that there are 7 Earths, so there are 7 Moons, the last one alone being
visible; the same for the Sun, whose visible body is called a Maya, a
reflection, just as man's body is. "The real Sun and the real Moon are as
invisible as the real man," says an occult maxim.
And it may be remarked en passant
that those ancients were not so foolish after all who first started the idea of
"the seven moons." For though
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this conception is now taken solely
as an astronomical measure of time, in a very materialised form, yet underlying
the husk there can still be recognised the traces of a profoundly philosophical
idea.
In reality the Moon is only the
satellite of the Earth in one respect, viz., that physically the Moon revolves
round the Earth. But in every other respect it is the Earth which is the
satellite of the Moon, and not vice versa. Startling as the statement may seem
it is not without confirmation from scientific knowledge. It is evidenced by the
tides, by the cyclic changes in many forms of disease which coincide with the
lunar phases; it can be traced in the growth of plants, and is very marked in
the phenomena of human gestation and conception. The importance of the Moon and
its influence on the Earth were recognized in every ancient religion, notably
the Jewish, and have been remarked by many observers of psychical and physical
phenomena. But, so far as Science knows, the Earth's action on the Moon is
confined to the physical attraction, which causes her to circle in her orbit.
And should an objector insist that this fact alone is sufficient evidence that
the Moon is truly the Earth's satellite on other planes of action, one may
reply by asking whether a mother, who walks round and round her child's cradle
keeping watch over the infant, is the subordinate of her child or dependent
upon it; though in one sense she is its satellite, yet she is certainly older
and more fully developed than the child she watches.
It is, then, the Moon that plays the
largest and most important part, as well in the formation of the Earth itself,
as in the peopling thereof with human beings. The "Lunar Monads" or
Pitris, the ancestors of man, become in reality man himself. They are the
"Monads" who enter on the cycle of evolution on Globe A, and who,
passing round the chain of planets, evolve the human form as has just been
shown. At the beginning of the human stage of the Fourth Round on this Globe,
they "ooze out" their astral doubles from the "ape-like"
forms which they had evolved in Round III. And it is this subtle, finer form,
which serves as the model round which Nature builds physical man. These
"Monads" or "divine sparks" are thus the "Lunar"
ancestors, the Pitris themselves. For these "Lunar Spirits" have to
become "Men" in order that their "Monads" may reach a
higher plane of activity and self-consciousness, i.e., the plane of the
Manasa-Putras, those who
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endow the "senseless"
shells, created and informed by the Pitris, with "mind" in the latter
part of the Third Root-Race.
In the same way the
"Monads" or Egos of the men of the seventh Round of our Earth, after
our own Globes A, B, C, D, et seq., parting with their life-energy, will have
informed and thereby called to life other laya-centres destined to live and act
on a still higher plane of being -- in the same way will the Terrene
"Ancestors" create those who will become their superiors.
It now becomes plain that there
exists in Nature a triple evolutionary scheme, for the formation of the three
periodical Upadhis; or rather three separate schemes of evolution, which in our
system are inextricably interwoven and interblended at every point. These are
the Monadic (or spiritual), the intellectual, and the physical evolutions.
These three are the finite aspects or the reflections on the field of Cosmic Illusion
of ATMA, the seventh, the ONE REALITY.
1. The Monadic is, as the name
implies, concerned with the growth and development into still higher phases of
activity of the Monad in conjunction with:--
2. The Intellectual, represented by
the Manasa-Dhyanis (the Solar Devas, or the Agnishwatta Pitris) the
"givers of intelligence and consciousness"* to man and:--
3. The Physical, represented by the
Chhayas of the lunar Pitris, round which Nature has concreted the present
physical body. This body serves as the vehicle for the "growth" (to
use a misleading word) and the transformations through Manas and -- owing to
the accumulation of experiences -- of the finite into the INFINITE, of the
transient into the Eternal and Absolute.
Each of these three systems has its
own laws, and is ruled and guided by different sets of the highest Dhyanis or
"Logoi." Each is represented in the constitution of man, the
Microcosm of the great Macrocosm; and it is the union of these three streams in
him which makes him the complex being he now is.
"Nature," the physical
evolutionary Power, could never evolve intelligence unaided -- she can only
create "senseless forms," as will be seen in our
"ANTHROPOGENESIS." The "Lunar Monads" cannot progress, for
they have not yet had sufficient touch with the forms
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Vide CONCLUSION in Part II. of this
Book.
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created by "Nature" to
allow of their accumulating experiences through its means. It is the
Manasa-Dhyanis who fill up the gap, and they represent the evolutionary power
of Intelligence and Mind, the link between "Spirit" and
"Matter" -- in this Round.
Also it must be borne in mind that
the Monads which enter upon the evolutionary cycle upon Globe A, in the first
Round, are in very different stages of development. Hence the matter becomes
somewhat complicated. . . . Let us recapitulate.
The most developed Monads (the lunar)
reach the human germ-stage in the first Round; become terrestrial, though very
ethereal human beings towards the end of the Third Round, remaining on it (the
globe) through the "obscuration" period as the seed for future
mankind in the Fourth Round, and thus become the pioneers of Humanity at the
beginning of this, the Fourth Round. Others reach the Human stage only during
later Rounds, i.e., in the second, third, or first half of the Fourth Round.
And finally the most retarded of all, i.e., those still occupying animal forms
after the middle turning-point of the Fourth Round -- will not become men at
all during this Manwantara. They will reach to the verge of humanity only at
the close of the seventh Round to be, in their turn, ushered into a new chain
after pralaya -- by older pioneers, the progenitors of humanity, or the
Seed-Humanity (Sishta), viz., the men who will be at the head of all at the end
of these Rounds.
The student hardly needs any further
explanation on the part played by the fourth Globe and the fourth Round in the
scheme of evolution.
From the preceding diagrams, which
are applicable, mutatis mutandis, to Rounds, Globes or Races, it will be seen
that the fourth member of a series occupies a unique position. Unlike the
others, the Fourth has no "sister" Globe on the same plane as itself,
and it thus forms the fulcrum of the "balance" represented by the
whole chain. It is the sphere of final evolutionary adjustments, the world of
Karmic scales, the Hall of Justice, where the balance is struck which
determines the future course of the Monad during the remainder of its
incarnations in the cycle. And therefore it is, that, after this central
turning-point has been passed in the Great Cycle, -- i.e., after the middle
point of the Fourth Race in the Fourth Round on our Globe -- no more Monads can
enter the human kingdom. The door is closed for this Cycle and the balance
struck. For were it otherwise -- had there been a new soul
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created for each of the countless
milliards of human beings that have passed away, and had there been no
reincarnation -- it would become difficult indeed to provide room for the
disembodied "Spirits;" nor could the origin and cause of suffering
ever be accounted for. It is the ignorance of the occult tenets and the
enforcement of false conceptions under the guise of religious education, which
have created materialism and atheism as a protest against the asserted divine
order of things.
The only exceptions to the rule just
stated are the "dumb races," whose Monads are already within the
human stage, in virtue of the fact that these "animals" are later
than, and even half descended from man, their last descendants being the
anthropoid and other apes. These "human presentments" are in truth
only the distorted copies of the early humanity. But this will receive full
attention in the next Book.
As the Commentary, broadly rendered,
says:--
1. "Every form on earth, and
every speck (atom) in Space strives in its efforts towards self-formation to
follow the model placed for it in the ' HEAVENLY MAN.' . . . Its (the atom's)
involution and evolution, its external and internal growth and development,
have all one and the same object -- man; man, as the highest physical and
ultimate form on this earth; the MONAD, in its absolute totality and awakened
condition -- as the culmination of the divine incarnations on Earth."
2. "The Dhyanis (Pitris) are
those who have evolved their BHUTA (doubles) from themselves, which RUPA (form)
has become the vehicle of monads (seventh and sixth principles) that had
completed their cycle of transmigration in the three preceding Kalpas (Rounds).
Then, they (the astral doubles) became the men of the first Human Race of the
Round. But they were not complete, and were senseless."
This will be explained in the Books
that follow. Meanwhile man -- or rather his Monad -- has existed on the earth
from the very beginning of this Round. But, up to our own Fifth Race, the
external shapes which covered those divine astral doubles changed and
consolidated with every sub-race; the form and physical structure of the fauna
changing at the same time, as they had to be adapted to the ever-changing
conditions of life on this globe during the geological periods of its formative
cycle. And thus shall they go on changing with every
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Root Race and every chief sub-race
down to the last one of the Seventh in this Round.
3. "The inner, now concealed,
man, was then (in the beginnings) the external man. The progeny of the Dhyanis
(Pitris), he was 'the son like unto his father.' Like the lotus, whose external
shape assumes gradually the form of the model within itself, so did the form of
man in the beginning evolve from within without. After the cycle in which man
began to procreate his species after the fashion of the present animal kingdom,
it became the reverse. The human foetus follows now in its transformations all
the forms that the physical frame of man had assumed throughout the three
Kalpas (Rounds) during the tentative efforts at Plastic formation around the
monad by senseless, because imperfect, matter, in her blind wanderings. In the
present age, the physical embryo is a plant, a reptile, an animal, before it
finally becomes man, evolving within himself his own ethereal counterpart, in
his turn. In the beginning it was that counterpart (astral man) which, being
senseless, got entangled in the meshes of matter."
But this "man" belongs to
the fourth Round. As shown, the MONAD had passed through, journeyed and been
imprisoned in, every transitional form throughout every kingdom of nature
during the three preceding Rounds. But the monad which becomes human is not the
Man. In this Round -- with the exception of the highest mammals after man, the
anthropoids destined to die out in this our race, when their monads will be
liberated and pass into the astral human forms (or the highest elementals) of
the Sixth* and the Seventh Races, and then into lowest human forms in the fifth
Round -- no units of either of the kingdoms are animated any longer by monads
destined to become human in their next stage, but only by the lower Elementals
of their respective realms.**
The last human Monad incarnated
before the beginning of the 5th
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Nature never repeats herself,
therefore the anthropoids of our day have not existed at any time since the
middle of the Miocene period; when, like all cross breeds, they began to show a
tendency, more and more marked as time went on, to return to the type of their
first parent, the black and yellow gigantic Lemuro-Atlantean. To search for the
"Missing Link" is useless. To the scientists of the closing sixth
Root-race, millions and millions of years hence, our modern races, or rather
their fossils, will appear as those of small insignificant apes -- an extinct
species of the genus homo.
** These "Elementals" will
become human Monads, in their turn, only at the next great planetary
Manvantara.
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Root-Race.* The cycle of
metempsychosis for the human monad is closed, for we are in the Fourth Round
and the Fifth Root-Race. The reader will have to bear in mind -- at any rate
one who has made himself acquainted with "Esoteric Buddhism" -- that
the Stanzas which follow in this Book and Book II speak of the evolution in our
Fourth Round only. The latter is the cycle of the turning-point, after which,
matter,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Such anthropoids form an exception
because they were not intended by Nature, but are the direct product and
creation of "senseless" man. The Hindus give a divine origin to the
apes and monkeys because the men of the Third Race were gods from another plane
who had become "senseless" mortals. This subject had already been
touched upon in "Isis Unveiled" twelve years ago as plainly as was
then possible. On pp. 278-279, the reader is referred "to the Brahmins, if
he would know the reason of the regard they have for the monkeys. For then he
(the reader) would perhaps learn -- were the Brahman to judge him worthy of an
explanation -- that the Hindu sees in the ape but what Manu desired he should:
the transformation of species most directly connected with that of the human
family, a bastard branch engrafted on their own stock before the final
perfection of the latter. He might learn, further, that in the eyes of the
educated 'heathen' the spiritual or inner man is one thing, and his terrestrial
physical casket another. That physical nature, the great combination of
physical correlations of forces, ever creeping onward towards perfection, has
to avail herself of the material at hand; she models and remodels as she
proceeds, and finishing her crowning work in man, presents him alone as a fit
tabernacle for the overshadowing of the divine Spirit."
Moreover, a German scientific work is
mentioned in a footnote on the same page. It says that a Hanoverian scientist
had recently published a Book entitled "Ueber die Auflosung der Arten
durch Naturliche Zucht-wahl," in which he shows, with great ingenuity,
that Darwin was wholly mistaken in tracing man back to the ape. On the
contrary, he maintains that it is the ape which is evolved from man. He shows
that, in the beginning, mankind were morally and physically the types and
prototypes of our present Race, and of our human dignity, by their beauty of
form, regularity of feature, cranial development, nobility of sentiments,
heroic impulses, and grandeur of ideal conception. This is a purely Brahmanic,
Buddhistic and Kabalistic philosophy. The Book is copiously illustrated with
diagrams, tables, etc. It asserts that the gradual debasement and degradation
of man, morally and physically, can be readily traced throughout the
ethnological transformation down to our time. And, as one portion has already
degenerated into apes, so the civilized man of the present day will at last,
under the action of the inevitable law of necessity, be also succeeded by like
descendants. If we may judge of the future by the actual Present, it certainly
does seem possible that so unspiritual and materialistic a body should end as
Simia rather than as Seraphs. But though the apes descend from man, it is
certainly not the fact that the human Monad, which has once reached the level
of humanity, ever incarnates again in the form of an animal.
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having reached its lowest depths,
begins to strive onward and to get spiritualized with every new Race and with
every fresh cycle. Therefore the student must take care not to see
contradiction where there is none, as in "Esoteric Buddhism" Rounds
are spoken of in general, while here only the Fourth, or our present Round, is
meant. Then it was the work of formation; now it is that of reformation and
evolutionary perfection.
Finally, to close this chapter anent
various, but unavoidable misconceptions, we must refer to a statement in
"Esoteric Buddhism" which has produced a very fatal impression upon
the minds of many Theosophists. One unfortunate sentence from the work just
referred to is constantly brought forward to prove the materialism of the
doctrine. On p. 48, 5th Edition, the Author, referring to the progress of
organisms on the Globes, says that "the mineral kingdom will no more
develop the vegetable . . . than the Earth was able to develop man from the
ape, till it received an impulse."
Whether this sentence renders
literally the thought of the author, or is simply (as we believe it is) a
lapsus calami, may remain an open question.
It is really with surprise that we
have ascertained the fact that "Esoteric Buddhism" was so little
understood by some Theosophists, as to have led them into the belief that it
thoroughly supported Darwinian evolution, and especially the theory of the
descent of man from a pithecoid ancestor. As one member writes: "I suppose
you realise that three-fourths of Theosophists and even outsiders imagine that,
as far as the evolution of man is concerned, Darwinism and Theosophy kiss one
another." Nothing of the kind was ever realised, nor is there any great
warrant for it, so far as we know, in "Esoteric Buddhism." It has
been repeatedly stated that evolution as taught by Manu and Kapila was the
groundwork of the modern teachings, but neither Occultism nor Theosophy has
ever supported the wild theories of the present Darwinists -- least of all the
descent of man from an ape. Of this, more hereafter. But one has only to turn
to p. 47 of "Esoteric Buddhism," 5th edition, to find there the
statement that "Man belongs to a kingdom distinctly separate from that of
the animals." With such a plain and unequivocal statement before him, it
is very strange that any careful student should have been so misled unless he
is prepared to charge the author with a gross contradiction.
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Every Round repeats on a higher scale
the evolutionary work of the preceding Round. With the exception of some higher
anthropoids, as just mentioned, the Monadic inflow, or inner evolution, is at
an end till the next Manvantara. It can never be too often repeated, that the
full-blown human Monads have to be first disposed of, before the new crop of
candidates appears on this Globe at the beginning of the next cycle. Thus there
is a lull; and this is why, during the Fourth Round, man appears on Earth
earlier than any animal creation, as will be described.
But it is still urged that the author
of "Esoteric Buddhism" has "preached Darwinism" all along.
Certain passages would undoubtedly seem to lend countenance to this inference.
Besides which the Occultists themselves are ready to concede partial
correctness to the Darwinian hypothesis, in later details, bye-laws of
Evolution, and after the midway point of the Fourth Race. Of that which has
taken place, physical science can really know nothing, for such matters lie
entirely outside of its sphere of investigation. But what the Occultists have
never admitted, nor will they ever admit, is that man was an ape in this or in
any other Round; or that he ever could be one, however much he may have been
"ape-like." This is vouched for by the very authority from whom the
author of "Esoteric Buddhism" got his information.
Thus to those who confront the
Occultists with these lines from the above-named volume: "It is enough to
show that we may as reasonably -- and that we must, if we would talk about
these matters at all -- conceive a life-impulse giving birth to mineral form,
as of the same sort of impulse concerned to raise a race of apes into a race of
rudimentary men." To those who bring this passage forward as showing
"decided Darwinism," the Occultists answer by pointing to the
explanation of the Master (Mr. Sinnett's "teacher") which would
contradict these lines, were they written in the spirit attributed to them. A
copy of this letter was sent to the writer, together with others, two years ago
(1886), with additional marginal remarks, to quote from, in the "Secret
Doctrine." It begins by considering the difficulty experienced by the
Western student, in reconciling some facts, previously given, with the
evolution of man from the animal, i.e., from the mineral, vegetable and animal
kingdoms, and advises the student to hold to the doctrine of analogy and
correspondences. Then it touches upon the mystery of the Devas,
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and even Gods, having to pass through
states which it was agreed to refer to as "Inmetallization, Inherbation,
Inzoonization and finally Incarnation," and explains this by hinting at
the necessity of failures even in the ethereal races of Dhyan Chohans.
Concerning this it says:
"Still, as these 'failures' are
too far progressed and spiritualized to be thrown back forcibly from Dhyan
Chohanship into the vortex of a new primordial evolution through the lower
kingdoms. . . . ." After which only a hint is given about the mystery
contained in the allegory of the fallen Asuras, which will be expanded and
explained in Book II. When Karma has reached them at the stage of human
evolution, "they will have to drink it to the last drop in the bitter cup
of retribution. Then they become an active force and commingle with the
Elementals, the progressed entities of the pure animal kingdom, to develop
little by little the full type of humanity."
These Dhyan Chohans, as we see, do
not pass through the three kingdoms as do the lower Pitris; nor do they
incarnate in man until the Third Root Race. Thus, as the teaching stands:
"Man in the First Round and
First Race on Globe D, our Earth, was an ethereal being (a Lunar Dhyani, as
man), non-intelligent but superspiritual; and correspondingly, on the law of
analogy, in the First Race of the Fourth Round. In each of the subsequent races
and sub-races . . . he grows more and more into an encased or incarnate being,
but still preponderatingly ethereal. . . . He is sexless, and, like the animal
and vegetable he develops monstrous bodies correspondential with his coarser
surroundings.
"II. Round. He (Man) is still
gigantic and ethereal but growing firmer and more condensed in body, a more
physical man. Yet still less intelligent than spiritual (1), for mind is a
slower and more difficult evolution than is the physical frame . . .
"III. Round. He has now a
perfectly concrete or compacted body, at first the form of a giant-ape, and now
more intelligent, or rather cunning, than spiritual. For, on the downward arc,
he has now reached a point where his primordial spirituality is eclipsed and
overshadowed by nascent mentality (2). In the last half of the Third Round his
gigantic stature decreases, and his body improves in texture, and he becomes a
more rational being, though still more an ape than a
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Deva. . . . (All this is almost
exactly repeated in the third Root-Race of the Fourth Round.)
"IV. Round. Intellect has an
enormous development in this Round. The (hitherto) dumb races acquire our
(present) human speech on this globe, on which, from the Fourth Race, language
is perfected and knowledge increases. At this half-way point of the Fourth Round
(as of the Fourth Root, or Atlantean, race) humanity passes the axial point of
the minor Manvantara cycle . . . . the world teeming with the results of
intellectual activity and spiritual decrease . . . ."
This is from the authentic letter;
what follows are the later remarks and additional explanations traced by the
same hand in the form of footnotes.
(1.) " . . . The original letter
contained general teaching -- a 'bird's eye view' -- and particularized
nothing. . . . To speak of 'physical man' while limiting the statement to the
early Rounds would be drifting back to the miraculous and instantaneous 'coats
of skin.' . . . The first 'Nature,' the first 'body,' the first 'mind' on the
first plane of perception, on the first Globe in the first Round, is what was
meant. For Karma and evolution have --
' . . . centred in our make such
strange extremes!
From different Natures* marvellously
mixed . . .'
(2.) "Restore: he has now
reached the point (by analogy, and as the Third Root Race in the Fourth Round)
where his ("the angel"-man's) primordial spirituality is eclipsed and
overshadowed by nascent human mentality, and you have the true version on your
thumb-nail. . . ."
These are the words of the Teacher --
text, words and sentences in brackets, and explanatory footnotes. It stands to
reason that there must be an enormous difference in such terms as
"objectivity" and "subjectivity," "materiality"
and "spirituality," when the same terms are applied to different
planes of being and perception. All this must be taken in its relative sense.
And therefore there is little to be wondered at, if, left to his own
speculations, an author, however eager to learn, yet quite inexperienced in
these abstruse teachings, has fallen
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Natures of the seven
hierarchies or classes of Pitris and Dhyan Chohans which compose our nature and
Bodies are here meant.
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into an error. Neither was the
difference between the "Rounds" and the "Races"
sufficiently defined in the letters received, nor was there anything of the
kind required before, as the ordinary Eastern disciple would have found out the
difference in a moment. Moreover, to quote from a letter of the Master's
(188-), "the teachings were imparted under protest. . . . They were, so to
say, smuggled goods . . . and when I remained face to face with only one
correspondent, the other, Mr. . . . ., had so far tossed all the cards into
confusion, that little remained to be said without trespassing upon law."
Theosophists, "whom it may concern," will understand what is meant.
The outcome of all this is that
nothing had ever been said in the "letters" to warrant the assurance
that the Occult doctrine has ever taught, or any Adept believed in, the
preposterous modern theory of the descent of man from a common ancestor with
the ape -- an anthropoid of the actual animal kind, unless metaphorically. To
this day the world is more full of "ape-like men" than the woods are
of "men-like apes." The ape is sacred in India because its origin is
well known to the Initiates, though concealed under a thick veil of allegory.
Hanuman is the son of Pavana (Vayu, "the god of the wind") by Anjana,
a monster called Kesari, though his genealogy varies. The reader who bears this
in mind will find in Book II. passim, the whole explanation of this ingenious
allegory. The "Men" of the Third Race (who separated) were
"Gods" by their spirituality and purity, though senseless, and as yet
destitute of mind, as men.
These "Men" of the Third
Race -- the ancestors of the Atlanteans -- were just such ape-like,
intellectually senseless giants as were those beings, who, during the Third
Round, represented Humanity. Morally irresponsible, it was these third Race
"men" who, through promiscuous connection with animal species lower
than themselves, created that missing link which became ages later (in the
tertiary period only) the remote ancestor of the real ape as we find it now in
the pithecoid family.*
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* And if this is found clashing with
that other statement which shows the animal later than man, then the reader is
asked to bear in mind that the placental mammal only is meant. In those days
there were animals of which zoology does not even dream in our own; and the modes
of reproduction were not identical with the notions which modern physiology has
upon the subject. It is not altogether convenient to touch upon such questions
in public, but there is no contradiction or impossibility in this whatever.
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Thus the earlier teachings, however
unsatisfactory, vague and fragmentary, did not teach the evolution of
"man" from the "ape." Nor does the author of "Esoteric
Buddhism" assert it anywhere in his work in so many words; but, owing to
his inclination towards modern science, he uses language which might perhaps
justify such an inference. The man who preceded the Fourth, the Atlantean race,
however much he may have looked physically like a "gigantic ape" --
"the counterfeit of man who hath not the life of a man" -- was still
a thinking and already a speaking man. The "Lemuro-Atlantean" was a
highly civilized race, and if one accepts tradition, which is better history
than the speculative fiction which now passes under that name, he was higher
than we are with all our sciences and the degraded civilization of the day: at
any rate, the Lemuro-Atlantean of the closing Third Race was so.
And now we may return to the Stanzas.
-------
STANZA VI. -- Continued.
5. AT THE FOURTH (Round, or
revolution of life and being around "the seven smaller wheels") (a),
THE SONS ARE TOLD TO CREATE THEIR IMAGES. ONE THIRD REFUSES. TWO (thirds) OBEY.
The full meaning of this sloka can be
fully comprehended only after reading the detailed additional explanations in
the "Anthropogenesis" and its commentaries, in Book II. Between this
Sloka and the last, Sloka 4 in this same Stanza, extend long ages; and there
now gleams the dawn and sunrise of another aeon. The drama enacted on our
planet is at the beginning of its fourth act, but for a clearer comprehension
of the whole play the reader will have to turn back before he can proceed
onward. For this verse belongs to the general Cosmogony given in the archaic
volumes, whereas Book II. will give a detailed account of the
"Creation" or rather the formation, of the first human beings,
followed by the second humanity, and then by the third; or, as they are called,
"the first, second, and the third Root-Races." As the solid Earth
began by being a ball of liquid fire, of fiery dust and its protoplasmic
phantom, so did man.
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(a) That which is meant by the
qualification the "Fourth" is explained as the "fourth
Round" only on the authority of the Commentaries. It can equally mean
fourth "Eternity" as "Fourth Round," or even the fourth
(our) Globe. For, as will repeatedly be shown, it is the fourth Sphere on the
fourth or lowest plane of material life. And it so happens that we are in the
Fourth Round, at the middle point of which the perfect equilibrium between
Spirit and Matter had to take place.* Says the Commentary explaining the
verse:--
"The holy youths (the gods)
refused to multiply and create species after their likeness, after their kind.
They are not fit forms (rupas) for us. They have to grow. They refuse to enter
the chhayas (shadows or images) of their inferiors. Thus had selfish feeling
prevailed from the beginning, even among the gods, and they fell under the eye
of the Karmic Lipikas."
They had to suffer for it in later
births. How the punishment reached the gods will be seen in the second volume.
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STANZA VI. -- Continued.
6. THE CURSE IS PRONOUNCED (a): THEY
WILL BE BORN IN THE FOURTH (Race), SUFFER AND CAUSE SUFFERING (b). THIS IS THE
FIRST WAR (c).
(a) It is a universal tradition that,
before the physiological "Fall," propagation of one's kind, whether
human or animal, took place through the WILL of the Creators, or of their
progeny. It was the Fall of Spirit into generation, not the Fall of mortal man.
It has already been stated that, to become a Self-Conscious Spirit, the latter
must pass through every cycle of being, culminating in its highest point on
earth in Man.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It was, as we shall see, at this
period -- during the highest point of civilization and knowledge, as also of
human intellectuality, of the fourth, Atlantean Race -- that, owing to the
final crisis of physiologico-spiritual adjustment of the races, humanity
branched off into its two diametrically opposite paths: the RIGHT- and the
LEFT-hand paths of knowledge or of Vidya. "Thus were the germs of the
White and the Black Magic sown in those days. The seeds lay latent for some time,
to sprout only during the early period of the Fifth (our Race)."
(Commentary.)
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Spirit per se is an unconscious
negative ABSTRACTION. Its purity is inherent, not acquired by merit; hence, as
already shown, to become the highest Dhyan Chohan it is necessary for each Ego
to attain to full self-consciousness as a human, i.e., conscious Being, which
is synthesized for us in Man. The Jewish Kabalists arguing that no Spirit could
belong to the divine hierarchy unless Ruach (Spirit) was united to Nephesh
(living Soul), only repeat the Eastern Esoteric teaching. "A Dhyani has to
be an Atma-Buddhi; once the Buddhi-Manas breaks loose from its immortal Atma of
which it (Buddhi) is the vehicle, Atman passes into NON-BEING, which is
absolute Being." This means that the purely Nirvanic state is a passage of
Spirit back to the ideal abstraction of Be-ness which has no relation to the
plane on which our Universe is accomplishing its cycle.
(b) "The curse is
pronounced" does not mean, in this instance, that any personal Being, god,
or superior Spirit, pronounced it, but simply that the cause which could but
create bad results had been generated, and that the effects of a Karmic cause
could lead the "Beings" that counteracted the laws of Nature, and
thus impeded her legitimate progress, only to bad incarnations, hence to
suffering.
(c) "There were many wars"
refers to several struggles of adjustment, spiritual, cosmical, and
astronomical, but chiefly to the mystery of the evolution of man as he is now.
Powers -- pure Essences -- "that were told to create" is a sentence
that relates to a mystery explained, as already said, elsewhere. It is not only
one of the most hidden secrets of Nature -- that of generation, over whose
solution the Embryologists have vainly put their heads together -- but likewise
a divine function that involves that other religious, or rather dogmatic,
mystery, the "Fall" of the Angels, as it is called. Satan and his
rebellious host would thus prove, when the meaning of the allegory is
explained, to have refused to create physical man, only to become the direct
Saviours and the Creators of "divine Man." The symbolical teaching is
more than mystical and religious, it is purely scientific, as will be seen
later on. For, instead of remaining a mere blind, functioning medium, impelled
and guided by fathomless LAW, the "rebellious" Angel claimed and
enforced his right of independent judgment and will, his
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right of free-agency and
responsibility, since man and angel are alike under Karmic Law.*
"And there was war in Heaven. .
. . Michael and his angels fought against the Dragon; and the Dragon fought and
his angels, and prevailed not; neither was their place found any more in
Heaven. And the Dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the devil and
Satan, which deceiveth the whole world."
The Kabalistic version of the same
story is given in the Codex Nazareus, the scripture of the Nazarenes, the real
mystic Christians of John the Baptist and the Initiates of Christos.
Bahak-Zivo, the "Father of the Genii," is ordered to construct
creatures (to create). But, as he is "ignorant of Orcus," he fails to
do so, and calls in Fetahil, a still purer spirit, to his aid, who fails still
worse. This is a repetition of the failure of the "Fathers," the
lords of light who fail one after the other. (Book II, Sloka 17.)
We will now quote from our earlier
Volumes:--
"Then steps on the stage of
creation the spirit** (of the Earth so-called, or the Soul, Psyche, which St.
James calls 'devilish') the lower portion the Anima Mundi or Astral Light. (See
the close of this Sloka). With the Nazarenes and the Gnostics this Spirit was
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Explaining Kabalistic views, the
author of the "New Aspects of Life" says of the Fallen Angels that,
"According to the symbolical teaching, Spirit, from being simply a
functionary agent of God, became volitional in its developed and developing
action; and, substituting its own will for the Divine desire in its regard, so
fell. Hence the Kingdom and reign of Spirits and spiritual action, which flow
from and are the product of Spirit-volition, are outside, and contrasted with,
and in contradiction to the Kingdom of Souls and Divine action." So far,
so good; but what does the Author mean by saying, "When man was created,
he was human in constitution, with human affections, human hopes and aspirations.
From this state he fell -- into the brute and savage"? This is
diametrically opposite to our Eastern teaching, and even to the Kabalistic
notion so far as we understand it, and to the Bible itself. This looks like
Corporealism and Substantialism colouring positive philosophy, though it is
rather hard to feel quite sure of the Author's meaning (see p. 235). A FALL,
however, "from the natural into the supernatural and the animal" --
supernatural meaning the purely spiritual in this case -- means what we
suggest.
** On the authority of Irenaeus, of
Justin Martyr and the "Codex" itself, Dunlap shows that the Nazarenes
regarded "Spirit" as a female and Evil Power in its connection with
our Earth. (Dunlap: "Sod," the Son of the Man, p. 52).
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feminine. Thus the spirit of the
Earth perceiving that for Fetahil,* the newest man (the latest), the splendour
was 'changed,' and that for splendour existed 'decrease and damage,' she awakes
Karabtanos,** 'who was frantic and without sense and judgment,' and says to
him:-- 'Arise, see, the splendour (light) of the newest man (Fetahil) has
failed (to produce or create men), the decrease of this splendour is visible.
Rise up, come with thy MOTHER (the Spiritus) and free thee from limits by which
thou art held, and those more ample than the whole world.' After which follows
the union of the frantic and blind matter, guided by the insinuations of the
spirit (not the Divine breath but the Astral spirit, which by its double
essence is already tainted with matter); and the offer of the MOTHER being
accepted, the Spiritus conceives "Seven Figures," and the seven
stellars (planets) which represent also the seven capital sins, the progeny of
an astral soul separated from its divine source (spirit) and matter, the blind
demon of concupiscence. Seeing this, Fetahil extends his hand towards the abyss
of matter, and says:-- 'Let the Earth exist, just as the abode of the powers
has existed.' Dipping his hand in the chaos, which he condenses, he creates our
planet.***"
"Then the Codex proceeds to tell
how Bahak-Zivo was separated from the Spiritus, and the Genii or angels from
the rebels.**** Then Mano***** (the greatest), who dwells with the greatest
FERHO, call Kebar-Zivo (known also by the name of Nebat-Iavar bar Iufin
Ifafin), Helm and Vine of the food of life,****** he being the third life, and
commiserating the rebellious and foolish Genii, on account of the magnitude of
their ambition, says: 'Lord of the Genii******* (AEons), see what the Genii,
the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Fetahil is identical with the host
of the Pitris who "created Man" as only a "shell." He was,
with the Nazarenes, the king of light, and the creator; but in this instance he
is the unlucky Prometheus, who fails to get hold of the Living Fire necessary
for the formation of the divine Soul, as he is ignorant of the secret name, the
ineffable or incommunicable name of the Kabalists.
** The spirit of Matter and
Concupiscence; "Kamarupa" minus "Manas," Mind.
*** See Franck's "Codex
Nazaraeus," and Dunlap's "Sod, the Son of the Man."
**** Codex Nazaraeus, ii., 233.
***** This Mano of the Nazarenes
strangely resembles the Hindu Manu, the Heavenly Man of the "Rig
Vedas."
****** "I am the true Vine, and
my father is the husbandman." (John xv., 1.)
******* With the Gnostics, Christ, as
well as Michael who is identical with him in some respects, was the "Chief
of the AEons."
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rebellious angels do, and about what
they are consulting.* They say, 'Let us call for the world, and let us call the
'powers' into existence." The Genii are the Principes, the "Sons of
Light," but thou art the "Messenger of Life."**
And in order to counteract the
influence of the seven "badly disposed" principles, the progeny of
Spiritus, CABAR-ZIO, the mighty Lord of Splendor, produces seven other lives
(the cardinal virtues) who shine in their own form and light "from on
high"*** and thus re-establish the balance between good and evil, light
and darkness.
Here one finds a repetition of the
early allegorical, dual systems, as the Zoroastrian, and detects a germ of the
dogmatic and dualistic religions of the future, a germ which has grown into
such a luxuriant tree in ecclesiastical Christianity. It is already the outline
of the two "Supremes" -- God and Satan. But in the Stanzas no such
idea exists.
Most of the Western Christian
Kabalists -- pre-eminently Eliphas Levi -- in their desire to reconcile the
Occult Sciences with Church dogmas, did their best to make of the "Astral
Light" only and preeminently the Pleroma of early Church Fathers, the
abode of the Hosts of the Fallen Angels, of the "Archons" and
"Powers." But the Astral Light, while only the lower aspect of the
Absolute, is yet dual. It is the Anima Mundi, and ought never to be viewed
otherwise, except for Kabalistic purposes. The difference which exists between
its "light" and its "Living Fire" ought to be ever present
in the mind of the Seer and the "Psychic." The higher aspect, without
which only creatures of matter from that Astral Light can be produced, is this
Living Fire, and it is the Seventh Principle. It is said in "Isis
Unveiled," in a complete description of it:--
"The Astral Light or Anima Mundi
is dual and bisexual. The (ideal) male part of it is purely divine and
spiritual, it is the Wisdom, it is Spirit or Purusha; while the female portion
(the Spiritus of the Nazarenes) is tainted, in one sense, with matter, is
indeed matter, and therefore is evil already. It is the life-principle of every
living creature, and furnishes the astral soul, the fluidic perisprit, to men,
animals, fowls of the air, and everything living. Animals have only the latent germ
of the highest immortal soul in them. . . . . This latter will develop
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Codex Nazaraeus, i, 135.
** Ibid.
*** See the Cosmogony of Pherecydes.
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only after a series of countless
evolutions; the doctrine of which evolution is contained in the Kabalistic
axiom: 'A stone becomes a plant; a plant, a beast; a beast, a man; a man, a
spirit; and the spirit, a god.'" (Vol. I., p. 301, note.)
The seven principles of the Eastern
Initiates had not been explained when "Isis" was written, but only
the three Kabalistic Faces of the semi-exoteric Kabala.* But these contain the
description of the mystic natures of the first group of Dhyan Chohans in the
regimen ignis, the region and "rule (or government) of fire," which
group is divided into three classes, synthesized by the first, which makes four
or the "Tetraktis." (See Comments on Stanza VII. Book I.) If one
studies the Comments attentively he will find the same progression in the
angelic natures, viz., from the passive down to the active, the last of these
Beings being as near to the Ahamkara element (the region or plane wherein
Egoship or the feeling of I-am-ness is beginning to be defined) as the first
ones are near to the undifferentiated essence. The former are Arupa,
incorporeal; the latter, Rupa, corporeal.
In Volume II. of Isis (p. 183 et
seq.) the philosophical systems of the Gnostics and the primitive Jewish
Christians, the Nazarenes and the Ebionites, are fully considered. They show
the views held in those days -- outside the circle of Mosaic Jews -- about
Jehovah. He was identified by all the Gnostics with the evil, rather than with
the good principle. For them, he was Ilda-Baoth, "the son of
Darkness," whose mother, Sophia Achamoth, was the daughter of Sophia, the
Divine Wisdom (the female Holy Ghost of the early Christians) -- Akasa;** while
Sophia Achamoth personified the lower Astral Light or Ether. Ilda-Baoth,*** or
Jehovah, is simply one of the Elohim, the seven
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* They are found, however, in the
Chaldean Book of Numbers.
** The astral light stands in the
same relation to Akasa and Anima Mundi, as Satan stands to the Deity. They are
one and the same thing seen from two aspects: the spiritual and the psychic --
the super-ethereal or connecting link between matter and pure spirit, and the
physical. See for the difference between nous, the higher divine wisdom, and
psyche, the lower and terrestrial (St. James iii. v. 15-17). Vide "Demon
est Deus inversus," Part II. of this volume.
*** Ilda-Baoth is a compound name
made up of Ilda, [[hebrew]], "a child," and Baoth; both from
[[hebrew]] the egg, and [[hebrew]] Baoth, "chaos," emptiness, void,
or desolation; or the child born in the egg of Chaos, like Brahma.
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creative Spirits, and one of the
lower Sephiroth. He produces from himself seven other Gods, "Stellar
Spirits" (or the lunar ancestors*), for they are all the same.** They are
all in his own image (the "Spirits of the Face"), and the reflections
one of the other, and have become darker and more material as they successively
receded from their originator. They also inhabit seven regions disposed like a
ladder, as its rungs slope up and down the scale of spirit and matter.*** With
Pagans and Christians, with Hindus and Chaldeans, with the Greek as with the
Roman Catholics -- with a slight variation of the texts in their
interpretations -- they all were the Genii of the seven planets, as of the
seven planetary spheres of our septenary chain, of which Earth is the lowest.
(See Isis, Vol. II. p. 186.) This connects the "Stellar" and
"Lunar" Spirits with the higher planetary Angels and the Saptarishis
(the seven Rishis of the Stars) of the Hindus -- as subordinate Angels
(Messengers) to these "Rishis," the emanations, on the descending
scale, of the former. Such, in the opinion of the philosophical Gnostics, were
the God and the Archangels now worshipped by the Christians! The "Fallen
Angels" and the legend of the "War in Heaven" is thus purely
pagan in its origin and comes from India via Persia and Chaldea. The only
reference to it in the Christian canon is found in Revelations xii., as quoted
a few pages back.
Thus "SATAN," once he
ceases to be viewed in the superstitious, dogmatic, unphilosophical spirit of
the Churches, grows into the grandiose image of one who made of terrestrial a
divine MAN; who gave him, throughout the long cycle of Maha-kalpa the law of
the Spirit of Life, and made him free from the Sin of Ignorance, hence of
death. (See the Section On Satan in Part II. Vol. II.)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Jehovah's connection with the moon
in the Kabala is well known to students.
** About the Nazarenes see Isis, Vol.
II. p. 131 and 132; the true followers of the true Christos were all Nazarenes
and Christians, and were the opponents of the later Christians.
*** Vide supra, the diagram of the
lunar ring of seven worlds, where, as in our or any other chain, the upper
worlds are spiritual, while the lowest, whether Moon, Earth, or any planet, is
dark with matter.
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STANZA VI. -- Continued.
6. THE OLDER WHEELS ROTATED DOWNWARD
AND UPWARD (a). . . . THE MOTHER'S SPAWN FILLED THE WHOLE (Kosmos).* THERE WERE
BATTLES FOUGHT BETWEEN THE CREATORS AND THE DESTROYERS, AND BATTLES FOUGHT FOR
SPACE; THE SEED APPEARING AND REAPPEARING CONTINUOUSLY (b).**
(a) Here, having finished for the
time being with our side-issues -- which, however they may break the flow of
the narrative, are necessary for the elucidation of the whole scheme -- the
reader must return once more to Cosmogony. The phrase "Older wheels"
refers to the worlds or Globes of our chain as they were during the
"previous Rounds." The present Stanza, when explained esoterically,
is found embodied entirely in the Kabalistic works. Therein will be found the
very history of the evolution of those countless Globes which evolve after a
periodical Pralaya, rebuilt from old material into new forms. The previous
Globes disintegrate and reappear transformed and perfected for a new phase of
life. In the Kabala, worlds are compared to sparks which fly from under the
hammer of the great Architect -- LAW, the law which rules all the smaller
Creators.
The following comparative diagram
shows the identity between the two systems, the Kabalistic and the Eastern. The
three upper are the three higher planes of consciousness, revealed and
explained in both schools only to the Initiates, the lower ones represent the four
lower planes -- the lowest being our plane, or the visible Universe.
These seven planes correspond to the
seven states of consciousness in man. It remains with him to attune the three
higher states in himself to the three higher planes in Kosmos. But before he
can attempt to attune, he must awaken the three "seats" to life and
activity. And how many are capable of bringing themselves to even a superficial
comprehension of Atma-Vidya (Spirit-Knowledge), or what is called by the Sufis,
Rohanee! In Section the VIIth of this Book, in Sub-section 3,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The reader is reminded that Kosmos
often means in our Stanzas only our own Solar System, not the Infinite
Universe.
** This is purely astronomical.
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the reader will find a still clearer
explanation of the above in the Commentary upon Saptaparna -- the man-plant.
See also the Section of that name in Part II.
1st Plane
2nd P.
The Three higher Planes of the
Septenary Kosmos
The Divine & Formless World of
Spirit*
3rd Plane
Eastern Gupta Vidya [[--]] Chaldean
Kabala
1st P The Archetypal World**
Globe A [[/]] G [[--]] Geburah A
[[/]] Chesed G or Z
[[--]] Tephireth F
2nd Plane The Intellectual World
B [[/]] F [[--]] Hod B [[/]] Netzah E
3rd Plane The Substantial or
Formative World
C [[/]] E [[--]] Yesod C
4th Plane The Material*** World
The Earth Globe D [[--]] The Earth
Malkuth D
[[above is in diagram format in the
original text]]
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Arupa or "formless,"
there where form ceases to exist, on the objective plane.
** The word "Archetypal"
must not be taken here in the sense that the Platonists gave to it, i.e., the
world as it existed in the Mind of the Deity; but in that of a world made as a
first model, to be followed and improved upon by the worlds which succeed it
physically -- though deteriorating in purity.
*** These are the four lower planes
of Cosmic Consciousness, the three higher planes being inaccessible to human
intellect as developed at present. The seven states of human consciousness
pertain to quite another question.
[[-------]]
(b) "The Seed appears and
disappears continuously." Here "Seed" stands for "the
World-germ," viewed by Science as material particles in a highly
attenuated condition, but in Occult physics as "Spiritual particles,"
i.e., supersensuous matter existing in a state of primeval
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differentiation.* In theogony, every
Seed is an ethereal organism, from which evolves later on a celestial being, a
God.
In the "beginning," that
which is called in mystic phraseology "Cosmic Desire" evolves into
absolute Light. Now light without any shadow would be absolute light -- in
other words, absolute darkness -- as physical science seeks to prove. That
shadow appears under the form of primordial matter, allegorized -- if one likes
-- in the shape of the Spirit of Creative Fire or Heat. If, rejecting the poetical
form and allegory, science chooses to see in this the primordial Fire-Mist, it
is welcome to do so. Whether one way or the other, whether Fohat or the famous
FORCE of Science, nameless, and as difficult of definition as our Fohat
himself, that Something "caused the Universe to move with circular
motion," as Plato has it; or, as the Occult teaching expresses it:
"The Central Sun causes Fohat to
collect primordial dust in the form of balls, to impel them to move in
converging lines and finally to approach each other and aggregate." (Book
of Dzyan) . . . . . "Being scattered in Space, without order or system,
the world-germs come into frequent collision until their final aggregation,
after which they become wanderers (Comets). Then the battles and struggles
begin. The older (bodies) attract the younger, while others repel them. Many
perish, devoured by their stronger companions. Those that escape become
worlds."**
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* To see and appreciate the
difference -- the immense gulf that separates terrestrial matter from the finer
grades of supersensuous matter -- every astronomer, every chemist and physicist
ought to be a psychometer, to say the least; he ought to be able to sense for
himself that difference in which he now refuses to believe. Mrs. Elizabeth
Denton, one of the most learned, and also one of the most materialistic and
sceptical women of her age -- the wife of Professor Denton, the well-known
American geologist and the author of "The Soul of Things" -- was,
nevertheless, one of the most wonderful psychometers some years ago. This is
what she described in one of her experiments; with a particle of a meteorite
placed on her forehead, in an envelope, the lady, not being aware of what it
contained, said:
"What a difference between that
which we recognise as matter here and that which seems like matter there! In
the one, the elements are so coarse and so angular, I wonder that we can endure
it all, much more that we can desire to continue our present relations to it;
in the other, all the elements are so refined, they are so free from those
great, rough angularities, which characterize the elements here, that I can but
regard that as by so much the more than this, the real existence." (Vol.
III. p. 345-6.)
** When carefully analysed and
reflected upon, this will be found as scientific as Science could make it, even
at our late period.
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We have been assured that there exist
several modern works of speculative fancy upon such struggles for life in
sidereal heaven, especially in the German language. We rejoice to hear it, for
ours is an Occult teaching lost in the darkness of archaic ages. We have
treated of it fully in "Isis Unveiled," and the idea of
Darwinian-like evolution, of struggle for life and supremacy, and of the
"survival of the fittest" among the Hosts above as the Hosts below,
runs throughout both the volumes of our earlier work, written in 1876 (See
Index in "Isis Unveiled" at the words "Evolution" --
"Darwin" -- "Kapila" -- "Battle of Life," etc.
etc.) But the idea was not ours, it is that of antiquity. Even the Puranic
writers have ingeniously interwoven allegory with Cosmic facts and human
events. Any symbologist may discern the astro-cosmical allusion even though he
be unable to grasp the whole meaning. The great "Wars in Heaven," in
the Puranas; the wars of the Titans, in Hesiod and other classical writers; the
"struggles," also in the Egyptian legend between Osiris and Typhon,
and even those in the Scandinavian legends, all refer to the same subject.
Northern Mythology refers to it as the battle of the Flames, the sons of Muspel
who fought on the field of Wigred. All these relate to Heaven and Earth, and
have a double and often even a triple meaning, and esoteric application to
things above as to things below. They relate severally to astronomical,
theogonical and human struggles; to the adjustment of orbs, and the supremacy
among nations and tribes. The "Struggle for Existence" and the
"Survival of the Fittest" reigned supreme from the moment that Kosmos
manifested into being, and could hardly escape the observant eye of the ancient
Sages. Hence the incessant fights of Indra, the god of the Firmament, with the
Asuras -- degraded from high gods into Cosmic demons; and with Vritri or Ah-hi;
the battles fought between stars and constellations, between Moon and planets
-- later on incarnated as kings and mortals. Hence also the War in Heaven of
Michael and his Host against the Dragon (Jupiter and Lucifer-Venus), when a
third of the stars of the rebellious host was hurled down into Space, and
"its place was found no more in Heaven." As said long ago --
"This is the basic and fundamental stone of the secret cycles. It shows
that the Brahmins and Tanaim . . . speculated on the creation and development
of the world quite in a Darwinian way, both anticipating him and his school in
the natural selection of species, the survival of the fittest,
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and transformation. . . . There were
old worlds that perished conquered by the new," etc., etc. ("Isis
Unveiled," Vol. II., p. 260.) The assertion that all the worlds (Stars,
planets, etc.) -- as soon as a nucleus of primordial substance in the laya
(undifferentiated) state is informed by the freed principles, of a just
deceased sidereal body -- become first comets, and then Suns to cool down to
inhabitable worlds, is a teaching as old as the Rishis.
Thus the Secret Books distinctly teach,
as we see, an astronomy that would not be rejected even by modern speculation
could the latter thoroughly understand its teachings.
For, archaic astronomy, and the
ancient, physical and mathematical sciences, expressed views identical with
those of modern science, and many of far more momentous import. A
"struggle for life" as a "survival of the fittest" in the
worlds above, as on our planet here below, are distinctly taught. This
teaching, however, although it would not be "entirely rejected" by
Science, is sure to be repudiated as an integral whole. For it avers that there
are only seven Self-born primordial "gods" emanated from the
trinitarian ONE. In other words, it means that all the worlds or sidereal
bodies (always on strict analogy) are formed one from the other, after the
primordial manifestation at the beginning of the "Great Age" is
accomplished. The birth of the celestial bodies in Space is compared to a crowd
or multitude of "pilgrims" at the festival of the "Fires."
Seven ascetics appear on the threshold of the temple with seven lighted sticks
of incense. At the light of these the first row of pilgrims light their incense
sticks. After which every ascetic begins whirling his stick around his head in
space, and furnishes the rest with fire. Thus with the heavenly bodies. A
laya-centre is lighted and awakened into life by the fires of another
"pilgrim," after which the new "centre" rushes into space
and becomes a comet. It is only after losing its velocity, and hence its fiery
tail, that the "Fiery Dragon" settles down into quiet and steady life
as a regular respectable citizen of the sidereal family. Therefore it is
said:--
Born in the unfathomable depths of
Space, out of the homogeneous Element called the World-Soul, every nucleus of
Cosmic matter, suddenly launched into being, begins life under the most hostile
circumstances. Through a series of countless ages, it has to conquer
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for itself a place in the
infinitudes. It circles round and round between denser and already fixed
bodies, moving by jerks, and pulling towards some given point or centre that
attracts it, trying to avoid, like a ship drawn into a channel dotted with
reefs and sunken rocks, other bodies that draw and repel it in turn; many
perish, their mass disintegrating through stronger masses, and, when born
within a system, chiefly within the insatiable stomachs of various Suns. (See
Comm. to Stanza IV). Those which move slower and are propelled into an elliptic
course are doomed to annihilation sooner or later. Others moving in parabolic
curves generally escape destruction, owing to their velocity.
Some very critical readers will
perhaps imagine that this teaching, as to the cometary stage passed through by
all heavenly bodies, is in contradiction with the statements just made as to
the moon being the mother of the earth. They will perhaps fancy that intuition
is needed to harmonize the two. But no intuition is in truth required. What
does Science know of Comets, their genesis, growth, and ultimate behaviour?
Nothing -- absolutely nothing! And what is there so impossible that a laya
centre -- a lump of cosmic protoplasm, homogeneous and latent, when suddenly
animated or fired up -- should rush from its bed in Space and whirl throughout
the abysmal depths in order to strengthen its homogeneous organism by an
accumulation and addition of differentiated elements? And why should not such a
comet settle in life, live, and become an inhabited globe!
"The abodes of Fohat are
many," it is said. "He places his four fiery (electro-positive) Sons
in the "Four circles"; these Circles are the Equator, the Ecliptic,
and the two parallels of declination, or the tropics -- to preside over the
climates of which are placed the Four mystical Entities. Then again:
"Other seven (sons) are commissioned to preside over the seven hot, and
seven cold lokas (the hells of the orthodox Brahmins) at the two ends of the
Egg of Matter (our Earth and its poles). The seven lokas are also called the
"Rings," elsewhere, and the "Circles." The ancients made
the polar circles seven instead of two, as Europeans do; for Mount Meru, which
is the North Pole, is said to have seven gold and seven silver steps leading to
it.
The strange statement made in one of
the Stanzas: "The Songs of Fohat and his Sons were radiant as the
noon-tide Sun and the Moon combined;" and that the four Sons on the middle
four-fold
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Circle "saw their father's songs
and heard his Solar-selenic radiance;" is explained in the Commentary in
these words: "The agitation of the Fohatic Forces at the two cold ends
(North and South Poles) of the Earth which resulted in a multicoloured radiance
at night, have in them several of the properties of Akasa (Ether) colour and
sound as well." . . . . . . "Sound is the characteristic of Akasa
(Ether): it generates air, the property of which is Touch; which (by friction)
becomes productive of Colour and Light." . . . . . . (Vishnu Purana.)
Perhaps the above will be regarded as
archaic nonsense, but it will be better comprehended, if the reader remembers
the Aurora Borealis and Australis, both of which take place at the very centres
of terrestrial electric and magnetic forces. The two poles are said to be the
store-houses, the receptacles and liberators, at the same time, of Cosmic and
terrestrial Vitality (Electricity); from the surplus of which the Earth, had it
not been for these two natural "safety-valves," would have been rent
to pieces long ago. At the same time it is now a theory that has lately become
an axiom, that the phenomenon of polar lights is accompanied by, and productive
of, strong sounds, like whistling, hissing, and cracking. (But see Professor Trumholdt's
works on the Aurora Borealis, and his correspondence regarding this moot
question.)
-------
STANZA VI. -- Continued.
7. MAKE THY CALCULATIONS, O LANOO, IF
THOU WOULDST LEARN THE CORRECT AGE OF THY SMALL WHEEL (chain). ITS FOURTH SPOKE
IS OUR MOTHER (Earth) (a). REACH THE FOURTH "FRUIT" OF THE FOURTH
PATH OF KNOWLEDGE THAT LEADS TO NIRVANA, AND THOU SHALT COMPREHEND, FOR THOU
SHALT SEE (b).
(a) The "small wheel" is
our chain of spheres, and the fourth spoke is our Earth, the fourth in the chain.
It is one of those on which the "hot (positive) breath of the Sun"
has a direct effect.*
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The seven fundamental
transformations of the globes or heavenly spheres, or rather of their constituent
particles of matter, is described as follows: (1) The homogeneous; (2) the
aeriform and radiant (gaseous); (3) Curd-like (nebulous); (4) Atomic, Ethereal
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
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To calculate its age, however, as the
pupil is asked to do in the Stanza, is rather difficult, since we are not given
the figures of the Great Kalpa, and are not allowed to publish those of our
small Yugas, except as to the approximate duration of these. "The older
wheels rotated for one Eternity and one half of an Eternity," it says. We
know that by "Eternity" the seventh part of 311,040,000,000,000
years, or an age of Brahma is meant. But what of that? We also know that, to
begin with, if we take for our basis the above figures, we have first of all to
eliminate from the 100 years of Brahma (or 311,040,000,000,000 years) two years
taken up by the Sandhyas (twilights), which leaves 98, as we have to bring it
to the mystical combination 14 x 7. But we have no knowledge at what time
precisely the evolution and formation of our little earth began. Therefore it
is impossible to calculate its age, unless the time of its birth is given --
which the TEACHERS refuse to do, so far. At the close of this Book and in Book
II., however, some chronological hints will be given. We must remember,
moreover, that the law of Analogy holds good for the worlds, as it does for
man; and that as "The ONE (Deity) becomes Two (Deva or Angel) and Two
becomes Three (or man)," etc., etc., so we are taught that the Curds
(world-stuff) become wanderers, (Comets), these become stars, and the stars
(the centres of vortices) our sun and planets -- to put it briefly.*
(b) There are four grades of
initiation mentioned in exoteric works, which are known respectively in
Sanskrit as "Srotapanna," "Sagardagan,"
"Anagamin," and "Arhan" -- the four paths to Nirvana, in
this, our fourth Round, bearing the same appellations. The Arhan, though he can
see the Past, the Present, and the Future, is not yet the highest Initiate; for
the Adept himself, the initiated candidate, becomes chela (pupil) to a higher
Initiate. Three further higher grades have to be conquered by the Arhan who
would reach the apex of the ladder of Arhatship. There are those who have
reached it even in this fifth race of ours, but the faculties necessary for the
attainment of these higher
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] (beginning of motion, hence of differentiation); (5) Germinal, fiery,
(differentiated, but composed of the germs only of the Elements, in their
earliest states, they having seven states, when completely developed on our
earth); (6) Four-fold, vapoury (the future Earth); (7) Cold and depending (on
the Sun for life and light).
* This cannot be so very
unscientific, since Descartes thought also that "the planets rotate on
their axes because they were once lucid stars, the centres of Vortices."
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grades will be fully developed in the
average ascetic only at the end of this Root-Race, and in the Sixth and
Seventh. Thus there will always be Initiates and the Profane till the end of
this minor Manvantara, the present life-cycle. The Arhats of the "fire-mist"
of the 7th rung are but one remove from the Root-Base of their Hierarchy -- the
highest on Earth, and our Terrestrial chain. This "Root-Base" has a
name which can only be translated by several compound words into English"
-- "the ever-living-human-Banyan." This "Wondrous Being"
descended from a "high region," they say, in the early part of the
Third Age, before the separation of the sexes of the Third Race.
This Third Race is sometimes called
collectively "the Sons of Passive Yoga," i.e., it was produced
unconsciously by the second Race, which, as it was intellectually inactive, is
supposed to have been constantly plunged in a kind of blank or abstract
contemplation, as required by the conditions of the Yoga state. In the first or
earlier portion of the existence of this third race, while it was yet in its
state of purity, the "Sons of Wisdom," who, as will be seen,
incarnated in this Third Race, produced by Kriyasakti a progeny called the
"Sons of Ad" or "of the Fire-Mist," the "Sons of Will
and Yoga," etc. They were a conscious production, as a portion of the race
was already animated with the divine spark of spiritual, superior intelligence.
It was not a Race, this progeny. It was at first a wondrous Being, called the
"Initiator," and after him a group of semi-divine and semi-human
beings. "Set apart" in Archaic genesis for certain purposes, they are
those in whom are said to have incarnated the highest Dhyanis, "Munis and
Rishis from previous Manvantaras" -- to form the nursery for future human
adepts, on this earth and during the present cycle. These "Sons of Will
and Yoga" born, so to speak, in an immaculate way, remained, it is
explained, entirely apart from the rest of mankind.
The "BEING" just referred
to, which has to remain nameless, is the Tree from which, in subsequent ages,
all the great historically known Sages and Hierophants, such as the Rishi
Kapila, Hermes, Enoch, Orpheus, etc., etc., have branched off. As objective
man, he is the mysterious (to the profane -- the ever invisible) yet ever
present Personage about whom legends are rife in the East, especially among the
Occultists and the students of the Sacred Science. It is he who changes form,
yet remains ever the same. And it is he again who holds spiritual sway over the
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initiated Adepts throughout the whole
world. He is, as said, the "Nameless One" who has so many names, and
yet whose names and whose very nature are unknown. He is the
"Initiator," called the "GREAT SACRIFICE." For, sitting at
the threshold of LIGHT, he looks into it from within the circle of Darkness,
which he will not cross; nor will he quit his post till the last day of this
life-cycle. Why does the solitary Watcher remain at his self-chosen post? Why
does he sit by the fountain of primeval Wisdom, of which he drinks no longer,
as he has naught to learn which he does not know -- aye, neither on this Earth,
nor in its heaven? Because the lonely, sore-footed pilgrims on their way back
to their home are never sure to the last moment of not losing their way in this
limitless desert of illusion and matter called Earth-Life. Because he would
fain show the way to that region of freedom and light, from which he is a
voluntary exile himself, to every prisoner who has succeeded in liberating
himself from the bonds of flesh and illusion. Because, in short, he has
sacrificed himself for the sake of mankind, though but a few Elect may profit
by the GREAT SACRIFICE.
It is under the direct, silent
guidance of this MAHA -- (great) -- GURU that all the other less divine
Teachers and instructors of mankind became, from the first awakening of human
consciousness, the guides of early Humanity. It is through these "Sons of
God" that infant humanity got its first notions of all the arts and
sciences, as well as of spiritual knowledge; and it is they who have laid the
first foundation-stone of those ancient civilizations that puzzle so sorely our
modern generation of students and scholars.*
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Let those who doubt this statement
explain the mystery of the extraordinary knowledge possessed by the ancients --
alleged to have developed from lower and animal-like savages, the cave-men of
the Palaeolithic age -- on any other equally reasonable grounds. Let them turn
to such works as those of Vitruvius Pollio of the Augustan age, on
architecture, for instance, in which all the rules of proportion are those
taught anciently at initiations, if he would acquaint himself with the truly
divine art, and understand the deep esoteric significance hidden in every rule
and law of proportion. No man descended from a Palaeolithic cave-dweller could
ever evolve such a science unaided, even in millenniums of thought and
intellectual evolution. It is the pupils of those incarnated Rishis and Devas
of the third Root Race, who handed their knowledge from one generation to another,
to Egypt and Greece with its now lost canon of proportion; as it is the
Disciples of the Initiates of the 4th, the Atlanteans, who handed it over to
their Cyclopes, the "Sons of Cycles" or of the "Infinite,"
from whom the name passed to the still later generations of Gnostic priests.
"It is owing to the divine perfection [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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Although these matters were barely
hinted at in "Isis Unveiled," it will be well to remind the reader of
what was said in Vol. I., pp. 587 to 593, concerning a certain Sacred Island in
Central Asia, and to refer him for further details to the chapter in Book II.
on "The Sons of God and the Sacred Island." A few more explanations,
however, though thrown out in a fragmentary form, may help the student to
obtain a glimpse into the present mystery.
To state at least one detail
concerning these mysterious "Sons of God" in plain words. It is from
them, these Brahmaputras, that the high Dwijas, the initiated Brahmins of old
justly claimed descent, while the modern Brahmin would have the lowest castes
believe literally that they issued direct from the mouth of Brahma. This is the
esoteric teaching, which adds moreover that, although these descendants
(spiritually of course) from the "sons of Will and Yoga," became in
time divided into opposite sexes, as their "Kriyasakti" progenitors
did themselves, later on; yet even their degenerate descendants have down to
the present day retained a veneration and respect for the creative
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] of those architectural proportions that the Ancients could build those
wonders of all the subsequent ages, their Fanes, Pyramids, Cave-Temples,
Cromlechs, Cairns, Altars, proving they had the powers of machinery and a knowledge
of mechanics to which modern skill is like a child's play, and which that skill
refers to itself as the 'works of hundred-handed giants.'" (See "Book
of God," Kenealy.) Modern architects may not altogether have neglected
those rules, but they have superadded enough empirical innovations to destroy
those just proportions. It is Vitruvius who gave to posterity the rules of
construction of the Grecian temples erected to the immortal gods; and the ten
books of Marcus Vitruvius Pollio on Architecture, of one, in short, who was an
initiate, can only be studied esoterically. The Druidical circles, the Dolmen,
the Temples of India, Egypt and Greece, the Towers and the 127 towns in Europe
which were found "Cyclopean in origin" by the French Institute, are
all the work of initiated Priest-Architects, the descendants of those primarily
taught by the "Sons of God," justly called "The Builders."
This is what appreciative posterity says of those descendants. "They used
neither mortar nor cement, nor steel nor iron to cut the stones with; and yet
they were so artfully wrought that in many places the joints are not seen,
though many of the stones, as in Peru, are 18 ft. thick, and in the walls of
the fortress of Cuzco there are stones of a still greater size." (Acosta,
vi., 14.) "Again, the walls of Syene, built 5,400 years ago, when that
spot was exactly under the tropic, which it has now ceased to be, were so
constructed that at noon, at the precise moment of the solar solstice, the
entire disc of the Sun was seen reflected on their surface -- a work which the
united skill of all the astronomers of Europe would not now be able to
effect." -- (Kenealy, "Book of God.")
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function, and still regard it in the
light of a religious ceremony, whereas the more civilized nations consider it
as a mere animal function. Compare the western views and practice in these
matters with the Institutions of Manu in regard to the laws of Grihasta and
married life. The true Brahmin is thus indeed "he whose seven forefathers
have drunk the juice of the moon-plant (Soma)," and who is a
"Trisuparna," for he has understood the secret of the Vedas.
And, to this day, such Brahmins know
that, during its early beginnings, psychic and physical intellect being dormant
and consciousness still undeveloped, the spiritual conceptions of that race
were quite unconnected with its physical surroundings. That divine man dwelt in
his animal -- though externally human -- form; and, if there was instinct in
him, no self-consciousness came to enlighten the darkness of the latent fifth
principle. When, moved by the law of Evolution, the Lords of Wisdom infused
into him the spark of consciousness, the first feeling it awoke to life and
activity was a sense of solidarity, of one-ness with his spiritual creators. As
the child's first feeling is for its mother and nurse, so the first aspirations
of the awakening consciousness in primitive man were for those whose element he
felt within himself, and who yet were outside, and independent of him. DEVOTION
arose out of that feeling, and became the first and foremost motor in his
nature; for it is the only one which is natural in our heart, which is innate
in us, and which we find alike in human babe and the young of the animal. This
feeling of irrepressible, instinctive aspiration in primitive man is
beautifully, and one may say intuitionally, described by Carlyle. "The
great antique heart," he exclaims, "how like a child's in its
simplicity, like a man's in its earnest solemnity and depth! heaven lies over
him wheresoever he goes or stands on the earth; making all the earth a mystic
temple to him, the earth's business all a kind of worship. Glimpses of bright
creatures flash in the common sunlight; angels yet hover, doing God's messages
among men . . . . . Wonder, miracle, encompass the man; he lives in an element
of miracle* . . . . A great law of duty, high as these two infinitudes (heaven
and hell), dwarfing all else, annihilating all else -- it was a reality, and it
is one: the garment
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* That which was natural in the sight
of primitive man has become only now miracle to us; and that which was to him a
miracle could never be expressed in our language.
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only of it is dead; the essence of it
lives through all times and all eternity!"
It lives undeniably, and has settled
in all its ineradicable strength and power in the Asiatic Aryan heart from the
Third Race direct through its first "mind-born" sons, -- the fruits
of Kriyasakti. As time rolled on the holy caste of Initiates produced but
rarely, and from age to age, such perfect creatures: beings apart, inwardly,
though the same as those who produced them, outwardly.
While in the infancy of the third
primitive race:--
"A creature of a more exalted
kind
Was wanting yet, and therefore was
designed;
Conscious of thought, of more
capacious breast
For empire formed and fit to rule the
rest. . . . ."
It was called into being, a ready and
perfect vehicle for the incarnating denizens of higher spheres, who took
forthwith their abodes in these forms born of Spiritual WILL and the natural
divine power in man. It was a child of pure Spirit, mentally unalloyed with any
tincture of earthly element. Its physical frame alone was of time and of life,
as it drew its intelligence direct from above. It was the living tree of divine
wisdom; and may therefore be likened to the Mundane Tree of the Norse Legend,
which cannot wither and die until the last battle of life shall be fought,
while its roots are gnawed all the time by the dragon Nidhogg; for even so, the
first and holy Son of Kriyasakti had his body gnawed by the tooth of time, but
the roots of his inner being remained for ever undecaying and strong, because
they grew and expanded in heaven not on earth. He was the first of the FIRST,
and he was the seed of all the others. There were other "Sons of
Kriyasakti" produced by a second Spiritual effort, but the first one has
remained to this day the Seed of divine Knowledge, the One and the Supreme
among the terrestrial "Sons of Wisdom." Of this subject we can say no
more, except to add that in every age -- aye, even in our own -- there have
been great intellects who have understood the problem correctly.
How comes our physical body to the
state of perfection it is found in now? Through millions of years of evolution,
of course, yet never through, or from, animals, as taught by materialism. For,
as Carlyle says:-- ". . . The essence of our being, the mystery in us that
calls itself 'I,' -- what words have we for such things? -- it is a breath of
Heaven,
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the highest Being reveals himself in
man. This body, these faculties, this life of ours, is it not all as a vesture
for the UNNAMED?"
The breath of heaven, or rather the
breath of life, called in the Bible Nephesh, is in every animal, in every
animate speck as in every mineral atom. But none of these has, like man, the
consciousness of the nature of that highest Being,* as none has that divine
harmony in its form which man possesses. It is, as Novalis said, and no one
since has said it better, as repeated by Carlyle:--
"There is but one temple in the
universe, and that is the body of man. Nothing is holier than that high form .
. . . We touch heaven when we lay our hand on a human body!" "This
sounds like a mere flourish of rhetoric," adds Carlyle, "but it is
not so. If well meditated it will turn out to be a scientific fact; the
expression . . . of the actual truth of the thing. We are the miracle of
miracles, -- the great inscrutable Mystery."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* There is no nation in the world in
which the feeling of devotion or of religious mysticism is more developed and
prominent than in the Hindu people. See what Max Muller says of this
idiosyncracy and national feature in his works. This is direct inheritance from
the primitive conscious men of the Third Race.
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STANZA VII.
1. BEHOLD THE BEGINNING OF SENTIENT
FORMLESS LIFE (a).
FIRST, THE DIVINE (vehicle) (b), THE
ONE FROM THE MOTHER-SPIRIT (Atman); THEN THE SPIRITUAL -- (Atma-Buddhi,
Spirit-soul)* (c); (again) THE THREE FROM THE ONE (d), THE FOUR FROM THE ONE
(e), AND THE FIVE (f), FROM WHICH THE THREE, THE FIVE AND THE SEVEN (g) --
THESE ARE THE THREE-FOLD AND THE FOUR-FOLD DOWNWARD; THE "MIND-BORN SONS
OF THE FIRST LORD (Avalokiteswara) THE SHINING SEVEN (the "Builders").**
IT IS THEY WHO ARE THOU, ME, HIM, O LANOO; THEY WHO WATCH OVER THEE AND THY
MOTHER, BHUMI (the Earth).
(a) The hierarchy of Creative Powers
is divided into seven (or 4 and 3) esoteric, within the twelve great Orders,
recorded in the twelve signs of the Zodiac; the seven of the manifesting scale
being connected, moreover, with the Seven Planets. All this is subdivided into
numberless groups of divine Spiritual, semi-Spiritual, and ethereal Beings.
The Chief Hierarchies among these are
hinted at in the great Quaternary, or the "four bodies and the three
faculties" of Brahma exoterically, and the Panchasyam, the five Brahmas,
or the five Dhyani-Buddhas in the Buddhist system.
The highest group is composed of the
divine Flames, so-called, also spoken of as the "Fiery Lions" and the
"Lions of Life," whose esotericism is securely hidden in the Zodiacal
sign of Leo. It is the nucleole of the superior divine World (see Commentary in
first pages of Addendum). They are the formless Fiery Breaths, identical in one
aspect with the upper Sephirothal TRIAD, which is placed by the Kabalists in
the "Archetypal World."
The same hierarchy, with the same
numbers, is found in the Japanese system, in the "Beginnings" as
taught by both the Shinto and the Buddhist sects. In this system,
Anthropogenesis precedes Cosmogenesis, as the Divine merges into the human, and
creates --
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This relates to the Cosmic
principles.
** The seven creative Rishis now
connected with the constellation of the Great Bear
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midway in its descent into matter --
the visible Universe. The legendary personages -- remarks reverentially Omoie
-- "having to be understood as the stereotyped embodiment of the higher
(secret) doctrine, and its sublime truths." To state it at full length,
however, would occupy too much of our space, but a few words on this old system
cannot be out of place. The following is a short synopsis of this
Anthropo-Cosmogenesis, and it shows how closely the most separated notions echoed
one and the same Archaic teaching.
When all was as yet Chaos (Kon-ton)
three spiritual Beings appeared on the stage of future creation: (1) Ame no ani
naka nushi no Kami, "Divine Monarch of the Central Heaven"; (2) Taka
mi onosubi no Kami, "Exalted, imperial Divine offspring of Heaven and the
Earth"; and (3) Kamu mi musubi no Kami, "Offspring of the Gods,"
simply.
These were without form or substance
(our arupa triad), as neither the celestial nor the terrestrial substance had
yet differentiated, "nor had the essence of things been formed."
In the Zohar -- which, as now
arranged and re-edited by Moses de Leon, with the help of Syrian and Chaldean
Christian Gnostics in the XIIth century, and corrected and revised still later
by many Christian hands, is only a little less exoteric than the Bible itself
-- this divine "Vehicle" no longer appears as it does in the
"Chaldean Book of Numbers." True enough, Ain-Soph, the ABSOLUTE
ENDLESS NO-THING, uses also the form of the ONE, the manifested "Heavenly
man" (the FIRST CAUSE) as its chariot (Mercabah, in Hebrew; Vahan, in
Sanskrit) or vehicle to descend into, and manifest through, in the phenomenal
world. But the Kabalists neither make it plain how the ABSOLUTE can use
anything, or exercise any attribute whatever, since, as the Absolute, it is
devoid of attributes; nor do they explain that in reality it is the First Cause
(Plato's Logos) the original and eternal IDEA, that manifests through Adam
Kadmon, the Second Logos, so to speak. In the "Book of Numbers" it is
explained that EN (or Ain, Aior) is the only self-existent, whereas its
"Depth" (Bythos or Buthon of the Gnostics, called Propator) is only
periodical. The latter is Brahm as differentiated from Brahma or Parabrahm. It
is the Depth, the Source of Light, or Propator, which is the unmanifested Logos
or the abstract Idea, and not Ain-Soph, whose ray uses Adam-Kadmon or the
manifested Logos (the objective Universe) "male and female" -- as a
chariot through which to manifest. But in the Zohar we read the following
incongruity: "Senior
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occultatus est et absconditus;
Microprosopus manifestus est, et non manifestus." (Rosenroth; Liber
Mysterii, IV., 1.) This is a fallacy, since Microprosopus or the microcosm, can
only exist during its manifestations, and is destroyed during the
Maha-Pralayas. Rosenroth's Kabala is no guide, but very often a puzzle.
(b) As in the Japanese system, in the
Egyptian, and every old cosmogony -- at this divine FLAME, The "One,"
are lit the three descending groups. Having their potential being in the higher
group, they now become distinct and separate Entities. These are called the
"Virgins of Life," the "Great Illusion," etc., etc., and
collectively the "Six-pointed Star." The latter is the symbol, in
almost every religion, of the Logos as the first emanation. It is that of Vishnu
in India (the Chakra, or wheel), and the glyph of the Tetragrammaton, the
"He of the four letters" or -- metaphorically -- "the limbs of
Microprosopos" in the Kabala, which are ten and six respectively. The
later Kabalists however, especially the Christian mystics, have played sad
havoc with this magnificent symbol.* For the "ten limbs" of the
Heavenly Man are the ten Sephiroth; but the first Heavenly Man is the
unmanifested Spirit of the Universe, and ought never to be degraded into Microprosopus
-- the lesser Face or Countenance, the prototype of man on the terrestrial
plane.** Of this, however, later on. The six-pointed Star refers to the six
Forces or Powers of Nature, the six planes, principles, etc., etc., all
synthesized by the seventh, or the central point in the Star. All these, the
upper and lower hierarchies included, emanate from the "Heavenly or
Celestial Virgin,"*** the great mother in all religions, the Androgyne,
the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Indeed, the Microprosopus -- who
is, philosophically speaking, quite distinct from the unmanifested eternal
Logos "one with the Father," -- has been finally brought, by
centuries of incessant efforts, of sophistry and paradoxes, to be considered as
one with Jehovah, or the ONE living God (!), whereas Jehovah is no better than
Binah, a female Sephiroth. This fact cannot be too frequently impressed upon
the reader.
** The Microprosopus is, as just
said, the Logos manifested, and of such there are many.
*** Sephira is the Crown, KETHER, in
the abstract principle only, as a mathematical x (the unknown quantity). On the
plane of differentiated nature she is the female counterpart of Adam Kadmon --
the first Androgyne. The Kabala teaches that the word "Fiat Lux"
(Genesis ch. i.) referred to the formation and evolution of the Sephiroth, and
not to light as opposed to darkness. Rabbi Simeon says: "Oh com-
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
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Sephira-Adam-Kadmon. In its Unity,
primordial light is the seventh, or highest, principle, Daivi-prakriti, the
light of the unmanifested Logos. But in its differentiation it becomes Fohat,
or the "Seven Sons." The former is symbolised by the Central point in
the double-Triangle; the latter by the hexagon itself, or the "six
limbs" of the Microprosopus the Seventh being Malkuth, the "Bride"
of the Christian Kabalists, or our Earth. Hence the expressions:
"The first after the 'One' is
divine Fire; the second, Fire and AEther; the third is composed of Fire, AEther
and Water; the fourth of Fire, AEther, Water, and Air."* The One is not
concerned with Man-bearing globes, but with the inner invisible Spheres.
"The 'First-Born' are the LIFE, the heart and pulse of the Universe; the
Second are its MIND or Consciousness,"**
as said in the Commentary.
(c) The second Order of Celestial
Beings, those of Fire and AEther (corresponding to Spirit and Soul, or the
Atma-Buddhi) whose names are legion, are still formless, but more definitely
"substantial." They are the first differentiation in the Secondary
Evolution or "Creation" -- a misleading word. As the name shows, they
are the prototypes of the incarnating Jivas or Monads, and are composed of the
Fiery Spirit of Life. It is through these that passes, like a pure solar beam,
the ray which is furnished by them with its future vehicle, the Divine Soul,
Buddhi. These are directly concerned with the Hosts of the higher world of our
system. From these twofold Units emanate the threefold.
In the cosmogony of Japan, when, out
of the chaotic mass, an egglike nucleus appears, having within itself the germ
and potency of all the universal as well as of all terrestrial life, it is the
"three-fold" just named, which differentiates. "The male
aethereal" (Yo) principle
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] panions, companions, man as an emanation was both man and woman, Adam
Kadmon verily, and this is the sense of the words 'Let there be Light, and it
was Light.' And this is the two-fold man." (Auszuge aus dem Zohar, pp.
13-15.)
* See next footnote. These elements
of Fire, Air, etc., are not our compound elements.
** This "Consciousness" has
no relation to our consciousness. The consciousness of the "One
manifested," if not absolute, is still unconditioned. Mahat (the Universal
Mind) is the first production of the Brahma-Creator, but also of the Pradhana
(undifferentiated matter).
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ascends and the female grosser or
more material principle (In) is precipitated into the Universe of substance,
when a separation occurs between the celestial and the terrestrial. From this
the female, the mother, the first rudimentary objective being is born. It is
ethereal, without form or sex, and yet it is from this and the mother that the
Seven Divine Spirits are born, from whom will emanate the seven creations, just
as in the Codex Nazaraeus from Karabtanos and the Mother Spiritus the seven
evilly disposed (material) spirits are born. It would be too long to give here
the Japanese names, but once translated they stand in this order:--
(1.) The "Invisible
Celibate," which is the creative logos of the noncreating
"father," or the creative potentiality of the latter made manifest.
(2.) "The Spirit (or the God) of
the rayless depths" (of Chaos); which becomes differentiated matter, or
the world-stuff; also the mineral realm.
(3.) "The Spirit of the
Vegetable Kingdom," of the "Abundant Vegetation."
(4.) This one is of dual nature,
being at the same time "The Spirit of the Earth" and "the Spirit
of the Sands," the former containing the potentiality of the male element,
the latter that of the female element, the two forming a combined nature.
These two were ONE; yet unconscious
of being two.
In this duality were contained (a)
the male, dark and muscular Being, Isu no gai no Kami; and (b) Eku gai no Kami,
the female, fair and weaker or more delicate Being. Then, the:--
(5th and 6th.) Spirits who were
androgynous or dual-sexed, and, finally:--
(7.) The Seventh Spirit, the last
emanated from the "mother," appears as the first divine human form
distinctly male and female. It was the seventh creation, as in the Puranas,
wherein man is the seventh creation of Brahma.
These, Tsanagi-Tsanami, descended
into the Universe by the celestial Bridge (the milky way), and "Tsanagi,
perceiving far below a chaotic mass of cloud and water, thrust his jewelled
spear into the depths, and dry land appeared." Then the two separated to
explore Onokoro, the newly-created island-world; etc., etc. (Omoie).
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Such are the Japanese exoteric
fables, the rind that conceals the kernel of the same one truth of the Secret
Doctrine. Turning back to the esoteric explanations in every cosmogony:--
(d) The Third order corresponds to the
Atma-Buddhi-Manas: Spirit, Soul and Intellect, and is called the
"Triads."
(e) The Fourth are substantial
Entities. This is the highest group among the Rupas (Atomic Forms*). It is the
nursery of the human, conscious, spiritual Souls. They are called the
"Imperishable Jivas," and constitute, through the order below their
own, the first group of the first septenary** host -- the great mystery of
human conscious and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is worthy of notice that, while
rejecting as a superstition of Occultism, and religion too, the theory of
substantial and invisible Beings called Angels, Elementals, etc. -- without, of
course, having ever looked into the philosophy of these incorporeal Entities,
or thought over them -- modern chemistry, owing to observation and discovery,
should have unconsciously been forced to adopt and recognize the same ratio of
progression and order in the evolution of chemical atoms as Occultism does,
both for its Dhyanis and Atoms -- analogy being its first law. As seen above,
the very first group of the Rupa Angels is quaternary, an element being added
to each in descending order. So are the atoms, adopting the phraseology of
chemistry, monatomic, diatomic, and tetratomic, progressing downwards. Let it
be remembered that Fire, Water, and Air, or the "Elements of primary
Creation" so-called, are not the compound Elements they are on Earth, but
noumenal homogeneous Elements -- the Spirits thereof. Then follow the septenary
groups or hosts. Placed on parallel lines in a diagram with Atoms, the Natures
of those Beings would be seen to correspond in their downward scale of
progression to composite elements in a mathematically identical manner, as to
analogy. This refers, of course, only to diagrams made by the Occultists; for
were the scale of Angelic Beings to be placed on a parallel line with the scale
of the chemical atoms of Science -- from the hypothetical Helium down to
Uranium -- they would of course be found to differ. For these have, as
correspondents on the Astral plane, only the four lowest orders -- the higher
three principles in the atom, or rather molecule or chemical element, being
perceptible only to the initiated Dangma's eye. But then, if Chemistry desired
to find itself on the right path, it would have to correct its tabular
arrangement by that of the Occultists -- which it may refuse to do. In Esoteric
Philosophy, every physical particle corresponds to and depends on its higher
noumenon -- the Being to whose essence it belongs; and above as below, the
Spiritual evolves from the Divine, the psycho-mental from the Spiritual --
tainted from its lower plane by the astral -- the whole animate and (seemingly)
inanimate Nature evolving on parallel lines, and drawing its attributes from
above as well as from below.
** The number seven does not imply
only seven Entities, but seven groups or Hosts, as explained before. The
highest group, the Asuras born in Brahma's first body -- [[Footnote continued
on next page]]
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intellectual Being. For the latter
are the field wherein lies concealed in its privation the germ that will fall
into generation. That germ will become the spiritual potency in the physical
cell that guides the development of the embryo, and which is the cause of the
hereditary transmission of faculties and all the inherent qualities in man. The
Darwinian theory, however, of the transmission of acquired faculties, is
neither taught nor accepted in Occultism. Evolution, in it, proceeds on quite
other lines; the physical, according to esoteric teaching, evolving gradually
from the spiritual, mental, and psychic. This inner soul of the physical cell
-- this "spiritual plasm" that dominates the germinal plasm -- is the
key that must open one day the gates of the terra incognita of the Biologist,
now called the dark mystery of Embryology. (See text and note infra.)
(f) The Fifth group is a very
mysterious one, as it is connected with the Microcosmic Pentagon, the
five-pointed star representing man. In India and Egypt these Dhyanis were
connected with the Crocodile, and their abode is in Capricornus. These are
convertible terms in Indian astrology, as this (tenth) sign of the Zodiac is
called Makara, loosely translated "crocodile." The word itself is
occultly interpreted in various ways, as will be shown further on. In Egypt the
defunct man -- whose symbol is the pentagram or the five-pointed star, the
points of which represent the limbs of a man -- was shown emblematically
transformed into a crocodile: Sebakh or Sevekh "or seventh," as Mr.
Gerald Massey says, showing it as having been the type of intelligence, is a
dragon in reality, not a crocodile. He is the "Dragon of Wisdom" or
Manas, the "Human Soul," Mind, the Intelligent principle, called in
our esoteric philosophy the "Fifth" principle.
Says the defunct
"Osirified" in ch. lxxxviii., "Book of the Dead," or the
Ritual, under the glyph of a mummiform god with a crocodile's head:--
(1) "I am the god (crocodile)
presiding at the fear . . . at the arrival of his Soul among men. I am the
god-crocodile brought for destruction" (an allusion to the destruction of
divine spiritual purity
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] which turned into "Night" -- are septenary, i.e., divided like
the Pitris into seven classes, three of which are arupa (bodiless) and four
with bodies. (See Vishnu Purana, Book I.) They are in fact more truly our
Pitris (ancestors) than the Pitris who projected the first physical men. (See
Book II.)
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when man acquires the knowledge of
good and evil; also to the "fallen" gods, or angels of every
theogony).
(2) "I am the fish of the great
Horus (as Mankara is the "crocodile," the vehicle of Varuna). I am
merged in Sekten."
This last sentence gives the
corroboration of, and repeats the doctrine of, esoteric Buddhism, for it
alludes directly to the fifth principle (Manas), or the most spiritual part of
its essence rather, which merges into, is absorbed by, and made one with
Atma-Buddhi after the death of man. For Se-khen is the residence or loka of the
god Khem (Horus-Osiris, or Father and Son), hence the "Devachan" of
Atma-Buddhi. In the Ritual of the Dead the defunct is shown entering into
Sekhem with Horus-Thot and "emerging from it as pure spirit" (lxiv.,
29). Thus the defunct says (v. 130): "I see the forms of (myself, as
various) men transforming eternally . . . I know this (chapter). He who knows
it . . . takes all kinds of living forms." . . .
And in verse 35, addressing in magic
formula that which is called, in Egyptian esotericism, the "ancestral
heart," or the re-incarnating principle, the permanent EGO, the defunct
says:--
"Oh my heart, my ancestral heart
necessary for my transformations, . . . . . . do not separate thyself from me
before the guardian of the Scales. Thou art my personality within my breast,
divine companion watching over my fleshes (bodies). . . . . . ."
It is in Sekhem that lies concealed
"the Mysterious Face," or the real man concealed under the false
personality, the triple-crocodile of Egypt, the symbol of the higher Trinity or
human Triad, Atma, Buddhi and Manas.* In all the ancient papyri the crocodile is
called Sebek (Seventh), while the water is the fifth principle esoterically;
and, as already stated, Mr. Gerald Massey shows that the crocodile was
"the Seventh Soul, the supreme one of seven -- the Seer unseen." Even
exoterically Sekhem is the residence of the god Khem, and Khem is Horus
avenging the death of his father Osiris, hence punishing the Sins of man when
he becomes a disembodied Soul. Thus the defunct
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* One of the explanations of the real
though hidden meaning of this Egyptian religious glyph is easy. The crocodile
is the first to await and meet the devouring fires of the morning sun, and very
soon came to personify the solar heat. When the sun arose, it was like the
arrival on earth and among men "of the divine soul which informs the
Gods." Hence the strange symbolism. The mummy donned the head of a
crocodile to show that it was a soul arriving from the earth.
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"Osirified" became the god
Khem, who "gleans the field of Aanroo," i.e., he gleans either his
reward or punishment, as that field is the celestial locality (Devachan) where
the defunct is given wheat, the food of divine justice. The fifth group of the
celestial Beings is supposed to contain in itself the dual attributes of both
the spiritual and physical aspects of the Universe; the two poles, so to say,
of Mahat the Universal Intelligence, and the dual nature of man, the spiritual
and the physical. Hence its number Five, multiplied and made into ten,
connecting it with Makara, the 10th sign of Zodiac.
(g) The sixth and seventh groups
partake of the lower qualities of the Quaternary. They are conscious, ethereal
Entities, as invisible as Ether, which are shot out like the boughs of a tree
from the first central group of the four, and shoot out in their turn
numberless side groups, the lower of which are the Nature-Spirits, or
Elementals of countless kinds and varieties; from the formless and
unsubstantial -- the ideal THOUGHTS of their creators -- down to the Atomic,
though, to human perception, invisible organisms. The latter are considered as
the "Spirits of Atoms" for they are the first remove (backwards) from
the physical Atom -- sentient, if not intelligent creatures. They are all
subject to Karma, and have to work it out through every cycle. For, as the
doctrine teaches, there are no such privileged beings in the universe, whether
in our or in other systems, in the outer or the inner worlds,* as the angels of
the Western Religion and the Judean. A Dhyan Chohan has to become one; he
cannot be born or appear suddenly on the plane of life as a full-blown angel. The
Celestial Hierarchy of the present Manvantara will find itself transferred in
the next cycle of life into higher, superior worlds, and will make room for a
new hierarchy, composed of the elect ones of our mankind. Being is an endless
cycle within the one absolute eternity, wherein move numberless inner cycles
finite and conditioned. Gods, created as such, would evince no personal merit
in being gods. Such a class of beings, perfect only by virtue of the special
immaculate nature inherent in them, in the face of suffering and struggling
humanity, and even of the lower creation, would be the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* A world when called "a higher
world" is not higher by reason of its location, but because it is superior
in quality or essence. Yet such a world is generally understood by the profane
as "Heaven," and located above our heads.
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symbol of an eternal injustice quite
Satanic in character, an ever present crime. It is an anomaly and an
impossibility in Nature. Therefore the "Four" and the
"Three" have to incarnate as all other beings have. This sixth group,
moreover, remains almost inseparable from man, who draws from it all but his
highest and lowest principles, or his spirit and body, the five middle human
principles being the very essence of those Dhyanis.* Alone, the Divine Ray (the
Atman) proceeds directly from the One. When asked how that can be? How is it
possible to conceive that those "gods," or angels, can be at the same
time their own emanations and their personal selves? Is it in the same sense in
the material world, where the son is (in one way) his father, being his blood,
the bone of his bone and the flesh of his flesh? To this the teachers answer
"Verily it is so." But one has to go deep into the mystery of BEING
before one can fully comprehend this truth.
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STANZA VII. -- Continued.
2. THE ONE RAY MULTIPLIES THE SMALLER
RAYS. LIFE PRECEDES FORM, AND LIFE SURVIVES THE LAST ATOM (of Form,
Sthula-sarira, external body). THROUGH THE COUNTLESS RAYS THE LIFE-RAY, THE
ONE, LIKE A THREAD THROUGH MANY BEADS (pearls) (a).
(a) This sloka expresses the
conception -- a purely Vedantic one, as already explained elsewhere -- of a
life-thread, Sutratma, running through successive generations. How, then, can
this be explained? By resorting to a simile, to a familiar illustration, though
necessarily imperfect, as all our available analogies must be. Before resorting
to it, however, I would ask whether it seems unnatural, least of all
"supernatural," to any one of us, when we consider that process known
as the growth and development of a foetus into a healthy baby weighing several
pounds evolves from what? From the segmentation of an infinitesimally small
ovum and a spermatozoon; and afterwards we see that baby develop into a
six-foot man! This refers to the atomic and physical
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Paracelsus calls them the Flagae;
the Christians, the "Guardian Angels;" the Occultist, the
"Ancestors, the Pitris;" they are the sixfold Dhyan Chohans, having
the six spiritual Elements in the composition of their bodies -- in fact, men,
minus the physical body.
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expansion from the microscopically
small into something very large, from the -- to the naked eye -- unseen, into
the visible and objective. Science has provided for all this; and, I dare say,
her theories, embryological, biological, and physiological, are correct enough
so far as exact observation of the material goes. Nevertheless, the two chief
difficulties of the science of embryology -- namely, what are the forces at
work in the formation of the foetus, and the cause of "hereditary transmission"
of likeness, physical, moral or mental -- have never been properly answered;
nor will they ever be solved till the day when scientists condescend to accept
the Occult theories.* But if this physical pheno-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The materialists and the
evolutionists of the Darwinian school would be ill-advised to accept the newly
worked-out theories of Professor Weissmann, the author of Beitrage zur
Descendenzlehre, with regard to one of the two mysteries of Embryology, as
above specified, which he seems to have solved -- as he thinks. For, when it is
solved, Science will have stepped over into the domain of the truly occult, and
stepped for ever out of the realm of transformation, as taught by Darwin. The
two are irreconcileable, from the standpoint of materialism. Regarded from that
of the Occultists, it solves all these mysteries. Those who are not acquainted
with the new discovery of Professor Weissman -- at one time a fervent Darwinist
-- ought to hasten to repair the deficiency. The German
Embryologist-philosopher shows -- thus stepping over the heads of the Greek
Hippocrates and Aristotle, right back into the teachings of the old Aryans --
one infinitesimal cell, out of millions of others at work in the formation of
an organism, determining alone and unaided, by means of constant segmentation
and multiplication, the correct image of the future man (or animal) in its
physical, mental, and psychic characteristics. It is that cell which impresses
on the face and form of the new individual the features of the parents or of
some distant ancestor; it is that cell again which transmits to him the
intellectual and mental idiosyncracies of his sires, and so on. This Plasm is
the immortal portion of our bodies -- simply through the process of successive
assimilations. Darwin's theory, viewing the embryological cell as an essence or
the extract from all other cells, is set aside; it is incapable of accounting
for hereditary transmission. There are but two ways of explaining the mystery
of heredity; either the substance of the germinal cell is endowed with the
faculty of crossing the whole cycle of transformations that lead to the
construction of a separate organism and then to the reproduction of identical
germinal cells; or, those germinal cells do not have their genesis at all in
the body of the individual, but proceed directly from the ancestral germinal
cell passed from father to son through long generations. It is the latter
hypothesis that Weissmann accepted and has worked upon; and it is to this cell
that he traces the immortal portion of man. So far, so good; and when this
almost correct theory is accepted, how will Biologists explain the first
appearance of this everlasting cell? Unless man "grew" like the
"immortal Topsy," and was not born at all, but fell from the clouds,
how was that embryological cell born in him?
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menon astonishes no one, except in so
far as it puzzles the Embryologists, why should our intellectual and inner
growth, the evolution of the human-spiritual to the Divine-Spiritual, be
regarded as, or seem, more impossible than the other? Now to the simile.
Complete the physical plasm,
mentioned in the last foot-note, the "Germinal Cell" of man with all
its material potentialities, with the "spiritual plasm," so to say,
or the fluid that contains the five lower principles of the six-principled
Dhyan -- and you have the secret, if you are spiritual enough to understand it.
"When the seed of the animal man
is cast into the soil of the animal woman, that seed cannot germinate unless it
has been fructified by the five virtues (the fluid of, or the emanation from
the principles) of the six-fold Heavenly man. Wherefore the Microcosm is
represented as a Pentagon, within the Hexagon Star, the "Macrocosm."
("[[Anthropos]],") a work on Occult Embryology, Book I.). Then:
"The functions of Jiva on this Earth are of a five-fold character. In the
mineral atom it is connected with the lowest principles of the Spirits of the
Earth (the six-fold Dhyanis); in the vegetable particle, with their second --
the Prana (life); in the animal, with all these plus the third and the fourth;
in man, the germ must receive the fruition of all the five. Otherwise he will
be born no higher than an animal"; namely, a congenital idiot. Thus in man
alone the Jiva is complete. As to his seventh principle, it is but one of the
Beams of the Universal Sun. Each rational creature receives only the temporary
loan of that which has to return to its source; while his physical body is
shaped by the lowest terrestrial lives, through physical, chemical, and
physiological evolution. "The Blessed Ones have nought to do with the
purgations of matter." (Kabala, Chaldean Book of Numbers).
It comes to this: Mankind in its
first prototypal, shadowy form, is the offspring of the Elohim of Life (or
Pitris); in its qualitative and physical aspect it is the direct progeny of the
"Ancestors," the lowest Dhyanis, or Spirits of the Earth; for its
moral, psychic, and spiritual nature, it is indebted to a group of divine Beings,
the name and characteristics of which will be given in Book II. Collectively,
men are the handiwork of hosts of various spirits; distributively, the
tabernacles of those hosts; and occasionally and singly, the vehicles of some
of them. In our present all-material Fifth Race, the earthly Spirit of the
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Fourth is still strong in us; but we
are approaching the time when the pendulum of evolution will direct its swing
decidedly upwards, bringing Humanity back on a parallel line with the primitive
third Root-Race in Spirituality. During its childhood, mankind was composed wholly
of that Angelic Host, who were the indwelling Spirits that animated the
monstrous and gigantic tabernacles of clay of the Fourth Race built by (as they
are now also) and composed of countless myriads of lives.* This sentence will
be explained later on in the present Commentary. The "tabernacles"
have improved in texture and symmetry of form, growing and developing with the
globe that bore them; but the physical improvement took place at the expense of
the spiritual inner man and nature. The three middle principles in earth and
man became with every race more material; the Soul stepping back to make room
for the physical intellect; the essence of elements becoming the material and
composite elements now known.
Man is not, nor could he ever be, the
complete product of the "Lord God"; but he is the child of the
Elohim, so arbitrarily changed into the singular masculine gender. The first
Dhyanis, commissioned to "create" man in their image, could only
throw off their shadows, like a delicate model for the Nature Spirits of matter
to work upon. (See Book II.) Man is, beyond any doubt, formed physically out of
the dust of the Earth, but his creators and fashioners were many. Nor can it be
said that the "Lord God breathed into his nostrils the breath of life,"
unless that God is identified with the "ONE LIFE," Omnipresent though
invisible, and unless the same operation is attributed to "God" on
behalf of every living Soul -- or Nephesch, which is the vital Soul, not the
divine Spirit or Ruach, which ensures to man alone a divine degree of
immortality, that no animal, as such, could ever attain in this cycle of
incarnation. It is the inadequate distinctions made by the Jews, and now by our
Western metaphysicians, who, not knowing of, and being unable to understand,
hence to accept, more than a triune man -- Spirit, Soul,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Science, dimly perceiving the
truth, may find Bacteria and other infinitesimals in the human body, and see in
them but occasional and abnormal visitors to which diseases are attributed.
Occultism -- which discerns a life in every atom and molecule, whether in a
mineral or human body, in air, fire or water -- affirms that our whole body is
built of such lives, the smallest bacteria under the microscope being to them
in comparative size like an elephant to the tiniest infusoria.
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Body -- thus confuse the "breath
of life" with immortal Spirit.* This applies also directly to the
Protestant theologians, who, in translating verse 8 of Ch. III. in the Fourth
Gospel, have entirely perverted the meaning. Indeed the verse is made to say
"The wind bloweth where it listeth," instead of "the Spirit
goeth where it willeth," as in the original and also in the translation of
the Greek Eastern Church.
Thus the philosophy of psychic,
spiritual, and mental relations with man's physical functions is in almost
inextricable confusion. Neither the old Aryan, nor the Egyptian psychology are
now properly understood. Nor can they be assimilated without accepting the
esoteric septenary, or, at any rate, the Vedantic quinquepartite division of
the human inner principles. Failing which, it will be for ever impossible to
understand the metaphysical and purely psychic and even physiological relations
between the Dhyan-Chohans, or Angels, on the one plane, and humanity on the
other. No Eastern (Aryan) esoteric works are so far published, but we possess
the Egyptian papyri which speak clearly
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The learned and very philosophical
author of "New Aspects of Life" would impress upon his reader that
the Nephesh chaiah (living soul), according to the Hebrews, "proceeded
from, or was produced by, the infusion of the Spirit or Breath of Life into the
quickening body of man, and was to supersede and take the place of that spirit
in the thus constituted self, so that the spirit passed into, was lost sight
of, and disappeared in the living Soul." The human body, he thinks, ought
to be viewed as a matrix in which, and from which, the Soul (which he seems to
place higher than the spirit) is developed -- considered functionally and from
the standpoint of activity, the Soul stands undeniably higher in this finite
and conditioned world of Maya -- the Soul, he says, "is ultimately
produced from the animated body of man." Thus the author identifies
"Spirit" (Atma) simply with "the breath of life." The
Eastern Occultists will demur to this statement, for it is based on the
erroneous conception that Prana and Atma or Jivatma are one and the same thing.
The author supports the argument by showing that with the ancient Hebrews,
Greeks and even Latins, Ruach, Pneuma and Spiritus -- with the Jews undeniably,
and with the Greeks and Romans very probably -- meant Wind; the Greek word Anemos
(wind) and the Latin Anima "Soul" having a suspicious relation.
This is very far fetched. A
legitimate battle-field for deciding this question is hardly to be found, since
Mr. Pratt seems to be a practical, matter-of-fact metaphysician, a kind of Kabalist-Positivist,
and the Eastern metaphysicians, especially the Vedantins, are all Idealists.
The Occultists are also of the extreme esoteric Vedantin school, and they call
the One Life (Parabrahm), the Great Breath and the Whirlwind; but they
disconnect the seventh principle entirely from matter or any relation to, or
connection with it.
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of the seven principles or the
"Seven Souls of Man."* The Book of the Dead gives a complete list of
the "transformations" that every defunct undergoes, while divesting
himself, one by one, of all those principles -- materialised for the sake of
clearness into ethereal entities or bodies. We must, moreover, remind those who
try to prove that the ancient Egyptians knew nothing of and did not teach
Reincarnation, that the "Soul" (the Ego or Self) of the defunct is
said to be living in Eternity: it is immortal, "co-eval with, and
disappearing with the Solar boat," i.e., for the cycle of necessity. This
"Soul" emerges from the Tiaou (the realm of the cause of life) and
joins the living on Earth by day, to return to Tiaou every night. This
expresses the periodical existences of the Ego. (Book of the Dead, cvxliii.)
The shadow, the astral form, is
annihilated, "devoured by the Uraeus" (cxlix., 51), the Manes will be
annihilated; the two twins (the 4th and 5th principles) will be scattered; but
the Soul-bird, "the divine Swallow -- and the Uraeus of Flame" (Manas
and Atma-Buddhi) will live in the eternity, for they are their mother's
husbands.**
Like alone produces like. The Earth
gives Man his body, the gods (Dhyanis) his five inner principles, the psychic
Shadow, of which those gods are often the animating principle. SPIRIT (Atman)
is one -- and indiscrete. It is not in the Tiaou.
For what is the Tiaou? The frequent
allusion to it in the "Book of the Dead" contains a mystery. Tiaou is
the path of the Night Sun, the inferior hemisphere, or the infernal region of
the Egyptians, placed by them on the concealed side of the moon. The human
being, in their
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Vide in Part II., Book II.,
"The Seven Souls of Man," the divisions made respectively by Messrs.
Gerald Massey and Franz Lambert.
** Another suggestive analogy between
the Aryan or Brahmanical and the Egyptian esotericism. The former call the
Pitris "the lunar ancestors" of men; and the Egyptians made of the
Moon-God, Taht-Esmun, the first human ancestor. This "moon-god"
"expressed the Seven nature-powers that were prior to himself, and were
summed up in him as his seven souls, of which he was the manifestor as the
eighth one (hence the eighth sphere). The seven rays of the Chaldean Heptakis
or Iao, on the Gnostic stones indicate the same septenary of souls." . . .
"The first form of the mystical SEVEN was seen to be figured in heaven, by
the seven large stars of the Great Bear, the constellation assigned by the
Egyptians to the Mother of Time, and of the seven elemental powers." (See
The Seven Souls, etc.) As well known to every Hindu, this same constellation
represents in India the Seven Rishis, and as such is called Riksha, and
Chitra-Sikhandinas.
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esotericism, came out from the moon
(a triple mystery -- astronomical, physiological, and psychical at once); he
crossed the whole cycle of existence and then returned to his birth-place
before issuing from it again. Thus the defunct is shown arriving in the West,
receiving his judgment before Osiris, resurrecting as the god Horus, and
circling round the sidereal heavens, which is an allegorical assimilation to
Ra, the Sun; then having crossed the Noot (the celestial abyss), returning once
more to Tiaou: an assimilation to Osiris, who, as the God of life and
reproduction, inhabits the moon. Plutarch (Isis and Osiris, ch. xliii.) shows
the Egyptians celebrating a festival called "The Ingress of Osiris into
the moon." In chapter xli. life is promised after death; and the renovation
of life is placed under the patronage of Osiris-Lunus, because the moon was the
symbol of life-renewals or reincarnations, owing to its growth, waning, dying,
and reappearance every month. In the Dankmoe, (iv. 5) it is said:-- "Oh,
Osiris-Lunus! That renews to thee thy renewal." And Safekh says to Seti I.
(Mariette's Abydos, plate 51), "Thou renewest thyself as the god Lunus
when a babe." It is still better explained in a Louvre papyrus (P.
Pierret, "Etudes Egyptologiques"): "Couplings and conceptions
abound when he (Osiris-Lunus) is seen in heaven on that day." Says Osiris:
"Oh, sole radiant beam of the moon! I issue from the circulating
multitudes (of stars) . . . . . . Open me the Tiaou, for Osiris N. I will issue
by day to do what I have to do amongst the living" ("Book of the
Dead," ch. ii.), -- i.e., to produce conceptions.
Osiris was "God manifest in
generation," because the ancients knew, far better than the moderns, the
real occult influences of the lunar body upon the mysteries of conception.*
Later on, when the moon became connected with female goddesses** -- with Diana,
Isis, Artemis,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In the oldest systems we find the
Moon always male. Thus Soma is, with the Hindus, a kind of sidereal Don Juan, a
"King," and the father, albeit illegitimate, of Buddha -- Wisdom,
which relates to Occult Knowledge, a wisdom gathered through a thorough
acquaintance with lunar mysteries including those of sexual generation. (See "Holy
of Holies.")
** If instead of being taught in
Sunday Schools useless lessons from the Bible, the armies of the ragged and the
poor were taught Astrology -- so far, at any rate, as the occult properties of
the Moon and its hidden influences on generation are concerned, then there
would be little need to fear increase of the population nor to resort to the
questionable literature of the Malthusians for its arrest. For it is the Moon
and her [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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Juno, etc., that connection was due
to a thorough knowledge of physiology and female nature, physical as much as
psychic. But, primarily, the Sun and Moon were the only visible and, so to say,
tangible [by their effects] psychic and physiological deities -- the Father and
the Son, while Space and air in general, or that expanse of Heaven called Noot
by the Egyptians, was the concealed Spirit or Breath of the two. These
"Father and Son" were interchangeable in their functions and worked
harmoniously together in their effects upon terrestrial nature and humanity;
hence they were regarded as ONE, though TWO in personified Entities. They were
both males, and both had their distinct and also collaborative work in the
causative generation of Humanity. So much from the astronomical and cosmic
standpoints viewed and expressed in symbolical language -- which became in our last
races theological and dogmatic. But behind this veil of Cosmic and Astrological
symbols, there were the Occult mysteries of Anthropography and the primeval
genesis of man. And in this, no knowledge of symbols -- or even the key to the
post-diluvian symbolical language of the Jews -- will, or can help, save only
with reference to that which was laid down in national scriptures for exoteric
uses; the sum of which, however cleverly veiled, was only the smallest portion
of the real primitive history of each people, often relating, moreover, -- as
in the Hebrew Scriptures -- merely to the terrestrial human, not divine life of
that nation. That psychic and spiritual element belonged to MYSTERY and
INITIATION. There were things never recorded in scrolls, but, as in Central
Asia, on rocks and in subterranean crypts.
Nevertheless, there was a time when
the whole world was "of one lip and of one knowledge," and Man knew
more of his origin than he does now, and thus knew that the Sun and Moon,
however large a part they do play in the constitution, growth and development
of the human body, were not the direct causative agents of his appearance on
Earth;
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] conjunctions that regulate conceptions, and every astrologer in India
knows it. During the previous and the present races, at least at the beginning
of this one, those who indulged in marital relations during certain lunar
phases that made those relations sterile were regarded as sorcerers and
sinners. But even now those sins of old, based on the Occult knowledge and the
abuse of it, would appear preferable to the crimes of to-day, which are
perpetrated because of the complete ignorance of, and disbelief in all such
occult influences.
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these agents being, in truth, the
living and intelligent Powers which the Occultists call Dhyan Chohans.
As to this, a very learned admirer of
the Jewish Esotericism tells us that "the Kabala says expressly that
Elohim is a 'general abstraction'; what we call in mathematics 'a constant
co-efficient' or a 'general function' entering into all construction, not
particular; that is, by the general ratio 1 to 31415, (the astro-Dhyanic and)
Elohistic figures." To this the Eastern Occultist replies: Quite so, it is
an abstraction to our physical senses. To our spiritual perceptions, however,
and to our inner spiritual eye, the Elohim or Dhyanis are no more an
abstraction than our soul and spirit are to us. Reject the one and you reject
the other -- since that which is the surviving Entity in us is partly the
direct emanation from, and partly those celestial Entities themselves. One
thing is sure; the Jews were perfectly acquainted with sorcery and various
maleficent forces; but, with the exception of some of their great prophets and
seers like Daniel and Ezekiel (Enoch belonging to a far distant race and not to
any nation but to all, as a generic character), they knew little of, nor would
they deal with, the real divine Occultism, their national character being
averse to anything which had no direct bearing upon their own ethnical, tribal,
and individual benefits -- witness their own prophets, and the curses thundered
by them against the "stiff-necked race." But even the Kabala plainly
shows the direct relation between the Sephiroth, or Elohim, and men.
Therefore, when it is proved to us
that the Kabalistic identification of Jehovah with Binah, a female Sephiroth,
has still another, a sub-occult meaning in it, then and then only the Occultist
will be ready to pass the palm of perfection to the Kabalist. Until then, it is
asserted that, as Jehovah is in the abstract sense of a "one living
God," a single number, a metaphysical figment, and a reality only when put
in his proper place as an emanation and a Sephiroth -- we have a right to
maintain that the Zohar (as witnessed by the BOOK OF NUMBERS, at any rate),
gave out originally, before the Christian Kabalists had disfigured it, and
still gives out the same doctrine that we do; i.e., it makes Man emanate, not
from one Celestial MAN, but from a Septenary group of Celestial men or Angels,
just as in "Pymander, the Thought Divine."
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STANZA VII. -- Continued.
(3) WHEN THE ONE BECOMES TWO -- THE
"THREE-FOLD" APPEARS (a). THE THREE ARE (linked into) ONE; AND IT IS
OUR THREAD, O LANOO, THE HEART OF THE MAN-PLANT, CALLED SAPTAPARNA (b).
(a) "When the ONE becomes two,
the three-fold appears": to wit, when the One Eternal drops its reflection
into the region of Manifestation, that reflection, "the Ray,"
differentiates the "Water of Space"; or, in the words of the
"Book of the Dead"; "Chaos ceases, through the effulgence of the
Ray of Primordial light dissipating total darkness by the help of the great
magic power of the WORD of the (Central) Sun." Chaos becomes male-female,
and Water, incubated through Light, and the "three-fold being issues as
its First-born." "Osiris-Ptah (or RA) creates his own limbs (like
Brahma) by creating the gods destined to personify his phases" during the
Cycle (xvii., 4). The Egyptian Ra, issuing from the DEEP, is the Divine
Universal Soul in its manifested aspect, and so is Narayana, the Purusha,
"concealed in Akasa and present in Ether."
This is the metaphysical explanation,
and refers to the very beginning of Evolution, or, as we should rather say, of
Theogony. The meaning of the Stanza when explained from another standpoint in
its reference to the mystery of man and his origin, is still more difficult to
comprehend. In order to form a clear conception of what is meant by the One
becoming two, and then being transformed into the "three-fold," the
student has to make himself thoroughly acquainted with what we call
"Rounds." If he refers to "Esoteric Buddhism" -- the first
attempt to sketch out an approximate outline of archaic Cosmogony -- he will
find that by a "Round" is meant the serial evolution of nascent
material nature, of the seven globes of our chain* with their mineral,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Several inimical critics are
anxious to prove that no seven principles of man nor septenary constitution of
our chain were taught in our earlier volume, "Isis Unveiled." Though
in that work the doctrine could only be hinted at, there are many passages,
nevertheless, in which the septenary constitution of both man and chain is
openly mentioned. Speaking of the Elohim in Vol. II., page 420, it is said:
"They remain over the seventh heaven (or spiritual world), for it is they
who, according to the Kabalists, formed in succession the six material worlds,
or rather, attempts at worlds that preceded our own, which, they say, is the
seventh." Our globe is, of course, upon the diagram representing the
"chain," the seventh and the lowest; though, [[Footnote continued on
next page]]
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vegetable, and animal kingdoms (man
being there included in the latter and standing at the head of it) during the
whole period of a life-cycle. The latter would be called by the Brahmins
"a Day of Brahma." It is, in short, one revolution of the
"Wheel" (our planetary chain), which is composed of seven globes (or
seven separate "Wheels," in another sense this time). When evolution
has run downward into matter, from planet A to planet G, or Z, as the Western
students call it, it is one Round. In the middle of the Fourth revolution,
which is our present "Round": "Evolution has reached its acme of
physical development, crowned its work with the perfect physical man, and, from
this point, begins its work spirit-ward." All this needs little
repetition, as it is well explained in "Esoteric Buddhism." That
which was hardly touched upon, and of which the little that was said has misled
many, is the origin of man, and it is upon this that a little more light may
now be thrown, just enough to make the Stanza more comprehensible, as the
process will be fully explained only in its legitimate place, in Book II.
Now every "Round" (on the
descending scale) is but a repetition in a more concrete form of the Round which
preceded it, as every globe -- down to our fourth sphere (the actual earth) --
is a grosser and more material copy of the more shadowy sphere which precedes
it in their successive order, on the three higher planes. (See diagram in
Stanza VI. Comm. 6). On its way upwards on the ascending arc, Evolution
spiritualises and etherealises, so to speak, the general nature of all,
bringing it on to a level with the plane on which the twin globe on the
opposite side is placed; the result being, that when the seventh globe is
reached (in whatever Round) the nature of everything that is evolving returns
to the condition it was in at its starting point -- plus, every time, a new and
superior degree in the states of consciousness. Thus it becomes clear that the "origin
of man," so-called, on this our present
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] as the evolution on these globes is cyclic, it is the fourth in
descending the arc of matter. And again, on page 367, Vol. II., it is written:
"In the Egyptian notions, as in those of all other faiths founded on
philosophy, man was not merely . . . an union of soul and body; he was a
trinity when spirit was added to it; and besides that doctrine made him consist
of body, astral form, or shadow, the animal soul, the higher soul, and
terrestrial intelligence and a sixth principle, etc., etc. -- the seventh --
SPIRIT." So clearly are these principles mentioned, that even in the
Index, one finds on page 683:-- "Six principles of man" -- the
seventh being the synthesis of the six, and not a principle but a ray of the
Absolute ALL -- in strict truth.
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Round, or life-cycle on this planet,
must occupy the same place in the same order -- save details based on local
conditions and time -- as in the preceding Round. Again, it must be explained
and remembered that, as the work of each Round is said to be apportioned to a
different group of so-called "Creators" or "Architects," so
is that of every globe; i.e., it is under the supervision and guidance of
special "Builders" and "Watchers" -- the various
Dhyan-Chohans.
The group of the hierarchy which is
commissioned to "create"* men is a special group, then; yet it
evolved shadowy man in this cycle just as a higher and still more spiritual
group evolved him in the Third Round. But as it is the Sixth -- on the downward
scale of Spirituality -- the last and seventh being the terrestrial Spirits
(elementals) which gradually form, build, and condense his physical body --
this Sixth group evolves no more than the future man's shadowy form, a filmy,
hardly visible transparent copy of themselves. It becomes the task of the fifth
Hierarchy -- the mysterious beings that preside over the constellation
Capricornus, Makara, or "Crocodile" in India as in Egypt -- to inform
the empty and ethereal animal form and make of it the Rational Man. This is one
of those subjects upon which very little may be said to the general public. It
is a MYSTERY, truly, but only to him who is prepared to reject the existence of
intellectual and conscious spiritual Beings in the Universe, limiting full
Consciousness to man alone, and that only as a "function of the
Brain." Many are those among the Spiritual Entities, who have incarnated
bodily in man, since the beginning of his appearance, and who, for all that,
still exist as independently as they did before, in the infinitudes of Space. .
. .
To put it more clearly: the invisible
Entity may be bodily present on earth without abandoning, however, its status
and functions in the supersensuous regions. If this needs explanation, we can
do no better than remind the reader of like cases in Spiritualism, though such
cases are very rare, at least as regards the nature of the Entity
incarnating,**
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Creation is an incorrect word to
use, as no religion, not even the sect of the Visishta Adwaitees in India --
one which anthropomorphises even Parabrahmam -- believes in creation out of
nihil as Christians and Jews do, but in evolution out of preexisting materials.
** The so-called "Spirits"
that may occasionally possess themselves of the bodies of mediums are not the
Monads or Higher Principles of disembodied personalities. Such a
"Spirit" can only be either an Elementary, or -- a Nirmanakaya.
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or taking temporary possession of a
medium. Just as certain persons -- men and women, reverting to parallel cases
among living persons -- whether by virtue of a peculiar organization, or
through the power of acquired mystic knowledge, can be seen in their
"double" in one place, while the body is many miles away; so the same
thing can occur in the case of superior Beings.
Man, philosophically considered, is,
in his outward form, simply an animal, hardly more perfect than his
pithecoid-like ancestor of the third round. He is a living body, not a living
being, since the realisation of existence, the "Ego-Sum,"
necessitates self-consciousness, and an animal can only have direct
consciousness, or instinct. This was so well understood by the Ancients that
the Kabalist even made of soul and body two lives, independent of each other.*
The soul, whose body vehicle is the Astral, ethero-substantial envelope, could
die and man be still living on earth -- i.e., the soul could free itself from
and quit the tabernacle for various reasons -- such as insanity, spiritual and
physical depravity, etc.** Therefore, that which living men (Initiates)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* On p. 340-351 (Genesis of the Soul)
in the "New Aspects of Life," the Author states the Kabalistic
teaching: "They held that, functionally, Spirit and Matter of
corresponding opacity and density tended to coalesce; and that the resultant
created Spirits, in the disembodied state, were constituted on a scale in which
the differing opacities and transparencies of Elemental or uncreated Spirit
were reproduced. And that these Spirits in the disembodied state attracted,
appropriated, digested and assimilated Elemental Spirit and Elemental Matter
whose condition was conformed to their own." "They therefore taught
that there was a wide difference in the condition of created Spirits; and that
in the intimate association between the Spirit-world and the world of Matter,
the more opaque Spirits in the disembodied state were drawn towards the more
dense parts of the material world, and therefore tended towards the centre of
the Earth, where they found the conditions most suited to their state; while
the more transparent Spirits passed into the surrounding aura of the planet,
the most rarified finding their home in its satellite."
This relates exclusively to our
Elementary Spirits, and has naught to do with either the Planetary, Sidereal,
Cosmic or Inter-Etheric Intelligent Forces or "Angels" as they are
termed by the Roman Church. The Jewish Kabalists, especially the practical
Occultists who dealt with ceremonial magic, busied themselves solely with the
spirits of the Planets and the "Elementals" so-called. Therefore this
covers only a portion of the Esoteric Teaching.
** The possibility of the
"Soul" (i.e., the eternal Spiritual Ego) dwelling in the unseen
worlds, while its body goes on living on Earth, is a pre-eminently occult
doctrine, especially in Chinese and Buddhist philosophy. See "Isis
Unveiled," vol. i., [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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can do, the Dhyanis, who have no
physical body to hamper them, can do still better. This was the belief of the
Antediluvians, and it is fast becoming that of modern intellectual society, in
Spiritualism, besides the Greek and Roman Churches, which teach the ubiquity of
their angels. The Zoroastrians regarded their Amshaspends as dual entities
(Ferouers), applying this duality -- in esoteric philosophy, at any rate -- to
all the spiritual and invisible denizens of the numberless worlds in space
which are visible to our eye. In a note of Damascius (sixth century) on the Chaldean
oracles, we have a triple evidence of the universality of this doctrine, for he
says: "In these oracles the seven Cosmocratores of the world, ('The
World-Pillars,') mentioned likewise by St. Paul, are double -- one set being
commissioned to rule the superior worlds the spiritual and the sidereal, and
the other to guide and watch over the worlds of matter." Such is also the
opinion of Jamblichus, who makes an evident distinction between the archangels
and the "Archontes." (See "De Mysteriis," sec. ii., ch. 3.)
The above may be applied, of course, to the distinction made between the
degrees or orders of spiritual beings, and it is in this sense that the Roman
Catholic Church tries to interpret and teach the difference; for while the
archangels are in her teaching divine and holy, their doubles are denounced by
her as devils.* But the word "ferouer" is not to be understood in
this sense, for it means simply the reverse or the opposite side of some
attribute or quality. Thus when the Occultist says that the "Demon is the
lining of God" (evil, the reverse of the medal), he does not mean two
separate
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] p. 602, for an illustration. Many are the Soulless men among us, for the
occurrence is found to take place in wicked materialists as well as in persons
"who advance in holiness and never turn back." (See ibid and also
"Isis," vol. ii., p. 369.)
* This identity between the Spirit
and its material "double" (in man it is the reverse) explains still
better the confusion, alluded to already in this work, made in the names and
individualities, as well as the numbers, of the Rishis and the Prajapatis;
especially between those of the Satyayuga and the Mahabharatan period. It also
throws additional light on what the Secret Doctrine teaches with regard to the
Root and the Seed Manus (see Book ii. "On the primitive Manus of
humanity"). Not only those progenitors of our mankind, but every human
being, we are taught, has its prototype in the Spiritual Spheres; which
prototype is the highest essence of his seventh principle. Thus the seven Manus
become 14, the Root Manu being the Prime Cause, and the "Seed-Manu"
its effect; and when the latter reach from Satyayuga (the first stage) to the
heroic period, these Manus or Rishis become 21 in number.
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actualities, but the two aspects or
facets of the same Unity. Now the best man living would appear, side by side
with an Archangel -- as described in Theology -- a fiend. Hence a certain
reason to depreciate a lower "double," immersed far deeper in matter
than its original. But there is still as little cause to regard them as devils,
and this is precisely what the Roman Catholics maintain against all reason and
logic.
(b) The concluding sentence of this
sloka shows how archaic is the belief and the doctrine that man is seven-fold
in his constitution. The thread of being which animates man and passes through
all his personalities, or rebirths on this Earth (an allusion to Sutratma), the
thread on which moreover all his "Spirits" are strung -- is spun from
the essence of the "threefold," the "fourfold" and the
"fivefold"; which contain all the preceding. Panchasikha, agreeably
to Bhagavata Purana (V. XX. 25-28), is one of the seven Kumaras who go to
Sveta-Dvipa to worship Vishnu. We shall see further on, what connection there
is between the "celibate" and chaste sons of Brahma, who refuse
"to multiply," and terrestrial mortals. Meanwhile it is evident that
"the Man-Plant," Saptaparna, thus refers to the seven principles, and
man is compared to the seven-leaved plant of this name* so sacred among
Buddhists.
For further details as to Saptaparna
and the importance of the number seven in occultism, as well as in symbology,
the reader is referred to Part II., Book II., on Symbolism: Sections on
"Saptaparna," "The Septenary in the Vedas," etc. etc.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Egyptian allegory in the
"Book of the Dead" already mentioned, the hymn that relates to the
reward "of the Soul," is as suggestive of our Septenary Doctrine as
it is poetical. The deceased is allotted a piece of land in the field of
Aanroo, wherein the Manes, the deified shades of the dead, glean, as the
harvest they have sown by their actions in life, the corn seven cubits high,
which grows in a territory divided into 14 and 7 portions. This corn is the
food on which they live and prosper, or that will kill them, in Amenti, the
realm of which the Aanroo field is a domain. For, as said in the hymn, (see
chap. xxxii. 9) the deceased is either destroyed therein, or becomes pure
spirit for the Eternity, in consequence of the "Seven times seventy-seven
lives" passed or to be passed on Earth. The idea of the corn reaped as the
"fruit of our actions" is very graphic.
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STANZA VII. -- Continued.
4. IT IS THE ROOT THAT NEVER DIES,
THE THREE-TONGUED FLAME OF THE FOUR WICKS* (a) . . . THE WICKS ARE THE SPARKS,
THAT DRAW FROM THE THREE-TONGUED FLAME (their upper triad) SHOT OUT BY THE
SEVEN, THEIR FLAME; THE BEAMS AND SPARKS OF ONE MOON REFLECTED IN THE RUNNING
WAVES OF ALL THE RIVERS OF THE EARTH ("Bhumi," or
"Prithivi")** (b).
(a) The "Three-tongued
flame" that never dies is the immortal spiritual triad -- the Atma-Buddhi
and Manas -- the fruition of the latter assimilated by the first two after
every terrestrial life. The "four wicks" that go out and are
extinguished, are the four lower principles, including the body.
"I am the three-wicked Flame and
my wicks are immortal," says the defunct. "I enter into the domain of
Sekhem (the God whose arm sows the seed of action produced by the disembodied
soul) and I enter the region of the Flames who have destroyed their
adversaries," i.e., got rid of the sin-creating "four wicks."
(See chap. i., vii., "Book of the Dead," and the "Mysteries of
Ro-stan.")
(b) Just as milliards of bright
sparks dance on the waters of an ocean above which one and the same moon is
shining, so our evanescent personalities -- the illusive envelopes of the
immortal MONAD-EGO -- twinkle and dance on the waves of Maya. They last and
appear, as the thousands of sparks produced by the moon-beams, only so long as
the Queen of the Night radiates her lustre on the running waters of life: the
period of a Manvantara; and then they disappear, the beams -- symbols of our
eternal Spiritual Egos -- alone surviving, re-merged in, and being, as they were
before, one with the Mother-Source.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The three-tongued flame of the four
wicks corresponds to the four unities and the three Binaries of the Sephirothal
tree (see Commentary on Stanza VI.).
** Useless to repeat again that the
terms given here are Sanskrit translations; for the original terms, unknown and
unheard of in Europe, would only puzzle the reader more, and serve no useful
purpose.
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STANZA VII. -- Continued.
(5) THE SPARK HANGS FROM THE FLAME BY
THE FINEST THREAD OF FOHAT. IT JOURNEYS THROUGH THE SEVEN WORLDS OF MAYA (a).
IT STOPS IN THE FIRST (Kingdom), AND IS A METAL AND A STONE; IT PASSES INTO THE
SECOND (Kingdom), AND BEHOLD -- A PLANT; THE PLANT WHIRLS THROUGH SEVEN FORMS
AND BECOMES A SACRED ANIMAL; (the first shadow of the physical man) (b).
FROM THE COMBINED ATTRIBUTES OF
THESE, MANU (man), THE THINKER, IS FORMED.
WHO FORMS HIM? THE SEVEN LIVES; AND
THE ONE LIFE (c). WHO COMPLETES HIM? THE FIVEFOLD LHA. AND WHO PERFECTS THE
LAST BODY? FISH, SIN, AND SOMA (the moon) (d).
(a) The phrase "through the
seven Worlds of Maya" refers here to the seven globes of the planetary
chain and the seven rounds, or the 49 stations of active existence that are
before the "Spark" or Monad, at the beginning of every "Great
Life-Cycle" or Manvantara. The "thread of Fohat" is the thread
of life before referred to.
This relates to the greatest problem
of philosophy -- the physical and substantial nature of life, the independent
nature of which is denied by modern science because that science is unable to
comprehend it. The reincarnationists and believers in Karma alone dimly
perceive that the whole secret of Life is in the unbroken series of its
manifestations: whether in, or apart from, the physical body. Because if --
"Life, like a dome of
many-coloured glass,
Stains the white radiance of
Eternity" --
yet it is itself part and parcel of
that Eternity; for life alone can understand life.
What is that "Spark" which
"hangs from the flame?" It is JIVA, the MONAD in conjunction with
MANAS, or rather its aroma -- that which remains from each personality, when
worthy, and hangs from Atma-Buddhi, the Flame, by the thread of life. In
whatever way interpreted, and into whatever number of principles the human
being is divided, it may easily be shown that this doctrine is supported by all
the ancient
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religions, from the Vedic to the
Egyptian, from the Zoroastrian to the Jewish. In the case of the
last-mentioned, the Kabalistic works offer abundant proof of this statement.
The entire system of the Kabalistic numerals is based on the divine septenary
hanging from the Triad (thus forming the Decade) and its permutations 7, 5, 4,
and 3, which, finally, all merge into the ONE itself: an endless and boundless
Circle.
"The Deity (the ever Invisible
Presence)," says the Zohar, "manifests itself through the ten
Sephiroth which are its radiating witnesses. The Deity is like the Sea from
which outflows a stream called WISDOM, the waters of which fall into a lake
named Intelligence. From the basin, like seven channels, issue the Seven
Sephiroth. . . . . For ten equal seven: the Decade contains four Unities and three
Binaries." The ten Sephiroth correspond to the limbs of MAN. "When I
framed Adam Kadmon," the Elohim are made to say, "the Spirit of the
Eternal shot out of his Body like a sheet of lightning that radiated at once on
the billows of the Seven millions of skies, and my ten splendours were his
limbs." But neither the Head nor the shoulders of Adam-Kadmon can be seen;
therefore we read in the Sephra Dzenioutha (the "Book of the Concealed
Mystery"):--
"In the beginning of Time, after
the Elohim (the "Sons of Light and Life," or the
"Builders") had shaped out of the eternal Essence the Heavens and the
Earth, they formed the worlds six by six, the seventh being Malkuth, which is
our Earth (see Mantuan Codex) on its plane, and the lowest on all the other
planes of conscious existence. The Chaldean Book of Numbers contains a detailed
explanation of all this. "The first triad of the body of Adam Kadmon (the
three upper planes of the seven*) cannot be seen before the soul stands in the
presence of the Ancient of Days." The Sephiroth of this upper triad are:--
"1, Kether (the Crown) represented by the brow of Macroprosopos; 2,
Chochmah (Wisdom, a male Principle) by his right shoulder; and 3, Binah
(Intelligence, a female Principle) by the left shoulder." Then come the
seven limbs (or Sephiroth) on the planes of manifestation, the totality of
these four planes being represented by Microprosopus (the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The formation of the "living
Soul" or man, would render the idea more clearly. "A Living
Soul" is a synonym of man in the Bible. These are our seven
"Principles."
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lesser Face) or Tetragrammaton, the
"four-lettered" Mystery. "The seven manifested and the three
concealed limbs are the Body of the Deity."
Thus our Earth, Malkuth, is both the
Seventh and the Fourth world, the former when counting from the first globe
above, the latter if reckoned by the planes. It is generated by the sixth globe
or Sephiroth called Yezod, "foundation," or as said in the Book of
Numbers "by Yezod, He (Adam Kadmon) fecundates the primitive Heva"
(Eve or our Earth). Rendered in mystic language this is the explanation why
Malkuth, called "the inferior Mother," Matrona, Queen, and the
Kingdom of the Foundation, is shown as the Bride of Tetragrammaton or
Microprosopus (the 2nd Logos) the Heavenly Man. When free from all impurity she
will become united with the Spiritual Logos, i.e., in the 7th Race of the 7th
Round -- after the regeneration, on the day of "SABBATH." For the "seventh
day" has again an occult significance undreamt of by our theologians.
"When Matronitha, the Mother, is
separated and brought face to face with the King, in the excellence of the
Sabbath, all things become one body," says verse 746, in chapter xxii. of
"Ha Idra Zuta Kadisha." "Becomes one body" means that all
is reabsorbed once more into the one element, the spirits of men becoming
Nirvanees and the elements of everything else becoming again what they were
before -- protyle or undifferentiated substance. "Sabbath" means rest
or Nirvana. It is not the seventh day after six days but a period the duration
of which equals that of the seven "days" or any period made up of
seven parts. Thus a pralaya is equal in duration to the manwantara, or a night
of Brahma is equal to this "day." If the Christians will follow
Jewish customs they ought to adopt the spirit and not the dead letter thereof:
i.e., to work one week of seven days and rest seven days. That the word
"Sabbath" had a mystic significance is shown in the contempt shown by
Jesus for the Sabbath day, and by what is said in Luke xviii. 12. Sabbath is
there taken for the whole week. (See Greek text where the week is called
Sabbath. "I fast twice in the Sabbath.") Paul, an Initiate, knew it
well when referring to the eternal rest and felicity in heaven, as Sabbath;
"and their happiness will be eternal, for they will ever be (one) with the
Lord and will enjoy an eternal Sabbath." (Hebrew iv. 2.)
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The difference between the two
systems, taking the Kabala as contained in the Chaldean Book of Numbers, not as
misrepresented by its now disfigured copy, the Kabala of the Christian mystics
--the Kabala and the archaic esoteric Vidya, is very small indeed, being
confined to unimportant divergences of form and expression. Thus Eastern
occultism refers to our earth as the fourth world, the lowest of the chain,
above which run upward on both its sides the six globes, three on each side.
The Zohar, on the other hand, calls the earth the lower, or the Seventh, adding
that upon the six depend all things which are in it, "Microprosopus."
The "smaller face," smaller because manifested and finite, "is
formed of six Sephiroth," says the same work. "Seven kings come and
die in the thrice-destroyed world" -- (Malkuth our earth, destroyed after
each of the three rounds which it has gone through). "And their reign (of
the seven kings) will be broken up." (Book of Numbers, 1. viii., 3.) This
relates to the Seven Races, five of which have already appeared, and two more
have still to appear in this Round.
The Shinto allegorical accounts of
Cosmogony and the origin of man in Japan hint at the same belief.
Captain C. Pfoundes studied for
nearly nine years in the monasteries of Japan the religion underlying the
various sects of the land. . . . . . "The Shinto idea of creation,"
he says, "is as follows: Out of chaos (Konton) the earth (in) was the
sediment precipitated, and the Heavens (yo) the ethereal essences which
ascended: Maa (jin) appeared between the two. The first man was called Kuni-to
ko tatchi-no-mikoto, and five other names were given to him, and then the human
race appeared, male and female. Isanagi and Isanami begat Tenshoko doijin, the
first of the five gods of the Earth." These "gods" are simply
our five races, Isanagi and Isanami being the two kinds of the
"ancestors," the two preceding races which give birth to animal and
to rational man.
It will be shown (Vol. II. Pt. II.)
that the number seven, as well as the doctrine of the septenary constitution of
man, was pre-eminent in all the secret systems. It plays as important a part in
Western Kabala as in Eastern Occultism. Eliphas Levi calls the number seven
"the key to the Mosaic creation and the symbols of every religion."
He shows the Kabala following faithfully even the septenary division of man, as
the diagram he gives in his "Clef des Grands Mysteres" is septenary.
This
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may be seen at a glance on page 389,
"Une prophetic et diverses pensees de Paracelse," however cleverly
the correct thought is veiled. One needs also only to look at the diagram
(Plate VII. in Mr. Mathers' Kabala) "the formation of the Soul"* from
the same "Key of the Great Mysteries" by Levi to find the same,
though with a different interpretation.
Thus it stands with both the
Kabalistic and the Occult names attached:--
7 Neschanah [[--]] Pure Spirit [[--]]
Atma
6 Ruach [[--]] Spiritual Soul [[--]]
Buddhi
5 Nephesch [[--]] Plastic Mediator
[[--]] Manas
N. B. -- Please remark that this
triad is disconnected with the lower Quaternary, as it disconnects itself
always after death.
THE UPPER TRIAD [[--]] The Immortal.
E. Levi calls Nephesch what we name Manas, and vice versa.*
4 Samael [[--]] Seat of Passion &
Animal Desires [[--]] Kama
3 Mikael [[--]] the Sun Principle
[[--]] whence Life Prana
2 Image of man [[--]] Astral Body
[[--]] or Linga Sarira
1 Image of the Creators [[--]]
Physical Body [[--]] Sthula Sarira [[--]] Rupa
The lower Quarternary: the Transitory
and the mortal.
Nephesch. -- The Breath of animal
life in man -- the breath of life instinctual in the animal: and Manas is the
3rd Soul -- the human in its light side, -- animal, in its connection with
Samaelor Kama.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Nephesch is the "breath of
(animal) life" breathed into Adam, the man of dust; it is consequently the
Vital Spark, the informing element. Without Manas, or what is miscalled in
Levi's diagram Nephesch instead of Manas, "the reasoning Soul," or
mind, Atma-Buddhi are irrational on this plane and cannot act. It is Buddhi
which is the plastic mediator, not Manas, "the intelligent medium between
the upper Triad and the lower Quaternary." But there are many such strange
and curious transformations to be found in the Kabalistic works -- a convincing
proof that its literature has become a sad jumble. We do not accept the
classification except in this one particular, in order to show the points of
agreement.
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We will now give in tabular form what
the very cautious Eliphas Levi says in explanation of his diagram, and what the
Esoteric Doctrine teaches -- and compare the two. Levi, too, makes a
distinction between Kabalistic and Occult Pneumatics. (See "Histoire de la
Magic," pp. 388, 389.)
[[first column]]
Says Eliphas Levi, the Kabalist:--
KABALISTIC PNEUMATICS.
1. The Soul (or EGO) is a clothed
light; and this light is triple.
2. Neschamah -- "pure
Spirit."
3. Ruach -- the Soul or Spirit.
4. Nephesch -- plastic mediator.**
5. The garment of the Soul is the
rind (body) of the image (astral Soul).
6. The image is double, because it
reflects the good as the bad.
7. Imago, body.
-------
OCCULT PNEUMATICS.
As given by Eliphas Levi.
1. Nephesh is immortal because it
renews its life by the destruction of forms.
[But Nephesh, the "breath of
[[first column continued on next
page]]
[[second column]]
Say the Theosophists:--
ESOTERIC PNEUMATICS.
1. Ditto, for it is
Atma-Buddhi-Manas.
2. Ditto.*
3. Spiritual Soul.
4. Mediator between Spirit and its
Man, the Seat of Reason, the Mind, in man.
5. Correct.
6. Too uselessly apocalyptic. Why not
say that the astral reflects the good as well as the bad man; man, who is ever
tending to the upper triangle, or else disappears with the Quaternary.
7. Ditto, the earthly image.
-------
OCCULT PNEUMATICS.
As given by the Occultists.
1. Manas is immortal, because after
every new incarnation it adds to Atma-Buddhi something of itself, and
[[second column continued on next
page]]
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Eliphas Levi has, whether purposely
or otherwise, confused the numbers: with us his No. 2 is No. 1. (Spirit); and
by making of Nephesch both the plastic mediator and Life, he thus makes in
reality only six principles, because he repeats the first two.
** Esotericism teaches the same. But
Manas is not Nephesch; nor is the latter the astral, but the 4th principle, if
also the 2nd prana, for Nephesch is the "breath of life" in man, as
in beast or insect, of physical, material life, which has no spirituality in
it.
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[[first column continued from
previous page]]
life," is a misnomer and a
useless puzzle to the student.]
2. Ruach progresses by the evolution
of ideas (! ?).
3. Neschamah is progressive without
oblivion and destruction.
4. The soul has three dwellings.
5. These dwellings are: the plane of
the mortals: the Superior Eden; and the Inferior Eden.
6. The image (man) is a sphinx that
offers the riddle of birth.
7. The fatal image (the astral)
endows Nephesch with its aptitudes; but Ruach is able to substitute for this
(vitiated) Nephesch the image
[[first column continued on next
page]]
[[second column continued from
previous page]]
thus, assimilating itself to the
Monad, shares its immortality.
2. Buddhi becomes conscious by the
accretions it gets from Manas after every new incarnation and the death of man.
3. Atma neither progresses, forgets,
nor remembers. It does not belong to this plane: it is but the ray of light
eternal which shines upon and through the darkness of matter -- when the latter
is willing.
4. The Soul (collectively, as the
upper Triad) lives on three planes, besides its fourth, the terrestrial sphere;
and it exists eternally on the highest of the three.
5. These dwellings are: Earth for the
physical man, or the animal Soul; Kama-loka (Hades, the Limbo) for the
disembodied man, or his Shell; Devachan for the higher Triad.
6. Correct.
7. The astral through Kama (desire)
is ever drawing Manas down into the sphere of material passions and desires.
But if the better man
[[second column continued on next
page]]
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[[first column continued from
previous page]]
conquered in accordance with the
inspirations of Neschamah.
-------
[[second column continued from
previous page]]
or Manas tries to escape the fatal
attraction and turns its aspirations to Atma -- Spirit -- then Buddhi (Ruach)
conquers, and carries Manas with it to the realm of eternal Spirit.
-------
It is very evident that the French
Kabalist either did not know sufficiently the real tenet, or distorted it to
suit himself and his object. Thus he says again, treating upon the same
subject, and we, Occultists, answer the late Kabalist and his admirers:--
[[first column]]
1. The body is the mould of Nephesch;
Nephesch the mould of Ruach; Ruach the mould of the garments of Neschamah.
2. Light (the Soul) personifies in
clothing itself (with a body); and personality endures only when the garment is
perfect.
3. The angels aspire to become men; a
perfect man, a man-god is above all the angels.
4. Every 14,000 years the soul
rejuvenates and rests in the jubilean sleep of oblivion.
[[second column]]
1. The body follows the whims, good
or bad, of Manas; Manas tries to follow the light of Buddhi, but often fails.
Buddhi is the mould of the "garments" of Atma, because Atma is no
body, or shape, or anything, and because Buddhi is its vehicle only
figuratively.
2. The Monad becomes a personal ego
when it incarnates; and something remains of that personality through Manas,
when the latter is perfect enough to assimilate Buddhi. 3. Correct.
4. Within a period, "a great
age" or a day of Brahrna, 14 Manus reign; after which comes Pralaya when
all the Souls rest in Nirvana. (Souls = Egos).
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Such are the distorted copies of the
esoteric doctrine in the Kabala. But see also "The Primeval Manus of
Humanity" in Book II.
To return to Stanza VII.
(b) The well-known Kabalistic
aphorism runs:-- "A stone becomes a plant; a plant, a beast; the beast, a
man; a man a spirit; and the spirit a god." The "spark" animates
all the kingdoms in turn before it enters into and informs divine man, between
whom and his predecessor, animal man, there is all the difference in the world.
Genesis begins its anthropology at the wrong end (evidently for a blind) and
lands nowhere.* Had it begun as it ought, one would have found in it, first,
the celestial Logos, the "Heavenly Man," which evolves as a Compound
Unit of Logoi, out of whom after their pralayic sleep -- a sleep that gathers
the cyphers scattered on the Mayavic plane into One, as the separate globules
of quicksilver on a plate blend into one mass -- the Logoi appear in their
totality as the first "male and female" or Adam Kadmon, the
"Fiat Lux" of the Bible, as we have already seen. But this transformation
did not take place on our Earth, nor on any material plane, but in the Spacial
Depths of the first differentiation of the eternal Root-matter. On our nascent
globe things proceed differently. The Monad or Jiva, as said in "Isis
Unveiled," vol. i., p. 302, is, first of all, shot down by the law of
Evolution into the lowest form of matter -- the mineral. After a sevenfold
gyration encased in the stone (or that which will become mineral and stone in
the Fourth Round), it creeps out of it, say, as a lichen. Passing thence,
through all the forms of vegetable matter, into what is termed animal matter,
it has now reached the point in which it has become the germ, so to speak, of
the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The introductory chapters of
Genesis were never meant to represent even a remote allegory of the creation of
our Earth. They embrace a metaphysical conception of some indefinite period in
the eternity, when successive attempts were being made by the law of evolution
at the formation of universes. The idea is plainly stated in the Zohar:
"There were old worlds, which perished as soon as they came into
existence, were formless, and were called Sparks. Thus, the smith, when
hammering the iron, lets the sparks fly in all directions. The sparks are the
primordial worlds, which could not continue because the Sacred Aged (Sephira)
had not as yet assumed its form (of androgyne, or opposite sexes) of King and
Queen (Sephira and Kadmon), and the Master was not yet at his work." See
Zohar, "Idra Suta," Book iii., p. 292, b. The Supreme consulting with
the Architect of the world -- his Logos -- about creation. ("Isis
Unveiled," vol. ii., p. 421.)
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animal, that will become the physical
man. All this, up to the Third Round, is formless, as matter, and senseless, as
consciousness. For the Monad or Jiva per se cannot be even called spirit: it is
a ray, a breath of the ABSOLUTE, or the Absoluteness rather, and the Absolute
Homogeneity, having no relations with the conditioned and relative finiteness,
is unconscious on our plane. Therefore, besides the material which will be
needed for its future human form, the monad requires (a) a spiritual model, or
prototype, for that material to shape itself into; and (b) an intelligent
consciousness to guide its evolution and progress, neither of which is
possessed by the homogeneous monad, or by senseless though living matter. The
Adam of dust requires the Soul of Life to be breathed into him: the two middle
principles, which are the sentient life of the irrational animal and the Human
Soul, for the former is irrational without the latter. It is only when, from a
potential androgyne, man has become separated into male and female, that he
will be endowed with this conscious, rational, individual Soul, (Manas)
"the principle, or the intelligence, of the Elohim," to receive
which, he has to eat of the fruit of Knowledge from the Tree of Good and Evil.
How is he to obtain all this? The Occult doctrine teaches that while the monad
is cycling on downward into matter, these very Elohim -- or Pitris, the lower
Dhyan-Chohans -- are evolving pari passu with it on a higher and more spiritual
plane, descending also relatively into matter on their own plane of
consciousness, when, after having reached a certain point, they will meet the
incarnating senseless monad, encased in the lowest matter, and blending the two
potencies, Spirit and Matter, the union will produce that terrestrial symbol of
the "Heavenly Man" in space -- PERFECT MAN. In the Sankhya
philosophy, Purusha (spirit) is spoken of as something impotent unless he
mounts on the shoulders of Prakriti (matter), which, left alone, is --
senseless. But in the secret philosophy they are viewed as graduated. Though
one and the same thing in their origin, Spirit and Matter, when once they are
on the plane of differentiation, begin each of them their evolutionary progress
in contrary directions -- Spirit falling gradually into matter, and the latter
ascending to its original condition, that of a pure spiritual substance. Both
are inseparable, yet ever separated. In polarity, on the physical plane, two
like poles will always repel each other, while the negative and the positive
are mutually attracted, so do Spirit and Matter stand to each other -- the two
poles of the same homogeneous substance, the root-principle of the universe.
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Therefore, when the hour strikes for
Purusha to mount on Prakriti's shoulders for the formation of the Perfect Man
-- rudimentary man of the first 2 1/2 Races being only the first, gradually
evolving into the most perfect of mammals -- the Celestial
"Ancestors" (Entities from preceding worlds, called in India the
Sishta) step in on this our plane, as the Pitris had stepped in before them for
the formation of the physical or animal-man, and incarnate in the latter. Thus
the two processes -- for the two creations: the animal and the divine man --
differ greatly. The Pitris shoot out from their ethereal bodies, still more
ethereal and shadowy similitudes of themselves, or what we should now call
"doubles," or "astral forms," in their own likeness.* This
furnishes the Monad with its first dwelling, and blind matter with a model
around and upon which to build henceforth. But Man is still incomplete. From
Swayambhuva Manu (in Manu, Book I.), from whom descended the seven primitive
Manus or Prajapati, each of whom gave birth to a primitive race of men, down to
the Codex Nazareus, in which Karabtanos or Fetahil (blind concupiscent matter)
begets on his Mother, "Spiritus," seven figures, each of which stands
as the progenitor of one of the primaeval seven races -- this doctrine has left
its impress on every Archaic Scripture.
"Who forms Manu (the Man) and
who forms his body? The LIFE and the LIVES. Sin** and the MOON." Here Manu
stands for the spiritual, heavenly man, the real and non-dying EGO in us, which
is the direct emanation of the "One Life" or the Absolute Deity. As
to our outward physical bodies, the house of the tabernacle of the Soul, the
Doctrine teaches a strange lesson; so strange that unless thoroughly explained
and as rightly comprehended, it is only the exact Science of the future that is
destined to vindicate the theory fully.
It has been stated before now that
Occultism does not accept anything inorganic in the Kosmos. The expression
employed by Science, "inorganic substance," means simply that the
latent life slumbering in the molecules of so-called "inert matter"
is incognizable. ALL IS LIFE, and every atom of even mineral dust is a LIFE,
though beyond our comprehension and perception, because it is outside the range
of the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Read in Isis, vol. ii., pp.
297-303, the doctrine of the Codex Nazaraeus -- every tenet of our teaching is
found there under a different form and allegory.
** The word "Sin" is
curious, but has a particular Occult relation to the Moon, besides being its
Chaldean equivalent.
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laws known to those who reject
Occultism. "The very Atoms," says Tyndall, "seem instinct with a
desire for life." Whence, then, we would ask, comes the tendency "to
run into organic form"? Is it in any way explicable except according to
the teachings of Occult Science?
"The worlds, to the
profane," says a Commentary, "are built up of the known Elements. To
the conception of an Arhat, these Elements are themselves collectively a divine
Life; distributively, on the plane of manifestations, the numberless and
countless crores of lives.* Fire alone is ONE, on the plane of the One
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Is Pasteur unconsciously taking the
first step toward Occult Science in declaring that, if he dared express his
full idea upon this subject, he would say that the Organic cells are endowed
with a vital potency that does not cease its activity with the cessation of a
current of Oxygen towards them, and does not, on that account, break off its
relations with life itself, which is supported by the influence of that gas?
"I would add," goes on Pasteur, "that the evolution of the germ
is accomplished by means of complicated phenomena, among which we must class
processes of fermentation"; and life, according to Claude Bernard and
Pasteur, is nothing else than a process of fermentation. That there exist in
Nature Beings or Lives that can live and thrive without air, even on our globe,
was demonstrated by the same men of science. Pasteur found that many of the
lower lives, such as Vibriones, and some microbes and bacteria, could exist
without air, which, on the contrary, killed them. They derived the oxygen
necessary for their multiplication from the various substances that surround
them. He calls them AErobes, living on the tissues of our matter when the
latter has ceased to form a part of an integral and living whole (then called
very unscientifically by science "dead matter"), and Anaerobes. The
one kind binds oxygen, and contributes vastly to the destruction of animal life
and vegetable tissues, furnishing to the atmosphere materials which enter later
on into the constitution of other organisms; the other destroys, or rather
annihilates finally, the so-called organic substance; ultimate decay being
impossible without their participation. Certain germ-cells, such as those of
yeast, develop and multiply in air, but when deprived of it, they will adapt
themselves to life without air and become ferments, absorbing oxygen from
substances coming in contact with them, and thereby ruining the latter. The
cells in fruit, when lacking free oxygen, act as ferments and stimulate
fermentation. "Therefore the vegetable cell manifests in this case its
life as an anaerobic being. Why, then, should an organic cell form in this case
an exception"? asks Professor Bogolubof. Pasteur shows that in the
substance of our tissues and organs, the cell, not finding sufficient oxygen
for itself, stimulates fermentation in the same way as the fruit-cell, and
Claude Bernard thought that Pasteur's idea of the formation of ferments found
its application and corroboration in the fact that Urea increases in the blood
during strangulation: LIFE therefore is everywhere in the Universe, and,
Occultism teaches us, it is also in the atom. Also see infra, at the close of
this Section.
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Reality: on that of manifested, hence
illusive, being, its particles are fiery lives which live and have their being
at the expense of every other life that they consume. Therefore they are named
the "DEVOURERS." . . . "Every visible thing in this Universe was
built by such LIVES, front conscious and divine primordial man down to the
unconscious agents that construct matter." . . . "From the ONE LIFE
formless and Uncreate, proceeds the Universe of lives. First was manifested
from the Deep (Chaos) cold luminous fire (gaseous light?) which formed the
curds in Space." (Irresolvable nebulae, perhaps?). . . . . . ." . . .
These fought, and a great heat was developed by the encountering and collision,
which produced rotation. Then came the first manifested MATERIAL, Fire, the hot
flames, the wanderers in heaven (comets); heat generates moist vapour; that
forms solid water (?); then dry mist, then liquid mist, watery, that puts out
the luminous brightness of the pilgrims (comets?) and forms solid watery wheels
(MATTER globes). Bhumi (the Earth) appears with six sisters.* These produce by
their continuous motion the inferior fire, heat, and an aqueous mist, which
yields the third World-Element -- WATER; and from the breath of all
(atmospheric) AIR is born. These four are the four lives of the first four
periods (Rounds) of Manvantara. The three last will follow."
This means that every new Round
develops one of the Compound Elements, as now known to Science, -- which
rejects the primitive nomenclature, preferring to subdivide them into
constituents. If Nature is the "Ever-becoming" on the manifested
plane, then those Elements are to be regarded in the same light: they have to
evolve, progress, and increase to the Manvantaric end. Thus the First Round, we
are taught, developed but one Element, and a nature and humanity in what may be
called one aspect of Nature -- called by some, very unscientifically, though it
may be so de facto, "One-dimensional Space."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is a Vedic teaching that
"there are three Earths corresponding to three Heavens, and our Earth (the
fourth) is called Bhumi." This is the explanation given by our exoteric
Western Orientalists. But the esoteric meaning and allusion to it in the Vedas
is that it refers to our planetary chain, three "Earths" on the
descending arc, and three "heavens" which are the three Earths or
globes also, only far more ethereal, on the ascending or spiritual arc: by the
first three we descend into matter, by the other three we ascend into Spirit;
the lower one, Bhumi, our Earth, forming the turning point, so to say, and
containing potentially as much of Spirit as it does of Matter. We shall treat
of this hereafter.
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The Second Round brought forth and
developed two Elements -- Fire and Earth -- and its humanity, adapted to this
condition of Nature, if we can give the name Humanity to beings living under
conditions unknown to men, was -- to use again a familiar phrase in a strictly
figurative sense (the only way in which it can be used correctly) -- "a
two-dimensional species." The processes of natural development which we
are now considering will at once elucidate and discredit the fashion of
speculating on the attributes of the two, three, and four or more
"dimensional Space;" but in passing, it is worth while to point out
the real significance of the sound but incomplete intuition that has prompted
-- among Spiritualists and Theosophists, and several great men of Science, for
the matter of that* -- the use of the modern expression, "the fourth
dimension of Space." To begin with, of course, the superficial absurdity
of assuming that Space itself is measurable in any direction is of little
consequence. The familiar phrase can only be an abbreviation of the fuller form
-- the "Fourth dimension of MATTER in Space."** But it is an unhappy
phrase even thus expanded, because while it is perfectly true that the progress
of evolution may be destined to introduce us to new characteristics of matter,
those with which we are already familiar are really more numerous than the
three dimensions. The faculties, or what is perhaps the best available term,
the characteristics of matter, must clearly bear a direct relation always to
the senses of man. Matter has extension, colour, motion (molecular motion),
taste, and smell, corresponding to the existing senses of man, and by the time
that it fully develops the next characteristic -- let us call it for the moment
PERMEABILITY -- this will correspond to the next sense of man -- let us call it
"NORMAL CLAIRVOYANCE;" thus, when some bold thinkers have been
thirsting for a fourth dimension to explain the passage of matter through
matter, and the production of knots upon an endless cord, what they were really
in want of, was a sixth characteristic of matter. The three dimensions belong
really but to one attribute or characteristic of matter -- extension; and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Professor Zollner's theory has been
more than welcomed by several Scientists --who are Spiritualists -- Professors
Butlerof and Wagner, of St. Petersburg, for instance.
** "The giving reality to
abstractions is the error of Realism. Space and Time are frequently viewed as
separated from all the concrete experiences of the mind, instead of being
generalizations of these in certain aspects." (Bain, Logic, Part II., p.
389.)
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popular common sense justly rebels
against the idea that under any condition of things there can be more than
three of such dimensions as length, breadth, and thickness. These terms, and
the term "dimension" itself, all belong to one plane of thought, to
one stage of evolution, to one characteristic of matter. So long as there are
foot-rules within the resources of Kosmos, to apply to matter, so long will
they be able to measure it three ways and no more; and from the time the idea
of measurement first occupied a place in the human understanding, it has been
possible to apply measurement in three directions and no more. But these
considerations do not militate in any way against the certainty that in the
progress of time -- as the faculties of humanity are multiplied -- so will the
characteristics of matter be multiplied also. Meanwhile, the expression is far
more incorrect than even the familiar one of the "Sun rising or setting."
We now return to the consideration of
material evolution through the Rounds. Matter in the second Round, it has been
stated, may be figuratively referred to as two-dimensional. But here another
caveat must be entered. That loose and figurative expression may be regarded --
in one plane of thought, as we have just seen -- as equivalent to the second
characteristic of matter corresponding to the second perceptive faculty or
sense of man. But these two linked scales of evolution are concerned with the processes
going on within the limits of a single Round. The succession of primary aspects
of Nature with which the succession of Rounds is concerned, has to do, as
already indicated, with the development of the "Elements" (in the
Occult sense) -- Fire, Air, Water,* Earth. We are only in the fourth Round, and
our catalogue so far stops short. The centres of consciousness (destined to
develop into humanity as we know it) of the third Round arrived at a perception
of the third Element Water.** Those of the fourth Round have added
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The order in which these Elements
are placed above is the correct one for esoteric purposes and in the Secret
Teachings. Milton was right when he spoke of the "Powers of Fire, Air,
Water, Earth"; the Earth, such as we know it now, had no existence before
the 4th Round, hundreds of million years ago, the commencement of our
geological Earth. The globe was "fiery, cool and radiant as its ethereal
men and animals during the first Round," says the Commentary, uttering a
contradiction or paradox in the opinion of our present Science; "luminous
and more dense and heavy during the second Round; watery during the
Third!" Thus are the elements reversed.
** If we had to frame our conclusions
according to the data furnished to us by the [[Footnote continued on next
page]]
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earth as a state of matter to their
stock as well as the three other elements in their present transformation. In
short, none of the so-called elements were, in the three preceding Rounds, as
they are now. For all we know, FIRE may have been pure AKASA, the first Matter
of the Magnum Opus of the Creators and "Builders," that Astral Light
which the paradoxical Eliphas Levi calls in one breath "the body of the
Holy Ghost," and in the next "Baphomet," the "Androgyne
Goat of Mendes"*; AIR, simply
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] geologists, then we would say that there was no real water -- even
during the Carboniferous period. We are told that gigantic masses of carbon,
which existed formerly spread in the atmosphere as Carbonic Acid, were absorbed
by plants, while a large proportion of that gas was mixed in the water. Now, if
this be so, and we have to believe that all the Carbonic Acid which went to
compose those plants that formed bituminous coal, lignite, etc., and went
towards the formation of limestone, and so on, that all this was at that period
in the atmosphere in gaseous form, then, there must have been seas and oceans
of liquid carbonic acid? But how then could the carboniferous period be
preceded by the Devonian and Silurian ages -- those of Fishes and Molluscs --
on that assumption? Barometric pressure, moreover, must have exceeded several
hundred times the pressure of our present atmosphere. How could organisms, even
so simple as those of certain fishes and molluscs, stand that? There is a
curious work by Blanchard, on the Origin of Life, wherein he shows some strange
contradictions and confusions in the theories of his colleagues, and which we
recommend to the reader's attention.
* Eliphas Levi shows it very truly
"a force in Nature," by means of which "a single man who can
master it . . . might throw the world into confusion and transform its
face"; for it is the "great Arcanum of transcendent Magic." Quoting
the words of the great Western Kabalist in their translated form (see The
Mysteries of Magic, by A. E. Waite), we may explain them perhaps the better by
the occasional addition of a word or two to show the difference between Western
and Eastern explanations of the same subject. The Author says of the great
Magic Agent -- "This ambient and all-penetrating fluid, this ray detached
from the (Central or 'Spiritual') Sun's splendour . . . fixed by the weight of
the atmosphere (?!) and the power of central attraction . . . the Astral Light,
this electromagnetic ether, this vital and luminous caloric, is represented on
ancient monuments by the girdle of Isis which twines round two poles and in
ancient theogonies by the serpent devouring its own tail, emblem of prudence
and of Saturn" -- emblem of infinity, immortality, and Kronos --
"Time" -- not the god Saturn or the planet. "It is the winged
dragon of Medea, the double serpent of the caduceus, and the tempter of
Genesis; but it is also the brazen snake of Moses encircling the Tau lastly, it
is the devil of exoteric dogmatism, and is really the blind force (it is not
blind, and Levi knew it), which souls must conquer in order to detach
themselves from the chains of Earth; 'for if they should not,' they will be
absorbed by the same power which first produced them and will return to the
central and eternal fire." This great archaeus is now discovered by, and
only for one man -- Mr. J. W. Keeley, of [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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Nitrogen, "the breath of the
Supporters of the Heavenly Dome," as the Mohammedan mystics call it;
WATER, that primordial fluid which was required, according to Moses, to make a
living soul with. And this may account for the flagrant discrepancies and
unscientific statements found in Genesis. Separate the first from the second
chapter; read the former as a scripture of the Elohists, and the latter as that
of the far younger Jehovists; still one finds, if one reads between the lines,
the same order in which things created appear -- namely, Fire (light), Air,
Water, and MAN (or the Earth). For the sentence: "In the beginning God
created Heaven and Earth" is a mistranslation; it is not "Heaven and
Earth," but the duplex or dual Heaven, the upper and the lower Heavens, or
the separation of primordial substance that was light in its upper and dark in its
lower portions -- or the manifested Universe -- in its duality of the invisible
(to the senses) and the visible to our perceptions. God divided the light from
the Darkness (v. 4); and then made the firmament, air (5), "a firmament in
the midst of the waters, and let it divide the waters from the waters,"
(6), i.e., "the waters which were under the firmament (our manifested
visible Universe) from the waters above the firmament," or the (to us)
invisible planes of being. In the second chapter (the Jehovistic), plants and herbs
are created before water, just as in the first, light is produced before the
Sun. "God made the Earth and the Heavens and every plant of the field
before it was in the Earth and every herb of the field before it grew; for the
Elohim ('gods') had not caused it to rain upon the earth, etc." (v. 5) --
an absurdity unless the esoteric explanation is accepted. The plants were
created before they were in the earth -- for there was no earth then such as it
is now; and the herb of the field was in existence before it grew as it does
now in the fourth Round.
Discussing and explaining the nature
of the invisible Elements and the "primordial fire" mentioned above,
Eliphas Levi calls it invariably the "Astral Light." It is the
"grand Agent Magique" with him; undeniably it is so, but -- only so
far as Black Magic is concerned, and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] Philadelphia. For others, however, it is discovered, yet must remain
almost useless. "So far shalt thou go. . . ."
All the above is as practical as it
is correct, save one error, which we will explain in the text further on.
Eliphas Levi commits a great blunder in always identifying the Astral Light
with what we call Akasa. What it really is will be given in Part II. of Vol.
II.
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on the lowest planes of what we call
Ether, the noumenon of which is Akasa; and even this would be held incorrect by
orthodox Occultists. The "Astral Light" is simply the older
"sidereal Light" of Paracelsus; and to say that "everything which
exists has been evolved from it, and it preserves and reproduces all
forms," as he writes, is to enunciate truth only in the second
proposition. The first is erroneous; for if all that exists was evolved through
(or via) it, it is not the astral light. The latter is not the container of all
things but only the reflector, at best, of this all. Eliphas Levi writes:--
"The great Magic agent is the
fourth emanation of the life principle (we say -- it is the first in the inner,
and the second in the outer (our) Universe), of which the Sun is the third form
. . . for the day-star (the sun) is only the reflection and material shadow of
the Central Sun of truth, which illuminates the intellectual (invisible) world
of Spirit and which itself is but a gleam borrowed from the ABSOLUTE."
So far he is right enough. But when
the great authority of the Western Kabalists adds that nevertheless, "it
is not the immortal Spirit as the Indian Hierophants have imagined" -- we
answer that he slanders the said Hierophants, as they have said nothing of the
kind; while even the Puranic exoteric writings flatly contradict the assertion.
No Hindu has ever mistaken Prakriti -- the Astral Light being only above the
lowest plane of Prakriti, the material Kosmos -- for the "immortal
Spirit." Prakriti is ever called Maya, illusion, and is doomed to
disappear with the rest, the gods included, at the hour of the Pralaya; for it
is shown that Akasa is not even the Ether, least of all then, we imagine, can
it be the Astral Light. Those unable to penetrate beyond the dead letter of the
Puranas, have occasionally confused Akasa with Prakriti, with Ether, and even
with the visible Sky! It is true also that those who have invariably translated
the term Akasa by "Ether" (Wilson, for instance), finding it called
"the material cause of sound" possessing, moreover, this one single
property (Vishnu Purana), have ignorantly imagined it to be
"material," in the physical sense. True, again, that if the
characteristics are accepted literally, then, since nothing material or physical,
and therefore conditioned and temporary can be immortal -- according to
metaphysics and philosophy -- it would follow that Akasa is neither infinite
nor immortal. But all this is erroneous, since both the words Pradhana
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(primeval matter) and sound, as a
property, have been misunderstood; the former term (Pradhana) being certainly synonymous
with Mulaprakriti and Akasa, and the latter (sound) with the Verbum, the Word
or the Logos. This is easy to demonstrate; for it is shown in the following
sentences in Vishnu Purana: "In the beginning there was neither day nor
night, nor sky, nor earth, nor darkness, nor light. . . . . Save only ONE,
unapprehensible by intellect, or that which is Brahma and Pums (Spirit) and
Pradhana (primordial matter)." . . . . (Book I., ch. ii.).
Now, what is Pradhana, if it is not
Mulaprakriti, the root of all, in another aspect? For Pradhana, though said
further on to merge into the Deity as everything else does, in order to leave
the ONE absolute during the Pralaya, yet is held as infinite and immortal. The Commentator
describes the Deity as: "One Pradhanika Brahma Spirit: THAT, was,"
and interprets the compound term as a substantive, not as a derivative word
used attributively, i.e., like something conjoined with Pradhana.* Hence
Pradhana even in the Puranas is an aspect of Parabrahmam, not an evolution, and
must be the same as the Vedantic Mulaprakriti. "Prakriti in its primary
state is Akasa," says a Vedantin scholar (see "Five Years of
Theosophy," p. 169). It is almost abstract Nature.
Akasa, then, is Pradhana in another
form, and as such cannot be Ether, the ever-invisible agent, courted even by
physical Science. Nor is it Astral Light. It is, as said, the noumenon of the
seven-fold differentiated Prakriti** -- the ever immaculate "Mother"
of the fatherless Son, who becomes "Father" on the lower manifested
plane. For MAHAT is the first product of Pradhana, or Akasa, and Mahat --
Universal intelligence "whose characteristic property is Buddhi" --
is no other than the Logos, for he is called "Eswara" Brahma, Bhava,
etc. (See Linga Purana, sec. lxx. 12 et seq.; and Vayu Purana, but especially
the former Purana -- prior, section viii., 67-74). He is, in short, the
"Creator" or the divine mind in creative operation, "the cause
of all things." He is
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The student has to note, moreover,
that the Purana is a dualistic system, not evolutionary, and that, in this
respect, far more will be found, from an esoteric standpoint, in Sankhya, and
even in the Manava-dharma-Sastra, however much the latter differs from the
former.
** In the Sankhya philosophy, the
seven Prakritis or "productive productions" are Mahat, Ahamkara, and
the five tanmatras. See "Sankhya-karika," III., and the Commentary
thereon.
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the "first-born" of whom
the Puranas tell us that "Mahat and matter are the inner and outer
boundaries of the Universe," or, in our language, the negative and the
positive poles of dual nature (abstract and concrete), for the Purana adds:
"In this manner -- as were the seven forms (principles) of Prakriti
reckoned from Mahat to Earth -- so at the time of pralaya (pratyahara) these
seven successively re-enter into each other. The egg of Brahma (Sarva-mandala)
is dissolved with its seven zones (dwipa), seven oceans, seven regions,
etc." (Vishnu Purana, Book vi., ch. iv.)*
These are the reasons why the
Occultists refuse to give the name of Astral Light to Akasa, or to call it
Ether. "In my Father's house are many mansions," may be contrasted
with the occult saying, "In our Mother's house there are seven
mansions," or planes, the lowest of which is above and around us -- the
Astral Light.
The elements, whether simple or
compound, could not have remained the same since the commencement of the
evolution of our chain. Everything in the Universe progresses steadily in the
Great Cycle, while incessantly going up and down in the smaller cycles. Nature
is never stationary during manvantara, as it is ever becoming,** not simply
being; and mineral, vegetable, and human life are always adapting their
organisms to the then reigning Elements, and therefore those Elements were then
fitted for them, as they are now for the life of present humanity. It will only
be in the next, or fifth, Round that the fifth Element, Ether -- the gross body
of Akasa, if it can be called even that --
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* No use to say so to the Hindus, who
know their Puranas by heart, but very useful to remind our Orientalists and
those Westerns who regard Wilson's translations as authoritative, that in his
English translation of the Vishnu Purana he is guilty of the most ludicrous
contradictions and errors. So on this identical subject of the seven Prakritis
or the seven zones of Brahma's egg, the two accounts differ totally. In Vol. 1,
page 40, the egg is said to be externally invested by seven envelopes -- Wilson
comments: "by Water, Air, Fire, Ether, and Ahamkara" (which last word
does not exist in the Sanskrit texts); and in vol. v., p. 198, of the same
Vishnu Purana it is written, "in this manner were the seven forms of
nature (Prakriti) reckoned from Mahat to Earth" (?). Between Mahat or
Maha-Buddhi and "Water, etc.," the difference is very considerable.
** According to the great
metaphysician Hegel also. For him Nature was a perpetual becoming. A purely
esoteric conception. Creation or Origin, in the Christian sense of the term, is
absolutely unthinkable. As the above-quoted thinker said: "God (the
Universal Spirit) objectivises himself as Nature, and again rises out of
it."
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will, by becoming a familiar fact of
Nature to all men, as air is familiar to us now, cease to be as at present
hypothetical, and also an "agent" for so many things. And only during
that Round will those higher senses, the growth and development of which Akasa
subserves, be susceptible of a complete expansion. As already indicated, a
partial familiarity with the characteristic of matter -- permeability -- which
should be developed concurrently with the sixth sense, may be expected to
develop at the proper period in this Round. But with the next element added to
our resources in the next Round, permeability will become so manifest a
characteristic of matter, that the densest forms of this will seem to man's
perceptions as obstructive to him as a thick fog, and no more.
Let us return to the life-cycle now.
Without entering at length upon the description given of the higher LIVES, we
must direct our attention at present simply to the earthly beings and the earth
itself. The latter, we are told, is built up for the first Round by the
"Devourers" which disintegrate and differentiate the germs of other
lives in the Elements; pretty much, it must be supposed, as in the present
stage of the world, the aerobes do, when, undermining and loosening the
chemical structure in an organism, they transform animal matter and generate
substances that vary in their constitutions. Thus Occultism disposes of the
so-called Azoic age of Science, for it shows that there never was a time when
the Earth was without life upon it. Wherever there is an atom of matter, a
particle or a molecule, even in its most gaseous condition, there is life in
it, however latent and unconscious. "Whatsoever quits the Laya State,
becomes active life; it is drawn into the vortex of MOTION (the alchemical
solvent of Life); Spirit and Matter are the two States of the ONE, which is
neither Spirit nor Matter, both being the absolute life, latent." (Book of
Dzyan, Comm. III., par. 18). . . . "Spirit is the first differentiation of
(and in) SPACE; and Matter the first differentiation of Spirit. That, which is
neither Spirit nor matter -- that is IT -- the Causeless CAUSE of Spirit and
Matter, which are the Cause of Kosmos. And THAT we call the ONE LIFE or the
Intra-Cosmic Breath."
Once more we will say -- like must
produce like. Absolute Life cannot produce an inorganic atom whether single or
complex, and there is life
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even in laya just as a man in a
profound cataleptic state -- to all appearance a corpse -- is still a living
being.
When the "Devourers" (in
whom the men of science are invited to see, with some show of reason, atoms of
the Fire-Mist, if they will, as the Occultist will offer no objection to this);
when the "Devourers," we say, have differentiated "the
fire-atoms" by a peculiar process of segmentation, the latter become
life-germs, which aggregate according to the laws of cohesion and affinity.
Then the life-germs produce lives of another kind, which work on the structure
of our globes. * * * *
Thus, in the first Round, the globe,
having been built by the primitive fire-lives, i.e., formed into a sphere --
had no solidity, nor qualifications, save a cold brightness, nor form nor
colour; it is only towards the end of the First Round that it developed one
Element which from its inorganic, so to say, or simple Essence became now in
our Round the fire we know throughout the system. The Earth was in her first
rupa, the essence of which is the Akasic principle named *** "that which
is now known as, and very erroneously termed, Astral Light, which Eliphas Levi
calls "the imagination of Nature,"** probably to avoid giving it its
correct name, as others do.
"It is through and from the
radiations of the seven bodies of the seven orders of Dhyanis, that the seven
discrete quantities (Elements), whose motion and harmonious Union produce the
manifested Universe of Matter, are born." (Commentary.)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
** Speaking of it in his Preface to
the "History of Magic" Eliphas Levi says: "It is through this
Force that all the nervous centres secretly communicate with each other; from
it -- that sympathy and antipathy are born; from it -- that we have our dreams;
and that the phenomena of second sight and extra-natural visions take place. .
. . . Astral Light, acting under the impulsion of powerful wills, destroys,
coagulates, separates, breaks, gathers in all things. . . . God created it on
that day when he said: Fiat Lux, and it is directed by the Egregores, i.e., the
chiefs of the souls who are the spirits of energy and action." Eliphas
Levi ought to have added that the astral light, or primordial substance, if
matter at all, is that which, called Light, LUX, esoterically explained, is the
body of those Spirits themselves, and their very essence. Our physical light is
the manifestation on our plane and the reflected radiance of the Divine Light
emanating from the collective body of those who are called the "LIGHTS"
and the "FLAMES." But no other Kabalist has ever had the talent of
heaping up one contradiction on the other, of making one paradox chase another
in the same sentence and in such flowing language, as Eliphas Levi. He leads
his reader through the most lovely, gorgeously blooming valleys, to strand him
after all on a desert and barren rocky island.
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The Second Round brings into
manifestation the second element AIR, that element, the purity of which would
ensure continuous life to him who would use it. There have been two occultists
only in Europe who have discovered and even partially applied it in practice,
though its composition has always been known among the highest Eastern
Initiates. The ozone of the modern chemists is poison compared with the real
universal solvent which could never be thought of unless it existed in nature.
"From the second Round, Earth -- hitherto a foetus in the matrix of Space
-- began its real existence: it had developed individual sentient life, its
second principle. The second corresponds to the sixth (principle); the second
is life continuous, the other, temporary."
The Third Round developed the third
Principle -- WATER; while the Fourth transformed the gaseous fluids and plastic
form of our globe into the hard, crusted, grossly material sphere we are living
on. "Bhumi" has reached her fourth principle. To this it may be
objected that the law of analogy, so much insisted upon, is broken. Not at all.
Earth will reach her true ultimate form -- (inversely in this to man) -- her
body shell -- only toward the end of the manvantara after the Seventh Round.
Eugenius Philalethes was right when he assured his readers on his word of
honour that no one had yet seen the Earth (i.e., MATTER in its essential form).
Our globe is, so far, in its Kamarupic state -- the astral body of desires of
Ahamkara, dark Egotism, the progeny of Mahat, on the lower plane. . . .
It is not molecularly constituted
matter -- least of all the human body (sthulasarira) -- that is the grossest of
all our "principles," but verily the middle principle, the real
animal centre; whereas our body is but its shell, the irresponsible factor and
medium through which the beast in us acts all its life. Every intellectual
theosophist will understand my real meaning. Thus the idea that the human
tabernacle is built by countless lives, just in the same way as the rocky crust
of our Earth was, has nothing repulsive in it for the true mystic. Nor can
Science oppose the occult teaching, for it is not because the microscope will
ever fail to detect the ultimate living atom or life, that it can reject the
doctrine.
(c) Science teaches us that the
living as well as the dead organism of both man and animal are swarming with
bacteria of a hundred various
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kinds; that from without we are
threatened with the invasion of microbes with every breath we draw, and from
within by leucomaines, aerobes, anaerobes, and what not. But Science never yet
went so far as to assert with the occult doctrine that our bodies, as well as
those of animals, plants, and stones, are themselves altogether built up of
such beings; which, except larger species, no microscope can detect. So far, as
regards the purely animal and material portion of man, Science is on its way to
discoveries that will go far towards corroborating this theory. Chemistry and
physiology are the two great magicians of the future, who are destined to open
the eyes of mankind to the great physical truths. With every day, the identity
between the animal and physical man, between the plant and man, and even
between the reptile and its nest, the rock, and man -- is more and more clearly
shown. The physical and chemical constituents of all being found to be
identical, chemical science may well say that there is no difference between
the matter which composes the ox and that which forms man. But the Occult
doctrine is far more explicit. It says:--- Not only the chemical compounds are
the same, but the same infinitesimal invisible lives compose the atoms of the
bodies of the mountain and the daisy, of man and the ant, of the elephant, and
of the tree which shelters him from the sun. Each particle -- whether you call
it organic or inorganic -- is a life. Every atom and molecule in the Universe
is both life-giving and death-giving to that form, inasmuch as it builds by
aggregation universes and the ephemeral vehicles ready to receive the
transmigrating soul, and as eternally destroys and changes the forms and expels
those souls from their temporary abodes. It creates and kills; it is
self-generating and self-destroying; it brings into being, and annihilates,
that mystery of mysteries -- the living body of man, animal, or plant, every
second in time and space; and it generates equally life and death, beauty and
ugliness, good and bad, and even the agreeable and disagreeable, the beneficent
and maleficent sensations. It is that mysterious LIFE, represented collectively
by countless myriads of lives, that follows in its own sporadic way, the
hitherto incomprehensible law of Atavism; that copies family resemblances as
well as those it finds impressed in the aura of the generators of every future
human being, a mystery, in short, that will receive fuller attention elsewhere.
For the present, one instance may be cited in illustration. Modern science
begins to find out that ptomaine (the alkaloid poison generated by decaying
matter and corpses -- a life also) extracted
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with the help of volatile ether,
yields a smell as strong and equal to that of the freshest orange-blossoms; but
that free from oxygen, these alkaloids yield either a most sickening,
disgusting smell, or the most agreeable aroma which recalls that of the most
delicately scented flowers. And it is suspected that such blossoms owe their
agreeable smell to the poisonous ptomaine; the venomous essence of certain
mushrooms (fungi) being nearly identical with the venom of the cobra of India,
the most deadly of serpents.* Thus, having discovered the effects, Science has
to find their PRIMARY CAUSES; and this it can never do without the help of the
old sciences, of alchemy, occult botany and physics. We are taught that every
physiological change, in addition to pathological phenomena; diseases -- nay,
life itself -- or rather the objective phenomena of life, produced by certain
conditions and changes in the tissues of the body which allow and force life to
act in that body; that all this is due to those unseen CREATORS and DESTROYERS
that are called in such a loose and general way, microbes.** Such
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The French savants Arnaud, Gautier,
and Villiers, have found in the saliva of living men the same venomous alkaloid
as in that of the toad, the salamander, the cobra, and the trigonocephalus of
Portugal. It is proven that venom of the deadliest kind, whether called
ptomaine, or leucomaine, or alkaloid, is generated by living men, animals, and
plants. The same savant, Gautier, discovered an alkaloid in the fresh meat of
an ox and in its brains, and a venom which he calls Xanthocreatinine similar to
the substance extracted from the poisonous saliva of reptiles. It is the
muscular tissues, as being the most active organ in the animal economy, that
are suspected of being the generators or factors of venoms, having the same
importance as carbonic acid and urea in the functions of life, which venoms are
the ultimate products of inner combustion. And though it is not yet fully
determined whether poisons can be generated by the animal system of living
beings without the participation and interference of microbes, it is
ascertained that the animal does produce venomous substances in its
physiological or living state.
** It might be supposed that these
"fiery lives" and the microbes of science are identical. This is not
true. The "fiery lives" are the seventh and highest subdivision of
the plane of matter, and correspond in the individual with the One Life of the
Universe, though only on that plane. The microbes of science are the first and
lowest sub-division on the second plane -- that of material prana (or life).
The physical body of man undergoes a complete change of structure every seven
years, and its destruction and preservation are due to the alternate function
of the fiery lives as "destroyers" and "builders." They are
"builders" by sacrificing themselves in the form of vitality to
restrain the destructive influence of the microbes, and, by supplying the
microbes with what is necessary, they compel them under that restraint to build
up the material body and its cells. They are "destroyers" also when
that restraint is [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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experimenters as Pasteur are the best
friends and helpers of the Destroyers and the worst enemies of the Creators --
if the latter were not at the same time destroyers too. However it may be, one
thing is sure in this: The knowledge of these primary causes and of the
ultimate essence of every element, of its lives, their functions, properties,
and conditions of change -- constitutes the basis of MAGIC. Paracelsus was,
perhaps, the only Occultist in Europe, during the last centuries since the
Christian era, who was versed in this mystery. Had not a criminal hand put an
end to his life, years before the time allotted him by Nature, physiological
Magic would have fewer secrets for the civilized world than it now has.
(d) But what has the Moon to do in
all this? we may be asked. What have "Fish, Sin and Moon" in the
apocalyptic saying of the Stanza to do in company with the
"Life-microbes"? With the latter nothing, except availing themselves
of the tabernacle of clay prepared by them; with divine perfect man everything,
since "Fish, Sin and Moon" make conjointly the three symbols of the
immortal Being.
This is all that can be given. Nor
does the writer pretend to know more of this strange symbol than may be
inferred about it from exoteric religions; from the mystery perhaps, which
underlies the Matsya (fish)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] removed and the microbes, unsupplied with vital constructive energy, are
left to run riot as destructive agents. Thus, during the first half of a man's
life (the first five periods of seven years each) the "fiery lives"
are indirectly engaged in the process of building up man's material body; life
is on the ascending scale, and the force is used in construction and increase.
After this period is passed the age of retrogression commences, and, the work
of the "fiery lives" exhausting their strength, the work of destruction
and decrease also commences.
An analogy between cosmic events in
the descent of spirit into matter for the first half of a manvantara (planetary
as human) and its ascent at the expense of matter in the second half, may here
be traced. These considerations have to do solely with the plane of matter, but
the restraining influence of the "fiery lives" on the lowest
sub-division of the second plane -- the microbes -- is confirmed by the fact
mentioned in the foot-note on Pasteur (vide supra) that the cells of the organs,
when they do not find sufficient oxygen for themselves, adapt themselves to
that condition and form ferments, which, by absorbing oxygen from substances
coming in contact with them, ruin the latter. Thus the process is commenced by
one cell robbing its neighbour of the source of its vitality when the supply is
insufficient; and the ruin so commenced steadily progresses.
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Avatar of Vishnu, the Chaldean Oannes
-- the Man-Fish, recorded in the imperishable sign of the Zodiac, Pisces, and
running throughout the two Testaments in the personages of Joshua "Son of
the Fish (Nun)" and Jesus; the allegorical "Sin" or Fall of
Spirit into matter, and the Moon -- in so far as it relates to the
"Lunar" ancestors, the Pitris.
For the present it may be as well to
remind the reader that while the Moon-goddesses were connected in every
mythology, especially the Grecian, with child-birth, because of the lunar
influence on women and conception, the occult and actual connection of our
satellite with fecundation is to this day unknown to physiology, which regards
every popular practice in this reference as gross superstition. As it is
useless to discuss them in detail, we may only stop at present to discuss the
lunar symbology casually, to show that the said superstition belongs to the
most ancient beliefs, and even to Judaism -- the basis of Christianity. With
the Israelites, the chief function of Jehovah was child-giving, and the
esotericism of the Bible, interpreted Kabalistically, shows undeniably the Holy
of Holies in the temple to be only the symbol of the womb. This is now proven
beyond doubt and cavil, by the numerical reading of the Bible in general, and
of Genesis especially. This idea must certainly have been borrowed by the Jews
from the Egyptians and Indians, whose Holy of Holies was, and with the latter
is to this day, symbolised by the King's chamber in the Great Pyramid (see
"Source of Measures") and the Yoni symbols of exoteric Hinduism. To
make the whole clearer and to show at the same time the enormous difference in
the spirit of interpretation and the original meaning of the same symbols
between the ancient Eastern Occultists and the Jewish Kabalists we refer the
reader to Book II., "The Holy of Holies."*
-------
STANZA VII. -- Continued.
6. FROM THE FIRST-BORN (primitive, or
the first man) THE THREAD BETWEEN THE SILENT WATCHER AND HIS SHADOW BECOMES
MORE
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Phallic worship has developed only
with the loss of the keys to the true meaning of the symbols. It was the last
and most fatal turning point from the highway of truth and divine knowledge
into the side path of fiction, raised into dogma through human falsification
and hierarchic ambition.
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STRONG AND RADIANT WITH EVERY CHANGE
(re-incarnation) (a). THE MORNING SUN-LIGHT HAS CHANGED INTO NOON-DAY GLORY . .
. .
(a) This sentence: "The thread
between the silent watcher and his shadow (man) becomes stronger" -- with
every re-incarnation -- is another psychological mystery, that will find its
explanation in Book II. For the present it will suffice to say that the
"Watcher" and his "Shadows" -- the latter numbering as many
as there are re-incarnations for the monad -- are one. The Watcher, or the
divine prototype, is at the upper rung of the ladder of being; the shadow, at
the lower. Withal, the Monad of every living being, unless his moral turpitude
breaks the connection and runs loose and "astray into the lunar path"
-- to use the Occult expression -- is an individual Dhyan Chohan, distinct from
others, a kind of spiritual individuality of its own, during one special
Manvantara. Its Primary, the Spirit (Atman) is one, of course, with Paramatma
(the one Universal Spirit), but the vehicle (Vahan) it is enshrined in, the
Buddhi, is part and parcel of that Dhyan-Chohanic Essence; and it is in this
that lies the mystery of that ubiquity, which was discussed a few pages back.
"My Father, that is in Heaven, and I -- are one," -- says the
Christian Scripture; in this, at any rate, it is the faithful echo of the
esoteric tenet.
-------
STANZA VII. -- Continued.
7. THIS IS THY PRESENT WHEEL -- SAID
THE FLAME TO THE SPARK. THOU ART MYSELF, MY IMAGE AND MY SHADOW. I HAVE CLOTHED
MYSELF IN THEE, AND THOU ART MY VAHAN (vehicle) TO THE DAY, "BE WITH
US," WHEN THOU SHALT RE-BECOME MYSELF AND OTHERS, THYSELF AND ME (a), THEN
THE BUILDERS, HAVING DONNED THEIR FIRST CLOTHING, DESCEND ON RADIANT EARTH, AND
REIGN OVER MEN -- WHO ARE THEMSELVES (b).
(a) The day when "the spark will
re-become the Flame (man will merge into his Dhyan Chohan) myself and others,
thyself and me," as the Stanza has it -- means this: In Paranirvana --
when Pralaya will have reduced not only material and psychical bodies, but even
the spiritual Ego(s) to their original principle -- the Past, Present, and even
Future
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Humanities, like all things, will be
one and the same. Everything will have re-entered the Great Breath. In other
words, everything will be "merged in Brahma" or the divine unity.
Is this annihilation, as some think?
Or Atheism, as other critics -- the worshippers of a personal deity and
believers in an unphilosophical paradise -- are inclined to suppose? Neither.
It is worse than useless to return to the question of implied atheism in that
which is spirituality of a most refined character. To see in Nirvana
annihilation amounts to saying of a man plunged in a sound dreamless sleep --
one that leaves no impression on the physical memory and brain, because the
sleeper's Higher Self is in its original state of absolute consciousness during
those hours -- that he, too, is annihilated. The latter simile answers only to
one side of the question -- the most material; since re-absorption is by no
means such a "dreamless sleep," but, on the contrary, absolute
existence, an unconditioned unity, or a state, to describe which human language
is absolutely and hopelessly inadequate. The only approach to anything like a
comprehensive conception of it can be attempted solely in the panoramic visions
of the soul, through spiritual ideations of the divine monad. Nor is the
individuality -- nor even the essence of the personality, if any be left behind
-- lost, because re-absorbed. For, however limitless -- from a human standpoint
-- the paranirvanic state, it has yet a limit in Eternity. Once reached, the
same monad will re-emerge therefrom, as a still higher being, on a far higher
plane, to recommence its cycle of perfected activity. The human mind cannot in
its present stage of development transcend, scarcely reach this plane of
thought. It totters here, on the brink of incomprehensible Absoluteness and
Eternity.
(b) The "Watchers" reign
over man during the whole period of Satya Yuga and the smaller subsequent
yugas, down to the beginning of the Third Root Race; after which it is the
Patriarchs, Heroes, and the Manes (see Egyptian Dynasties enumerated by the
priests to Solon), the incarnated Dhyanis of a lower order, up to King Menes
and the human kings of other nations; all were recorded carefully. In the views
of symbologists this Mythopoeic Age is of course only regarded as a fairy tale.
But since traditions and even Chronicles of such dynasties of divine Kings --
of gods reigning over men followed by dynasties of Heroes or Giants -- exist in
the annals of every nation, it is difficult to understand how all the peoples
under the sun, some of whom are separated by vast
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oceans and belong to different
hemispheres, such as the ancient Peruvians and Mexicans, as well as the
Chaldeans, could have worked out the same "fairy tales" in the same
order of events.* However, as the Secret Doctrine teaches history -- which, for
being esoteric and traditional, is none the less more reliable than profane
history -- we are as entitled to our beliefs as anyone else, whether
religionist or sceptic. And that Doctrine says that the Dhyani-Buddhas of the
two higher groups, namely, the "Watchers" or the
"Architects," furnished the many and various races with divine kings
and leaders. It is the latter who taught humanity their arts and sciences, and
the former who revealed to the incarnated Monads that had just shaken off their
vehicles of the lower Kingdoms -- and who had, therefore, lost every
recollection of their divine origin -- the great spiritual truths of the
transcendental worlds. (See Book II., "Divine Dynasties.")
Thus, as expressed in the Stanza, the
Watchers descended on Earth and reigned over men -- "who are
themselves." The reigning kings had finished their cycle on Earth and
other worlds, in the preceding Rounds. In the future manvantaras they will have
risen to higher systems than our planetary world; and it is the Elect of our
Humanity, the Pioneers on the hard and difficult path of Progress, who will
take the places of their predecessors. The next great Manvantara will witness
the men of our own life-cycle becoming the instructors and guides of a mankind
whose Monads may now yet be imprisoned -- semi-conscious -- in the most
intellectual of the animal kingdom, while their lower principles will be
animating, perhaps, the highest specimens of the Vegetable world.
Thus proceed the cycles of the
septenary evolution, in Septennial nature; the Spiritual or divine; the psychic
or semi-divine; the intellectual, the passional, the instinctual, or
cognitional; the semi-corporeal and the purely material or physical natures.
All these evolve and progress cyclically, passing from one into another, in a
double, centrifugal and centripetal way, one in their ultimate essence, seven
in their aspects. The lowest, of course, is the one depending upon and
subservient to
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See the "Sacred Mysteries
among the Mayas and the Quiches, 11,500 years ago," by Auguste le
Plongeon, who shows the identity between the Egyptian rites and beliefs and
those of the people he describes. The ancient hieratic alphabets of the Maya
and the Egyptians are almost identical.
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our five physical senses.* Thus far,
for individual, human, sentient, animal and vegetable life, each the microcosm
of its higher macrocosm. The same for the Universe, which manifests
periodically, for purposes of the collective progress of the countless lives,
the outbreathings of the One Life; in order that through the Ever-Becoming,
every cosmic atom in this infinite Universe, passing from the formless and the
intangible, through the mixed natures of the semi-terrestrial, down to matter
in full generation, and then back again, reascending at each new period higher
and nearer the final goal; that each atom, we say, may reach through individual
merits and efforts that plane where it re-becomes the one unconditioned ALL.
But between the Alpha and the Omega there is the weary "Road" hedged
in by thorns, that "goes down first, then --
Winds up hill all the way
Yes, to the very end . . . . ."
Starting upon the long journey
immaculate; descending more and more into sinful matter, and having connected
himself with every atom in manifested Space -- the Pilgrim, having struggled
through and suffered in every form of life and being, is only at the bottom of
the valley of matter, and half through his cycle, when he has identified
himself with collective Humanity. This, he has made in his own image. In order
to progress upwards and homewards, the "God" has now to ascend the
weary uphill path of the Golgotha of Life. It is the martyrdom of
self-conscious existence. Like Visvakarman he has to sacrifice himself to
himself in order to redeem all creatures, to resurect from the many into the
One Life. Then he ascends into heaven indeed; where, plunged into the
incomprehensible absolute Being and Bliss of Paranirvana he reigns
unconditionally, and whence he will re-descend again a the next
"coming," which one portion of humanity expects in its dead-letter
sense as the second advent, and the other as the last "Kalki Avatar."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Which are in truth seven as shown
later, on the authority of the oldest Upanishads.
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SUMMING UP.
"The History of Creation and of
this world from its beginning up to the present time is composed of seven
chapters. The seventh chapter is not yet written."
(T. Subba Row, Theosophist, 1881.)
THE first of these Seven chapters has
been attempted and is now finished. However incomplete and feeble as an
exposition, it is, at any rate, an approximation -- using the word in a
mathematical sense -- to that which is the oldest basis for all the subsequent
Cosmogonies. The attempt to render in a European tongue the grand panorama of
the ever periodically recurring Law -- impressed upon the plastic minds of the
first races endowed with Consciousness by those who reflected the same from the
Universal Mind -- is daring, for no human language, save the Sanskrit -- which
is that of the Gods -- can do so with any degree of adequacy. But the failures
in this work must be forgiven for the sake of the motive.
As a whole, neither the foregoing nor
what follows can be found in full anywhere. It is not taught in any of the six
Indian schools of philosophy, for it pertains to their synthesis -- the
seventh, which is the Occult doctrine. It is not traced on any crumbling
papyrus of Egypt, nor is it any longer graven on Assyrian tile or granite wall.
The Books of the Vedanta (the last word of human knowledge) give out but the
metaphysical aspect of this world-Cosmogony; and their priceless thesaurus, the
Upanishads -- Upa-ni-shad being a compound word meaning "the conquest of
ignorance by the revelation of secret, spiritual knowledge" -- require now
the additional possession of a Master-key to enable the student to get at their
full meaning. The reason for this I venture to state here as I learned it from
a Master.
The name, "Upanishads," is
usually translated "esoteric doctrine." These treatises form part of
the Sruti or "revealed knowledge," Revelation, in short, and are
generally attached to the Brahmana
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portion of the Vedas,* as their third
division. There are over 150 Upanishads enumerated by, and known to,
Orientalists, who credit the oldest with being written probably about 600 years
B.C.; but of genuine texts there does not exist a fifth of the number. The
Upanishads are to the Vedas what the Kabala is to the Jewish Bible. They treat
of and expound the secret and mystic meaning of the Vedic texts. They speak of
the origin of the Universe, the nature of Deity, and of Spirit and Soul, as
also of the metaphysical connection of mind and matter. In a few words: They
CONTAIN the beginning and the end of all human knowledge, but they have now
ceased to REVEAL it, since the day of Buddha. If it were otherwise, the
Upanishads could not be called esoteric, since they are now openly attached to
the Sacred Brahmanical books, which have, in our present age, become accessible
even to the Mlechchhas (out-castes) and the European Orientalists. One thing in
them -- and this in all the Upanishads -- invariably and constantly points to
their ancient origin, and proves (a) that they were written, in some of their
portions, before the caste system became the tyrannical institution which it
still is; and (b) that half of their contents have been eliminated, while some
of them were rewritten and abridged. "The great Teachers of the higher
Knowledge and the Brahmans are continually represented as going to Kshatriya
(military caste) kings to become their pupils." As Cowell pertinently
remarks, the Upanishads "breathe an entirely different spirit" (from
other Brahmanical writings), "a freedom of thought unknown in any earlier
work except in the Rig Veda hymns themselves." The second fact is
explained by a tradition recorded in one of the MSS. on Buddha's life. It says
that the Upanishads were originally attached to their Brahmanas after the
beginning of a reform, which led to the exclusiveness of the present caste
system among the Brahmins, a few centuries after the invasion of India by the
"twice-born." They were complete in those days, and were used for the
instruction of the chelas who were preparing for their initiation.
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* . . . "The Vedas have a
distinct dual meaning -- one expressed by the literal sense of the words, the
other indicated by the metre and the swara -- intonation -- which are as the
life of the Vedas. . . . Learned pundits and philologists of course deny that
swara has anything to do with philosophy or ancient esoteric doctrines; but the
mysterious connection between swara and light is one of its most profound
secrets." (T. Subba Row, Five Years of Theosophy, p. 154.)
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This lasted so long as the Vedas and
the Brahmanas remained in the sole and exclusive keeping of the temple-Brahmins
-- while no one else had the right to study or even read them outside of the
sacred caste. Then came Gautama, the Prince of Kapilavastu. After learning the
whole of the Brahmanical wisdom in the Rahasya or the Upanishads, and finding
that the teachings differed little, if at all, from those of the "Teachers
of Life" inhabiting the snowy ranges of the Himalaya,* the Disciple of the
Brahmins, feeling indignant because the sacred wisdom was thus withheld from
all but the Brahmins, determined to save the whole world by popularizing it.
Then it was that the Brahmins, seeing that their sacred knowledge and Occult
wisdom was falling into the hands of the "Mlechchhas," abridged the
texts of the Upanishads, originally containing thrice the matter of the Vedas
and the Brahmanas together, without altering, however, one word of the texts.
They simply detached from the MSS. the most important portions containing the
last word of the Mystery of Being. The key to the Brahmanical secret code
remained henceforth with the initiates alone, and the Brahmins were thus in a
position to publicly deny the correctness of Buddha's teaching by appealing to
their Upanishads, silenced for ever on the chief questions. Such is the
esoteric tradition beyond the Himalayas.
Sri Sankaracharya, the greatest
Initiate living in the historical ages, wrote many a Bhashya on the Upanishads.
But his original treatises, as there are reasons to suppose, have not yet
fallen into the hands of the Philistines, for they are too jealously preserved
in his maths (monasteries, mathams). And there are still weightier reasons to
believe that the priceless Bhashyas (Commentaries) on the esoteric doctrine of
the Brahmins, by their greatest expounder, will remain for ages yet a dead
letter to most of the Hindus, except the Smartava Brahmins. This sect, founded
by Sankaracharya, (which is still very powerful in Southern India) is now
almost the only one to produce students who have preserved sufficient knowledge
to comprehend the
[[Footnote(s) -------------------------------------------------]]
* Also called "the Sons of
Wisdom," and of the "Fire-Mist" and the "Brothers of the
Sun" in the Chinese records. Si-dzang (Tibet) is mentioned in the MSS. of
the sacred library of the province of Fo-Kien, as the great seat of Occult
learning from time immemorial, ages before Buddha. The Emperor Yu, the
"great" (2,207 years B.C.), a pious mystic and great adept, is said
to have obtained his knowledge from the "great teachers of the Snowy
Range" in Si-dzang.
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dead letter of the Bhashyas. The
reason of this is that they alone, I am informed, have occasionally real
Initiates at their head in their mathams, as for instance, in the
"Sringa-giri," in the Western Ghats of Mysore. On the other hand,
there is no sect in that desperately exclusive caste of the Brahmins, more
exclusive than is the Smartava; and the reticence of its followers to say what
they may know of the Occult sciences and the esoteric doctrine, is only
equalled by their pride and learning.
Therefore the writer of the present
statement must be prepared beforehand to meet with great opposition and even
the denial of such statements as are brought forward in this work. Not that any
claim to infallibility, or to perfect correctness in every detail of all that
which is herein said, was ever put forward. Facts are there, and they can
hardly be denied. But, owing to the intrinsic difficulties of the subjects
treated, and the almost insurmountable limitations of the English tongue (as of
all other European languages) to express certain ideas, it is more than
probable that the writer has failed to present the explanations in the best and
in the clearest form; yet all that could be done was done under every adverse
circumstance, and this is the utmost that can be expected of any writer.
Let us recapitulate and show, by the
vastness of the subjects expounded, how difficult, if not impossible, it is to
do them full justice.
(1.) The Secret Doctrine is the
accumulated Wisdom of the Ages, and its cosmogony alone is the most stupendous
and elaborate system: e.g., even in the exotericism of the Puranas. But such is
the mysterious power of Occult symbolism, that the facts which have actually
occupied countless generations of initiated seers and prophets to marshal, to
set down and explain, in the bewildering series of evolutionary progress, are
all recorded on a few pages of geometrical signs and glyphs. The flashing gaze
of those seers has penetrated into the very kernel of matter, and recorded the
soul of things there, where an ordinary profane, however learned, would have
perceived but the external work of form. But modern science believes not in the
"soul of things," and hence will reject the whole system of ancient
cosmogony. It is useless to say that the system in question is no fancy of one
or several isolated individuals. That it is the uninterrupted record covering
thousands of generations of Seers whose respective experiences were made to
test and to verify the
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traditions passed orally by one early
race to another, of the teachings of higher and exalted beings, who watched
over the childhood of Humanity. That for long ages, the "Wise Men" of
the Fifth Race, of the stock saved and rescued from the last cataclysm and
shifting of continents, had passed their lives in learning, not teaching. How
did they do so? It is answered: by checking, testing, and verifying in every
department of nature the traditions of old by the independent visions of great
adepts; i.e., men who have developed and perfected their physical, mental,
psychic, and spiritual organisations to the utmost possible degree. No vision
of one adept was accepted till it was checked and confirmed by the visions --
so obtained as to stand as independent evidence -- of other adepts, and by
centuries of experiences.
(2.) The fundamental Law in that
system, the central point from which all emerged, around and toward which all
gravitates, and upon which is hung the philosophy of the rest, is the One
homogeneous divine SUBSTANCE-PRINCIPLE, the one radical cause.
. . . "Some few, whose lamps
shone brighter, have been led
From cause to cause to nature's
secret head,
And found that one first Principle
must be. . . ."
It is called
"Substance-Principle," for it becomes "substance" on the
plane of the manifested Universe, an illusion, while it remains a
"principle" in the beginningless and endless abstract, visible and
invisible SPACE. It is the omnipresent Reality: impersonal, because it contains
all and everything. Its impersonality is the fundamental conception of the
System. It is latent in every atom in the Universe, and is the Universe itself.
(See in chapters on Symbolism, "Primordial Substance, and Divine Thought.")
(3.) The Universe is the periodical
manifestation of this unknown Absolute Essence. To call it "essence,"
however, is to sin against the very spirit of the philosophy. For though the
noun may be derived in this case from the verb esse, "to be," yet IT
cannot be identified with a being of any kind, that can be conceived by human
intellect. IT is best described as neither Spirit nor matter, but both.
"Parabrahmam and Mulaprakriti" are One, in reality, yet two in the
Universal conception of the manifested, even in the conception of the One
Logos, its first manifestation, to which, as the able lecturer in the
"Notes on the Bhagavadgita" shows, IT appears from the objective
standpoint of
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the One Logos as Mulaprakriti and not
as Parabrahmam; as its veil and not the one REALITY hidden behind, which is
unconditioned and absolute.
(4.) The Universe is called, with
everything in it, MAYA, because all is temporary therein, from the ephemeral
life of a fire-fly to that of the Sun. Compared to the eternal immutability of
the ONE, and the changelessness of that Principle, the Universe, with its
evanescent ever-changing forms, must be necessarily, in the mind of a
philosopher, no better than a will-o'-the-wisp. Yet, the Universe is real
enough to the conscious beings in it, which are as unreal as it is itself.
(5.) Everything in the Universe,
throughout all its kingdoms, is CONSCIOUS: i.e., endowed with a consciousness
of its own kind and on its own plane of perception. We men must remember that
because we do not perceive any signs -- which we can recognise -- of
consciousness, say, in stones, we have no right to say that no consciousness
exists there. There is no such thing as either "dead" or
"blind" matter, as there is no "Blind" or
"Unconscious" Law. These find no place among the conceptions of Occult
philosophy. The latter never stops at surface appearances, and for it the
noumenal essences have more reality than their objective counterparts; it
resembles therein the mediaeval Nominalists, for whom it was the Universals
that were the realities and the particulars which existed only in name and
human fancy.
(6.) The Universe is worked and
guided from within outwards. As above so it is below, as in heaven so on earth;
and man -- the microcosm and miniature copy of the macrocosm -- is the living
witness to this Universal Law, and to the mode of its action. We see that every
external motion, act, gesture, whether voluntary or mechanical, organic or
mental, is produced and preceded by internal feeling or emotion, will or
volition, and thought or mind. As no outward motion or change, when normal, in
man's external body can take place unless provoked by an inward impulse, given
through one of the three functions named, so with the external or manifested
Universe. The whole Kosmos is guided, controlled, and animated by almost
endless series of Hierarchies of sentient Beings, each having a mission to
perform, and who -- whether we give to them one name or another, and call them
Dhyan-Chohans or Angels -- are "messengers" in the sense only that
they are the agents of Karmic and Cosmic Laws. They vary infinitely in their
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respective degrees of consciousness
and intelligence; and to call them all pure Spirits without any of the earthly
alloy "which time is wont to prey upon" is only to indulge in
poetical fancy. For each of these Beings either was, or prepares to become, a
man, if not in the present, then in a past or a coming cycle (Manvantara). They
are perfected, when not incipient, men; and differ morally from the terrestrial
human beings on their higher (less material) spheres, only in that they are
devoid of the feeling of personality and of the human emotional nature -- two
purely earthly characteristics. The former, or the "perfected," have
become free from those feelings, because (a) they have no longer fleshly bodies
-- an ever-numbing weight on the Soul; and (b) the pure spiritual element being
left untrammelled and more free, they are less influenced by maya than man can
ever be, unless he is an adept who keeps his two personalities -- the spiritual
and the physical -- entirely separated. The incipient monads, having never had
terrestrial bodies yet, can have no sense of personality or EGO-ism. That which
is meant by "personality," being a limitation and a relation, or, as
defined by Coleridge, "individuality existing in itself but with a nature
as a ground," the term cannot of course be applied to non-human entities;
but, as a fact insisted upon by generations of Seers, none of these Beings,
high or low, have either individuality or personality as separate Entities,
i.e., they have no individuality in the sense in which a man says, "I am
myself and no one else;" in other words, they are conscious of no such
distinct separateness as men and things have on earth. Individuality is the
characteristic of their respective hierarchies, not of their units; and these
characteristics vary only with the degree of the plane to which those
hierarchies belong: the nearer to the region of Homogeneity and the One Divine,
the purer and the less accentuated that individuality in the Hierarchy. They
are finite, in all respects, with the exception of their higher principles --
the immortal sparks reflecting the universal divine flame -- individualized and
separated only on the spheres of Illusion by a differentiation as illusive as
the rest. They are "Living Ones," because they are the streams
projected on the Kosmic screen of illusion from the ABSOLUTE LIFE; beings in
whom life cannot become extinct, before the fire of ignorance is extinct in
those who sense these "Lives." Having sprung into being under the
quickening influence of the uncreated beam, the reflection of the great Central
Sun that
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radiates on the shores of the river
of Life, it is the inner principle in them which belongs to the waters of
immortality, while its differentiated clothing is as perishable as man's body.
Therefore Young was right in saying that
"Angels are men of a superior
kind"
and no more. They are neither
"ministering" nor "protecting" angels; nor are they
"Harbingers of the Most High" still less the "Messengers of
wrath" of any God such as man's fancy has created. To appeal to their
protection is as foolish as to believe that their sympathy may be secured by
any kind of propitiation; for they are, as much as man himself is, the slaves
and creatures of immutable Karmic and Kosmic law. The reason for it is evident.
Having no elements of personality in their essence they can have no personal
qualities, such as attributed by men, in their exoteric religions, to their
anthropomorphic God -- a jealous and exclusive God who rejoices and feels
wrathful, is pleased with sacrifice, and is more despotic in his vanity than
any finite foolish man. Man, as shown in Book II., being a compound of the
essences of all those celestial Hierarchies may succeed in making himself, as
such, superior, in one sense, to any hierarchy or class, or even combination of
them. "Man can neither propitiate nor command the Devas," it is said.
But, by paralyzing his lower personality, and arriving thereby at the full
knowledge of the non-separateness of his higher SELF from the One absolute
SELF, man can, even during his terrestrial life, become as "One of
Us." Thus it is, by eating of the fruit of knowledge which dispels
ignorance, that man becomes like one of the Elohim or the Dhyanis; and once on
their plane the Spirit of Solidarity and perfect Harmony, which reigns in every
Hierarchy, must extend over him and protect him in every particular.
The chief difficulty which prevents
men of science from believing in divine as well as in nature Spirits is their
materialism. The main impediment before the Spiritualist which hinders him from
believing in the same, while preserving a blind belief in the
"Spirits" of the Departed, is the general ignorance of all, except
some Occultists and Kabalists, about the true essence and nature of matter. It
is on the acceptance or rejection of the theory of the Unity of all in Nature,
in its ultimate Essence, that mainly rests the belief or unbelief in the
existence around us of other conscious beings besides the Spirits of the Dead.
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It is on the right comprehension of
the primeval Evolution of Spirit-Matter and its real essence that the student
has to depend for the further elucidation in his mind of the Occult Cosmogony,
and for the only sure clue which can guide his subsequent studies.
In sober truth, as just shown, every
"Spirit" so-called is either a disembodied or a future man. As from
the highest Archangel (Dhyan Chohan) down to the last conscious
"Builder" (the inferior class of Spiritual Entities), all such are
men, having lived aeons ago, in other Manvantaras, on this or other Spheres; so
the inferior, semi-intelligent and non-intelligent Elementals -- are all future
men. That fact alone -- that a Spirit is endowed with intelligence -- is a
proof to the Occultist that that Being must have been a man, and acquired his
knowledge and intelligence throughout the human cycle. There is but one
indivisible and absolute Omniscience and Intelligence in the Universe, and this
thrills throughout every atom and infinitesimal point of the whole finite
Kosmos which hath no bounds, and which people call SPACE, considered
independently of anything contained in it. But the first differentiation of its
reflection in the manifested World is purely Spiritual, and the Beings
generated in it are not endowed with a consciousness that has any relation to
the one we conceive of. They can have no human consciousness or Intelligence
before they have acquired such, personally and individually. This may be a
mystery, yet it is a fact, in Esoteric philosophy, and a very apparent one too.
The whole order of nature evinces a
progressive march towards a higher life. There is design in the action of the
seemingly blindest forces. The whole process of evolution with its endless
adaptations is a proof of this. The immutable laws that weed out the weak and
feeble species, to make room for the strong, and which ensure the
"survival of the fittest," though so cruel in their immediate action
-- all are working toward the grand end. The very fact that adaptations do
occur, that the fittest do survive in the struggle for existence, shows that
what is called "unconscious Nature"* is in reality an aggregate of
forces mani-
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* Nature taken in its abstract sense,
cannot be "unconscious," as it is the emanation from, and thus an
aspect (on the manifested plane) of the ABSOLUTE consciousness. Where is that
daring man who would presume to deny to vegetation and even to minerals a
consciousness of their own. All he can say is, that this consciousness is
beyond his comprehension.
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pulated by semi-intelligent beings
(Elementals) guided by High Planetary Spirits, (Dhyan Chohans), whose
collective aggregate forms the manifested verbum of the unmanifested LOGOS, and
constitutes at one and the same time the MIND of the Universe and its immutable
LAW.
Three distinct representations of the
Universe in its three distinct aspects are impressed upon our thought by the
esoteric philosophy: the PRE-EXISTING (evolved from) the EVER-EXISTING; and the
PHENOMENAL -- the world of illusion, the reflection, and shadow thereof. During
the great mystery and drama of life known as the Manvantara, real Kosmos is
like the object placed behind the white screen upon which are thrown the
Chinese shadows, called forth by the magic lantern. The actual figures and
things remain invisible, while the wires of evolution are pulled by the unseen
hands; and men and things are thus but the reflections, on the white field, of
the realities behind the snares of Mahamaya, or the great Illusion. This was
taught in every philosophy, in every religion, ante as well as post diluvian,
in India and Chaldea, by the Chinese as by the Grecian Sages. In the former
countries these three Universes were allegorized, in exoteric teachings, by the
three trinities emanating from the Central eternal germ and forming with it a
Supreme Unity: the initial, the manifested, and the Creative Triad, or the
three in One. The last is but the symbol, in its concrete expression, of the
first ideal two. Hence Esoteric philosophy passes over the necessarianism of
this purely metaphysical conception, and calls the first one, only, the Ever
Existing. This is the view of every one of the six great schools of Indian
philosophy -- the six principles of that unit body of WISDOM of which the
"gnosis," the hidden knowledge, is the seventh.
The writer hopes that, superficially
handled as may be the comments on the Seven Stanzas, enough has been given in
this cosmogonic portion of the work to show Archaic teachings to be more
scientific (in the modern sense of the word) on their very face, than any other
ancient Scriptures left to be regarded and judged on their exoteric aspect.
Since, however, as confessed before, this work withholds far more than it gives
out, the student is invited to use his own intuitions. Our chief care is to
elucidate that which has already been given out, and, to our regret, very
incorrectly at times; to supplement the knowledge hinted at -- whenever and
wherever possible -- by addi-
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tional matter; and to bulwark our
doctrines against the too strong attacks of modern Sectarianism, and more especially
against those of our latter-day Materialism, very often miscalled Science,
whereas, in reality, the words "Scientists" and "Sciolists"
ought alone to bear the responsibility for the many illogical theories offered
to the world. In its great ignorance, the public, while blindly accepting
everything that emanates from "authorities," and feeling it to be its
duty to regard every dictum coming from a man of Science as a proven fact --
the public, we say, is taught to scoff at anything brought forward from
"heathen" sources. Therefore, as materialistic Scientists can be
fought solely with their own weapons -- those of controversy and argument -- an
Addendum is added to every Book contrasting our respective views and showing
how even great authorities may often err. We believe that this can be done
effectually by showing the weak points of our opponents, and by proving their
too frequent sophisms -- made to pass for scientific dicta -- to be incorrect.
We hold to Hermes and his "Wisdom" -- in its universal character;
they -- to Aristotle as against intuition and the experience of the ages,
fancying that Truth is the exclusive property of the Western world. Hence the
disagreement. As Hermes says, "Knowledge differs much from sense; for
sense is of things that surmount it, but Knowledge (gyi) is the end of
sense" -- i.e., of the illusion of our physical brain and its intellect;
thus emphasizing the contrast between the laboriously acquired knowledge of the
senses and mind (manas), and the intuitive omniscience of the Spiritual divine
Soul -- Buddhi.
Whatever may be the destiny of these
actual writings in a remote future, we hope to have proven so far the following
facts:
(1) The Secret Doctrine teaches no
Atheism, except in the Hindu sense of the word nastika, or the rejection of
idols, including every anthropomorphic god. In this sense every Occultist is a
Nastika.
(2) It admits a Logos or a collective
"Creator" of the Universe; a Demi-urgos -- in the sense implied when
one speaks of an "Architect" as the "Creator" of an
edifice, whereas that Architect has never touched one stone of it, but, while
furnishing the plan, left all the manual labour to the masons; in our case the
plan was furnished by the Ideation of the Universe, and the constructive labour
was left to the Hosts of intelligent Powers and Forces. But that Demiurgos is
no
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personal deity, -- i.e., an imperfect
extra-cosmic god, -- but only the aggregate of the Dhyan-Chohans and the other
forces.
As to the latter --
(3) They are dual in their character;
being composed of (a) the irrational brute energy, inherent in matter, and (b)
the intelligent soul or cosmic consciousness which directs and guides that
energy, and which is the Dhyan-Chohanic thought reflecting the Ideation of the
Universal mind. This results in a perpetual series of physical manifestations
and moral effects on Earth, during manvantaric periods, the whole being
subservient to Karma. As that process is not always perfect; and since, however
many proofs it may exhibit of a guiding intelligence behind the veil, it still
shows gaps and flaws, and even results very often in evident failures --
therefore, neither the collective Host (Demiurgos), nor any of the working
powers individually, are proper subjects for divine honours or worship. All are
entitled to the grateful reverence of Humanity, however, and man ought to be
ever striving to help the divine evolution of Ideas, by becoming to the best of
his ability a co-worker with nature in the cyclic task. The ever unknowable and
incognizable Karana alone, the Causeless Cause of all causes, should have its
shrine and altar on the holy and ever untrodden ground of our heart --
invisible, intangible, unmentioned, save through "the still small
voice" of our spiritual consciousness. Those who worship before it, ought
to do so in the silence and the sanctified solitude of their Souls*; making
their spirit the sole mediator between them and the Universal Spirit, their
good actions the only priests, and their sinful intentions the only visible and
objective sacrificial victims to the Presence. (See Part II., "On the Hidden
Deity.")
(4) Matter is Eternal. It is the
Upadhi (the physical basis) for the One infinite Universal Mind to build
thereon its ideations. Therefore, the Esotericists maintain that there is no
inorganic or dead matter in nature, the distinction between the two made by
Science being as unfounded as it is arbitrary and devoid of reason.
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* "When thou prayest, thou shalt
not be as the hypocrites are . . . but enter into thine inner chamber and having
shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret." Matt. vi.). Our
Father is within us "in Secret," our 7th principle, in the
"inner chamber" of our Soul perception. "The Kingdom of
Heaven" and of God "is within us" says Jesus, not outside. Why
are Christians so absolutely blind to the self-evident meaning of the words of
wisdom they delight in mechanically repeating?
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Whatever Science may think, however
-- and exact Science is a fickle dame, as we all know by experience --
Occultism knows and teaches differently, from time immemorial -- from Manu and
Hermes down to Paracelsus and his successors.
Thus Hermes, the thrice great
Trismegistus, says: "Oh, my son, matter becomes; formerly it was; for
matter is the vehicle of becoming."* Becoming is the mode of activity of
the uncreate deity. Having been endowed with the germs of becoming, matter
(objective) is brought into birth, for the creative force fashions it according
to the ideal forms. Matter not yet engendered had no form; it becomes when it
is put into operation." (The Definitions of Asclepios, p. 134, "Virgin
of the World.")
"Everything is the product of
one universal creative effort. . . . There is nothing dead, in Nature.
Everything is organic and living, and therefore the whole world appears to be a
living organism." (Paracelsus, "Philosophia ad Athenienes," F.
Hartmann's translations, p. 44.)
(5.) The Universe was evolved out of
its ideal plan, upheld through Eternity in the unconsciousness of that which
the Vedantins call Parabrahm. This is practically identical with the
conclusions of the highest Western Philosophy -- "the innate, eternal, and
self-existing Ideas" of Plato, now reflected by Von Hartmann. The
"unknowable" of Herbert Spencer bears only a faint resemblance to
that transcendental Reality believed in by Occultists, often appearing merely a
personification of a "force behind phenomena" -- an infinite and
eternal Energy
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* To this the late Mrs. (Dr.)
Kingsford, the able translator and compiler of the Hermetic Fragments (see
"The Virgin of the World") remarks in a foot-note; "Dr. Menard
observes that in Greek the same word signifies to be born and to become. The
idea here is that the material of the world is in its essence eternal, but that
before creation or 'becoming' it is in a passive and motionless condition. Thus
it 'was' before being put into operation; now it 'becomes,' that is, it is
mobile and progressive." And she adds the purely Vedantic doctrine of the
Hermetic philosophy that "Creation is thus the period of activity
(Manvantara) of God, who, according to Hermetic thought (or which, according to
the Vedantin) has two modes -- Activity or Existence, God evolved (Deus
explicitus); and Passivity of Being (Pralaya) God involved (Deus implicitus).
Both modes are perfect and complete, as are the waking and sleeping states of
man. Fichte, the German philosopher, distinguished Being (Seyn) as One, which
we know only through existence (Dasein) as the Manifold. This view is
thoroughly Hermetic. The 'Ideal Forms' are the archetypal or formative ideas of
the Neo-Platonists; the eternal and subjective concepts of things subsisting in
the divine mind prior to 'becoming'" (p. 134).
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from which all things proceed, while
the author of the "Philosophy of the Unconscious" has come (in this
respect only) as near to a solution of the great Mystery as mortal man can. Few
were those, whether in ancient or mediaeval philosophy, who have dared to
approach the subject or even hint at it. Paracelsus mentions it inferentially.
His ideas are admirably synthesized by Dr. F. Hartmann, F.T.S., in his
"Life of Paracelsus."
All the Christian Kabalists
understood well the Eastern root idea: The active Power, the "Perpetual
motion of the great Breath" only awakens Kosmos at the dawn of every new
Period, setting it into motion by means of the two contrary Forces,* and thus
causing it to become objective on the plane of Illusion. In other words, that
dual motion transfers Kosmos from the plane of the Eternal Ideal into that of
finite manifestation, or from the Noumenal to the Phenomenal plane. Everything
that is, was, and will be, eternally IS, even the countless forms, which are
finite and perishable only in their objective, not in their ideal Form. They
existed as Ideas, in the Eternity,** and, when they pass away, will exist as
reflections. Neither the form of man, nor that of any animal, plant or stone
has ever been created, and it is only on this plane of ours that it commenced
"becoming," i.e., objectivising into its present materiality, or
expanding from within outwards, from the most sublimated and supersensuous
essence into its grossest appearance. Therefore our human forms have existed in
the Eternity as astral or ethereal prototypes; according to which models, the
Spiritual Beings (or Gods) whose duty it was to bring them into objective being
and terrestrial Life, evolved the protoplasmic forms of the future Egos from
their own essence. After which, when this human Upadhi, or basic mould was
ready, the natural terrestrial Forces began to work on those supersensuous
moulds which contained, besides their own, the elements of all the past
vegetable and future animal forms of this globe in them. Therefore, man's
outward shell passed through every vegetable and animal body before it assumed
the human shape. As this will be fully
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* The centripetal and the centrifugal
forces, which are male and female, positive and negative, physical and
spiritual, the two being the one Primordial Force.
** Occultism teaches that no form can
be given to anything, either by nature or by man, whose ideal type does not
already exist on the subjective plane. More than this; that no such form or
shape can possibly enter man's consciousness, or evolve in his imagination,
which does not exist in prototype, at least as an approximation.
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described in Book II., with the
Commentaries thereupon, there is no need to say more of it here.
According to the Hermetico-Kabalistic
philosophy of Paracelsus, it is Yliaster -- the ancestor of the just-born
Protyle, introduced by Mr. Crookes in chemistry -- or primordial Protomateria
that evolved out of itself the Kosmos.
"When Evolution took place the
Yliaster divided itself. . . . melted and dissolved, developing from within
itself the Ideos or Chaos, called respectively Mysterium magnum, Iliados,
Limbus Major, or Primordial Matter. This Primordial essence is of a monistic nature,
and manifests itself not only as vital activity, a spiritual force, an
invisible, incomprehensible, and indescribable power, but also as vital matter
of which the substance of living beings consists." In this Ideos of
primordial matter, or the proto-ilos -- which is the matrix of all created
things -- is contained the substance from which everything is formed. It is the
Chaos . . . out of which the Macrocosm, and, later on, by evolution and
division in Mysteria Specialia,* each separate being, came into existence.
"All things and all elementary substances were contained in it in potentia
but not in actu" -- which makes the translator, Dr. F. Hartmann, justly
observe that "it seems that Paracelsus anticipated the modern discovery of
the 'potency of matter' three hundred years ago" (P. 42).
This Magnus Limbus, then, or Yliaster
of Paracelsus, is simply our old friend "Father-Mother," within,
before it appeared in Space, of the second and other Stanzas. It is the
universal matrix of Kosmos, personified in the dual character of Macro- and
Microcosm (or the Universe and our Globe)** by Aditi-Prakriti, the Spiritual
and the physical nature. For we find it explained in Paracelsus that "the
Magnus Limbus is the nursery out of which all creatures have grown, in the same
sense as a tree grows out of a small seed; with the difference, however, that
the great Limbus takes its origin from the Word, while the Limbus minor (the
terrestrial seed or sperm) takes it from the earth.
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* This word is explained by Dr.
Hartmann from the original texts of Paracelsus before him, as follows.
According to this great Rosicrucian: "Mysterium is everything out of which
something may be developed, which is only germinally contained in it. A seed is
the 'Mysterium' of a plant, an egg that of a living bird, etc."
** It is only the mediaeval Kabalists
who, following the Jewish and one or two Neo-Platonists, applied the term
Microcosm to man. Ancient philosophy called the Earth the Microcosm of the
Macrocosm, and man the outcome of the two.
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The great Limbus is the seed out of
which all beings have come, and the little Limbus is each ultimate being that
reproduces its form, and that has itself been produced by the 'great.' The
latter possesses all the qualifications of the great one, in the same sense as
a son has an organization similar to that of his father." (See Comment.
Book II. para. iii.) . . . "As Yliaster dissolved, Ares, the dividing,
differentiating, and individualising power (Fohat, another old friend,) . . .
began to act. All production took place in consequence of separation. There
were produced out of the Ideos, the elements of Fire, Water, Air and Earth,
whose birth, however, did not take place in a material mode, or by simple separation,"
but by spiritual and dynamical, not even complex, combinations -- e.g.,
mechanical mixture as opposed to chemical combination -- just as fire may come
out of a pebble, or a tree out of a seed, although there is originally no fire
in the pebble, nor a tree in the seed. Spirit is living, and Life is Spirit,
and Life and Spirit (Prakriti Purusha) (?) produce all things, but they are
essentially one and not two. . . . The elements too, have each one its own
Yliaster, because all the activity of matter in every form is only an effluvium
of the same fount. But as from the seed grow the roots with their fibres, and
after that the stalk with its branches and leaves, and lastly the flowers and
seeds; likewise all beings were born from the elements, and consist of
elementary substances out of which other forms may come into existence, bearing
the characteristics of their parents." ("This doctrine, preached 300
years ago," remarks the translator, "is identical with the one that
has revolutionized modern thought, after having been put into new shape and
elaborated by Darwin. It was still more elaborated by Kapila in the Sankhya
philosophy") . . . . The elements as the mothers of all creatures are of
an invisible, spiritual nature, and have souls.* They all spring from the
"Mysterium Magnum." (Philosophia ad Athenienses.)
Compare this with Vishnu Purana.
"From Pradhana (primordial
substance) presided over by Kshetrajna (embodied Spirit?) proceeds the
evolution of those qualities. . . . From the great Principle Mahat (Universal
Intellect, or mind) . . . proceeds
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* The Eastern Occultist says --
"are guided and informed by the Spiritual Beings" the Workmen in the
invisible worlds and behind the veil of Occult nature, or nature in Abscondito.
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the origin of the subtle elements and
from these the organs of sense (Book I., ii.).
Thus it may be shown that all the
fundamental truths of nature were universal in antiquity, and that the basic
ideas upon spirit, matter, and the universe, or upon God, Substance, and man,
were identical. Taking the two most ancient religious philosophies on the
globe, Hinduism and Hermetism, from the scriptures of India and Egypt, the
identity of the two is easily recognisable.
This becomes apparent to one who
reads the latest translation and rendering of the "Hermetic
Fragments" just mentioned, by our late lamented friend, Dr. Anna
Kingsford. Disfigured and tortured as these have been in their passage through
Sectarian Greek and Christian hands, the translator has most ably and
intuitionally seized the weak points and tried to remedy them by means of
explanations and foot-notes. And she says:.......... The creation of the
visible world by the 'working gods' or Titans, as agents of the Supreme God,*
is a thoroughly Hermetic idea, recognisable in all religious systems, and in
accordance with modern scientific research (?), which shows us everywhere the
Divine power operating through natural Forces."
"That Universal Being, that
contains all, and which is all, put into motion the Soul and the World, all that
nature comprises, says Hermes. In the manifold unity of universal life, the
innumerable individualities distinguished by their variations, are,
nevertheless, united in such a manner that the whole is one, and that
everything proceeds from Unity." (Asclepios, Part I.)
"God is not a mind, but the
cause that the mind is; not a spirit, but the cause that the Spirit is; not
light, but the cause that the Light is." (Divine Pymander, Book IX., v.
64.)
The above shows plainly that
"Divine Pyrnander," however much distorted in some passages by
Christian "smoothing," was nevertheless written by a philosopher,
while most of the so-called "hermetic Fragments" are the production
of sectarian pagans with a tendency towards an anthropomorphic Supreme Being. Yet
both are the echo of the Esoteric philosophy and the Hindu Puranas.
Compare two invocations, one to the
Hermetic "Supreme All," the
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* A frequent expression in the said
Fragments, to which we take exception. The Universal Mind is not a Being or
"God."
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other to the "Supreme All"
of the later Aryans. Says a Hermetic Fragment cited by Suidas (see Mrs.
Kingsford's "The Virgin of the World"): -
"I adjure thee, Heaven, holy
work of the great God; I adjure thee, Voice of the Father, uttered in the
beginning when the universal world was framed; I adjure thee by the word, only
Son of the Father who upholds all things; be favourable, be favourable."
This just preceded by the following:
"Thus the Ideal Light was before the Ideal Light, and the luminous
Intelligence of Intelligence was always, and its unity was nothing else than
the Spirit enveloping the Universe. Out of whom is neither God nor Angels, nor
any other essentials, for He (It?) is the Lord of all things and the power and
the Light; and all depends on Him (It) and is in Him (It), etc."
(Fragments of the writings of Hermes to Ammon.)
This is contradicted by the very same
Trismegistos, who is made to say: "To speak of God is impossible. For
corporeal cannot express the incorporeal. . . . . That which has not any body
nor appearance, nor form, nor matter, cannot be apprehended by sense. I
understand, Tatios, I understand, that which it is impossible to define -- that
is God." (Physical Eclogues, Florilegium of Stobaeus.)
The contradiction between the two
passages is evident; and this shows (a) that Hermes was a generic nom-de-plume
used by a series of generations of mystics of every shade, and (b) that a great
discernment has to be used before accepting a Fragment as esoteric teaching
only because it is undeniably ancient. Let us now compare the above with a like
invocation in the Hindu Scriptures -- undoubtedly as old, if not far older.
Here it is Parasara, the Aryan "Hermes" who instructs Maitreya, the
Indian Asclepios, and calls upon Vishnu in his triple hypostasis.
"Glory to the unchangeable,
holy, eternal Supreme Vishnu, of one universal nature, the mighty over all; to
him who is Hiranyagarbha, Hari, and Sankara (Brahma, Vishnu, and Siva), the
creator, the preserver, and the destroyer of the world; to Vasudeva, the
liberator (of his worshippers); to him whose essence is both single and
manifold; who is both subtile and corporeal, indiscreet and discreet; to Vishnu
the cause of final emancipation, the cause of the creation, existence, the
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end of the world; who is the root of
the world, and who consists of the world." (Vish. Purana, Book L.)
This is a grand invocation, full of
philosophical meaning underlying it; but, for the profane masses, as suggestive
as is the first of an anthropomorphic Being. We must respect the feeling that
dictated both; but we cannot help finding it in full disharmony with its inner
meaning, even with that which is found in the same Hermetic treatise where it
is said:
"Reality is not upon the earth,
my son, and it cannot be thereon. . . . Nothing on earth is real, there are
only appearances. . . He (man) is not real, my son, as man. The real consists
solely in itself and remains what it is. . . Man is transient, therefore he is
not real, he is but appearance, and appearance is the supreme illusion.
Tatios: Then the celestial bodies
themselves are not real, my father, since they also vary?
Trismegistos: That which is subject
to birth and to change is not real. . . . . There is in them a certain falsity,
seeing that they too are variable.......
Tatios: And what then is the
primordial Reality?
Trismeg.: That which is one and
alone, 0 Tatios; That which is not made of matter, nor in any body. Which has
neither colour nor form, which changes not nor is transmitted but which always
is."
This is quite consistent with the
Vedantic teaching. The leading thought is Occult; and many are the passages in
the Hermetic Fragments that belong bodily to the Secret Doctrine.
The latter teaches that the whole
universe is ruled by intelligent and semi-intelligent Forces and Powers, as
stated from the very beginning. Christian Theology admits and even enforces
belief in such, but makes an arbitrary division and refers to them as
"Angels" and "Devils." Science denies the existence of
such, and ridicules the very idea. Spiritualists believe in the Spirits of the
Dead, and, outside these, deny entirely any other kind or class of invisible
beings. The Occultists and Kabalists are thus the only rational expounders of
the ancient traditions, which have now culminated in dogmatic faith on the one
hand, and dogmatic denials on the other. For, both belief and unbelief embrace
but one small corner each of the infinite horizons of spiritual and physical
manifestations; and thus both are right from
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their respective standpoints, and
both are wrong in believing that they can circumscribe the whole within their
own special and narrow barriers; for -- they can never do so. In this respect
Science, Theology, and even Spiritualism show little more wisdom than the
ostrich does, when it hides its head in the sand at its feet, feeling sure that
there can be thus nothing beyond its own point of observation and the limited
area occupied by its foolish head.
As the only works now extant upon the
subject under consideration within reach of the profane of the Western
"civilized" races are the above-mentioned Hermetic Books, or rather
Hermetic Fragments, we may contrast them in the present case with the teachings
of Esoteric philosophy. To quote for this purpose from any other would be
useless, since the public knows nothing of the Chaldean works which are
translated into Arabic and preserved by some Sufi initiates. Therefore the
"Definitions of Asclepios," as lately compiled and glossed by Mrs. A.
Kingsford, F.T.S., some of which sayings are in remarkable agreement with the
Esoteric Eastern doctrine, have to be resorted to for comparison. Though not a
few passages show a strong impression of some later Christian hand, yet on the
whole the characteristics of the genii* and gods are those of eastern
teachings, while concerning other things there are passages which differ widely
in our doctrines. The following are a few:--
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* The Hermetic philosophers called
Theoi, gods, Genii and Daimones (in the original texts), those Entities whom we
call Devas (gods), Dhyan Chohans, Chitkala (Kwan-yin, the Buddhists call them),
and by other names. The Daimones are -- in the Socratic sense, and even in the
Oriental and Latin theological sense -- the guardian spirits of the human race;
"those who dwell in the neighbourhood of the immortals, and thence watch
over human affairs," as Hermes has it. In Esoteric parlance, they are
called Chitkala, some of which are those who have furnished man with his fourth
and fifth Principles from their own essence; and others the Pitris so-called.
This will be explained when we come to the production of the complete man. The
root of the name is Chiti, "that by which the effects and consequences of
actions and kinds of knowledge are selected for the use of the soul," or
conscience the inner Voice in man. With the Yogis, the Chiti is a synonym of
Mahat, the first and divine intellect; but in Esoteric philosophy Mahat is the
root of Chiti, its germ; and Chiti is a quality of Manas in conjunction with
Buddhi, a quality that attracts to itself by spiritual affinity a Chitkala when
it develops sufficiently in man. This is why it is said that Chiti is a voice
acquiring mystic life and becoming Kwan-Yin.
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EXTRACTS FROM A PRIVATE COMMENTARY,*
hitherto secret:--
(xvii.) "The Initial Existence
in the first twilight of the Maha-Manwantara (after the MAHA-PRALAYA that
follows every age of Brahma) is a CONSCIOUS SPIRITUAL QUALITY. In the
manifested WORLDS (solar systems) it is, in its OBJECTIVE SUBJECTIVITY, like
the film from a Divine Breath to the gaze of the entranced seer. It spreads as
it issues from LAYA** throughout infinity as a colourless spiritual fluid. It
is on the SEVENTH PLANE, and in its SEVENTH STATE in our planetary world.***
(xviii.) "It is Substance to OUR
spiritual sight. It cannot be called so by men in their WAKING STATE; therefore
they have named it in their ignorance 'God-Spirit.'
(xix.) "It exists everywhere and
forms the first UPADHI (foundation) on which our World (solar system) is built.
Outside the latter it is to be found in its pristine purity only between (the
solar systems or) the Stars of the Universe, the worlds already formed or
forming; those in LAYA resting meanwhile in its bosom. As its substance is of a
different kind from that known on earth, the inhabitants of the latter, seeing
THROUGH IT, believe in their illusion and ignorance that it is empty space.
There is not one finger's breath (ANGULA) of void Space in the whole Boundless
(Universe).........
(xx.) "Matter or Substance is
septenary within our World, as it is so beyond it. Moreover, each of its states
or principles is graduated into seven degrees of density. SURYA (the Sun), in
its visible reflection, exhibits the first, or lowest state of the seventh, the
highest state of the Universal PRESENCE, the pure of the pure, the first
manifested Breath of the ever Unmanifested SAT (Be-ness). All the Central
physical or objective Suns are in their substance the lowest state of the first
Principle of the BREATH. Nor are any of these any more than the REFLECTIONS of
their PRIMARIES which are concealed from the gaze of all but the Dhyan Chohans,
whose Corporeal substance belongs to the fifth division of the seventh
Principle of the Mother substance, and is,
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* This (teaching) does not refer to
Prakriti-Purusha beyond the boundaries of our small universe.
** The ultimate quiescent state: the
Nirvana condition of the seventh Principle.
*** The teaching is all given from
our plane of consciousness.
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therefore, four degrees higher than
the solar reflected substance. As there are seven Dhatu (principal substances
in the human body) so there are seven Forces in Man and in all Nature.
(xxi.) "The real substance of
the concealed (Sun) is a nucleus of Mother substance.* It is the heart and the
matrix of all the living and existing Forces in our solar universe. It is the
Kernel from which proceed to spread on their cyclic journeys all the Powers
that set in action the atoms in their functional duties, and the focus within
which they again meet in their SEVENTH ESSENCE every eleventh year. He who
tells thee he has seen the sun, laugh at him** as if he had said that the sun
moves really onward on his diurnal path . . . .
(xxiii). "It is on account of
his septenary nature that the Sun is spoken of by the ancients as one who is
driven by seven horses equal to the metres of the Vedas; or, again, that,
though he is identified with the SEVEN "Gaina" (classes of being) in
his orb, he is distinct from them,*** as he is, indeed; as also that he has
SEVEN RAYS, as indeed he has . . . .
(xxv.) "The Seven Beings in the
Sun are the Seven Holy Ones, Self-born from the inherent power in the matrix of
Mother substance. It is they who send the Seven Principal Forces, called rays,
which at the beginning of Pralaya will centre into seven new Suns for the next
Manvantara. The energy from which they spring into conscious existence in every
Sun, is what some people call Vishnu (see foot-note below), which is the Breath
of the ABSOLUTENESS.
We call it the One manifested life --
itself a reflection of the Absolute.........
(xxvi.) "The latter must never
be mentioned in words or speech LEST IT SHOULD TAKE AWAY SOME OF OUR SPIRITUAL
ENERGIES THAT ASPIRE towards ITS state, gravitating ever onward unto IT
spiritually, as the whole physical universe gravitates towards ITS manifested
centre -- cosmically.
(xxvii.) "The former -- the
Initial existence -- which may be called while in
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* Or the "dream of
Science," the primeval really homogeneous matter, which no mortal can make
objective in this Race or Round either.
** "Vishnu in the form of the
Solar active energy, neither ever rises nor sets, and is at once, the sevenfold
Sun and distinct from it," says Vishnu Purana (Book II., Chap. 11).
*** "In the same manner as a man
approaches a mirror placed upon a stand, beholds in it his own image, so the
energy or reflection of Vishnu (the Sun) is never disjoined but remains in the
Sun as in a mirror that is there stationed" ("Vishnu Purana").
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this state of being the ONE LIFE, is,
as explained, a FILM for creative or formative Purposes. It manifests in seven
states, which, with their septenary sub-divisions, are the FORTY-NINE Fires*
mentioned in sacred books . . . . . .
(xxix.) "The first is the . . .
. 'Mother' (prima MATERIA). Separating itself into its primary seven states, it
proceeds down cyclically; when** having consolidated itself in its LAST
principle as GROSS MATTER, it revolves around itself and informs, with the
seventh emanation of the last, the first and the lowest element (the Serpent
biting its own tail). In a hierarchy, or order of being, the seventh emanation
of her last principle is:--
(a) In the mineral, the spark that
lies latent in it, and is called to its evanescent being by the POSITIVE
awakening the NEGATIVE (and so forth) . . . .
(b) In the plant it is that vital and
intelligent Force which informs the seed and develops it into the blade of
grass, or the root and sapling. It is the germ which becomes the UPADHI of the
seven principles of the thing it resides in, shooting them out as the latter
grows and develops.
(c) In every animal it does the same.
It is its life principle and vital power; its instinct and qualities; its
characteristics and special idiosyncrasies . . . .
(d) To man, it gives all that it
bestows on all the rest of the manifested units in nature; but develops,
furthermore, the reflection of all its FORTY-NINE FIRES in him. Each of his
seven principles is an heir in full to, and a partaker of, the seven principles
of the "great Mother." The breath of her first principle is his
spirit (Atma). Her second principle is BUDDHI (soul). We call it, erroneously,
the seventh. The third furnishes him with (a) the brain stuff on the physical
plane, and (b) with the MIND that moves it [which is the human soul. -- H. P.
B.] -- according to his organic capacities.
(e) It is the guiding Force in the
Cosmic and terrestrial elements. It resides in the Fire provoked out of its
latent into active being; for the whole of the seven subdivisions of the * * *
principle reside in the terrestrial Fire. It whirls in the breeze, blows with
the hurricane, and sets the air in motion, which element participates in one of
its principles also. Proceeding cyclically, it regulates the motion
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* In "Vishnu" and other
Puranas.
** See the Hermetic
"Nature," "Going down cyclically into matter when she meets
'heavenly man.' "
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of the water, attracts and repels the
waves* according to fixed laws of which its seventh principle is the informing
soul.
(f) Its four higher principles
contain the germ that develops into the Cosmic Gods; its three lower ones breed
the lives of the Elements (Elementals).
(g) In our Solar world, the One
Existence is Heaven and the Earth, the Root and the flower, the Action and the
Thought. It is in the Sun, and is as present in the glow-worm. Not an atom can
escape it. Therefore, the ancient Sages have wisely called it the manifested
God in Nature. . . ."
It may be interesting, in this
connection, to remind the reader of what Mr. Subba Row said of the Forces --
mystically defined. See "Five Years of Theosophy" and "The
Twelve Signs of the Zodiac." Thus he says:
"Kanya (the sixth sign of the
Zodiac, or Virgo) means a Virgin, and represents Sakti or Mahamaya. The sign .
. . is the 6th Rasi or division, and indicates that there are six primary
forces in Nature (synthesized by the Seventh)" . . . These Sakti stand as
follows: -
(1.) PARASAKTI. Literally the great
or Supreme Force or power. It means and includes the powers of light and heat.
(2.) JNANASAKTI. . . . The power of
intellect, of real Wisdom or Knowledge. It has two aspects:
The following are some of its
manifestations when placed under the influence or control of material
conditions. (a) The power of the mind in interpreting our sensations. (b) Its
power in recalling past ideas (memory) and raising future expectation. (c) Its
power as exhibited in what are called by modern psychologists "the laws of
association," which enables it to form persisting connections between
various groups of sensations and possibilities of sensations, and thus generate
the notion or idea of an external object. (d) Its power in connecting our ideas
together by the mysterious link of memory, and thus generating the notion of
self or individuality; some of its manifestations when liberated from the bonds
of matter are -- (a) Clairvoyance, (b) Psychometry.
(3.) ITCHASAKTI -- the power of the
Will. Its most ordinary manifesta-
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* The writers of the above knew
perfectly well the physical cause of the tides, of the waves, etc. It is the
informing Spirit of the whole Cosmic solar body that is meant here, and which
is referred to whenever such expressions are used from the mystic point of
view.
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tion is the generation of certain
nerve currents which set in motion such muscles as are required for the
accomplishment of the desired object.
(4.) KRIYASAKTI. The mysterious power
of thought which enables it to produce external, perceptible, phenomenal
results by its own inherent energy. The ancients held that any idea will
manifest itself externally if one's attention is deeply concentrated upon it.
Similarly an intense volition will be followed by the desired result.
A Yogi generally performs his wonders
by means of Itchasakti and Kriyasakti.
(5.) KUNDALINI SAKTI. The power or
Force which moves in a curved path. It is the Universal life-Principle
manifesting everywhere in nature. This force includes the two great forces of
attraction and repulsion. Electricity and magnetism are but manifestations of
it. This is the power which brings about that "continuous adjustment of
internal relations to external relations" which is the essence of life
according to Herbert Spencer, and that "continuous adjustment of external
relations to internal relations" which is the basis of transmigration of
souls, punar janman (re-birth) in the doctrines of the ancient Hindu
philosophers. A Yogi must thoroughly subjugate this power before he can attain
Moksham. . . .
(6.) MANTRIKA-SAKTI. The force or
power of letters, speech or music. The Mantra Shastra has for its
subject-matter this force in all its manifestations......... The influence of
melody is one of its ordinary manifestations. The power of the ineffable name
is the crown of this Sakti.
Modern Science has but partly
investigated the first, second and fifth of the forces above named, but is
altogether in the dark as regards the remaining powers. The six forces are in
their unity represented by the "Daiviprakriti" (the Seventh, the
light of the LOGOS).
The above is quoted to show the real
Hindu ideas on the same. It is all esoteric, though not covering the tenth part
of what might be said. For one, the six names of the Six Forces mentioned are
those of the six Hierarchies of Dhyan Chohans synthesized by their Primary, the
seventh, who personify the Fifth Principle of Cosmic Nature, or of the
"Mother" in its Mystical Sense. The enumeration alone of the yogi
Powers would require ten volumes. Each of these Forces has a living Conscious
Entity at its head, of which entity it is an emanation.
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But let us compare with the
commentary just cited the words of Hermes, the "thrice great":--
"The creation of Life by the Sun
is as continuous as his light; nothing arrests or limits it. Around him, like
an army of Satellites, are innumerable choirs of genii. These dwell in the
neighbourhood of the Immortals, and thence watch over human things. They fulfil
the will of the gods (Karma) by means of storms, tempests, transitions of fire
and earthquakes; likewise by famines and wars, for the punishment of impiety.*
. . . It is the sun who preserves and nourishes all creatures; and even as the
Ideal World which environs the sensible world fills this last with the
plenitude and universal variety of forms, so also the Sun, enfolding all in his
light, accomplishes everywhere the birth and development of creatures." .
. . "Under his orders is the choir of Genii, or rather the choirs, for
there are many and diverse, and their number corresponds to that of the stars.
Every star has its genii, good and evil by nature, or rather by their
operation, for operation is the essence of the genii. . . . All these Genii
preside over mundane affairs,** they shake and overthrow the constitution of
States and of individuals; they imprint their likeness on our Souls, they are
present in our nerves, our marrow, our veins, our arteries, and our very
brain-substance . . . at the moment when each of us receives life and being, he
is taken in charge by the genii (Elementals) who preside over births,*** and
who are classed beneath the astral powers (Superhuman astral Spirits.) They
change perpetually, not always identically, but revolving in circles.**** They
permeate by the body two parts of the Soul, that it may receive from each the
impress of his own energy. But the reasonable part of the Soul is not subject
to the genii; it is designed
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* See Stanzas III. and IV. and the
Commentaries thereupon, especially the Comments on Stanza IV. "the Lipika
and the four Maharajas," the agents of Karma.
** And "Gods" or Dhyanis,
too, not only the genii or "guided Forces."
*** The meaning of this is that as
man is composed of all the Great Elements: Fire, Air, Water, Earth and Ether --
the ELEMENTALS which belong respectively to these Elements feel attracted to
man by reason of their co-essence. That element which predominates in a certain
constitution will be the ruling element throughout life. For instance, if man
has a preponderance of the Earthly, gnomic element, the gnomes will lead him
towards assimilating metals -- money and wealth, and so on. "Animal man is
the son of the animal elements out of which his Soul (life) was born, and
animals are the mirrors of man," says Paracelsus (De Fundamento
Sapientiae). Paracelsus was cautious, and wanted the Bible to agree with what
he said, and therefore did not say all.
**** Cyclic progress in development.
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for the reception of (the) God,* who
enlightens it with a sunny ray. Those who are thus illumined are few in number,
and from them the genii abstain: for neither genii nor Gods have any power in
the presence of a single ray of God.** But all other men, both soul and body,
are directed by genii, to whom they cleave, and whose operations they
affect........... The genii have then the control of mundane things and our
bodies serve them as instruments...........
The above, save a few sectarian
points, represents that which was a universal belief common to all nations till
about a century or so back. It is still as orthodox in its broad outlines and
features among pagans and Christians alike, if one excepts a handful of
materialists and men of Science.
For whether one calls the genii of
Hermes and his "Gods," "Powers of Darkness" and
"Angels," as in the Greek and Latin Churches; or "Spirits of the
Dead," as in Spiritualism or, again, Bhoots and Devas, Shaitan or Djin, as
they are still called in India and Mussulman countries -- they are all one and
the same thing -- ILLUSION. Let not this, however, be misunderstood in the
sense into which the great philosophical doctrine of the Vedantists has been
lately perverted by Western schools.
All that which is, emanates from the
ABSOLUTE, which, from this qualification alone, stands as the one and only
reality -- hence, everything extraneous to this Absolute, the generative and
causative Element, must be an illusion, most undeniably. But this is only so
from the purely metaphysical view. A man who regards himself as mentally sane,
and is so regarded by his neighbours, calls the visions of an insane brother --
whose hallucinations make the victim either happy or supremely wretched, as the
case may be -- illusions and fancies likewise. But, where is that madman for
whom the hideous shadows in his deranged mind, his illusions, are not, for the
time being, as actual and as real as the things which his physician or keeper
may see? Everything is relative in this Universe, everything is an illusion.
But
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* The God in man and often the
incarnation of a God, a highly Spiritual Dhyan Chohan in him, besides the
presence of his own seventh Principle.
** Now, what "god" is meant
here? Not God "the Father," the anthropomorphic fiction; for that god
is the Elohim collectively, and has no being apart from the Host. Besides, such
a god is finite and imperfect. It is the high Initiates and Adepts who are
meant here by those men "few in number." And it is precisely those
men who believe in "gods" and know no "God," but one
Universal unrelated and unconditioned Deity.
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the experience of any plane is an
actuality for the percipient being, whose consciousness is on that plane;
though the said experience, regarded from the purely metaphysical standpoint,
may be conceived to have no objective reality. But it is not against
metaphysicians, but against physicists and materialists that Esoteric teachings
have to fight, and for these Vital Force, Light, Sound, Electricity, even to
the objectively pulling force of magnetism, have no objective being, and are
said to exist merely as "modes of motion," "sensations and affections
of matter."
Neither the Occultists generally, nor
the Theosophists, reject, as erroneously believed by some, the views and
theories of the modern scientists, only because these views are opposed to
Theosophy. The first rule of our Society is to render unto Caesar what is
Caesar's. The Theosophists, therefore, are the first to recognize the intrinsic
value of science. But when its high priests resolve consciousness into a
secretion from the grey matter of the brain, and everything else in nature into
a mode of motion, we protest against the doctrine as being unphilosophical,
self-contradictory, and simply absurd, from a scientific point of view, as much
and even more than from the occult aspect of the esoteric knowledge.
For truly the astral light of the
derided Kabalists has strange and weird secrets for him who can see in it; and
the mysteries concealed within its incessantly disturbed waves are there, the
whole body of Materialists and scoffers notwithstanding.* These secrets, along
with
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
* The astral light of the Kabalists
is very incorrectly translated by some "AEther;" the latter is
confused with the hypothetical Ether of Science, and both are referred to by
some theosophists as synonymous with Akasa. This is a great mistake.
"A characteristic of Akasa will
serve to show how inadequately it is represented by Ether," writes the
author of Rational Refutations, thus unconsciously helping Occultism. "In
dimension it is infinite; it is not made up of parts; and colour, taste, smell,
and tangibility do not appertain to it. So far forth it corresponds exactly to
time, space, Isvara, ("The Lord," but rather creative potency and
soul -- anima mundi). Its speciality, as compared therewith, consists in its
being the material cause of sound. Except for its being so, one might take it
to be one with vacuity" (p. 120.)
It is vacuity, no doubt, especially
for Rationalists. At any rate Akasa is sure to produce vacuity in the brain of
a materialist. Nevertheless, though Akasa is not that Ether of Science, not
even the Ether of the Occultist, who defines the latter as one of the
principles of Akasa only, it is as certainly, together with its primary, the
cause of sound, only a physical and spiritual, not a material cause by any
means. The relations [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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many other mysteries, will remain
non-existent to the materialists of our age, in the same way as America was a
non-existent myth for Europeans during the early part of the mediaeval ages,
whereas Scandinavians and Norwegians had actually reached and settled in that
very old "New World" several centuries before. But, as a Columbus was
born to re-discover, and to force the Old World to believe in Antipodal
countries, so will there be born scientists who will discover the marvels now claimed
by Occultists to exist in the regions of Ether, with their varied and multiform
denizens and conscious Entities. Then, nolens volens, Science will have to
accept the old "Superstition," as it has several others. And having
been once forced to accept it -- judging from past experience -- its learned
professors will, in all probability, as in the case of MESMERISM and Magnetism,
now re-baptised Hypnotism, father the thing and reject its name. The choice of
the new appellation will depend, in its turn, on the "modes of
motion," the new name for the older "automatic physical processes
among the nerve fibrils of the (Scientific) brain" of Moleschott; as also,
very likely, upon the last meal of the namer; since, according to the Founder
of the new Hylo-Idealistic Scheme, "Cerebration is generically the same as
chylification."* Thus, were one to believe this preposterous proposition,
the new name of the archaic thing would have to take its chance, on the
inspiration of the namer's liver, and then only would these truths have a
chance of becoming scientific!
But TRUTH, however distasteful to the
generally blind majorities, has always had her champions, ready to die for her,
and it is not the Occultists who will protest against its adoption by Science
under whatever new name. But, until absolutely forced on the notice and
acceptance of Scientists, many an Occult truth will be tabooed, as the
phenomena of the Spiritualists and other psychic manifestations were, to be finally
appropriated by its ex-traducers without the least acknowledgment or thanks.
Nitrogen has added considerably to chemical knowledge, but its discoverer,
Paracelsus, is to this day called a "quack."
[[Footnote(s)
-------------------------------------------------]]
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] of Ether to Akasa may be defined by applying to both Akasa and Ether the
words said of the god in the Vedas, "So himself was indeed (his own)
son," one being the progeny of the other and yet itself. This may be a
difficult riddle to the profane, but very easy to understand for any Hindu --
though not even a mystic.
* National Reformer, January 9th,
1887. Article "Phreno-Kosmo-Biology," by Dr. Lewins.
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How profoundly true are the words of
H. T. Buckle, in his admirable "History of Civilization" (Vol. I., p.
256), when he says:--
"Owing to circumstances still
unknown (Karmic provision, H.P.B.) there appear from time to time great
thinkers, who, devoting their lives to a single purpose, are able to anticipate
the progress of mankind, and to produce a religion or a philosophy by which important
effects are eventually brought about. But if we look into history we shall
clearly see that, although the origin of a new opinion may be thus due to a
single man, the result which the new opinion produces will depend on the
condition of the people among whom it is propagated. If either a religion or a
philosophy is too much in advance of a nation it can do no present service but
must bide its time* until the minds of men are ripe for its reception. . . .
Every science, every creed has had its martyrs. According to the ordinary
course of affairs, a few generations pass away, and then there comes a period
when these very truths are looked upon as commonplace facts, and a little later
there comes another period in which they are declared to be necessary, and even
the dullest intellect wonders how they could ever have been denied."
It is barely possible that the minds
of the present generations are not quite ripe for the reception of Occult
truths. Such will be the retrospect furnished to the advanced thinkers of the
Sixth Root Race of the history of the acceptance of Esoteric Philosophy --
fully and unconditionally. Meanwhile the generations of our Fifth Race will
continue to be led away by prejudice and preconceptions. Occult Sciences will
have the finger of scorn pointed at them from every street corner, and everyone
will seek to ridicule and crush them in the name, and for the greater glory, of
Materialism and its so-called Science. The Addendum which completes the present
Book shows, however, in an anticipatory answer to several of the forthcoming
Scientific objections, the true and mutual positions of the defendant and
plaintiff. The Theosophists and Occultists stand arraigned by public opinion,
which still holds high the banner of the inductive Sciences. The latter have,
then, to be examined; and it must be shown how far their achievements and
discoveries in the realm of natural laws are opposed, not so much to our
claims, as to the facts in nature. The hour has now struck to ascertain whether
the
[[Footnote(s)]]-------------------------------------------------
* This is Cyclic law, but this law
itself is often defied by human stubbornness.
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walls of the modern Jericho are so
impregnable that no blast of the Occult trumpet is ever likely to make them
crumble.
The so-called Forces, with Light and
Electricity heading them, and the constitution of the Solar orb must be
carefully examined; as also Gravitation and the Nebular theories. The Natures
of Ether and of other Elements must be discussed: thus contrasting scientific
with other Occult teachings, while revealing some of the hitherto secret tenets
of the latter. (Vide Addendum.)
Some fifteen years ago, the writer
was the first to repeat, after the Kabalists, the wise Commandments in the
Esoteric Catechism. "Close thy mouth, lest thou shouldst speak of this
(the mystery), and thy heart, lest thou shouldst think aloud; and if thy heart
has escaped thee, bring it back to its place, for such is the object of our
alliance." (Sepher Jezireh, Book of Creation.) And again:-- "This is
a secret which gives death: close thy mouth lest thou shouldst reveal it to the
vulgar; compress thy brain lest something should escape from it and fall
outside." (Rules of Initiation.)
A few years later, a corner of the
Veil of Isis had to be lifted; and now another and a larger rent is made. . . .
But old and time-honoured errors --
such as become with every day more glaring and self-evident -- stand arrayed in
battle-order now, as they did then. Marshalled by blind conservatism, conceit
and prejudice, they are constantly on the watch, ready to strangle every truth,
which, awakening from its age-long sleep, happens to knock for admission. Such
has been the case ever since man became an animal. That this proves in every
case moral death to the revealers, who bring to light any of these old, old
truths, is as certain as that it gives LIFE and REGENERATION to those who are
fit to profit even by the little that is now revealed to them.
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BOOK I., PART II.
THE
EVOLUTION OF SYMBOLISM
IN ITS APPROXIMATE ORDER.
---------------------
EXPLANATORY SECTIONS.
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CONTENTS.
-------
§§. PAGE.
I. -- SYMBOLISM AND IDEOGRAPHS ...
303
II. -- MYSTERY LANGUAGE ... 310
III. -- PRIMORDIAL SUBSTANCE AND
DIVINE THOUGHT ... 325
IV. -- CHAOS, THEOS, KOSMOS ... 342
V. -- THE HIDDEN DEITY AND ITS GLYPHS
... 349
VI. -- THE MUNDANE EGG ... 359
VII. -- THE DAYS AND NIGHTS OF BRAHMA
... 368
VIII. -- THE LOTUS AS A UNIVERSAL
SYMBOL ... 379
IX. -- DEUS LUNUS ... 386
X. -- TREE AND SERPENT AND CROCODILE
WORSHIP ... 403
XI. -- DEMON EST DEUS INVERSUS ...
411
XII. -- THEOGONY OF THE CREATIVE GODS
... 424
XIII. -- THE SEVEN CREATIONS ... 445
XIV. -- THE FOUR ELEMENTS OF THE
ANCIENTS ... 460
XV. -- ON KWAN-SHI YIN AND KWAN-YIN
... 470
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BOOK I. -- PART II.
(SECRET DOCTRINE.)
§ I.
SYMBOLISM AND IDEOGRAPHS.
"A symbol is ever, to him who has
eyes for it,
some dimmer or clearer revelation of
the God-like.
Through all there glimmers something
of a divine
idea; nay, the highest ensign that
men ever met and
embraced under the cross itself, had
no meaning, save
an accidental extrinsic one."
CARLYLE.
THE study of the hidden meaning in
every religious and profane legend, of whatsoever nation, large or small --
pre-eminently the traditions of the East -- has occupied the greater portion of
the present writer's life. She is one of those who feel convinced that no
mythological story, no traditional event in the folk-lore of a people has ever
been, at any time, pure fiction, but that every one of such narratives has an
actual, historical lining to it. In this the writer disagrees with those
symbologists, however great their reputation, who find in every myth nothing
save additional proofs of the superstitious bent of mind of the ancients, and
believe that all mythologies sprung from and are built upon solar myths. Such
superficial thinkers were admirably disposed of by Mr. Gerald Massey, the poet
and Egyptologist, in a lecture on "Luniolatry, Ancient and Modern."
His pointed criticism is worthy of reproduction in this part of this work, as
it echoes so well our own feelings, expressed openly so far back as 1875, when
"Isis Unveiled" was written.
"For thirty years past Professor
Max Muller has been teaching in his books and lectures, in the Times and
various magazines, from the platform of the Royal Institution, the pulpit of
Westminster Abbey, and his chair at Oxford, that mythology is a disease of
language, and that the ancient symbolism was a result of something like a
primitive aberration.
"'We know,' says Renouf, echoing
Max Muller, in his Hibbert lectures, 'we know that mythology is the disease
which springs up at a peculiar stage of human culture.' Such is the shallow
explanation of the non-evolutionists, and such explanations are still accepted
by the British public, that gets its think-
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ing done by proxy. Professor Max
Muller, Cox, Gubernatis, and other propounders of the Solar Mythos, have portrayed
the primitive myth-maker for us as a sort of Germanised-Hindu metaphysician,
projecting his own shadow on a mental mist, and talking ingeniously concerning
smoke, or, at least, cloud; the sky overhead becoming like the dome of
dreamland, scribbled over with the imagery of aboriginal nightmares! They
conceive the early man in their own likeness, and look upon him as perversely
prone to self-mystification, or, as Fontenelle has it, 'subject to beholding
things that are not there.' They have misrepresented primitive or archaic man
as having been idiotically misled from the first by an active but untutored
imagination into believing all sorts of fallacies, which were directly and
constantly contradicted by his own daily experience; a fool of fancy in the midst
of those grim realities that were grinding his experience into him, like the
grinding icebergs making their imprints upon the rocks submerged beneath the
sea. It remains to be said, and will one day be acknowledged, that these
accepted teachers have been no nearer to the beginnings of mythology and
language than Burns' poet Willie had been near to Pegasus. My reply is, 'Tis
but a dream of the metaphysical theorist that mythology was a disease of
language, or of anything else except his own brain. The origin and meaning of
mythology have been missed altogether by these solarites and weather-mongers!
Mythology was a primitive mode of thinking the early thought. It was founded on
natural facts, and is still verifiable in phenomena. There is nothing insane, nothing
irrational in it, when considered in the light of evolution, and when its mode
of expression by sign-language is thoroughly understood. The insanity lies in
mistaking it for human history or Divine Revelation.* Mythology is the
repository of man's most ancient science, and what concerns us chiefly is this
-- when truly interpreted once more, it is destined to be the death of those
false theologies to which it has unwittingly given birth.** In modern
phraseology a statement is sometimes said to be mythical in proportion to its
being untrue; but the ancient mythology was not a system or mode of falsifying
in that sense. Its fables were the means of conveying facts; they were neither
forgeries nor fictions. . . . For example, when the Egyptians portrayed the
moon as a Cat, they were not ignorant enough to suppose that the moon was a
cat; nor did their wandering fancies see any likeness in the moon to a cat; nor
was a cat-myth any mere expansion of verbal metaphor; nor had they any
intention of making puzzles or riddles. . . . They had observed the simple fact
that the cat saw in the dark, and that her eyes became full-orbed, and grew
most luminous by night. The moon was the seer by night in heaven, and the cat
was its equivalent on the earth; and so the familiar cat was adopted as a
representative, a natural sign, a living pictograph of the lunar orb. . . . And
so it followed that the sun which saw down in the under-world at night could
also be called the cat, as it was, because it also saw in the dark. The name of
the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* As far as divine revelation is
concerned, we agree. Not so with regard to "human history." . . . For
there is "history" in most of the allegories and "myths" of
India, and events, real actual events, are concealed under them.
** When the "false
theologies" disappear, then true prehistoric realities will be found,
contained especially in the mythology of the Aryans -- ancient Hindoos, and
even the pre-Homeric Hellenes.
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cat in Egyptian is mau, which denotes
the seer, from mau, to see. One writer on mythology asserts that the Egyptians
'imagined a great cat behind the sun, which is the pupil of the cat's eye.' But
this imagining is all modern. It is the Mullerite stock in trade. The moon as
cat was the eye of the sun, because it reflected the solar light, and because
the eye gives back image in its mirror. In the form of the goddess Pasht, the
cat keeps watch for the sun, with her paw holding down and bruising the head of
the serpent of darkness, called his eternal enemy. . . ."
This is a very correct exposition of
the lunar-mythos from its astronomical aspect. Selenography, however, is the
least esoteric of the divisions of lunar Symbology. To master thoroughly -- if
one is permitted to coin a new word -- Selenognosis, one must become proficient
in more than its astronomical meaning. The moon (vide § VII. Deus Lunus) is
intimately related to the Earth, as shown in Stanza VI. of Book I., and is more
directly concerned with all the mysteries of our globe than is even
Venus-Lucifer, the occult sister and alter-ego of the Earth.
The untiring researches of Western,
and especially German, symbologists, during the last and the present centuries,
have brought every Occultist and most unprejudiced persons to see that without
the help of symbology (with its seven departments, of which the moderns know
nothing) no ancient Scripture can ever be correctly understood. Symbology must
be studied from every one of its aspects, for each nation had its own peculiar
methods of expression. In short, no Egyptian papyrus, no Indian tolla, no
Assyrian tile, or Hebrew scroll, should be read and accepted literally.
This every scholar now knows. The
able lectures of Mr. G. Massey alone are sufficient in themselves to convince
any fair-minded Christian that to accept the dead-letter of the Bible is
equivalent to falling into a grosser error and superstition than any hitherto
evolved by the brain of the savage South Sea Islander. But the point to which
even the most truth-loving and truth-searching Orientalists -- whether Aryanists
or Egyptologists -- seem to remain blind, is the fact that every symbol in
papyrus or olla is a many-faced diamond, each of whose facets not merely bears
several interpretations, but relates likewise to several sciences. This is
instanced in the just quoted interpretation of the moon symbolized by the cat
-- an example of sidero-terrestrial imagery; the moon bearing many other
meanings besides this with other nations.
As a learned Mason and Theosophist,
the late Mr. Kenneth Mackenzie, has shown in his Royal Masonic Cyclopaedia,
there is a great difference between emblem and symbol. The former
"comprises a larger series of thoughts than a symbol, which may be said
rather to illustrate some single special idea." Hence, the symbols (say
lunar, or solar) of several countries, each illustrating such a special idea,
or series of ideas, form collectively an esoteric emblem. The latter is "a
concrete visible
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picture or sign representing
principles, or a series of principles, recognizable by those who have received
certain instructions" (initiates). To put it still plainer, an emblem is usually
a series of graphic pictures viewed and explained allegorically, and unfolding
an idea in panoramic views, one after the other. Thus the Puranas are written
emblems. So are the Mosaic and Christian Testaments, or the Bible, and all
other exoteric Scriptures. As the same authority shows:--
"All esoteric Societies have
made use of emblems and symbols, such as the Pythagorean Society, the
Eleusinian, the Hermetic Brethren of Egypt, the Rosicrucians, and the
Freemasons. Many of these emblems it is not proper to divulge to the general
eye, and a very minute difference may make the emblem or symbol differ widely
in its meaning. The magical sigillae, being founded on certain principles of
numbers, partake of this character, and although monstrous or ridiculous in the
eyes of the uninstructed, convey a whole body of doctrine to those who have
been trained to recognise them."
The above enumerated societies are
all comparatively modern, none dating back earlier than the middle ages. How
much more proper, then, that the students of the oldest Archaic School should
be careful not to divulge secrets of far more importance to humanity (in the
sense of being dangerous in the hands of the latter) than any of the so-called
"Masonic Secrets," which have now become, as the French say, those of
"Polichinelle!" But this restriction can apply only to the
psychological or rather psycho-physiological and Cosmical significance of
symbol and emblem, and even to that only partially. An adept must refuse to
impart the conditions and means that lead to a correlation of elements, whether
psychic or physical, that may produce a hurtful result as well as a beneficent
one. But he is ever ready to impart to the earnest student the secret of the
ancient thought in anything that regards history concealed under mythological
symbolism, and thus to furnish a few more land-marks towards a retrospective
view of the past, as containing useful information with regard to the origin of
man, the evolution of the races and geognosy; yet it is the crying complaint of
to-day, not only among theosophists, but also among the few profane interested
in the subject. "Why do not the adepts reveal that which they know?"
To this, one might answer, "Why should they, since one knows beforehand that
no man of science will accept, even as an hypothesis, let alone as a theory or
axiom, the facts imparted. Have you so much as accepted or believed in the A B
C of the Occult philosophy contained in the Theosophist, "Esoteric
Buddhism," and other works and periodicals? Has not even the little which
was given, been ridiculed and derided, and made to face the "animal"
and "ape theory" of Huxley -- Haeckel, on one hand, and the rib of
Adam and the apple on the other? Notwithstanding such an unenviable prospect, a
mass of facts is given in the present work. And now the origin of man, the
evolution of the globe and
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the races, human and animal, are as
fully treated here as the writer is able to treat them.
The proofs brought forward in
corroboration of the old teachings are scattered widely throughout the old
scriptures of ancient civilizations. The Puranas, the Zendavesta, and the old
classics are full of them; but no one has ever gone to the trouble of
collecting and collating together those facts. The reason for this is, that all
such events were recorded symbolically; and that the best scholars, the most
acute minds, among our Aryanists and Egyptologists, have been too often
darkened by one or another preconception; still oftener, by one-sided views of
the secret meaning. Yet even a parable is a spoken symbol: a fiction or a
fable, as some think; an allegorical representation, we say, of life-realities,
events, and facts. And, as a moral was ever drawn from a parable, that moral
being an actual truth and fact in human life, so an historical, real event was
deduced -- by those versed in the hieratic sciences -- from certain emblems and
symbols recorded in the ancient archives of the temples. The religious and
esoteric history of every nation was embedded in symbols; it was never
expressed in so many words. All the thoughts and emotions, all the learning and
knowledge, revealed and acquired, of the early races, found their pictorial
expression in allegory and parable. Why? Because the spoken word has a potency
unknown to, unsuspected and disbelieved in, by the modern "sages."
Because sound and rhythm are closely related to the four Elements of the
Ancients; and because such or another vibration in the air is sure to awaken
corresponding powers, union with which produces good or bad results, as the
case may be. No student was ever allowed to recite historical, religious, or
any real events in so many unmistakable words, lest the powers connected with
the event should be once more attracted. Such events were narrated only during
the Initiation, and every student had to record them in corresponding symbols, drawn
out of his own mind and examined later by his master, before they were finally
accepted. Thus was created in time the Chinese Alphabet, as, before that, the
hieratic symbols were fixed upon in old Egypt. In the Chinese language, the
alphabet of which may be read in any language,* and which is only a little less
ancient than the Egyptian alphabet of Thoth, every word has its corresponding
symbol conveying the word needed in a pictorial form. The language possesses
many thousands of such symbol letters, or logograms, each meaning a whole word;
for letters proper, or an alphabet, do not exist in the Chinese language any
more than they did in the Egyptian till a far later period.
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* Thus, a Japanese who does not
understand one word of Chinese, meeting with a Chinaman who has never heard the
language of the former, will communicate in writing with him, and they will
understand each other perfectly -- because the writing is symbolical.
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The explanation of the chief symbols
and emblems is now attempted, as Book II., which treats of Anthropogenesis,
would be most difficult to understand without a preparatory acquaintance with
the metaphysical symbols at least.
Nor would it be just to enter upon an
esoteric reading of symbolism without giving due honour to one who has rendered
it the greatest service in this century, by discovering the chief key to
ancient Hebrew symbology, interwoven strongly with metrology, one of the keys
to the once universal mystery language. Mr. Ralston Skinner, of Cincinnati, the
author of "The Hebrew-Egyptian Mystery and the Source of Measures"
has our thanks. A mystic and a Kabalist by nature, he has laboured for many
years in this direction, and his efforts were certainly crowned with great
success. In his own words:--
"The writer is quite certain that
there was an ancient language which modernly and up to this time appears to
have been lost, the vestiges of which, however, abundantly exist. . . . The
author discovered that this (integral ratio in numbers of diameter to
circumference of a circle) geometrical ratio was the very ancient, and probably
the divine origin of linear measures. . . . It appears almost proven that the
same system of geometry, numbers, ratio, and measures were known and made use
of on the continent of North America, even prior to the knowledge of the same
by the descending Semites. . . . ."
"The peculiarity of this
language was that it could be contained in another, concealed and not to be
perceived, save through the help of special instruction; letters and syllabic
signs possessing at the same time the powers or meaning of numbers, of
geometrical shapes, pictures, or ideographs and symbols, the designed scope of
which would be determinatively helped out by parables in the shape of narratives
or parts of narratives; while also it could be set forth separately,
independently, and variously, by pictures, in stone work, or in earth
construction."
"To clear up an ambiguity as to
the term language: Primarily the word means the expression of ideas by human
speech; but, secondarily, it may mean the expression of ideas by any other
instrumentality. This old language is so composed in the Hebrew text, that by
the use of the written characters, which will be the language first defined, a
distinctly separated series of ideas may be intentionally communicated, other
than those ideas expressed by the reading of the sound signs. This secondary
language sets forth, under a veil, series of ideas, copies in imagination of
things sensible, which may be pictured, and of things which may be classed as
real without being sensible; as, for instance, the number 9 may be taken as a
reality, though it has no sensible existence, so also a revolution of the moon,
as separate from the moon itself by which that revolution has been made, may be
taken as giving rise to, or causing a real idea, though such a revolution has
no substance. This idea-language may consist of symbols restricted to arbitrary
terms and signs, having a very limited range of conceptions, and quite
valueless, or it may be a reading of nature in some of her manifestations of a
value almost immeasurable, as regards human civilization. A picture of
something natural may give rise to ideas of co-ordina-
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tive subject-matter, radiating out in
various and even opposing directions, like the spokes of a wheel, and producing
natural realities in departments very foreign to the apparent tendency of the
reading of the first or starting picture. Notion may give rise to connected
notion, but if it does, then, however apparently incongruous, all resulting
ideas must spring from the original picture and be harmonically connected, or
related. . . . Thus with a pictured idea radical enough, the imagination of the
Cosmos itself even in its details of construction might result. Such a use of
ordinary language is now obsolete, but it has become a question with the writer
whether at one time, far back in the past, it, or such, was not the language of
the world and of universal use, possessed, however, as it became more and more
moulded into its arcane forms, by a select class or caste. By this I mean that
the popular tongue or vernacular commenced even in its origin to be made use of
as the vehicle of this peculiar mode of conveying ideas. Of this the evidences
are very strong; and, indeed, it would seem that in the history of the human
race there happened, from causes which at present, at any rate, we cannot
trace, a lapse or loss from an original perfect language and a perfect system
of science -- shall we say perfect because they were of divine origin and
importation?"
"Divine origin" does not
mean here a revelation from an anthropomorphic god on a mount amidst thunder
and lightning; but, as we understand it, a language and a system of science
imparted to the early mankind by a more advanced mankind, so much higher as to
be divine in the sight of that infant humanity. By a "mankind," in
short, from other spheres; an idea which contains nothing supernatural in it,
but the acceptance or rejection of which depends upon the degree of conceit and
arrogance in the mind of him to whom it is stated. For, if the professors of
modern knowledge would only confess that, though they know nothing of the
future of the disembodied man -- or rather will accept nothing -- yet this
future may be pregnant with surprises and unexpected revelations to them, once
their Egos are rid of their gross bodies -- then materialistic unbelief would
have fewer chances than it has. Who of them knows, or can tell, what may happen
when once the life cycle of this globe is run down and our mother earth herself
falls into her last sleep? Who is bold enough to say that the divine Egos of
our mankind -- at least the elect out of the multitudes passing on to other
spheres -- will not become in their turn the "divine" instructors of
a new mankind generated by them on a new globe, called to life and activity by
the disembodied "principles" of our Earth? (See Stanza VI., Book I.,
Part 1.) All this may have been the experience of the PAST, and these strange
records lie embedded in the "Mystery language" of the prehistoric
ages, the language now called SYMBOLISM.
--------------
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§ II.
THE MYSTERY LANGUAGE AND ITS KEYS.
RECENT discoveries made by great
mathematicians and Kabalists thus prove, beyond a shadow of doubt, that every
theology, from the earliest and oldest down to the latest, has sprung not only
from a common source of abstract beliefs, but from one universal esoteric, or
"Mystery" language. These scholars hold the key to the universal
language of old, and have turned it successfully, though only once, in the
hermetically closed door leading to the Hall of Mysteries. The great archaic
system known from prehistoric ages as the sacred Wisdom Science, one that is
contained and can be traced in every old as well as in every new religion, had,
and still has, its universal language -- suspected by the Mason Ragon -- the
language of the Hierophants, which has seven "dialects," so to speak,
each referring, and being specially appropriated, to one of the seven mysteries
of Nature. Each had its own symbolism. Nature could thus be either read in its
fulness, or viewed from one of its special aspects.
The proof of this lies, to this day,
in the extreme difficulty which the Orientalists in general, the Indianists and
Egyptologists especially, experience in interpreting the allegorical writings
of the Aryans and the hieratic records of old Egypt. This is because they will
never remember that all the ancient records were written in a language which
was universal and known to all nations alike in days of old, but which is now
intelligible only to the few. Like the Arabic figures which are plain to a man
of whatever nation, or like the English word and, which becomes et for the
Frenchman, und for the German, and so on, yet which may be expressed for all
civilized nations in the simple sign & -- so all the words of that mystery
language signified the same thing to each man of whatever nationality. There
have been several men of note who have tried to re-establish such a universal
and philosophical tongue: Delgarme, Wilkins, Leibnitz; but Demaimieux, in his
Pasigraphie, is the only one who has proven its possibility. The scheme of
Valentinius, called the "Greek Kabala," based on the combination of
Greek letters, might serve as a model.
The many-sided facets of the mystery
language have led to the adoption of widely varied dogmas and rites in the
exotericism of the Church rituals. It is they, again, which are at the origin
of most of the dogmas of the Christian Church, e.g., the seven Sacraments, the
Trinity, the Resurrection; the seven capital Sins and the seven Virtues. The
seven keys to the mystery tongue, however, having always been in
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the keeping of the highest among the
initiated Hierophants of antiquity, it is only the partial use of a few out of
the seven which passed, through the treason of some early Church Fathers --
ex-initiates of the Temples -- into the hands of the new sect of the Nazarenes.
Some of the early Popes were Initiates, but the last fragments of their
knowledge have now fallen into the power of the Jesuits, who have turned them
into a system of sorcery.
It is maintained that INDIA (not in
its present limits, but including its ancient boundaries) is the only country
in the world which still has among her sons adepts, who have the knowledge of
all the seven sub-systems and the key to the entire system. Since the fall of
Memphis, Egypt began to lose those keys one by one, and Chaldea had preserved
only three in the days of Berosus. As for the Hebrews, in all their writings
they show no more than a thorough knowledge of the astronomical, geometrical
and numerical systems of symbolizing all the human, and especially the
physiological functions. They never had the higher keys.
"Every time I hear people
talking of the religion of Egypt," writes M. Gaston Maspero, the great
French Egyptologist and the successor of Mariette Bey, "I am tempted to
ask which of the Egyptian religions they are talking about? Is it of the
Egyptian religion of the 4th Dynasty, or of the Egyptian religion of the
Ptolemaic period? Is it of the religion of the rabble, or of that of the
learned men? Of that which was taught in the schools of Heliopolis, or of that
other which was in the minds and conceptions of the Theban sacerdotal class?
For, between the first tomb of Memphis, which bears the cartouche of a king of
the third dynasty, and the last stones at Esneh under Caesar-Philippus, the
Arabian, there is an interval of at least five thousand years. Leaving aside
the invasion of the Shepherds, the Ethiopian and Assyrian dominions, the
Persian conquest, Greek colonization, and the thousand revolutions of its
political life, Egypt has passed during those five thousand years through many
vicissitudes of life, moral and intellectual. Chapter XVII. of the Book of the
Dead which seems to contain the exposition of the system of the world as it was
understood at Heliopolis during the time of the first dynasties, is known to us
only by a few copies of the eleventh and twelfth dynasties. Each of the verses
composing it was already at the time interpreted in three or four different
ways; so different, indeed, that according to this or another school, the
Demiurge became the solar fire -- Ra-shoo, or the primordial water. Fifteen
centuries later, the number of readings had increased considerably. Time had,
in its course, modified the ideas about the universe and the forces that ruled
it. During the hardly 18 centuries that Christianity exists, it has worked,
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developed and transformed most of its
dogmas; how many times, then, might not the Egyptian clergy have altered its
dogmas during those fifty centuries that separate Theodosius from the King
Builders of the Pyramids?"
Here we believe the eminent
Egyptologist is going too far. The exoteric dogmas may often have been altered,
the esoteric never. He does not take into account the sacred immutability of
the primitive truths, revealed only during the mysteries of initiation. The
Egyptian priests have forgotten much, they altered nothing. The loss of a good deal
of the primitive teaching was due to the sudden deaths of the great
Hierophants, who passed away before they had time to reveal all to their
successors; mostly, to the absence of worthy heirs to the knowledge. Yet they
have preserved in their rituals and dogmas the principal teachings of the
secret doctrine. Thus, in the seventeenth chapter mentioned by Maspero, one
finds (1) Osiris saying he is Toum (the creative force in nature, giving form
to all Beings, spirits and men), self-generated and self-existent, issued from
Noun, the celestial river, called Father-mother of the gods, the primordial
deity, which is chaos or the Deep, impregnated by the unseen spirit. (2) He has
found Shoo (solar force) on the staircase in the City of the Eight (the two
cubes of good and Evil), and he has annihilated the evil principles in Noun
(chaos) the children of Rebellion. (3) He is the Fire and Water, i.e., Noun the
primordial parent, and he created the gods out of his limbs -- 14 gods (twice
seven) seven dark and seven light gods (the seven Spirits of the Presence of
the Christians and the Seven dark Evil Spirits). (4) He is the Law of existence
and Being (v. 10), the Bennoo (or phoenix, the bird of resurrection in
Eternity), in whom night follows the day, and day the night -- an allusion to
the periodical cycles of cosmic resurrection and human re-incarnation; for what
can this mean? "The wayfarer who crosses millions of years, in the name of
One, and the great green (primordial water or Chaos) the name of the other"
(v. 17), one begetting millions of years in succession, the other engulfing
them, to restore them back. (5) He speaks of the Seven Luminous ones who follow
their Lord, who confers justice (Osiris in Amenti).
All this is now shown to have been
the source and origin of Christian dogmas. That which the Jews had from Egypt,
through Moses and other initiates, was confused and distorted enough in later
days; and that which the Church got from both, is still more misinterpreted.
Yet their system is now proven identical
in this special department of symbology -- the key, namely, to the mysteries of
astronomy as connected with those of generation and conception -- with those
ideas of ancient religions, the theology of which has developed the phallic
element. The Jewish system of sacred measures applied to religious symbols is
the same,
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so far as geometrical and numerical
combinations go, as those of Chaldea, Greece, and Egypt, having been adopted by
the Jews during the centuries of their slavery and captivity with those
nations.* What was that system? It is the intimate conviction of the author of
"The Source of Measures" that "the Mosaic Books were intended,
by a mode of art speech, to set forth a geometrical and numerical system of
exact science, which should serve as an origin of measures." Piazzi Smyth
believes likewise. This system and these measures are found by some scholars to
be identical with those used in the construction of the great pyramid -- but
this is only partially so. "The foundation of these measures was the
Parker ratio," says Mr. R. Skinner, in "The Source of Measures."
The author of this very extraordinary
work has found it out, he says, in the use of the integral ratio in numbers of
diameter to circumference of a circle, discovered by John Parker, of New York.
This ratio is 6,561 for diameter, and 20,612 for circumference. Furthermore,
that this geometrical ratio was the very ancient (and probably) the divine
origin of what have now become through exoteric handling and practical
application the British linear measures, "the underlying unit of which,
viz., the inch, was likewise the base of one of the royal Egyptian cubits and
of the Roman foot. He also found out that there was a modified form of the
ratio, viz., 113-355 (explained in his work); and that while this last ratio
pointed through its origin to the exact integral pi, or to 6,561 to 20,612, it
also served as a base for astronomical calculations. The author discovered that
a system of exact science, geometrical, numerical, and astronomical, founded on
these ratios and to be found in use in the construction of the Great Egyptian
Pyramid, was in part the burden of this language as contained in, and concealed
under, the verbiage of the Hebrew text of the Bible. The inch and the two-foot
rule of 24 inches interpreted for use through the elements of the circle (see
first pages of Book I.) and the ratios mentioned, were found to be at the basis
or foundation of this natural and Egyptian and Hebrew system of science, while,
moreover, it seems evident enough that the system itself was looked upon as of
divine origin and of divine revela-
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* As we said in Isis (Vol. II. p.
438-9), "To the present moment, in spite of all controversies and
researches, History and Science remain as much as ever in the dark as to the
origin of the Jews. They may be as well the exiled Tchandalas of old India, the
'bricklayers' mentioned by Vina-Svata, Veda-Vyasa and Manu, as the Phoenicians
of Herodotus, or the Hyk-Sos of Josephus, or descendants of Pali shepherds, or
a mixture of all these. The Bible names the Tyrians as a kindred people, and
claims dominion over them. . . . Yet whatever they may have been, they became a
hybrid people, not long after Moses, as the Bible shows them freely
intermarrying not alone with the Canaanites, but with every other nation or
race they came in contact with."
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tion. . . ." But let us see what
is said by the opponents of Prof. Piazzi Smyth's measurements of the Pyramid.
Mr. Petrie seems to deny them, and to
have made short work altogether of Piazzi Smyth's calculations in their
Biblical connection. So does Mr. Proctor, the champion
"Coincidentalist" for many years past in every question of ancient
arts and sciences. Speaking of "the multitude of relations independent of
the Pyramid, which have turned up while the Pyramidalists have been
endeavouring to connect the pyramid with the solar system . . . . these
coincidences," he says, "are altogether more curious than any
coincidence between the Pyramid and astronomical numbers: the former are as
close and remarkable as they are real" (i.e., those "coincidences"
that would remain if even the pyramid had no existence); "the latter which
are only imaginary (?) have only been established by the process which
schoolboys call 'fudging,' and now new measures have left the work to be done
all over again" (Petrie's letter to the Academy, Dec. 17, 1881.) To this
Mr. Staniland Wake justly observes in his work on "The Origin and
Significance of the Great Pyramid" (London, 1882): "They must,
however, have been more than mere coincidences, if the builders of the Pyramid
had the astronomical knowledge displayed in its perfect orientation and in its
other admitted astronomical features."
They had it; and it is on this
"knowledge" that the programme of the MYSTERIES and of the series of
Initiations was based: thence, the construction of the Pyramids, the
everlasting record and the indestructible symbol of these Mysteries and
Initiations on Earth, as the courses of the stars are in Heaven. The cycle of
Initiation was a reproduction in miniature of that great series of Cosmic
changes to which astronomers have given the name of tropical or sidereal year.
Just as, at the close of the cycle of the sidereal year [25,868 years], the
heavenly bodies return to the same relative positions as they occupied at its
outset, so at the close of the cycle of Initiation the inner man has regained
the pristine state of divine purity and knowledge from which he set out on his
cycle of terrestrial incarnation.
Moses, an Initiate into the Egyptian
Mystagogy, based the religious mysteries of the new nation which he created,
upon the same abstract formula derived from this sidereal cycle, which he
symbolised under the form and measurements of the tabernacle, that he is
supposed to have constructed in the wilderness. On these data, the later Jewish
High Priests constructed the allegory of Solomon's Temple -- a building which
never had a real existence, any more than had King Solomon himself, who is
simply, and as much a solar myth as is the still later Hiram Abif, of the
Masons, as Ragon has well demonstrated. Thus, if the measurements of this
allegorical temple, the symbol of the cycle of
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Initiation, coincide with those of
the Great Pyramid, it is due to the fact that the former were derived from the
latter through the Tabernacle of Moses.
That our author has undeniably
discovered one and even two of the keys is fully demonstrated in the work just
quoted. One has but to read it to feel a growing conviction that the hidden
meaning of the allegories and parables of both Testaments is now unveiled. But
that he owes this discovery far more to his own genius than to Parker and
Piazzi Smyth, is as certain, if not more so. For, as just shown, whether the
measures of the great Pyramid taken and adopted as the correct ones by the
Biblical "Pyramidalists" are beyond suspicion, is not so sure. A
proof of this is the work called "The Pyramids and Temples of Gizeh,"
by Mr. F. Petrie, besides other works written quite recently to oppose the said
calculations, which were called biassed. We gather that nearly every one of
Piazzi Smyth's measurements differs from the later and more carefully made
measurements of Mr. Petrie, who concludes the Introduction to his work with
this sentence:
"As to the results of the whole
investigation, perhaps many theories will agree with an American who was a warm
believer in Pyramid theories when he came to Gizeh. I had the pleasure of his
company there for a couple of days, and at our last meal together he said to me
in a saddened tone -- 'Well, Sir! I feel as if I had been to a funeral. By all
means let the old theories have a decent burial, though we should take care
that in our haste none of the wounded ones are buried alive.'"
As regards the late J. Parker's
calculation in general, and his third proposition especially, we have consulted
some eminent mathematicians, and this is the substance of what they say:
Parker's reasoning rests on
sentimental, rather than mathematical, considerations, and is logically
inconclusive.
Proposition III., namely, that --
"The circle is the natural basis
or beginning of all area, and the square being made so in mathematical science,
is artificial and arbitrary --"
-- is an illustration of an arbitrary
proposition, and cannot safely be relied upon in mathematical reasoning. The
same observation applies, even more strongly, to Proposition VII., which states
that:
"Because the circle is the
primary shape in nature, and hence the basis of area; and because the circle is
measured by, and is equal to the square only in ratio of half its circumference
by the radius, therefore, circumference and radius, and not the square of diameter,
are the only natural and legitimate elements of area, by which all regular
shapes are made equal to the square, and equal to the circle."
Proposition IX. is a remarkable
example of faulty reasoning, and it is the one on which Mr. Parker's Quadrature
mainly rests. Here it is:--
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"The circle and the equilateral
triangle are opposite to one another in all the elements of their construction,
and hence the fractional diameter of one circle, which is equal to the diameter
of one square, is in the opposite duplicate ratio to the diameter of an
equilateral triangle whose area is one," etc., etc.
Granting, for the sake of argument,
that a triangle can be said to have a radius in the sense in which we speak of
the radius of a circle, -- for what Parker calls the radius of the triangle is
the radius of a circle inscribed in the triangle and therefore not the radius
of the triangle at all, -- and granting for the moment the other fanciful and
mathematical propositions united in his premises, why must we conclude that if
the triangle and circle are opposite in all the elements of their construction,
the diameter of any defined circle is in the opposite duplicate ratio of the
diameter of any given equivalent triangle? What necessary connection is there
between the premises and the conclusion? The reasoning is of a kind not known
in geometry, and would not be accepted by strict mathematicians.
Whether the Archaic esoteric system
originated the British inch or not, is of little consequence, however, to the
strict and true metaphysician. Nor does Mr. Ralston Skinner's esoteric reading
of the Bible become incorrect, merely because the measurements of the Pyramid
will not be found to agree with those of Solomon's temple, the ark of Noah,
etc.; or because Mr. Parker's Quadrature of the Circle is rejected by
mathematicians. For Mr. Skinner's reading depends first of all on the
Kabalistic methods and the Rabbinical value of the Hebrew letters. But it is
extremely important to ascertain whether the measures used in the evolution and
building of the Aryan symbolic religion, in the construction of their temples,
the figures given in the Puranas, and especially in their chronology, their
astronomical symbols, the duration of the cycles, and other computations, were,
or were not, the same as those used in the Biblical measurements and glyphs.
For this will prove that the Jews, unless they took their sacred cubit and
measurements from the Egyptians (Moses being an initiate of the Priests) must
have got those notions from India. At any rate they passed them to the early
Christians. Hence, it is the Occultists and Kabalists who are the
"true" heirs to the KNOWLEDGE, or the secret wisdom which is still
found in the Bible; for they alone now understand its real meaning, whereas
profane Jews and Christians cling to the husks and dead letter thereof. That it
is the system of measures which led to the invention of the God-names Elohim
and Jehovah, and their adaptation to phallicism, and that Jehovah is a not very
flattered copy of Osiris, is now demonstrated by the author of the "Source
of Measures." But the latter and Mr. Piazzi Smyth both seem to labour
under the impression that (a) the priority of the system belongs to the
Israelites,
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the Hebrew language being the divine
language, and that (b) this universal language belongs to direct revelation!
The latter hypothesis is correct only
in the sense shown in the last paragraph of the preceding §; but we have yet to
agree as to the nature and character of the divine "Revealer." With
regard to priority, this, to the profane, will of course depend on (a) the
internal and external evidence of the revelation, and (b) on each scholar's individual
preconception. This, however, cannot prevent either the theistic Kabalist, or
the Pantheistic Occultist, from believing each in his way; neither of the two
convincing the other. The data furnished by history are too meagre and
unsatisfactory for either of them to prove to the sceptic which of them is
right.
On the other hand, the proofs
afforded by tradition are too constantly rejected for us to hope to settle the
question in our present age. Meanwhile, materialistic science will be laughing
impartially at both Kabalists and Occultists. But the said vexed question of
priority once laid aside, Science, in its departments of philology and
comparative religion, will find itself finally taken to task, and be compelled
to admit the common claim.* Its greatest scholars, instead of pooh-poohing that
supposed
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* One by one the claims become
admitted, as one Scientist after another is compelled to recognize the facts
given out from the Secret Doctrine -- though he rarely, if ever, recognizes
that he has been anticipated in his statements. Thus, in the palmy days of Mr.
Piazzi Smyth's authority on the Pyramid of Gizeh, his theory was, that the
porphyry sarcophagus of the King's Chamber "is the unit of measure for the
two most enlightened nations of the earth, England and America," and was
no better than a "corn bin." This was vehemently denied by us in Isis
Unveiled just published at that time. Then the New York press arose in arms
(the "Sun" and the "World" chiefly) against our presuming
to correct or find fault with such a star of learning. On p. 519, vol. I., we
had said, that Herodotus when treating of that Pyramid "might have added
that, externally it symbolized the creative principle of Nature, and illustrated
also the principles of geometry, mathematics, astrology, and astronomy.
Internally, it was a majestic fane, in whose sombre recesses were performed the
mysteries, and whose walls had often witnessed the initiation-scenes of members
of the royal family. The porphyry sarcophagus, which Professor Piazzi Smyth,
Astronomer Royal of Scotland, degrades into a corn-bin, was the baptismal font,
upon emerging from which the neophyte was "born again" and became an
adept."
Our statement was laughed at in those
days. We were accused of having got our ideas from the "craze" of
Shaw, an English writer who had maintained that the Sarcophagus had been used
for the celebration of the Mysteries of Osiris; (we had never heard of that writer!).
And now, six or seven years later, this is what Mr. Staniland Wake writes on p.
93 of his paper, on "The Origin and Significance of the Great
Pyramid."
"The so-called King's Chamber,
of which an enthusiastic pyramidist says, 'The polished walls, fine materials,
grand proportions, and exalted place, eloquently tell of glories yet to come --
if not, the chamber of perfections of Cheops' tomb, was probably the place to
which the initiant was admitted after he had passed through the narrow upward
passage and the grand gallery, with its lowly termination, which gradually
prepared him for the [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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"farrago of absurd fiction and
superstitions," as the Brahminical literature is generally termed, will
endeavour to learn the symbolical universal language with its numerical and
geometrical keys. But here again they will hardly be successful if they share
the belief that the Jewish Kabalistic system contains the key to the whole
mystery: for, it does not. Nor does any other Scripture at present possess it
in its entirety, for even the Vedas are not complete. Every old religion is but
a chapter or two of the entire volume of archaic primeval mysteries -- Eastern
Occultism alone being able to boast that it is in possession of the full
secret, with its seven keys. Comparisons will be instituted, and as much as
possible will be explained in this work -- the rest is left to the student's
personal intuition. For in saying that Eastern Occultism has the secret, it is
not as if a "complete" or even an approximate knowledge was claimed
by the writer, which would be absurd. What I know, I give out; that which I
cannot explain, the student must find out for himself.
But while supposing that the whole
cycle of the universal mystery language will not be mastered for whole
centuries to come, even that which has been hitherto discovered in the Bible by
some scholars is quite sufficient to demonstrate the claim -- mathematically.
Judaism having availed itself of two keys out of the seven, and these two keys
having been now rediscovered, it becomes no longer a matter of individual speculation
and hypothesis, least of all of "coincidence," but one of a correct
reading of the Bible texts, as anyone acquainted with arithmetic reads and
verifies an addition or total.* A few years longer and this system will kill
the dead letter of the Bible, as it will that of all the other exoteric faiths,
by showing the dogmas in their real, naked meaning.
And then this undeniable meaning,
however incomplete, will unveil the mystery of Being, besides changing entirely
the modern scientific systems of Anthropology, Ethnology and especially that of
Chronology. The element of Phallicism, found in every God-name and narrative in
the Old (and to some degree in the New) Testament, may also in time
considerably change modern materialistic views in Biology and Physiology.
Divested of their modern repulsive
crudeness, such views of nature and man, on the authority of the celestial
bodies and their mysteries,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] final stage of the SACRED MYSTERIES." Had Mr. Staniland Wake been a
Theosophist, he might have added that the narrow upward passage leading to the
King's chamber had a "narrow gate" indeed; the same "strait
gate" which "leadeth unto life," or the new spiritual re-birth
alluded to by Jesus in Matthew vii. 13 et seq; and that it is this gate in the
Initiation temple, that the writer who recorded the words alleged to have been
spoken by an Initiate, was thinking of.
* All we have said in Isis is now
found corroborated in the "Egyptian Mystery; or The Source of
Measures," by those readings of the Bible with the numerical and
geometrical keys thereto.
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will unveil the evolutions of the
human mind and show how natural was such a course of thought. The so-called
phallic symbols have become offensive only because of the element of materiality
and animality in them. As they originated with the archaic races, which,
issuing to their personal knowledge from an androgyne ancestry, were the first
phenomenal manifestations in their own sight of the separation of sexes and the
ensuing mystery of creating in their turn -- such symbols were but natural. If
later races have degraded them, especially the "chosen people," this
does not affect the origin of those symbols. The little Semitic tribe -- one of
the smallest branchlets from the commingling of the 4th and 5th sub-races (the
Mongolo-Turanian and the Indo-European, so-called, after the sinking of the
great Continent) -- could only accept its symbology in the spirit which was
given to it by the nations from which it was derived. Perchance, in the Mosaic
beginnings, that symbology was not as crude as it became later under the
handling of Ezra, who remodelled the whole Pentateuch. For the glyph of
Pharaoh's daughter (the woman), the Nile (the Great Deep and Water), and the
baby-boy found floating therein in the ark of rushes, has not been primarily
composed for, or by, Moses. It has been found anticipated in the Babylonian
fragments on the tiles, in the story of King Sargon,* who lived far earlier
than Moses. Now, what is the logical inference? Most assuredly that which gives
us the right to say that the story told of Moses by Ezra had been learned by
him while at Babylon,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* On page 224 of Assyrian Antiquities
Mr. George Smith says: "In the palace of Sennacherib at Kouyunjik I found
another fragment of the curious history of Sargon. . . . published in my
translation in the Transactions of the Society of Biblical Archaeology, vol. I.
part I. p. 46." The capital of Sargon, the Babylonian Moses, "was the
great city of Agadi, called by the Semitics Akkad -- mentioned in Genesis as
the capital of Nimrod." (Gen. x. 10) . . . "Akkad lay near the City
of Sippara on the Euphrates and North of Babylon." (See Isis, vol. II. p.
442-3,) Another strange coincidence is found in the fact that the name of the
neighbouring above-mentioned City of Sippara is the same as the name of the
wife of Moses -- Zipporah (Exodus ii.). Of course the story is a clever
addition by Ezra, who could not be ignorant of it. This curious story is found
on fragments of tablets from Kouyunjik, and reads as follows:--
1. Sargona, the powerful king, the
king of Akkad am I.
2. My mother was a princess, my
father I did not know; a brother of my father ruled over the country.
3. In the city of Azupiran, which is
by the side of the River Euphrates.
4. My mother, the princess, conceived
me; in difficulty she brought me forth.
5. She placed me in an ark of rushes,
with bitumen my exit she sealed up.
6. She launched me in the river, which
did not drown me.
7. The river carried me, to Akki the
water-carrier it brought me.
8. Akki, the water-carrier, in
tenderness of bowels, lifted me, etc., etc.
And now Exodus (ii): "And when
she (Moses' mother) could not longer hide him, she took for him an ark of
bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein,
and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink."
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and that he applied the allegory told
of Sargon to the Jewish lawgiver. In short, that Exodus was never written by
Moses, but re-fabricated from old materials by Ezra.
And if so, then why should not other
symbols and glyphs far more crude in their phallic element have been added by
this adept in the later Chaldean and Sabaean phallic worship? We are taught
that the primeval faith of the Israelites was quite different from that which
was developed centuries later by the Talmudists, and before them by David and
Hezekiah.
All this, notwithstanding the
exoteric element, as now found in the two Testaments, is quite sufficient to
class the Bible among esoteric works, and to connect its secret system with
Indian, Chaldean, and Egyptian symbolism. The whole cycle of biblical glyphs
and numbers as suggested by astronomical observations -- astronomy and theology
being closely connected -- is found in Indian exoteric, as well as esoteric,
systems. These figures and their symbols, the signs of the Zodiac, the planets,
their aspects and nodes -- the last term having now passed even into our modern
botany to distinguish male and female plants (the unisexual, polygamous,
monoecious, dioecious, etc., etc.) -- are known in astronomy as sextiles,
quartiles and so on, and have been used for ages and aeons by the archaic
nations, and in one sense have the same meaning as the Hebrew numerals. The
earliest forms of elementary geometry must have certainly been suggested by the
observation of the heavenly bodies and their groupings. Hence the most archaic
symbols in Eastern Esotericism are a circle, a point, a triangle, a plane, a
cube, a pentacle, and a hexagon, and plane figures with various sides and
angles. This shows the knowledge and use of geometrical symbology to be as old
as the world.
Starting from this, it becomes easy
to understand how nature herself could have taught primeval mankind, even
without the help of its divine instructors, the first principles of a numerical
and geometrical symbol language.* Hence one finds numbers and figures used as
an
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] "The story," says Mr. G. Smith, "is supposed to have happened
about 1600 B.C. rather earlier than the supposed age of Moses. As we know that
the fame of Sargon reached Egypt, it is quite likely that this account had a
connection with the event related in Exodus ii., for every action, when once
performed, has a tendency to be repeated." But now, when Professor Sayce
has had the courage to push back the dates of the Chaldean and Assyrian Kings
by two thousand years more, Sargon must have preceded Moses by 2,000 years at
the least. (See Professor Sayce's Lectures on the subject.) The confession is
suggestive, but the figures lack a cypher or two.
* As a reminder how the Esoteric
religion of Moses was crushed several times, and the worship of Jehovah, as
re-established by David, put in its place, by Hezekiah for one, read pp.
436-42, vol. II., in Isis Unveiled. Surely there must have been some very
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
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expression and a record of thought in
every archaic symbolical Scripture. They are ever the same, with only certain
variations growing out of the first figures. Thus the evolution and correlation
of the mysteries of Kosmos, of its growth and development -- spiritual and
physical, abstract and concrete -- were first recorded in geometrical changes
of shape. Every Cosmogony began with a circle, a point, a triangle, and a cube,
up to number 9, when it was synthesized by the first line and a circle -- the
Pythagorean mystic Decade, the sum of all, involving and expressing the
mysteries of the entire Kosmos; recorded a hundred times more fully in the
Hindu system, for him who can understand its mystic language. The numbers 3 and
4, in their blending of 7, as those of 5, 6, 9, and 10, are the very
corner-stone of Occult Cosmogonies. This decade and its thousand combinations
are found in every portion of the globe. One recognizes them in the caves and
rock-cut temples of Hindostan and Central Asia, as in the pyramids and lithoi
of Egypt and America; in the Catacombs of Ozimandyas, in the mounds of the
Caucasian snowcapped fastnesses, in the ruins of Palenque, in Easter Island,
everywhere whither the foot of ancient man has ever journeyed. The 3 and the 4,
the triangle and the cube, or the male and female universal glyph, showing the
first aspect of the evolving deity, is stamped for ever in the Southern Cross
in the Heavens, as in the Egyptian Crux-Ansata. As well expressed, "The
Cube unfolded is in display a cross of the tau, or Egyptian form, or of the
Christian cross form. . . . A circle attached to the first, gives the ansated
cross. . . numbers 3 and 4 counted on the cross, showing a form of the (Hebrew)
golden candlestick (in the Holy of Holies), and of the 3 + 4 = 7, and 6 + 1 =
7, days in the circle of the week, as 7 lights of the sun. So also as the week
of 7 lights gave origin to the month and year, so it is the time marker of
birth. . . . The cross form being shown, then, by the connected use of the form
113 : 355, the symbol is completed by the attachment of a man to the cross.*
This kind of measure was made to co-ordinate with the idea of the origin of
human life, and hence the phallic form.**"
The Stanzas show the cross and these
numbers playing a prominent part in archaic cosmogony. Meanwhile we may profit
by the evidence collected by the same author to show the identity of symbols
and their esoteric meaning all over the globe, which he calls rightly the
"primordial vestiges of these symbols."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] good reasons why the Sadducees, who furnished almost all the high
Priests of Judea, held to the Laws of Moses and spurned the alleged "Books
of Moses," the Pentateuch of the Synagogue and the Talmud.
* Once more, remember the Hindu
Wittoba crucified in space; the significance of the "sacred sign,"
the Swastica; Plato's Decussated man in Space, etc., etc.
** "Source of Measures."
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"Under the general view taken of
the nature of the number forms. . . . it becomes a matter of research of the
utmost interest as to when and where their existence and their use first became
known. Has it been a matter of revelation in what we know as the historic age
-- a cycle exceedingly modern when the age of the human race is contemplated?
It seems, in fact, as to the date of its possession by man, to have been
farther removed in the past from the old Egyptians than are the old Egyptians
from us.
"The Easter Isles in 'mid
Pacific' present the feature of the remaining peaks of the mountains of a
submerged continent, for the reason that these peaks are thickly studded with
Cyclopean statues, remnants of the civilization of a dense and cultivated
people, who must have of necessity occupied a widely extended area. On the back
of these images is to be found the 'ansated cross' and the same modified to the
outlines of the human form. A full description, with plate showing the land,
with the thickly planted statues, also with copies of the images, is to be found
in the January number 1870 of the London Builder.
"In the 'Naturalist,' published
at Salem, Massachusetts, in one of the early numbers, is to be found a
description of some very ancient and curious carving on the crest walls of the
mountains of South America, older by far, it is averred, than the races now
living. The strangeness of these tracings is in that they exhibit the outlines
of a man stretched out on a cross,* by a series of drawings, by which from the
form of a man that of a cross springs, but so done that the cross may be taken
as the man, or the man as the cross; thus exhibiting a symbolic display of the
interdependency of the forms set forth.
"It is known that tradition
among the Aztecs has handed down a very perfect account of the deluge. . . .
Baron Humboldt says that we are to look for the country of Aztalan, the
original country of the Aztecs, as high up at least as the 42nd parallel north;
whence, journeying, they at last arrived in the vale of Mexico. In that vale
the earthen mounds of the far north become the elegant stone pyramidal and
other structures whose remains are now found. The correspondences between the
Aztec remains and those of the Egyptians are well known. . . . Attwater, from
examination of hundreds of them, is convinced that they had a knowledge of
astronomy. As to one of the most perfect of the pyramidal structures among the
Aztecs, Humboldt gives a description to the following effect:
"The form of this pyramid (of
Papantla) which has seven stories, is more tapering than any other monument of
this kind yet discovered, but its height is not remarkable, being but 57 feet,
its base but 25 feet on each side. However, it is remarkable on one account: it
is built entirely of hewn stones, of an extraordinary size, and very beautifully
shaped. Three staircases lead to the top, the steps of which are decorated with
hieroglyphical sculptures and small niches arranged with great symmetry. The
number of these niches seems to allude to the 318 simple and compound signs of
the days of their civil calendar."
"318 is the Gnostic value of
Christ," remarks the author, "and the famous number of the trained or
circumcised servants of Abraham. When it is consi-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See farther on the description
given of the early Aryan initiation: of Visvakarma crucifying the Sun,
"Vikkartana," shorn of his beams -- on a cruciform lath.
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dered that 318 is an abstract value,
and universal, as expressive of a diameter value to a circumference of unity,
its use in the composition of the civil calendar becomes manifest."
Identical glyphs, numbers and
esoteric symbols are found in Egypt, Peru, Mexico, Easter Island, India,
Chaldea, and Central Asia. Crucified men, and symbols of the evolution of races
from gods; and yet behold Science repudiating the idea of a human race other
than one made in our image; theology clinging to its 6,000 years of Creation;
anthropology teaching our descent from the ape; and the Clergy tracing it from
Adam 4,004 years B.C.!!
Shall one, for fear of incurring the
penalty of being called a superstitious fool, and even a liar, abstain from
furnishing proofs -- as good as any -- only because that day, when all the
SEVEN KEYS shall be delivered unto Science, or rather the men of learning and
research in the symbological department, has not yet dawned? In the face of the
crushing discoveries of Geology and Anthropology with regard to the antiquity
of man, shall we -- in order to avoid the usual penalty that awaits every one
who strays outside the beaten paths of either Theology or Materialism -- hold
to the 6,000 years and "special creation," or accept in submissive
admiration our genealogy and descent from the ape? Not so, as long as it is
known that the secret records hold the said SEVEN keys to the mystery of the
genesis of man. Faulty, materialistic, and biassed as the scientific theories
may be, they are a thousand times nearer the truth than the vagaries of
theology. The latter are in their death agony for every one but the most
uncompromising bigot and fanatic.* Hence we have no choice but either to
blindly accept the deductions of Science, or to cut adrift from it, and
withstand it fearlessly to its face, stating what the Secret Doctrine teaches
us, being fully prepared to bear the consequences.
But let us see whether Science in its
materialistic speculations, and even theology in its death-rattle and supreme
struggle to reconcile the 6,000 years since Adam with Sir Charles Lyell's
"Geological Evidences of the Antiquity of Man," do not themselves
give us unconsciously a helping hand. Ethnology, on the confession of some of
its very learned votaries, finds it already impossible to account for the
varieties in the human race, unless the hypothesis of the creation of several
Adams be accepted. They speak of "a white Adam and a black Adam, a red
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Some of its defenders must have
lost their reason, one would rather say. For what can one think when, in the
face of the dead-letter absurdities of the Bible, these are still supported,
publicly and as fiercely as ever, and one finds its theologians maintaining
that though "the Scriptures carefully refrain (?) from making any direct
contribution to scientific knowledge, they have never stumbled upon any
statement which will not abide the light of ADVANCING SCIENCE"!!! --
("Primeval Man," p. 14).
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Adam and a yellow Adam."* Were
they Hindus enumerating the rebirths of Vamadeva from the Linga Purana, they
could say little more. For, enumerating the repeated births of Siva, the latter
show him in one Kalpa of a white complexion, in another of a black colour, in
still another of a red colour, after which the Kumara becomes "four youths
of a yellow colour." This strange coincidence, as Mr. Proctor would say,
speak only in favour of scientific intuition, as Siva-Kumara represents only
allegorically the human races during the genesis of man. But it led to another
intuitional phenomenon -- in the theological ranks this time. The unknown
author of "Primeval Man" in a desperate effort to screen the divine
Revelation from the merciless and eloquent discoveries of geology and anthropology,
remarking that "it would be unfortunate if the defenders of the Bible
should be driven into the position of either surrendering the inspiration of
Scripture, or denying the conclusions of geologists" -- finds a
compromise. Nay, he devotes a thick volume to proving this fact: "Adam was
not the first man** created upon this earth." . . . The exhumed relics of
pre-Adamic man, "instead of shaking our confidence in Scripture, supply
additional proof of its veracity" (p. 194). How so? In the simplest way
imaginable; for the author argues that, henceforth "we" (the clergy)
"are enabled to leave scientific men to pursue their studies without
attempting to coerce them by the fear of heresy" . . . (this must be a
relief indeed to Messrs. Huxley, Tyndall, and Sir C. Lyell). . . . "The
Bible narrative does not commence with creation, as is commonly supposed, but
with the formation of Adam and Eve, millions of years after our planet had been
created. Its previous history, so far as Scripture is concerned, is yet
unwritten." . . . . . "There may have been not one, but twenty
different races upon the earth before the time of Adam, just as there may be
twenty different races of men on other worlds" (p. 55). . . . Who, then,
or what were those races, since the author still maintains that Adam is the
first man of our race? It was THE SATANIC RACE AND RACES! "Satan (was)
never in heaven, Angels and men (being) one species." It was the
pre-Adamic race of "Angels that sinned." Satan was "the first
Prince of this world," we read. Having died in consequence of his
rebellion, he remained on earth as a disembodied Spirit, and tempted Adam and
Eve. "The earlier ages of the Satanic race, and more especially during the
life-time of Satan (!!!) may have been a period
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Primeval Man Unveiled, or the
Anthropology of the Bible"; author (unknown) of the "Stars and the
Angels" 1870, p. 195.
** Especially in the face of the
evidence furnished by the authorized Bible itself in ch. iv. of Genesis, v. 16
and 17, which shows Cain going to the land of Nod and there marrying a wife.
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of patriarchal civilization and
comparative repose -- a time of Tubal-Cains and Jubals, when both Sciences and
arts attempted to strike their roots into the accursed ground. . . . . What a
subject for an epic. . . . (when) there are inevitable incidents which must
have occurred. We see before us . . . . the gay primeval lover wooing his
blushing bride at dewy eve under the Danish oaks, that then grew where now no
oaks will grow . . . . the grey primeval patriarch . . . . the primeval
offspring innocently gambolling by his side. . . . . A thousand such pictures
rise before us"! . . . . (pp. 206-207).
The retrospective glance at this
Satanic "blushing bride" in the days of Satan's innocence, does not
lose in poetry as it gains in originality. Quite the reverse. The modern
Christian bride -- who does not often blush nowadays before her gay modern
lovers -- might even derive a moral lesson from this daughter of Satan, in the
exuberant fancy of her first human biographer. These pictures -- and to
appreciate them at their true value they must be examined in the volume that
describes them -- are all suggested with a view to reconcile the infallibility
of revealed Scripture with Sir C. Lyell's "Antiquity of Man" and
other damaging scientific works. But this does not prevent truth and fact
appearing at the foundation of these vagaries, which the author has never dared
to sign with his own, or even a borrowed name. For, his pre-Adamic races -- not
Satanic but simply Atlantic, and the Hermaphrodites before the latter -- are
mentioned in the Bible when read esoterically, as they are in the Secret
Doctrine. The SEVEN KEYS open the mysteries, past and future, of the seven
great Root Races, as of the seven Kalpas. Though the genesis of man, and even
the esoteric geology, will surely be rejected by Science just as much as the
Satanic and pre-Adamic races, yet if having no other way out of their
difficulties the Scientists have to choose between the two, we feel certain
that, Scripture notwithstanding, once the mystery language is approximately
mastered, it is the archaic teaching that will be accepted.
-------
§ III.
PRIMORDIAL SUBSTANCE AND DIVINE
THOUGHT.
"As it would seem irrational to
affirm that we already know all existing causes, permission must be given to
assume, if need be, an entirely new agent.
"Assuming, what is not strictly
accurate as yet, that the undulatory hypothesis accounts for all the facts, we
are called on to decide whether the existence of an undulating Ether is thereby
proved. We cannot positively affirm
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that no other supposition will
explain the facts. Newton's corpuscular hypothesis is admitted to have broken
down on Interference; and there is, at the present day, no rival. Still, it is
extremely desirable in all such hypotheses to find some collateral confirmation,
some evidence aliunde, of THE SUPPOSED ETHER. . . . . Some Hypotheses consist
of assumptions as to the minute structure and operations of bodies. From the
nature of the case, these assumptions can never be proved by direct means.
Their only merit is their suitability to express the phenomena. They are
REPRESENTATIVE FICTIONS." -- ("Logic," by Alexander Bain, LL.D.,
Part II., p. 133)
Ether, this hypothetical Proteus, one
of the "representative Fictions" of modern Science -- which,
nevertheless, was so long accepted -- is one of the lower
"principles" of what we call PRIMORDIAL SUBSTANCE (Akasa, in
Sanskrit), one of the dreams of old, and which has now become again the dream
of modern science. It is the greatest, just as it is the boldest, of the
surviving speculations of ancient philosophers. For the Occultists, however,
both ETHER and the Primordial Substance are a reality. To put it plainly, ETHER
is the Astral Light, and the Primordial Substance is AKASA, the Upadhi of
DIVINE THOUGHT.
In modern language, the latter would
be better named COSMIC IDEATION -- Spirit; the former, COSMIC SUBSTANCE,
Matter. These, the Alpha and the Omega of Being, are but the two facets of the
one Absolute Existence. The latter was never addressed, or even mentioned, by
any name in antiquity, except allegorically. In the oldest Aryan race, the
Hindu, the worship of the intellectual classes never consisted (as with the
Greeks) in a fervent adoration of marvellous form and art, which led later on
to anthropomorphism. But while the Greek philosopher adored form, and the Hindu
sage alone "perceived the true relation of earthly beauty and eternal
truth" -- the uneducated of every nation understood neither, at any time.
They do not understand it even now.
The evolution of the GOD-IDEA proceeds apace with man's own intellectual
evolution. So true it is that the noblest ideal to which the religious Spirit
of one age can soar, will appear but a gross caricature to the philosophic mind
in a succeeding epoch! The philosophers themselves had to be initiated into
perceptive mysteries, before they could grasp the correct idea of the ancients
in relation to this most metaphysical subject. Otherwise -- outside such
initiation -- for every thinker there will be a "Thus far shalt thou go and
no farther," mapped out by his intellectual capacity, as clearly and as
unmistakeably as there is for the progress of any nation or race in its cycle
by the law of Karma. Outside of initiation, the ideals of contemporary
religious thought must always have their wings clipped and remain unable to
soar higher; for idealistic as well as realistic thinkers, and even
free-thinkers, are but the outcome and the natural product of their respective
environments and periods. The ideals of both are only
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the necessary results of their
temperaments, and the outcome of that phase of intellectual progress to which a
nation, in its collectivity, has attained. Hence, as already remarked, the
highest flights of modern (Western) metaphysics have fallen far short of the
truth. Much of current Agnostic speculation on the existence of the "First
Cause" is little better than veiled materialism -- the terminology alone
being different. Even so great a thinker as Mr. Herbert Spencer speaks of the
"Unknowable" occasionally in terms that demonstrate the lethal influence
of materialistic thought, which, like the deadly Sirocco, has withered and
blighted all current ontological speculation.*
From the early ages of the Fourth
Race, when Spirit alone was worshipped and the mystery was made manifest, down
to the last palmy days of Grecian art at the dawn of Christianity -- the
Hellenes alone had dared to raise publicly an altar to the UNKNOWN GOD.
Whatever St. Paul may have had in his profound mind when declaring to the
Athenians that this "unknown," ignorantly worshipped by them, was the
true God announced by himself -- that Deity was not "Jehovah" (see
"The Holy of Holies"), nor was he "The Maker of the world and
all things." For it is not the "God of Israel" but the
"Unknown" of the ancient and modern Pantheist that "dwelleth not
in temples made with hands" (Acts xviii., 23-4).
Divine thought cannot be defined, or
its meaning explained, except by the numberless manifestations of Cosmic
Substance in which the former is sensed spiritually by those who can do so. To
say this, after having defined it as the Unknown Deity, abstract, impersonal,
sexless, which must be placed at the root of every Cosmogony and its subsequent
evolution, is equivalent to saying nothing at all. It is like attempting a
transcendental equation of conditions for the true values of a set, having in
hand for deducing them only a number of unknown quantities. Its place is found
in the old primitive Symbolic charts, in which, as shown in the text, it is
represented by a boundless darkness, on the ground of which appears the first
central point in white -- thus symbolising coeval and co-eternal SPIRIT-MATTER
making its appearance in the phenomenal world, before its first
differentiation. When "the one becomes two," it may then be
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* For instance, when he terms the
"First Cause" -- the UNKNOWABLE -- a "power manifesting through
phenomena," and "an infinite eternal Energy" (?) it is clear
that he has grasped solely the physical aspect of the mystery of Being -- the
Energies of Cosmic Substance only. The co-eternal aspect of the ONE REALITY --
Cosmic Ideation -- (as to its noumenon, it seems non-existent in the mind of
the great thinker) is absolutely omitted from consideration. Without doubt,
this one-sided mode of dealing with the problem is due largely to the
pernicious Western practice of subordinating consciousness, or regarding it as
a "by-product" of molecular motion.
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referred to as Spirit and matter. To
"Spirit" is referable every manifestation of consciousness,
reflective or direct, and of unconscious purposiveness (to adopt a modern
expression used in Western philosophy, so-called) as evidenced in the Vital
Principle, and Nature's submission to the majestic sequence of immutable law.
"Matter" must be regarded as objectivity in its purest abstraction --
the self-existing basis whose septenary manvantaric differentiations constitute
the objective reality underlying the phenomena of each phase of conscious
existence. During the period of Universal Pralaya, Cosmic Ideation is
nonexistent; and the variously differentiated states of Cosmic Substance are
resolved back again into the primary state of abstract potential objectivity.
Manvantaric impulse commences with
the re-awakening of Cosmic Ideation (the "Universal Mind")
concurrently with, and parallel to the primary emergence of Cosmic Substance --
the latter being the manvantaric vehicle of the former -- from its
undifferentiated pralayic state. Then, absolute wisdom mirrors itself in its
Ideation; which, by a transcendental process, superior to and incomprehensible
by human Consciousness, results in Cosmic Energy (Fohat). Thrilling through the
bosom of inert Substance, Fohat impels it to activity, and guides its primary
differentiations on all the Seven planes of Cosmic Consciousness. There are
thus Seven Protyles (as they are now called), while Aryan antiquity called them
the Seven Prakriti, or Natures, serving, severally, as the relatively
homogeneous basis, which in the course of the increasing heterogeneity (in the
evolution of the Universe) differentiate into the marvellous complexity
presented by phenomena on the planes of perception. The term
"relatively" is used designedly, because the very existence of such a
process, resulting in the primary segregations of undifferentiated Cosmic
Substance into its septenary bases of evolution, compels us to regard the
protyle* of each plane as only a mediate phase assumed by Substance in its
passage from abstract, into full objectivity.
Cosmic Ideation is said to be
non-existent during Pralayic periods, for the simple reason that there is no
one, and nothing, to perceive its effects. There can be no manifestation of
Consciousness, semi-consciousness, or even "unconscious
purposiveness," except through the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The term Protyle is due to Mr.
Crookes, the eminent chemist, who has given that name to pre-Matter, if one may
so call primordial and purely homogeneous substances, suspected, if not
actually yet found, by Science in the ultimate composition of the atom. But the
incipient segregation of primordial matter into atoms and molecules takes its
rise subsequent to the evolution of the Seven Protyles. It is the last of these
-- having recently detected the possibility of its existence on our plane --
that Mr. Crookes is in search of.
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vehicle of matter; that is to say, on
this our plane, wherein human consciousness in its normal state cannot soar
beyond what is known as transcendental metaphysics, it is only through some
molecular aggregation or fabric that Spirit wells up in a stream of individual
or sub-conscious subjectivity. And as Matter existing apart from perception is
a mere abstraction, both of these aspects of the ABSOLUTE -- Cosmic Substance
and Cosmic Ideation -- are mutually inter-dependent. In strict accuracy -- to
avoid confusion and misconception -- the term "Matter" ought to be
applied to the aggregate of objects of possible perception, and
"Substance" to noumena; for inasmuch as the phenomena of our plane
are the creation of the perceiving Ego -- the modifications of its own
subjectivity -- all the "states of matter representing the aggregate of
perceived objects" can have but a relative and purely phenomenal existence
for the children of our plane. As the modern Idealists would say, the
co-operation of Subject and Object results in the Sense-object or phenomenon.
But this does not necessarily lead to the conclusion that it is the same on all
other planes; that the co-operation of the two on the planes of their septenary
differentiation results in a septenary aggregate of phenomena which are
likewise non-existent per se, though concrete realities for the Entities of
whose experience they form a part, in the same manner as the rocks and rivers
around us are real from the stand-point of a physicist, though unreal illusions
of sense from that of the metaphysician. It would be an error to say, or even
conceive such a thing. From the stand-point of the highest metaphysics, the
whole Universe, gods included, is an illusion; but the illusion of him who is
in himself an illusion differs on every plane of consciousness; and we have no
more right to dogmatise about the possible nature of the perceptive faculties
of an Ego on, say, the sixth plane, than we have to identify our perceptions
with, or make them a standard for, those of an ant, in its mode of
consciousness. The pure object apart from consciousness* is unknown to us,
while living on the plane of our three-dimensional World; as we know only the
mental states it excites in the perceiving Ego. And, so long as the contrast of
Subject and Object endures -- to wit, as long as we enjoy our five senses and
no more, and do not know how to divorce our all-perceiving Ego (the Higher
Self) from the thraldom of these senses -- so long will it be impossible for
the personal Ego to break through the barrier which separates it from a
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Cosmic Ideation focussed in a
principle or upadhi (basis) results as the consciousness of the individual Ego.
Its manifestation varies with the degree of upadhi, e.g., through that known as
Manas it wells up as Mind-Consciousness; through the more finely differentiated
fabric (sixth state of matter) of the Buddhi resting on the experience of Manas
as its basis -- as a stream of spiritual INTUITION.
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knowledge of things in themselves (or
Substance). That Ego, progressing in an arc of ascending subjectivity, must
exhaust the experience of every plane. But not till the Unit is merged in the
ALL, whether on this or any other plane, and Subject and Object alike vanish in
the absolute negation of the Nirvanic State (negation, again, only from our
plane), is scaled that peak of Omniscience -- the Knowledge of
things-in-themselves; and the solution of the yet more awful riddle approached,
before which even the highest Dhyan Chohan must bow in silence and ignorance --
the unspeakable mystery of that which is called by the Vedantins, the
PARABRAHMAM.
Therefore, such being the case, all
those who sought to give a name to the incognizable Principle have simply
degraded it. Even to speak of Cosmic Ideation -- save in its phenomenal aspect
-- is like trying to bottle up primordial Chaos, or to put a printed label on
ETERNITY.
What, then, is the "primordial
Substance," that mysterious object of which Alchemy was ever talking, and
which became the subject of philosophical speculation in every age? What can it
be finally, even in its phenomenal pre-differentiation? Even that is ALL in
manifested Nature and -- nothing to our senses. It is mentioned under various
names in every Cosmogony, referred to in every philosophy, and shown to be, to
this day, the ever grasp-eluding PROTEUS in Nature. We touch and do not feel
it; we look at it without seeing it; we breathe it and do not perceive it; we
hear and smell it without the smallest cognition that it is there; for it is in
every molecule of that which in our illusion and ignorance we regard as Matter
in any of its states, or conceive as a feeling, a thought, an emotion. . . . In
short, it is the "upadhi," or vehicle, of every possible phenomenon,
whether physical, mental, or psychic. In the opening sentences of Genesis, as
in the Chaldean Cosmogony; in the Puranas of India, and in the Book of the Dead
of Egypt, it opens everywhere the cycle of manifestation. It is termed
"Chaos," and the face of the waters, incubated by the Spirit
proceeding from the Unknown, under whatever name. (See "Chaos, Theos,
Kosmos.")
The authors of the sacred Scriptures
in India go deeper into the origin of things evolved than Thales or Job, for
they say:--
"From INTELLIGENCE (called MAHAT
in the Puranas) associated with IGNORANCE (Iswar, as a personal deity) attended
by its projective power, in which the quality of dulness (tamas, insensibility)
predominates, proceeds Ether -- from ether, air; from air, heat; from heat,
water; and from water, earth "with everything on it." "From
THIS, from this same SELF, was the Ether produced," says the Veda.
(Taittiriya Upanishad II. 1).
It becomes thus evident that it is
not this Ether -- sprung at the fourth
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remove from an Emanation of
Intelligence "associated with Ignorance" -- which is the high
principle, the deific Entity worshipped by the Greeks and Latins under the name
of "Pater omnipotens AEther," and "Magnus AEther" in its
collective aggregates. The septenary gradation, and the innumerable
subdivisions and differences, made by the ancients between the powers of Ether
collectively, from its outward fringe of effects, with which our Science is so
familiar, up to the "Imponderable Substance," once admitted as the
"Ether of Space," now about to be rejected, has been ever a vexing
riddle for every branch of knowledge. The mythologists and symbologists of our
day, confused by this incomprehensible glorification, on the one hand, and
degradation on the other, of the same deified entity and in the same religious
systems, are often driven to the most ludicrous mistakes. The Church, firm as a
rock in each and all of her early errors of interpretation, has made of Ether
the abode of her Satanic legions.* The whole hierarchy of the
"Fallen" angels is there; the Cosmocratores -- or the "world
bearers," (according to Bossuet); Mundi Tenentes -- the "world
holders," as Tertullian calls them; and Mundi Domini "world
dominations," or rather dominators, the Curbati, or "Curved,"
etc., who thus make of the stars and celestial orbs in their course -- Devils!
The difference made between the seven
states of Ether (itself one of the Seven Cosmic principles), while the AEther
of the Ancients is universal Fire, may be seen in the injunctions by Zoroaster
and Psellus, respectively. The former said: "Consult it only when it is
without form or figure," absque forma et figura, which means without
flames or burning coals. "When it has a form -- heed it not," teaches
Psellus; "but when it is formless, obey it, for it is then sacred fire,
and all it will reveal thee, shall be true."** This proves that Ether,
itself an aspect of Akasa, has in its turn several aspects or "principles."
All the ancient nations deified
AEther in its imponderable aspect and potency. Virgil calls Jupiter, Pater
omnipotens AEther, "the great AEther."*** The Hindus have also placed
it among their deities; under the name of Akasa (the synthesis of AEther). And
the author of the Homoiomerian
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* For it is thus that the Church has
interpreted verse 12 in the VI. Chapter to the Ephesians. "For we wrestle
not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers,
against the rulers of the darkness of this world." Further on St. Paul
mentions the spiritual malices ("wickedness" in English texts) SPREAD
IN THE AIR -- "Spiritualia nequitiae coelestibus," the Latin texts
giving various names to these "malices," the innocent
"Elementals." But the Church is right this time, though wrong in
calling them all devils. The ASTRAL LIGHT or lower Ether is full of conscious
and semi-conscious and unconscious entities; only the church has less power
over them than over invisible microbes or mosquitoes.
** Effatum XVI. "Oracles of
Zoroaster."
*** Georgica. Book II.
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System of philosophy, Anaxagoras of
Clazomenae, firmly believed that the spiritual prototypes of all things, as
well as their elements, were to be found in the boundless Ether where they were
generated, whence they evolved, and whither they returned -- an Occult
teaching.
It thus becomes clear that it is from
Ether in its highest synthetic aspect, once anthropomorphised, that sprung the
first idea of a personal creative deity. With the philosophical Hindus the
elements are Tamas, i.e., "unenlightened by intellect, which they
obscure."
We have now to exhaust the question
of the mystical meaning of "Primordial Chaos" and of the
Root-Principle, and show how they were connected in the ancient philosophies
with Akasa, wrongly translated AEther, and also with Maya (illusion) -- of
which Ishwara is the male aspect. We shall speak further on of the intelligent
"principle," or rather of the invisible immaterial properties, in the
visible and material elements, that "sprung from the primordial Chaos."
For, "What is the primordial
Chaos but AEther?" it is asked in "ISIS UNVEILED." Not the
modern Ether; not such as is recognised now, but such as was known to the
ancient philosophers long before the time of Moses; but AEther, with all its
mysterious and occult properties, containing in itself the germs of universal
creation. Upper AEther or Akasa, is the celestial virgin and mother of every
existing form and being, from whose bosom, as soon as "incubated" by
the Divine Spirit, are called into existence Matter and Life, Force and Action.
AEther is the Aditi of the Hindus, and it is Akasa. Electricity, magnetism,
heat, light, and chemical action are so little understood even now that fresh
facts are constantly widening the range of our knowledge. Who knows where ends
the power of this protean giant -- AEther; or whence its mysterious origin?
Who, we mean, that denies the spirit that works in it, and evolves out of it
all visible forms?
It will be an easy task to show that
the cosmogonical legends all over the world are based on a knowledge by the
ancients of those sciences, which have allied themselves in our days in support
of the doctrine of evolution; and that further research may demonstrate that
those ancients were far better acquainted with the fact of evolution itself,
embracing both its physical and spiritual aspects, than we are now. "With
the old philosophers, evolution was a universal theorem, a doctrine embracing
the whole, and an established principle; while our modern evolutionists are enabled
to present us merely with speculative theoretics; with particular, if not
wholly negative theorems. It is idle for the representatives of our modern
wisdom to close the debate and pretend that the question is settled, merely
because the obscure phraseology of the Mosaic, far later, account clashes with
the definite exegesis of 'Exact Science'" ("Isis Unveiled").
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If one turns to the "Laws (or
Ordinances) of Manu," one finds the prototype of all these ideas. Mostly
lost (to the Western world) in their original form, disfigured by later
interpolations and additions, they have, nevertheless, preserved quite enough
of their ancient Spirit to show its character. "Removing the darkness, the
Self-existent Lord" (Vishnu, Narayana, etc.) becoming manifest, and
"wishing to produce beings from his Essence, created, in the beginning,
water alone. In that he cast seed. . . . . That became a golden Egg." (V.
6, 7, 8, 9.) Whence this Self-existent Lord? It is called THIS, and is spoken
of as "Darkness, imperceptible, without definite qualities, undiscoverable
as if wholly in sleep." (V. 5.) Having dwelt in that Egg for a whole
divine year, he "who is called in the world Brahma," splits that Egg
in two, and from the upper portion he forms the heaven, from the lower the
earth, and from the middle the sky and "the perpetual place of
waters." (12, 13.)
But there is, directly following
these verses, something more important for us, as it corroborates entirely our
esoteric teachings. From verse 14 to 36, evolution is given in the order
described in the Esoteric philosophy. This cannot be easily gainsaid. Even
Medhatithi, the son of Viraswamin, and the author of the Commentary, "the
Manubhasya," whose date, according to the western Orientalists, is 1,000
A.D., helps us with his remarks to the elucidation of the truth. He showed
himself either unwilling to give out more, because he knew that truth which has
to be kept from the profane, or else he was really puzzled. Still, what he does
give out makes the septenary principle in men and nature plain enough.
Let us begin with Chapter 1. of the
"Ordinances" or "Laws" after the Self-existent Lord, the
unmanifesting Logos of the Unknown "Darkness," becomes manifested in
the golden Egg. It is from this "Egg," from ----
(11.) That which is the undiscrete
(undifferentiated) cause, eternal, which Is and Is not, from It issued that
male who is called in the world Brahma. . . . .
Here we find, as in all genuine
philosophical systems, even the "Egg" or the Circle (or Zero),
boundless Infinity, referred to as IT,* and Brahma, the first unit only,
referred to as the male god, i.e., the fructifying Principle. It is [[diagram]]
or 10 (ten) the Decade. On the plane of the Septenary or our World only, it is
called Brahma. On that of the Unified Decade in the realm of Reality, this male
Brahma is an illusion.
(14.) "From Self (atmanah) he
created mind, (1) which is and is not;
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The ideal apex of the Pythagorean
triangle: vide Sections in Vol. II., "Cross and Circle," and the
"Earliest Symbolics of the Cross."
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(2) and from mind, Ego-ism
(Self-Consciousness) the ruler; (3) the Lord."
(1.) The mind is Manas. Medhatithi,
the commentator, justly observes here that it is the reverse of this and shows
already interpolation and rearranging; for it is Manas that springs from
Ahamkara or (Universal) Self-Consciousness, as Manas in the microcosm springs
from Mahat, or Maha-Buddhi (Buddhi, in man). For Manas is dual, and as shown
and translated by Colebrooke, "is serving both for sense and action, is an
organ by affinity, being cognate with the rest." "The rest"
means, here, that Manas, our fifth principle (the fifth, because the body was
named the first, which is the reverse of the true philosophical order)* is in
affinity both with Atma-Buddhi and with the lower four principles. Hence, our
teaching: namely, that Manas follows Atma-Buddhi to Devachan, and that the
lower (dregs, the residue of) Manas remains with Kama rupa, in Limbus, or
Kama-loka, the abode of the "Shells."
(2.) Such is the meaning of Manas,
which "is, and is not."
(3.) Medhatithi translates it as
"the one conscious of the I," or Ego, not "ruler," as the
Orientalists do. Thus they translate verse 16: "He also, having made the
subtile parts of those six (the Great Self and the five organs of sense) of
unmeasured brightness, to enter into the elements of Self (Atmamatrasu) created
all beings."
When, according to Medhatithi, it
ought to read matra-Chit instead of "Atmamatrasu," and thus be made
to say:--
"He having pervaded the subtile
parts of those six, of unmeasured brightness, by elements of self, created all
beings."
This latter reading must be the
correct one, since he, the Self, is what we call Atma, and thus constitutes the
seventh principle, the synthesis of the "six." Such is also the
opinion of the editor of Manava-dharma Shastra, who seems to have intuitionally
entered far deeper into the spirit of the philosophy than has the translator of
the "Ordinances of Manu," the late Dr. Burnell. For he hesitates
little between the text of Kulluka and the Commentaries of Medhatithi.
Rejecting the tanmatra, or subtile elements, and the atmamatrasu of Kulluka, he
says, applying the principles to the Cosmic Self: "The six appear rather
to be the manas plus the five principles of Ether, air, fire, water,
earth"; "having united five portions of these six with the spiritual
element (the seventh) he (thus) created all existing things;" atmamatra is
therefore the spiritual atom as opposed to the elementary, not reflective
"elements of himself." Thus he corrects the translation of verse --
"17. As the subtile elements of bodily forms of This One depend on these
six, so
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Vide A. Coke Burnell's translation,
edited by Ed. W. Hopkins, Ph.D.
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the wise call his form carira"
(sharira) -- and he says that "Elements" mean here portions or parts
(or principles), which reading is borne out by verse 19, which says:--
"19. This non-eternal (Universe)
arises then from the Eternal, by means of the subtile elements of forms of
those seven very glorious principles" (purusha).
Commenting upon which, according to
Medhatithi, the Editor remarks that "the five elements plus mind (Manas)
and Self-Consciousness (Ahamkara)* are meant;" "subtile
elements," as before (meaning) "five portions of form" (or
principles). For verse 20 shows it, when saying of these (five elements, or
"five portions of form" (rupa, plus Manas and Self-Consciousness)
that they constitute the "seven purusha," or principles, called in
the Puranas the "Seven Prakritis."
Moreover, these "five
elements" or "five portions" are spoken of in verse 27 as
"those which are called the atomic destructible portions" --
therefore "distinct from the atoms of the nyaya."
This creative Brahma, issuing from
the mundane or golden egg, unites in himself both the male and the female
principles. He is, in short, the same as all the creative Protologoi. Of
Brahma, however, it could not be said, as of Dionysos: "[[protogonon
diphue trigonon Baccheion Hanakta Hagrion arreton kruphion dikerota
dimorphon]]" -- a lunar Jehovah -- Bacchus truly, with David dancing nude
before his symbol in the ark -- because no licentious Dionysia were ever
established in his name and honour. All such public worship was exoteric, and
the great universal symbols were distorted universally, as those of Krishna are
now by the Vallabacharyas of Bombay, the followers of the infant god. But are
these popular gods the true Deity? Are they the Apex and synthesis of the
sevenfold creation, man included? Never! Each and all are one of the rungs of
that septenary ladder of Divine Consciousness, pagan as Christian. For Ain-Soph
also is said to manifest through the Seven Letters of Jehovah's name who,
having usurped the place of the Unknown Limitless, was given by his devotees
his Seven Angels of the Presence -- his Seven Principles. Yet they are
mentioned in almost every school. In the pure Sankhya philosophy mahat,
ahamkara and the five tanmatras are called the seven Prakritis (or Natures),
and they are counted from Maha-Buddhi or Mahat down to Earth. (See Sankhya
Karika III. and Commentaries.)
Nevertheless, however disfigured for
Rabbinical purposes is the original Elohistic version by Ezra, however
repulsive at times even the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Ahamkara, as universal
Self-Consciousness, has a triple aspect, as also Manas. For this conception of
"I," or one's Ego, is either sattwa, "pure quietude," or
appears as rajas, "active," or remains tamas, "stagnant,"
in darkness. It belongs to Heaven and Earth, and assumes the properties of
either.
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esoteric meaning in the Hebrew
scrolls, which is far more so than its outward veil or cloaking may be* -- once
the Jehovistic portions are eliminated, the Mosaic books are found full of
purely occult and priceless knowledge, especially in the first six chapters.
Read by the aid of the Kabala one
finds a matchless temple of occult truths, a well of deeply concealed beauty
hidden under a structure, the visible architecture of which, its apparent
symmetry notwithstanding, is unable to stand the criticism of cold reason, or
to reveal its age, for it belongs to all the ages. There is more wisdom
concealed under the exoteric fables of Puranas and Bible than in all the
exoteric facts and science in the literature of the world, and more OCCULT true
Science, than there is of exact knowledge in all the academies. Or, in plainer
and stronger language, there is as much esoteric wisdom in some portions of the
exoteric Puranas and Pentateuch, as there is of nonsense and of designed
childish fancy in it, when read only in the dead-letter murderous
interpretations of great dogmatic religions, and especially of sects.
Let anyone read the first verses of
chapter i. of Genesis and reflect upon them. There "God" commands to
another "god," who does his bidding -- even in the cautious English
Protestant translation of James the First's authorised edition.
In the "beginning," the
Hebrew language having no word to express the idea of Eternity,**
"God" fashions the heaven and the Earth; and the latter is
"without form and void," while the former is no Heaven in fact, but
the "Deep," Chaos, with darkness upon its face.***
"And the Spirit of GOD moved
upon the face of the Waters" (v. 2), or the great Deep of the Infinite
Space. And this Spirit is Nara-yana, or Vishnu.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See "The Holy of Holies."
** The word "eternity," by
which Christian theologians interpret the term "for ever and ever,"
does not exist in the Hebrew tongue -- either as a word or meaning. Oulam, says
Le Clerc, only imports a time when beginning or end is not known. It does not
mean "infinite duration," and the word for ever in the Old Testament,
only signifies a "long time." Nor is the term "eternity"
used in the Christian sense in the Puranas. For in Vishnu Purana, it is clearly
stated that by Eternity and Immortality only "existence to the end of the
Kalpa" is meant (Book II. chap. viii.).
*** Orphic theogony is purely
Oriental and Indian in its Spirit. The successive transformations it has
undergone, have now separated it widely from the spirit of ancient Cosmogony,
as may be seen by comparing it even with Hesiod's theogony. Yet the truly Aryan
Hindu spirit breaks forth everywhere in both Hesiod's and the Orphic theogony.
(See the remarkable work of James Darmesteter, Cosmogonies Aryennes, in his
Essais Orientaux.) Thus the original Greek conception of Chaos is that of the
Secret Wisdom Religion. In Hesiod, therefore, Chaos is infinite, boundless,
endless and beginningless in duration, an abstraction at the same time as a
visible presence. SPACE filled with darkness, which is primordial matter in its
precosmic state. For in its etymological sense, Chaos is Space, according to
Aristotle, and Space is the ever Unseen and Unknowable Deity in our philosophy.
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"And God said, Let there be a
firmament. . ." (v. 6), and "God," the second, obeyed and
"made the firmament" (v. 7). "And God said let there be
light," and "there was light." Now the latter does not mean
light at all, but in the Kabala, the androgyne "Adam Kadmon," or
Sephira (Spiritual light), for they are one; or, according to the Chaldean
"Book of Numbers," the secondary angels, the first being the Elohim
who are the aggregate of that "fashioning" god. For to whom are those
words of command addressed? And who is it who commands? That which commands is
the eternal Law, and he who obeys, the Elohim, the known quantity acting in and
with x, or the coefficient of the unknown quantity, the Forces of the ONE
Force. All this is Occultism, and is found in the archaic STANZAS. It is
perfectly immaterial whether we call these "Forces" the Dhyan
Chohans, or the Ophanim, as St. John does.
"The one Universal Light, which
to Man is Darkness, is ever existent," says the Chaldean "Book of
Numbers." From it proceeds periodically the ENERGY, which is reflected in
the "Deep" or Chaos, the store-house of future worlds, and, once
awakened, stirs up and fructifies the latent Forces, which are the ever present
eternal potentialities in it. Then awake anew the Brahmas and Buddhas -- the
co-eternal Forces -- and a new Universe springs into being. . . . .
In the Sepher Jezireh, the Kabalistic
Book of Creation, the author has evidently repeated the words of Manu. In it,
the Divine Substance is represented as having alone existed from the eternity,
boundless and absolute; and as having emitted from itself the Spirit.*
"One is the Spirit of the living God, blessed be ITS name, which liveth
for ever! Voice, Spirit, and Word, this is the Holy Spirit;"** and this is
the Kabalistic abstract Trinity, so unceremoniously anthropomorphised by the
Christian Fathers. From this triple ONE emanated the whole Kosmos. First from
ONE emanated number TWO, or Air (the Father), the creative element; and then
number THREE, Water (the Mother), proceeded from the air; Ether or Fire
completes the mystic four, the Arba-il.*** "When the Concealed of the
Concealed wanted to reveal Himself, he first made a point (primordial point, or
the first Sephiroth, air, or Holy Ghost), shaped into a sacred form (the ten
Sephiroth, or the Heavenly man), and covered it with a rich and splendid
garment, that is the world."****
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The manifested Spirit; Absolute,
Divine Spirit is one with absolute Divine Substance: Parabrahm and Mulaprakriti
are one in essence. Therefore, Cosmic Ideation and Cosmic Substance in their
primal character are one also.
** "Sepher Jezireh," chap.
1, Mishna ix.
*** Ibid. It is from Arba that Abram
is made to come.
**** "Zohar," I., 2a.
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"He maketh the wind His
messengers, flaming Fire His servants," says the Jezireh, showing the
cosmical character of the later euhemerised Elements,* and that the Spirit
permeates every atom in Kosmos.
This "primordial Substance"
is called by some Chaos: Plato and the Pythagoreans named it the Soul of the
World after it had been impregnated by the Spirit of that which broods over the
Primeval Waters, or Chaos. It is by being reflected in it, say the Kabalists,
that the brooding Principle created the phantasmagoria of a visible, manifested
Universe. Chaos, before -- Ether, after, the "reflection;" it is
still the deity that pervades all Space and things. It is the invisible,
imponderable Spirit of things and the invisible, but too tangible fluid that
radiates from the fingers of the healthy magnetizer, for it is Vital
Electricity -- LIFE itself. Called in derision by the Marquis de Mirville
"the nebulous Almighty," it is termed by the Theurgists and
Occultists to this day "the living Fire"; and there is not a Hindu
who practises at dawn a certain kind of meditation but knows its effects.** It
is the "Spirit of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Sepher Jezireh," Mishna
ix., 10. Everywhere throughout the Acts, Paul calls the invisible Kosmic Beings
the "Elements." (See Greek Texts.) But now the Elements are degraded
into and limited to atoms of which nothing is known, so far, and which are only
"children of necessity" as Ether is too -- as we said in
"ISIS." "The poor primordial elements have long been exiled, and
our ambitious physicists run races to determine who shall add one more to the
fledgling brood of the sixty and odd elementary substances." Meanwhile
there rages a war in modern chemistry about terms. We are denied the right to call
these substances "chemical elements," for they are not
"primordial principles of self-existing essences out of which the universe
was fashioned," according to Plato. Such ideas associated with the word
element were good enough for the "old Greek philosophy," but modern
science rejects them; for, as Professor Crookes says, "they are
unfortunate terms," and experimental science will have "nothing to do
with any kind of essences except those which it can see, smell, or taste. It
leaves others to the metaphysicians. . . ." We must feel grateful even for
so much.
** Writing upon this subject in Isis
Unveiled we said of it that it was: "The Chaos of the ancients, the
Zoroastrian sacred fire, or the Atash-Behram of the Parsees; the Hermes-fire,
the Elmes-fire of the ancient Germans; the lightning of Cybele; the burning
torch of Apollo; the flame on the altar of Pan; the inextinguishable fire in
the temple on the Acropolis, and in that of Vesta; the fire-flame of Pluto's helm;
the brilliant sparks on the hats of the Dioscuri, on the Gorgon head, the helm
of Pallas, and the staff of Mercury; the Egyptian Phtha-Ra; the Grecian Zeus
Cataibates (the descending) of Pausanias; the pentacostal fire-tongues; the
burning bush of Moses; the pillar of fire of the Exodus, and the "burning
lamp" of Abram, the eternal fire of the "bottomless pit"; the
Delphic oracular vapours; the Sidereal light of the Rosicrucians; the AKASA of
the Hindu adepts; the Astral Light of Eliphas Levi; the nerve-aura and the
fluid of the magnetists; the od of the Reichenbach; the Psychod and ectenic
force of Thury; the psychic force of Sergeant Cox, and the atmospheric
magnetism of some naturalists; galvanism; and finally, electricity -- all these
are but various names for many different manifestations or effects of the same
mysterious, all-pervading cause, the Greek Archeus." We now add -- it is
all this and much more.
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Light" and Magnes. As truly
expressed by an opponent, Magus and magnes are two branches growing from the
same trunk and shooting forth the same resultants. And in this appellation of
"living fire" we may also discover the meaning of the puzzling
sentence in the Zend-Avesta saying that there is "a fire that gives
knowledge of the future. Science and amiable speech," i.e., develops an
extraordinary eloquence in the sybil, the sensitive, and even some orators.
This "fire" is spoken of in
all the Hindu Books, as also in the Kabalistic works. The Zohar explains it as
the "white hidden fire, in the Resha trivrah" (the White Head), whose
Will causes the fiery fluid to flow in 370 currents in every direction of the
universe. It is identical with the "Serpent that runs with 370 leaps"
of the Siphrah Dzenioota, which, when the "Perfect Man," the
Metatron, is raised, i.e., when the divine man indwells in the animal man, it,
the Serpent, becomes three spirits, that is to say, is Atma-Buddhi-Manas, in
our theosophical phraseology. (Vide Part II. in Vol. II., §§ 3, "The Many
Meanings of the War in Heaven.")
Spirit, then, or Cosmic Ideation, and
Cosmic Substance -- one of whose principles is Ether -- are one, and include
the ELEMENTS, in the sense St. Paul attaches to them. These Elements are the
veiled Synthesis standing for Dhyan Chohans, Devas, Sephiroth, Amshaspends,
Archangels, etc., etc. The Ether of science -- the Ilus of Berosus, or the Protyle
of Chemistry -- constitutes, so to speak, the rude material (relatively) out of
which the above-named "Builders," following the plan traced out for
them eternally in the DIVINE THOUGHT, fashion the systems in the Cosmos. They
are "myths," we are told. "No more so than Ether and the
Atoms," we answer. The two latter are absolute necessities of physical
science; the "Builders" are as absolute a necessity of metaphysics.
We are twitted with: "You never saw them." We ask the materialists:
"Have you ever seen Ether, or your Atoms, or, again, your FORCE?"
Moreover, one of the greatest Western Evolutionists of our modern day, the
coadjutor of Darwin, Mr. A. R. Wallace, when discussing the inadequacy of
Natural Selection alone to account for the physical form of Man, admits the
guiding action of "higher intelligences" as a "necessary part of
the great laws which govern the material Universe" ("Contributions to
Theory of Natural Selection").
These "higher
intelligences" are the Dhyan Chohans of the Occultists.
Indeed, there are few Myths in any
religious system worthy of the name, but have an historical as well as a
scientific foundation. "Myths," justly observes Pococke, "are
now proved to be fables, just in proportion as we misunderstand them; truths,
in proportion as they were once understood."
The one prevailing, most distinct
idea -- found in all ancient teaching,
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with reference to Cosmic Evolution
and the first "creation" of our Globe with all its products, organic
and inorganic (strange word for an Occultist to use) -- is that the whole
Kosmos has sprung from the DIVINE THOUGHT. This thought impregnates matter,
which is co-eternal with the ONE REALITY; and all that lives and breathes
evolves from the emanations of the ONE Immutable -- Parabrahm = Mulaprakriti,
the eternal one-root. The former of these is, so to say, the aspect of the
central point turned inward into regions quite inaccessible to human intellect,
and is absolute abstraction; whereas, in its aspect as Mulaprakriti -- the
eternal root of all, -- it gives one some hazy comprehension at least of the
Mystery of Being.
"Therefore, it was taught in the
inner temples that this visible universe of spirit and matter is but the
concrete image of the ideal abstraction; it was built on the model of the first
DIVINE IDEA. Thus our universe existed from Eternity in a latent state. The
soul animating this purely spiritual universe is the central sun, the highest
deity itself. It was not the One who built the concrete form of the idea, but
the first-begotten; and as it was constructed on the geometrical figure of the
dodecahedron,* the first-begotten 'was pleased to employ twelve thousand years
in its creation.' The latter number is expressed in the Tyrrhenian cosmogony,**
which shows man created in the sixth millennium. This agrees with the Egyptian
theory of 6,000 'years'*** and with the Hebrew computation. But it is the
exoteric form of it. The secret computation explains that the 'twelve thousand
and the 6,000 years' are YEARS OF BRAHMA -- one day of Brahma being equal to
4,320,000,000 years. Sanchoniathon**** in his Cosmogony, declares that when the
wind (spirit) became enamoured of its own principles (the chaos), an intimate
union took place, which connection was called pothos, and from this sprang the
seed of all. And the chaos knew not its own production, for it was senseless; but
from its embrace with the wind was generated Mot, or the ilus (mud).***** From
this proceeded the spores of creation and the generation of the universe.
"Zeus-Zen (aether), and Chthonia
(the chaotic earth) and Metis (the water), his wives; Osiris and Isis-Latona --
the former god also representing ether -- the first emanation of the Supreme
Deity, Amun, the primeval source of light; the goddess earth and water again;
Mithras,****** the rock-born god, the symbol of the male mundane-fire, or the
personified primordial light, and Mithra, the fire-goddess, at once his mother
and his wife: the pure element of fire (the active or male principle) regarded
as light and heat, in conjunction with earth and water, or matter (female, or
passive, elements of Cosmical generation)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Plato: "Timaeus."
** "Suidas" v.
Tyrrhenia."
*** The reader will understand that
by "years" is meant "ages," not mere periods of thirteen
lunar months each.
**** See the Greek translation by
Philo Byblus.
***** Cory: "Ancient
Fragment."
****** Mithras was regarded among the
Persians as the Theos ekpetros -- god of the rock.
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Mithras is the son of Bordj, the
Persian mundane mountain,* from which he flashed out as a radiant ray of light.
Brahma, the fire-god, and his prolific consort; and the Hindu Agni, the
refulgent deity from whose body issue a thousand streams of glory and seven
tongues of flame, and in whose honour certain Brahmans preserve to this day a
perpetual fire; Siva, personated by the mundane mountain of the Hindus, the
Meru: these terrific fire-gods, who are said in the legend to have descended
from heaven, like the Jewish Jehovah, in a pillar of fire, and a dozen other
Archaic double-sexed deities, all loudly proclaim their hidden meaning. And
what could these dual myths mean but the psychochemical principle of primordial
creation? The first Evolution in its triple manifestation of spirit, force and
matter; the divine correllation at its starting point, allegorized as the
marriage of Fire and water, products of electrifying spirit, union of the male
active principle with the female passive element, which become the parents of
their tellurian child, cosmic matter, the prima materia, whose soul is AEther,
and whose shadow is the ASTRAL LIGHT!" (ISIS UNVEILED).
The fragments of the systems that
have now reached us are rejected as absurd fables. Nevertheless, occult Science
-- having survived even the great Flood that submersed the antediluvian giants
and with them their very memory, save in the Secret Doctrine, the Bible and
other Scriptures -- still holds the Key to all the world problems.
Let us apply that Key to the rare
fragments of long-forgotten cosmogonies and try by their scattered parts to
re-establish the once Universal Cosmogony of the Secret Doctrine. The Key fits
them all. No one can study ancient philosophies seriously without perceiving
that the striking similitude of conception between all -- in their exoteric
form very often, in their hidden spirit invariably -- is the result of no mere
coincidence, but of a concurrent design: and that there was, during the youth
of mankind, one languages, one knowledge, one universal religion, when there
were no churches, no creeds or sects, but when every man was a priest unto
himself. And, if it is shown that already in those ages which are shut out from
our sight by the exuberant growth of tradition, human religious thought
developed in uniform sympathy in every portion of the globe; then, it becomes
evident that, born under whatever latitude, in the cold North or the burning
South, in the East or West, that thought was inspired by the same revelations,
and man was nurtured under the protecting shadow of the same TREE OF KNOWLEDGE.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Bordj is called a fire-mountain --
a volcano; therefore it contains fire, rock, earth and water: the male, or
active and the female, or passive, elements. The myth is suggestive.
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§ IV.
CHAOS -- THEOS -- KOSMOS.
THESE three are the containment of
Space; or, as a learned Kabalist has defined it, "Space, the all
containing uncontained, is the primary embodiment of simply Unity. . . .
boundless extension."* But, he asks again, "boundless extension of
what?" -- and makes the correct reply -- "The unknown container of
all, the Unknown FIRST CAUSE." This is a most correct definition and
answer, most esoteric and true, from every aspect of occult teaching.
SPACE, which, in their ignorance and
iconoclastic tendency to destroy every philosophic idea of old, the modern
wiseacres have proclaimed "an abstract idea" and a void, is, in
reality, the container and the body of the Universe with its seven principles.
It is a body of limitless extent, whose PRINCIPLES, in Occult phraseology --
each being in its turn a septenary -- manifest in our phenomenal world only the
grossest fabric of their sub-divisions. "No one has ever seen the Elements
in their fulness," the Doctrine teaches. We have to search for our Wisdom
in the original expressions of the primeval people and in their synonyms. Even
the latest of them -- the Jews -- show in their Kabalistic teachings this idea,
e.g., the seven-headed Serpent of Space, called "the great Sea."
"In the beginning, the Alhim created the heavens and the earth; the 6
(Sephiroth). . . . They created six, and on these all things are based. And
those (six) depend upon the seven forms of the cranium up to Dignity of all
Dignities (Siphrah Dzenioota, i, § 16), see part ii., vol. ii. "Ancient
Divisions and the Mystic Numbers."
Now Wind, Air and Spirit have ever
been synonymous with every nation. Pneuma (Spirit) and Anemos (the wind) with
the Greeks, Spiritus and Ventus with the Latins, were convertible terms even if
dissociated from the original idea of the breath of life. In the
"Forces" of Science we see but the material effect of the spiritual
affect of one or the other of the four primordial Elements, transmitted to us
by the 4th Race, as we shall transmit Ether (or rather the gross subdivision of
it) in its fulness to the Sixth Root Race. This is explained in the text of
this and the following Book.
"Chaos" is called senseless
by the ancients, because it represented and contained in itself (Chaos and
Space being synonymous) all the Elements in their rudimentary, undifferentiated
State. They made of Ether, the fifth element, the synthesis of the other four;
for the AEther of the Greek philosophers is not its dregs -- of which indeed
they knew more
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "New Aspects of Life," by
Henry Pratt, M.D.
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than science does now -- which are
rightly enough supposed to act as an agent for many forces that manifest on
Earth. Their AEther was the Akasa of the Hindus; the Ether accepted in physics
is but one of its subdivisions, on our plane, -- the Astral Light of the
Kabalists with all its evil as well as good effects.
On account of the Essence of AEther,
or the Unseen Space, being held divine as the supposed veil of Deity, it was
regarded as the medium between this life and the next one. The ancients
considered that when the directing active "Intelligences" (the gods)
retired from any portion of Ether in our Space -- the four realms which they
superintend -- then that particular place was left in the possession of evil,
so called by reason of the absence of the Good from it.
"The existence of spirit in the
common mediator, the ether, is denied by materialism; while theology makes of
it a personal god. But the Kabalist holds that both are wrong, saying that in
ether, the elements represent but matter -- the blind cosmic forces of nature;
while Spirit represents the intelligence which directs them. The Aryan,
Hermetic, Orphic, and Pythagorean cosmogonical doctrines, as well as those of
Sanchoniathon and Berosus, are all based upon one irrefutable formula, viz.,
that the aether and chaos, or, in the Platonic language, mind and matter, were
the two primeval and eternal principles of the universe, utterly independent of
anything else. The former was the all-vivifying intellectual principle; the
chaos, a shapeless liquid principle, without 'form or sense,' from the union of
which two sprung into existence the universe, or rather the universal world,
the first androgynous deity -- the chaotic matter becoming its body, and ether
its soul. According to the phraseology of a Fragment of Hermias, 'chaos, from
this union with spirit, obtaining sense, shone with pleasure, and thus was
produced the Protogonos (the first-born) light.'* This is the universal
trinity, based on the metaphysical conceptions of the ancients, who, reasoning
by analogy, made of man, who is a compound of intellect and matter, the
microcosm of the macrocosm, or great universe." (Isis Unveiled.)
"Nature abhors Vacuum" said
the Peripatetics, who comprehended perhaps, though materialists in their way,
why Democritus, with his instructor Leucippus, taught that the first principles
of all things contained in the Universe were atoms and a vacuum. The latter
means simply latent Deity or force; which, before its first manifestation when
it became WILL -- communicating the first impulse to these atoms -- was the
great Nothingness, Ain-Soph, or NO-THING; was, therefore, to every sense, a
Void -- or CHAOS.
That Chaos, however, became the
"Soul of the World," according to Plato and the Pythagoreans.
According to Hindu teaching, Deity in the shape of AEther (Akasa) pervades all
things; and it was called there-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Damascius, in the
"Theogony," calls it Dis, "the disposer of all things."
Cory, "Ancient Fragments," p. 314.
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fore by the theurgists "the
living fire," the "Spirit of Light," and sometimes Magnes. It
was the highest Deity itself which, according to Plato, built the Universe in
the geometrical form of the Dodecahedron; and its "first begotten"
was born of Chaos and Primordial Light (the Central Sun). This
"First-Born," however, was only the aggregate of the Host of the
"Builders," the first constructive Forces, who are called in ancient
Cosmogonies the Ancients (born of the Deep, or Chaos) and the "First
Point." He is the Tetragrammaton, so-called, at the head of the Seven
lower Sephiroth. This was the belief of the Chaldees. "These
Chaldeans," writes Philo, the Jew, speaking very flippantly of the first
instructors of his ancestors, "were of opinion that the Kosmos, among the
things that exist (?) is a single point, either being itself God (Theos) or
that in it is God, comprehending the soul of all things." (See his
"Migration of Abraham," 32.)
Chaos-Theos-Kosmos are but the three
aspects of their synthesis -- SPACE. One can never hope to solve the mystery of
this Tetraktis by holding to the dead-letter even of the old philosophies, as
now extant. But, even in these CHAOS-THEOS-KOSMOS = SPACE, are identified in
all Eternity, as the One Unknown Space, the last word about which will,
perhaps, never be known before our seventh Round. Nevertheless, the allegories
and metaphysical symbols about the primeval and perfect CUBE, are remarkable
even in the exoteric Puranas.
There, also, Brahma is the Theos,
evolving out of Chaos, or the great "Deep," the waters, over which
Spirit = SPACE, personified by ayana -- the Spirit moving over the face of the
future boundless Kosmos -- is silently hovering, in the first hour of
re-awakening. It is also Vishnu, sleeping on Ananta-Sesha, the great Serpent of
Eternity, of which Western theology, ignorant of the Kabala, the only key that
opens the secrets of the Bible, has made -- the Devil. It is the first triangle
or the Pythagorean triad, the "God of the three Aspects," before it
is transformed through its perfect quadrature of the infinite Circle into the
"four-faced Brahma."
"Of him who is and yet is not,
from the not-being, Eternal Cause, is born the Being-Purusha," says Manu,
the legislator.
In Isis Unveiled, it is said that:--
"In the Egyptian mythology,
Kneph, the Eternal Unrevealed God, is represented by a snake emblem of Eternity
encircling a water urn, with its head hovering over the waters, which it
incubates with its breath. In this case the serpent is the Agathodaemon, the
good spirit: in its opposite aspect, it is the Kakodaemon -- the bad one. In
the Scandinavian Eddas, the honey dew, the fruit of the gods and of the
creative busy Yggdrasill (bees), falls during the hours of night, when the
atmosphere is impregnated with humidity; and in the Northern mythologies, as
the passive principle of creation, it typifies the
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creation of the universe out of
water; this dew is the astral light in one of its combinations, and possesses
creative as well as destructive properties. In the Chaldean legend of Berosus,
Oannes or Dagon, the man-fish, instructing the people, shows the infant world
created out of water, and all beings originating from this prima materia. Moses
teaches that only earth and water can bring a living soul: and we read in the
Scriptures that herbs could not grow until the Eternal caused it to rain upon
earth. In the Mexican Popol-Vuh, man is created out of mud or clay (terre
glaise), taken from under the water. Brahma creates the great Muni (or first man)
seated on his lotus, only after having called into being spirits who thus
enjoyed over mortals a priority of existence, and he creates him out of water,
air and earth. Alchemists claim that the primordial or pre-Adamic earth, when
reduced to its first substance, is in its second stage of transformation like
clear water, the first being the alkahest proper. This primordial substance is
said to contain within itself the essence of all that goes to make up man; it
has not only all the elements of his physical being, but even the "breath
of life" itself in a latent state, ready to be awakened. This it derives
from the "incubation" of the "Spirit of God" upon the face
of the waters -- CHAOS: in fact, this substance is chaos itself. From this it
was that Paracelsus claimed to be able to make his "homunculi;" and
this is why Thales, the great natural philosopher, maintained that water was
the principle of all things in nature.* . . . Job says, in chap. xxvi. 5, that
"dead things are formed from under the waters, and inhabitants
thereof." In the original text, instead of "dead things," it is
written dead Rephaim (giants or mighty primitive men), from whom
"Evolution" may one day trace our present race."
"In the primordial state of the
creation," says Polier's Mythologie des Indous, "the rudimental
universe, submerged in water, reposed in the bosom of Vishnu. Sprung from this
chaos and darkness, Brahma, the architect of the world, poised on a lotus-leaf,
floated (moved) upon the waters, unable to discern anything but water and
darkness." Perceiving such a dismal state of things, Brahma soliloquises
in consternation: "Who am I? Whence came I?" Then he hears a voice:**
"Direct your thoughts to Bhagavat." Brahma, rising from his natatory
position, seats himself upon the lotus in an attitude of contemplation, and
reflects upon the Eternal, who, pleased with this evidence of piety, disperses
the primeval darkness and opens his understanding. "After this Brahma
issues from the universal egg (infinite chaos) as light, for his understanding
is now opened, and he sets himself to work: he moves on the eternal waters,
with the spirit of God within himself; and in his capacity of mover of the
waters he is Vishnu, or Narayana." This is
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* With the Greeks, the
"River-gods," all of them the Sons of the primeval ocean (Chaos in
its masculine aspect), were the respective ancestors of the Hellenic races. For
them the OCEAN was the father of the Gods; and thus they had anticipated in
this connection the theories of Thales, as rightly observed by Aristotle
(Metaph. I., 3, 5).
** The "Spirit," or hidden
voice of the Mantras, the active manifestation of the latent Force, or occult
potency.
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exoteric, of course, yet in its main
idea as identical as possible with the Egyptian cosmogony, which shows in its
opening sentences Athtor,* or Mother Night (which represents illimitable
darkness), as the primeval element which covered the infinite abyss, animated
by water and the universal spirit of the Eternal, dwelling alone in Chaos. Similarly
in the Jewish Scriptures, the history of the creation opens with the spirit of
God and his creative emanation -- another Deity.**
The Zohar teaches that it is the
primordial elements -- the trinity of Fire, Air and Water -- the four cardinal
points, and all the Forces of Nature, which form collectively the VOICE of the
WILL Memrab, or the "Word," the Logos of the Absolute Silent ALL.
"The indivisible point, limitless and unknowable" spreads itself over
the endless space, and thus forms a veil (the Mulaprakriti of Parabraham) which
conceals this Absolute point. (Vide infra).
In the cosmogonies of all the nations
it is the "Architects" synthesized by Demiurgos (in the Bible the
"Elohim"), who fashion Kosmos out of Chaos, and who are the
collective Theos, "male-female," Spirit and matter. "By a series
(yom) of foundations (hasoth) the Alhim caused earth and heaven to be"
(Gen. ii., 4). In the Bible it is first Alhim, then Jahva-Alhim, and finally
Jehovah --after the separation of the sexes in chapter iv. of Genesis. It is
noticeable that nowhere, except in the later, the last Cosmogonies of our Fifth
race, is the ineffable and unutterable NAME*** -- the symbol of the Unknown
Deity, which was used only in the MYSTERIES -- used in connection with the "Creation"
of the Universe. It is the "Movers," the "Runners," the
theoi (from [[theein]], "to run"), who do the work of formation, the
"Messengers" of the manvantaric law, who have now become in
Christianity the "messengers" (malachim); and it seems the same in
Hinduism or early Brahmanism. For it is not Brahma who creates in the Rig Veda,
but the Prajapati, the "Lords of Being," who are the Rishis; the word
Rishi (according to Professor Mahadeo Kunte) being connected with the word to
move, to lead on, applied to them in their terrestrial character, when, as
Patriarchs, they lead their hosts on the Seven Rivers.
Moreover, the very word
"God" in the singular, embracing all the gods -- or theos from theoi
-- came to the "superior" civilized nations from a strange source,
one entirely and as pre-eminently phallic as the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Orthography of the "Archaic
Dictionary."
** We do not mean the current or
accepted Bible, but the real Jewish one, now explained kabalistically.
*** It is "unutterable" for
the simple reason that it is non-existent. It never was a name, nor any word at
all, but an Idea that could not be expressed. A substitute was created for it
in the century preceding our era.
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sincere, open-spoken lingham of
India. The attempt to derive God from the Anglo-Saxon synonym "good"
is an abandoned idea, for in no other language, in all of which the term varies
more or less, from the Persian Khoda down to the Latin Deus, has an instance
been found of a name of God being derived from the attribute of Goodness. To
the Latin races it comes from the Aryan Dyaus (the Day); to the Slavonian, from
the Greek Bacchus (Bagh-bog); and to the Saxon races directly from the Hebrew
Yodh or Jod. The latter is [[diagram]], the number-letter 10, male and female,
and Jod the phallic hook:-- hence the Saxon Godh, the Germanic Gott, and the
English God. This symbolic term may be said to represent the Creator of
physical "Humanity," on the terrestrial plane; but surely it had
nothing to do with the formation or "Creation" of Spirit, gods, or
Kosmos!
Chaos-Theos-Kosmos, the triple deity,
is all in all. Therefore, it is said to be male and female, good and evil,
positive and negative: the whole series of contrasted qualities. When latent
(in pralaya) it is incognizable and becomes the unknowable Deity. It can be
known only in its active functions; hence as matter-Force and living Spirit,
the correlations and outcome, or the expression, on the visible plane, of the
ultimate and ever-to-be unknown UNITY.
In its turn this triple unit is the
producer of the four primary "Elements,"* which are known in our
visible terrestrial nature as the seven (so far the five) Elements, each
divisible into forty-nine (or seven times seven) sub-elements, with about
seventy of which Chemistry is acquainted. Every Cosmical Element such as Fire,
Air, Water, Earth, partaking of the qualities and defects of their Primaries,
are in their nature Good and Evil, Force (or Spirit) and Matter, etc., etc.;
and each, therefore, is at one and the same time Life and Death, Health and Disease,
Action and Reaction. (See Section XIV., "The Four Elements.") They
are ever and constantly forming matter under the never-ceasing impulse of the
ONE Element (the incognizable), represented in the world of phenomena by
'AEther, or "the immortal gods who give birth and life to all."
In "the Philosophical writings
of Solomon Ben Yehudah Ibn Gebirol" (translated in Mr. Isaac Myer's
Kabbalah, just published) it is said on the structure of the Universe, "R.
Yehudah began, it is written:-- 'Elohim said: Let there be a firmament in the
midst of the waters.' Come, see, at the time that the Holy. . . . created the
World, He
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Cosmic Tabernacle of Moses,
erected by him in the Desert, was square, representing the four cardinal points
and the four Elements, as Josephus tells his readers (Antiq. 1, viii ch.,
xxii.) It is the idea taken from the pyramids in Egypt and in Tyre, where the
pyramids became pillars, the Genii, or Angels have their abodes in the four
respective points (See § xiv.; "The Four Elements.")
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created 7 heavens above, 7 earths
below, 7 seas, 7 days, 7 rivers, 7 weeks, 7 years, 7 times, and 7,000 years
that the world has been. The Holy is the seventh of all," etc. (p. 415).
This, besides showing a strange
identity with the cosmogony of the Puranas (e.g., Vishnu Purana 1st Book),
corroborates with regard to number seven, all our teachings as briefly given in
"Esoteric Buddhism."
The Hindus have an endless series of
allegories to express this idea. In the primordial Chaos, before it became
developed into the Seven Oceans (Sapta Samudra) -- emblematical of the seven
gunas (conditioned qualities) composed of trigunas (Satwa, Rajas and Tamas, see
Puranas) -- lie latent both Amrita (immortality) and Visha (poison, death,
evil). This allegory is found in the "Churning of the Ocean" by the
gods. Amrita is beyond any guna, for it is UNCONDITIONED per se; yet when
fallen into the phenomenal creation it got mixed up with EVIL, Chaos, with
latent theos in it, and before Kosmos was evolved. Hence, one finds Vishnu --
standing here for eternal Law -- periodically calling forth Kosmos into
activity -- "churning out of the primitive Ocean (boundless Chaos) the
Amrita of Eternity, reserved only for the gods and devas; and he has to employ
in the task Nagas and Asuras -- demons in exoteric Hinduism. The whole allegory
is highly philosophical, and we find it repeated in every philosophical System.
Plato, having fully embraced the ideas of Pythagoras -- who had brought them
from India -- compiled and published them in a form more intelligible than the
mysterious numerals of the Greek Sage. Thus the Kosmos is "the Son"
with Plato, having for his father and mother the Divine Thought and Matter.*
"The Egyptians," says
Dunlap,** "distinguish between an older and younger Horus; the former the
brother of Osiris, the latter the son of Osiris and Isis." The first is
the Idea of the world remaining in the Demiurgic Mind, "born in darkness
before the creation of the world." The second Horus is this
"Idea" going forth from the Logos, becoming clothed with matter, and
assuming an actual existence.***
"The Mundane God, eternal,
boundless, young and old, of winding form,"**** say the Chaldean oracles.
This "winding form" is a
figure to express the vibratory motion of the Astral Light, with which the
ancient priests were perfectly well acquainted, though its name was invented by
the Martinists.
Now Cosmolatry has the finger of
scorn pointed at its superstitions by modern Science, which ought, however, as
advised by a French
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Plutarch, "Isis and
Osiris," I., vi.
** "Spirit History of Man,"
p. 88.
*** Mover's "Phoinizer,"
268.
**** Cory, "Fragments,"
240.
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savant, before laughing at it
"to remodel entirely its own system of cosmo-pneumatological
education." Satis eloquentiae, sapientiae parvum. Cosmolatry like
Pantheism may be made to yield in its ultimate expression the words applied to
Vishnu . . . . "He is only the ideal Cause of the Potencies to be created
in the work of creation; and from him proceed the potencies to be created,
after they have become the real cause. Save that one ideal cause, there is no
other to which the world can be referred. . . . Through the potency of that
cause, every created thing comes by its proper nature." (Original Sanskrit
Texts, Part iv., pp. 32, 33.)
--------------
§ V.
ON THE HIDDEN DEITY, ITS SYMBOLS AND
GLYPHS.
THE Logos or Creative deity, the
"Word made Flesh," of every religion, has to be traced to its
ultimate source and Essence. In India, it is a Proteus of 1,008 divine names
and aspects in each of its personal transformations, from Brahma-Purusha down
through the Seven divine Rishis and ten semi-divine Prajapati (also Rishis) to
the divine-human Avatars. The same puzzling problem of the "One in
many" and the multitude in One, is found in other Pantheons, in the
Egyptian, the Greek and the Chaldeo-Judaic, the latter having made confusion
still more confused by presenting its Gods as euhemerizations, in the shapes of
Patriarchs. The latter are now accepted by those who reject Romulus as a myth,
and are represented as living and historical Entities. Verbum satis sapienti.
In the Zohar, En-Soph is also the
ONE, and the infinite Unity. This was known to the very few learned Fathers of
the Church, who were aware that Jehovah was but a third rate potency and no
"highest" God. But while complaining bitterly of the Gnostics and
saying . . . "our Heretics hold . . . that PROPATOR is known but to the
Only begotten Son* (who is Brahma among the rest) that is to the mind"
(nous), Irenaeus never mentioned that the Jews did the same in their real
secret books. Valentinus, "the profoundest doctor of the Gnosis,"
held that "there was a perfect AION who existed before Bythos, or Buthon
(the first father of unfathomable nature, which is the second Logos) called
Propator." It is thus AION, who springs as a Ray from Ain-Soph (who does
not create), and AION, who creates, or through whom, rather, everything is
created, or evolves.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* As Mulaprakriti is known only to
Iswar, the LOGOS, as he is called now by Mr. T. Subba Row, of Madras. (See his
Bhagavadgita Lectures.)
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For, as the Basilidians taught,
"there was a supreme god, Abraxas, by whom was created mind" (Mahat,
in Sanskrit, Nous in Greek). "From Mind proceeded the word, Logos, from
the word, Providence (Divine Light, rather), then from it Virtue and Wisdom in
Principalities, Powers, Angels, etc., etc." By these (Angels) the 365
AEons were created. "Amongst the lowest, indeed, and those who made this
world, he (Basilides) sets last of all the God of the Jews, whom he denies to
be God (and very rightly), affirming he is one of the angels" (Ibid.).
Here, then, we find the same system as in the Puranas, wherein the
Incomprehensible drops a seed, which becomes the golden egg, from which Brahma
is produced. Brahma produces Mahat, etc., etc. True Esoteric philosophy,
however, speaks neither of "creation" nor of "evolution" in
the sense the exoteric religions do. All these personified Powers are not
evolutions from one another, but so many aspects of the one and sole manifestation
of the ABSOLUTE all. The same system as the gnostic prevails in the Sephirothal
aspects of Ain-Soph, yet, as these aspects are in Space and Time, a certain
order is maintained in their successive appearances. Therefore, it becomes
impossible not to take notice of the great changes that the Zohar has undergone
under the handling of generations of Christian Mystics. For, even in the
metaphysics of the Talmud, the "lower Face" (or "Lesser
Countenance"), the microprosopus, in fact, could never be placed on the
plane of the same abstract ideal as the Higher, or "Greater
Countenance," macroprosopus. The latter is, in the Chaldean Kabala, a pure
abstraction; the Word or LOGOS, or DABAR (in Hebrew), which Word, though it
becomes in fact a plural number, or "Words" -- D(a)B(a)RIM, when it
reflects itself, or falls into the aspect of a Host (of angels, or Sephiroth,
"numbers") is still collectively ONE, and on the ideal plane a nought
-- 0, a "No-thing." IT is without form or being, "with no
likeness with anything else." (Franck, "Die Kabbala," p. 126.)
And even Philo calls the Creator, the Logos who stands next God, "the
SECOND GOD," and "the second God who is his (Highest God's)
WISDOM" (Philo. Quaest. et Solut). Deity is not God. It is NOTHING, and
DARKNESS. It is nameless, and therefore called Ain-Soph -- "the word Ayin
meaning nothing." See Franck "Die Kabbala," p. 153. See also
Section XII., "Theogony of the Creative Gods." The "Highest
God" (the unmanifested LOGOS) is its Son.
Nor are most of the gnostic systems,
which come down to us mutilated by the Church Fathers, anything better than the
distorted shells of the original speculations. Nor were they open to the public
or reader, at any time; i.e., had their hidden meaning or esotericism been
revealed, it would have been no more an esoteric teaching, and this could never
be. Alone Marcus (the chief of the Marcosians, 2nd century), who taught
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that deity had to be viewed under the
symbol of four syllables, gave out more of the esoteric truths than any other
Gnostic. But even he was never well understood. For it is only on the surface
or dead letter of his Revelation that it appears that God is a quaternary, to
wit: "the Ineffable, the Silence, the Father, and Truth," -- in
reality it is quite erroneous, and divulges only one more esoteric riddle. This
teaching of Marcus was that of the early Kabalists and ours. For he makes of
Deity, the number 30 in 4 syllables, which, translated esoterically, means a
Triad or Triangle, and a Quaternary or a square, in all seven, which, on the
lower plane made the seven divine or secret letters of which the God-name is composed.
This requires demonstration. In his "Revelation," speaking of divine
mysteries expressed by means of letters and numbers, Marcus narrates how the
"Supreme Tetrad came down unto me (him) from the region which cannot be
seen nor named, in a female form, because the world would have been unable to
bear her appearing under a male figure," and revealed to him "the
generation of the universe, untold before to either gods or men."
This first sentence already contains
a double meaning. Why should a female figure be more easily borne or listened
to by the world than a male figure? On the very face of it this appears
nonsensical. Withal it is quite simple and clear to one who is acquainted with
the mystery-language. Esoteric Philosophy, or the Secret Wisdom, was symbolized
by a female form, while a male figure stood for the Unveiled mystery. Hence,
the world not being ready to receive, could not bear it, and the Revelation of
Marcus had to be given allegorically. Then he writes:
"When first the Inconceivable,
the Beingless and Sexless (the Kabalistic Ain-Soph) began to be in labour
(i.e., when the hour of manifesting Itself had struck) and desired that Its
Ineffable should be born (the first LOGOS, or AEon, or Aion), and its invisible
should be clothed with form, its mouth opened and uttered the word like unto
itself. This word (logos) manifested itself in the form of the Invisible One.
The uttering of the (ineffable) name (through the word) came to pass in this
manner. He (the Supreme Logos) uttered the first word of his name, which is a
syllable of four letters. Then the second syllable was added, also of four
letters. Then the third, composed of ten letters; and after this the fourth,
which contains twelve letters. The whole name consists thus of thirty letters
and of four syllables. Each letter has its own accent and way of writing, but
neither understands nor ever beholds that form of the whole Name, -- no; not
even the power of the letter that stands next to Itself (to the Beingless and
the Inconceivable.)* All these sounds when united are the collective Beingless,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Iswara, or the Logos, cannot see
Parabrahmam, but only Mulaprakriti, says the lecturer, in the Four Lectures on
Bhagavatgita. (See Theosophist, Feb., 1887.)
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unbegotten AEon, and these are the
Angels that are ever beholding the face of the Father* (the Logos, the
"second God," who stands next God, "the Inconceivable,"
according to Philo).
This is as plain as ancient esoteric
secrecy would make it. It is as Kabalistic, but less veiled than the Zohar in
which the mystic names or attributes are also four syllabled, twelve,
forty-two, and even seventy-two syllabled words! The Tetrad shows to Marcus the
TRUTH in the shape of a naked woman, and letters every limb of that figure,
calling her head [[omega]], her neck [[psi]], shoulders and hands [[gamma]],
and [[chi]], etc., etc. In this Sephira is easily recognised, the Crown
(Kether) or head being numbered one; the brain or Chochmah, 2; the heart, or
Intelligence (Binah), 3; and the other seven Sephiroth representing the limbs
of the body. The Sephirothal Tree is the Universe, and Adam Kadmon represents
it in the West as Brahma represents it in India.
Throughout, the 10 Sephiroth are
represented as divided into the three higher, or the spiritual Triad, and the
lower Septenary. The true Esoteric meaning of the sacred number seven is
cleverly veiled in the Zohar; yet was betrayed by the double way of writing
"in the beginning" or Be-resheeth, and Be-raishath, the latter the "Higher,
or Upper Wisdom." As shown by Mr. Macgregor Mathers in his Kabbalah (p.
47), and in the Qabbalah of Mr. T. Myer (p. 233), both of these Kabalists being
supported by the best ancient authorities, these words have a dual and secret
meaning. Braisheeth bara Elohim means that the six, over which stands the
seventh Sephiroth, belong to the lower material class, or, as the author says:
"Seven . . . . are applied to the Lower Creation, and three to the
spiritual man, the Heavenly Prototypic or first Adam."
When the Theosophists and Occultists
say that God is no BEING, for IT is nothing, No-Thing, they are more
reverential and religiously respectful to the Deity than those who call God a
HE, and thus make of Him a gigantic MALE.
He who studies the Kabala will soon
find the same idea in the ultimate thought of its authors, the earlier and
great Hebrew Initiates, who got this secret Wisdom at Babylonia from the
Chaldean Hierophants, while Moses got his in Egypt. The Zohar cannot well be
judged by its after translations in Latin and other tongues, as all those ideas
were, of course, softened and made to fit in with the views and policy of its
Christian arrangers; but in truth its ideas are identical with those of all
other religious systems. The various Cosmogonies show that the Archaic
Universal Soul was held by every nation as the "Mind" of the
Demiurgic Creator; and that it
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The "Seven Angels of the
Face," with the Christians.
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was called the "Mother,"
Sophia with the Gnostics (or the female Wisdom), the Sephira with the Jews,
Saraswati or Vach, with the Hindus, the Holy Ghost being a female Principle.
Hence, born from it, the Kurios or
Logos was, with the Greeks, the "God, mind" (nous). "Now Koros
(Kurios) signifies the pure and unmixed nature of intellect -- wisdom,"
says Plato in "Cratylus"; and Kurios is Mercury, the Divine Wisdom,
and "mercury is the Sol" (Sun) ("Arnobius" vi., xii.), from
whom Thot-Hermes received this divine Wisdom. While, then, the Logoi of all
countries and religions are correlative (in their sexual aspects) with the
female Soul of the World or the "Great Deep;" the deity, from which
these two in one have their being, is ever concealed and called the
"Hidden One," connected only indirectly with Creation,* as it can act
only through the Dual Force emanating from the Eternal Essence. Even
AEsculapius, called the "Saviour of all," is identical, according to
ancient classics, with Phta, the Egyptian Creative Intellect (or Divine
Wisdom), and with Apollo, Baal, Adonis and Hercules (see Dunlap's "Mystery
of Adonis," pp. 23 and 95); and Phta is, in one of its aspects, the
"Anima Mundi," the Universal Soul of Plato, the "Divine
Spirit" of the Egyptians, the "Holy Ghost" of the early
Christians and Gnostics, and the Akasa of the Hindus, and even, in its lower
aspect, the Astral Light. For Phta was originally the "God of the
Dead," he in whose bosom they were received, hence the Limbus of the Greek
Christians, or the Astral Light. It is far later that Phta was classed with the
Sun-gods, his name signifying "he who opens," as he is shown to be
the first to unveil the face of the dead mummy, to call the soul to life in his
bosom. (See Maspero's "Bulaq Museum.") KNEPH, the Eternal Unrevealed,
is represented by the snake-emblem of eternity encircling a water-urn, with its
head hovering over the "waters" which it incubates with its breath --
another form of one and the same idea of "Darkness," its ray moving
on the waters, &c. As "Logos-Soul," this permutation is called
Phta; as Logos-Creator, he becomes Imhot-pou, his son, "the god of the
handsome face." In their primitive characters these two were the first
Cosmic Duad, Noot, "space or Sky," and Noo, "the primordial
Waters," the Androgyne Unity, above whom was the Concealed BREATH of
Kneph. And all of them had the aquatic animals and plants sacred to them, the
ibis, the swan, the goose, the crocodile, and the lotus.
Returning to the Kabalistic deity,
this Concealed Unity is then [[hebrew]] = [[to pan]] = [[apeiros]], Endless,
Boundless, non-Existent, [[hebrew]] so
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* We use the term as one accepted and
sanctioned by use, and therefore more comprehensible to the reader.
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long as the Absolute is within
Oulom,* the boundless and termless time, as such, En-Soph cannot be the Creator
or even the modeller of the Universe, nor can he be Aur (light). Therefore
En-Soph is also Darkness. The immutably Infinite and the absolutely Boundless
can neither will, think, nor act. To do this it has to become finite, and it
does so, by its ray penetrating into the mundane egg -- infinite space -- and
emanating from it as a finite god. All this is left to the ray latent in the
one. When the period arrives, the absolute will expands naturally the force
within it, according to the Law of which it is the inner and ultimate Essence.
The Hebrews did not adopt the egg as a symbol, but they substituted for it the
"Duplex heavens," for, translated correctly, the sentence "God
made the heavens and the earth" would read:-- "In and out of his own
essence as a womb (the mundane egg), God created the two heavens." But the
Christians have chosen as the symbol of their Holy Ghost, the dove.
"Whosoever acquaints himself
with [[hebrew]] the Mercaba and the lahgash (secret speech or incantation),
will learn the secret of secrets." Lahgash is nearly identical in meaning
with Vach, the hidden power of the Mantras.
When the active period has arrived,
from within the eternal essence of Ain-Soph, comes forth Sephira, the active
Power, called the Primordial Point, and the Crown, Kether. It is only through
her that the "Un-bounded Wisdom" could give a concrete form to the
abstract Thought. Two sides of the upper triangle by which the ineffable
Essence and the universe -- its manifested body -- are symbolized, the right
side and the base are composed of unbroken lines; the third, the left side, is
dotted. It is through the latter that emerges Sephira. Spreading in every
direction, she finally encompasses the whole triangle. In this emanation the
triple triad is formed. From the invisible Dew falling from the higher
Uni-triad (thus leaving 7 sephiroths only), the "Head" Sephira
creates primeval waters, i.e., Chaos takes shape. It is the first stage towards
the solidification of spirit which through various modifications will produce
earth. "It requires earth and water to make a living soul," says
Moses. It requires the image of an aquatic bird to connect it with water, the
female element of procreation with the egg and the bird that fecundates it.
When Sephira emerges like an active
power from within the latent Deity, she is female; when she assumes the office
of a creator, she becomes a male; hence, she is androgyne. She is the
"Father and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* With the ancient Jews, as shown by
Le Clerc, the word Oulom meant only a time whose beginning or end is not known.
The term "eternity," properly speaking, did not exist in the Hebrew
tongue with the meaning, for instance, applied by the Vedantins to Parabrahm.
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Mother Aditi," of the Hindu
Cosmogony and of the Secret Doctrine. If the oldest Hebrew scrolls had been
preserved, the modern Jehovah-worshipper would have found that many and
uncomely were the symbols of the creative god. The frog in the moon, typical of
his generative character, was the most frequent. All the birds and animals now
held "unclean" in the Bible had been the symbols of the Deity in days
of old. It was because they were too sacred that a mask of uncleanness was
placed over them, in order to preserve them from destruction. The brazen
serpent was not a bit more poetical than the goose or swan, if symbols are to
be accepted a la lettre.
In the words of the Zohar: "The
Indivisible Point, which has no limit and cannot be comprehended because of its
purity and brightness, expanded from without, forming a brightness that served
the indivisible Point as a veil;" yet the latter also "could not be
viewed in consequence of its immeasurable light. It too expanded from without,
and this expansion was its garment. Thus through a constant upheaving (motion)
finally the world originated" (Zohar I. 20a). The Spiritual substance sent
forth by the Infinite Light is the first Sephira or Shekinah: Sephira
exoterically contains all the other nine Sephiroths in her. Esoterically she
contains but two,* Chochmah or Wisdom, "a masculine, active potency whose
divine name is Jah ([[diagram]])," and BINAH, a feminine passive potency,
Intelligence, represented by the divine name Jehovah ([[diagram]]); which two
potencies form, with Sephira the third, the Jewish trinity or the Crown,
KETHER. These two Sephiroths called Father, Abba, and Mother Amona, are the
duad or the double-sexed logos from which issued the other seven Sephiroths.
(See Zohar.) This first Jewish triad (Sephira, Chochmah, and Binah) is the
Hindu Trimurti.* However veiled, even in the Zohar, and more still in the
exoteric Pantheon of India, every particular connected with one is reproduced
in the other. The Prajapati are the Sephiroths. Ten with Brahma they dwindle to
seven, when the Trimurti, and the Kabalistic triad, are separated from the
rest. The seven Builders (Creators) become the seven Prajapati, or the seven
Rishis, in the same order as the Sephiroths become the Creators; then the
Patriarchs, etc. In both Secret Systems, the One Universal Essence is
incomprehensible and inactive in its absoluteness, and can be connected with
the building of the Universe only in an indirect way. In both, the primeval
Malefemale or androgynous Principle, and their ten and seven Emanations
(Brahma-Viraj and Aditi-Vach on the one part and the Elohim-Jehovah, or
Adam-Adami (Adam Kadmon) and Sephira Eve on the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In the Indian Pantheon the
double-sexed Logos is Brahma, the Creator, whose seven "mind born"
sons are the primeval Rishis -- the "Builders."
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other), with their Prajapati and
Sephiroths, represent in their totality, first of all the Archetypal man, the
Proto-logos; and only in their secondary aspect do they become Cosmic powers,
and astronomical or sidereal bodies. If Aditi is the mother of the gods,
Deva-Matri, Eve is the mother of all living; they are the Sakti or generative
power in their female aspect of the "Heavenly man," and they are all
compound Creators. Says a "Gupta Vidya" Sutra: "In the
beginning, a ray issuing from Paramarthika (the one and only true existence),
it became manifested in Vyavaharika (conventional existence) which was used as
a Vahan to descend into the Universal Mother, and to cause her to expand
(swell, brih)." And in the Zohar it is stated: "The Infinite Unity,
formless and without similitude, after the form of the heavenly man was
created, used it. The Unknown Light* (Darkness) used the [[hebrew]](heavenly
form) as a chariot [[hebrew]] through which to descend, and wished to be called
by this form, which is the sacred name Jehovah."
As the Zohar says: "In the
beginning was the Will of the King, prior to any other existence. . . . It (the
Will) sketched the forms of all things that had been concealed but now came
into view. And there went forth as a sealed secret from the head of Ain Soph, a
nebulous spark of matter, without shape or form. . . . Life is drawn from below,
and from above the source renews itself, the sea is always full and spreads its
waters everywhere." Thus the deity is compared to a shoreless sea, to
water which is "the fountain of life" (Zohar iii., 290). "The
seventh palace, the fountain of life, is the first in the order from
above" (ii. 261). Hence the Kabalistic tenet on the lips of the very
Kabalistic Solomon, who says in Proverbs ix., 1: "Wisdom hath builded her
house; it hath hewn out its seven pillars."
Whence then, all this identity of
ideas, if there was no primeval UNIVERSAL Revelation? The few points shown are
like a few straws in a hayrick, in comparison to that which will be shown as
the work proceeds. If we turn to that most hazy of all Cosmogonies -- the Chinese,
even there the same idea is found. Tsi-tsai (the Self-Existent) is the unknown
Darkness, the root of the Wuliang-sheu (Boundless Age), Amitabhe, and Tien
(heaven) come later on. The "great Extreme" of Confucius gives the
same idea, his "straws" notwithstanding. The latter are a source of
great amusement to the missionaries. These laugh at every "heathen"
religion, despise and hate that of their
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Says Rabbi Simeon: "Ah,
companions, companions, man as an emanation was both man and woman, as well on
the side of the 'Father' as on the side of the 'Mother.' And this is the sense
of the words: 'And Elohim spoke; Let there be Light, and it was Light' . . .
and this is the two-fold man." ("Auszuge aus dem Sohar," p. 13,
15.) Light, then, in Genesis stood for the Androgyne Ray or "Heavenly
Man."
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brother Christians of other
denominations, and yet one and all accept a la lettre their own Genesis. If we
turn to Chaldea we find in it Anu, the concealed deity, the One, whose name,
moreover, shows it to be of Sanskrit origin. Anu, which means in Sanskrit
"atom," aniyamsam aniyasam (smallest of the small), is a name of
Parabrahm in the Vedantic philosophy; Parabrahm being described as smaller than
the smallest atom, and greater than the greatest sphere or universe: "Anagraniyam
and Mahatorvavat." This is what George Smith gives as the first verses of
the Akkadian Genesis as found in the Cuneiform Texts on the "Lateras
Coctiles." There also, we find Anu the passive deity or En-Soph, Bel, the
Creator, the Spirit of God (Sephira) moving on the face of the waters, hence
water itself, and Hea, the Universal Soul or wisdom of the three combined.
The first eight verses read thus:
1. When above, were not raised the
heavens;
2. And below on the earth a plant had
not grown up.
3. The abyss had not broken its
boundaries.
4. The chaos (or water) Tiamat (the
sea) was the producing mother of the whole of them. (This is the Cosmical Aditi
and Sephira.)
5. Those waters at the beginning were
ordained but --
6. A tree had not grown, a flower had
not unfolded.
7. When the gods had not sprung up,
any one of them.
8. A plant had not grown, and order
did not exist.
This was the chaotic or ante-genetic
period -- the double Swan and the Dark Swan, which becomes white, when Light is
created.*
The symbol chosen for the majestic
ideal of the Universal Principle will seem little calculated to answer its
sacred character. A goose, or even a swan, may appear unfit, no doubt, to
represent the grandeur of the Spirit. Nevertheless, it must have had some deep
occult meaning, since it figures not only in every cosmogony and world
religion, but even was chosen by the mediaeval Christians, the Crusaders, as
the vehicle of the Holy Ghost supposed to lead the army to Palestine, to wrench
the Tomb of the Saviour from the hands of the Saracen. If we are to credit
Professor Draper's statement in his "Intellectual Development of
Europe," the Crusaders, led on by Peter the Hermit, were preceded, at the
head of the army, by the Holy Ghost under the shape of a white gander in company
of a goat. The Egyptian God of Time, Seb, carries a goose on his head. Jupiter
assumes the form of a swan and Brahma also, because the root of all this is
that mystery of mysteries -- the MUNDANE EGG. (See preceding §).
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The Seven Swans that are believed
to land from Heaven into Lake Mansarovara, are in the popular fancy the Seven
Rishis of the Great Bear, who assume that form to visit the locality where the
Vedas were written.
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One has to learn the reason of a
symbol before one depreciates it. The dual element of Air and Water is that of
the ibis, swan, goose and pelican, of crocodiles and frogs, lotus flowers and
water lilies, &c.; and the result is the choice of the most unseemly
symbols among the modern as much as the ancient mystics. Pan, the great god of
nature, was generally figured in connection with aquatic birds, geese
especially, and so were other gods. If, later on, with the gradual degeneration
of religion, the gods to whom geese were sacred, became Priapic deities, it
does not stand to reason that water fowls were made sacred to Pan and other
Phallic deities as some scoffers even of antiquity would have it (see Petronii
Satyrica, cxxxvi.); but that the abstract and divine power of procreative
nature had become grossly anthropomorphized. Nor does the Swan of Leda show
"Priapic doings and her enjoyment thereof," as Mr. Hargrave Jennings
chastely expresses it -- for the myth is but another version of the same
philosophical idea of cosmogony. Swans are frequently found associated with
Apollo, as they are the emblems of water and fire (sun-light also), before the
separation of the Elements.
Our modern symbologists might profit
by some remarks made by a well-known writer, Mrs. Lydia Maria Child. "From
time immemorial an emblem has been worshipped in Hindostan as the type of
creation, or the origin of life. . . . Siva or the Mahadeva being not only the
reproducer of human forms, but also the fructifying principle, the generative
power that pervades the Universe. The maternal emblem is likewise a religious type.
This reverence for the production of life, introduced into the worship of
Osiris the sexual emblems. Is it strange that they regarded with reverence the
great mystery of human birth? Were they impure thus to regard it? Or are we
impure that do not so regard it? But no clean and thoughtful mind could so
regard them. . . . We have travelled far, and unclean have been the paths,
since those old Anchorites first spoke of God and the soul in the solemn depths
of their first sanctuaries. Let us not smile at their mode of tracing the
infinite and the incomprehensible Cause throughout all the mysteries of nature,
lest by so doing we cast the shadow of our own grossness on their patriarchal
simplicity." ("Progress of Religious Ideas," Vol. 1, p. 17, et
seq.)
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§ VI.
THE MUNDANE EGG.
WHENCE this universal symbol? The Egg
was incorporated as a sacred sign in the cosmogony of every people on the
Earth, and was revered both on account of its form and its inner mystery. From
the earliest mental conceptions of man, it was known as that which represented
most successfully the origin and secret of being. The gradual development of
the imperceptible germ within the closed shell; the inward working, without any
apparent outward interference of force, which from a latent nothing produced an
active something, needing nought save heat; and which, having gradually evolved
into a concrete, living creature, broke its shell, appearing to the outward
senses of all a self-generated, and self-created being -- must have been a
standing miracle from the beginning.
The secret teaching explains the reason
for this reverence by the Symbolism of the prehistoric races. The "First
Cause" had no name in the beginnings. Later it was pictured in the fancy
of the thinkers as an ever invisible, mysterious Bird that dropped an Egg into
Chaos, which Egg becomes the Universe. Hence Brahm was called Kalahansa,
"the swan in (Space and) Time." He became the "Swan of
Eternity," who lays at the beginning of each Mahamanvantara a "Golden
Egg." It typifies the great Circle, or O, itself a symbol for the universe
and its spherical bodies.
The second reason for its having been
chosen as the symbolical representation of the Universe, and of our earth, was
its form. It was a Circle and a Sphere; and the ovi-form shape of our globe
must have been known from the beginning of symbology, since it was so
universally adopted. The first manifestation of the Kosmos in the form of an
egg was the most widely diffused belief of antiquity. As Bryant shows (iii.,
165), it was a symbol adopted among the Greeks, the Syrians, Persians, and Egyptians.
In chap. liv. of the Egyptian Ritual, Seb, the god of Time and of the Earth, is
spoken of as having laid an egg, or the Universe, "an egg conceived at the
hour of the great one of the Dual Force" (Sec. V., 2, 3, etc.).
Ra is shown like Brahma gestating in
the Egg of the Universe. The deceased is "resplendent in the Egg of the
land of mysteries" (xxii., 1). For, this is "the Egg to which is
given life among the gods" (xlii., 11). "It is the Egg of the great
clucking Hen, the Egg of Seb, who issues from it like a hawk" (lxiv., 1,
2, 3; lxxvii., 1).
With the Greeks the Orphic Egg is
described by Aristophanes, and was part of the Dionysiac and other mysteries,
during which
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the Mundane Egg was consecrated and
its significance explained; Porphyry showing it a representation of the world,
[[Ermenenei de to oon kosmon]]. Faber and Bryant have tried to show that the
egg typified the ark of Noah, which, unless the latter is accepted as purely
allegorical and symbolical, is a wild belief. It can have typified the ark only
as a synonym of the moon, the argha which carries the universal seed of life;
but had surely nothing to do with the ark of the Bible. Anyhow, the belief that
the universe existed in the beginning in the shape of an egg was general. And
as Wilson has it: "A similar account of the first aggregation of the
elements in the form of an egg is given in all the (Indian) Puranas, with the
usual epithet Haima or Hiranya, 'golden' as it occurs in Manu." Hiranya,
however, means "resplendent," "shining," rather than
"golden," as proven by the great Indian scholar, the late Swami
Dayanand Sarasvati, in his unpublished polemics with Professor Max Muller. As
said in the Vishnu Purana: "Intellect (Mahat) . . . the (unmanifested)
gross elements inclusive, formed an egg . . . and the lord of the Universe
himself abided in it, in the character of Brahma. In that egg, O Brahman, were
the continents, and seas and mountains, the planets and divisions of the
universe, the gods, the demons and mankind." (Book i., ch. 2.) Both in
Greece and in India the first visible male being, who united in himself the
nature of either sex, abode in the egg and issued from it. This "first
born of the world" was Dionysius, with some Greeks; the god who sprang
from the mundane egg, and from whom the mortals and immortals were derived. The
god Ra is shown in the Ritual (Book of the Dead, xvii., 50) beaming in his egg
(the Sun), and he starts off as soon as the god Shoo (the Solar energy) awakens
and gives him the impulse. "He is in the Solar egg, the egg to which is
given life among the gods" (Ibid., xlii., 13). The Solar god exclaims:
"I am the creative soul of the celestial abyss. None sees my nest, none
can break my egg, I am the Lord!" (Ibid., LXXXV.).
In view of this circular form, the
"|" issuing from the "[[diagram]]," or the egg, or the male
from the female in the androgyne, it is strange to find a scholar saying -- on
the ground that the most ancient Indian MSS. show no trace of it -- that the
ancient Aryans were ignorant of the decimal notation. The 10, being the sacred
number of the universe, was secret and esoteric, both as the unit and cipher,
or zero, the circle. Moreover, Professor Max Muller says that "the two
words cipher and zero, which are but one, are sufficient to prove that our
figures are borrowed from the Arabs.* Cipher is the Arabic "cifron,"
and means
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Max Muller's "Our
Figures."
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empty, a translation of the Sanscrit
name of nought "sunya," he says.* The Arabs had their figures from
Hindustan, and never claimed the discovery for themselves.** As to the
Pythagoreans, we need but turn to the ancient manuscripts of Boethius's
Geometry, composed in the sixth century, to find among the Pythagorean
numerals*** the 1 and the nought, as the first and final ciphers. And Porphyry,
who quotes from the Pythagorean Moderatus,**** says that the numerals of
Pythagoras were "hieroglyphical symbols, by means whereof he explained
ideas concerning the nature of things," or the origin of the universe.
Now, if, on the other hand, the most
ancient Indian manuscripts show as yet no trace of decimal notation in them,
and Max Muller states very clearly that until now he has found but nine letters
(the initials of the Sanscrit numerals) in them; on the other hand, we have
records as ancient to supply the wanted proof. We speak of the sculptures and
the sacred imagery in the most ancient temples of the far East. Pythagoras
derived his knowledge from India; and we find Professor Max Muller
corroborating this statement, at least so far as to allow the Neo-Pythagoreans
to have been the first teachers of "ciphering," among the Greeks and
Romans; that "they at Alexandria, or in Syria, became acquainted with the
Indian figures, and adapted them to the Pythagorean abacus" (our figures).
This cautious admission implies that Pythagoras himself was acquainted with but
nine figures. Thus we might reasonably answer that, although we possess no
certain proof (exoterically) that the decimal notation was known by Pythagoras,
who lived on the very close of the archaic ages,***** we have yet sufficient
evidence to show that the full numbers, as given by Boethius, were known to the
Pythagoreans, even before Alexandria was built.****** This evidence we find in
Aristotle, who says that "some philosophers hold that ideas and numbers are
of the same nature, and amount to TEN in all."******* This, we believe,
will be sufficient to show that the decimal notation was known among them at
least as early as four centuries B.C., for Aristotle does not seem to treat the
question as an innovation of the "Neo-Pythagoreans."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* A Kabalist would be rather inclined
to believe that as the Arabic cifron was taken from the Indian Synya, nought,
so the Jewish Kabalistic Sephiroth (Sephrim) were taken from the word cipher,
not in the sense of emptiness but the reverse -- that of creation by number and
degrees in their evolution. And the Sephiroth are 10 or [[diagram]].
** See Max Muller's "Our
Figures."
*** See King's "Gnostics and
their Remains," plate xiii.
**** "Vita Pythag."
***** 608 B.C.
****** This city was built 332 B.C.
******* "Metaph." vii., F.
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But we know more than that: we know
that the decimal system must have been known to the mankind of the earliest
archaic ages, since the whole astronomical and geometrical portion of the
secret sacerdotal language was built upon the number 10, or the combination of
the male and female principles, and since the Pyramid of "Cheops" is
built upon the measures of this decimal notation, or rather upon the digits and
their combinations with the nought. Of this, however, sufficient was said in
Isis Unveiled, and it is useless to repeat and return to the same subject.
The symbolism of the Lunar and Solar
Deities is so inextricably mixed up, that it is next to impossible to separate
such glyphs as the egg, the lotus, and the "sacred" animals from each
other. The ibis, for instance, sacred to Isis, who is often represented with
the head of that bird, sacred also to Mercury or Thoth, because that god
assumed its form while escaping from Typhon, -- the ibis was held in the
greatest veneration in Egypt. There were two kinds of ibises, Herodotus tells
us (Lib. II. c. 75 et seq.) in that country: one quite black, the other black
and white. The former is credited with fighting and exterminating the winged
serpents which came every spring from Arabia and infested the country. The
other was sacred to the moon, because the latter planet is white and brilliant
on her external side, dark and black on that side which she never turns to the
earth. Moreover, the ibis kills land serpents, and makes the most terrible
havoc amongst the eggs of the crocodile, and thus saves Egypt from having the
Nile infested by those horrible Saurians. The bird is credited with doing so in
the moonlight, and thus being helped by Isis, as the moon, her sidereal symbol.
But the nearer esoteric truth underlying these popular myths is, that Hermes,
as shown by Abenephius (De cultu Egypt.), watched under the form of that bird
over the Egyptians, and taught them the occult arts and sciences. This means
simply that the ibis religiosa had and has "magical" properties in
common with many other birds, the albatross pre-eminently, and the mythical
white swan, the swan of Eternity or Time, the KALAHANSA.
Were it otherwise, indeed, why should
all the ancient peoples, who were no more fools than we are, have had such a
superstitious dread of killing certain birds? In Egypt, he who killed an ibis,
or the golden hawk -- the symbol of the Sun and Osiris -- risked and could
hardly escape death. The veneration of some nations for birds was such that
Zoroaster, in his precepts, forbids their slaughter as a heinous crime. We
laugh in our age at every kind of divination. Yet why should so many
generations have believed in divination by birds, and even in zoomancy, said by
Suidas to have been imparted by Orpheus, who taught how to perceive in the yoke
and white of
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the egg, under certain conditions,
that which the bird born from it would have seen around it during its short
life. This occult art, which demanded 3,000 years ago the greatest learning and
the most abstruse mathematical calculations, has now fallen into the depths of
degradation: it is old cooks and fortune-tellers who read their future to
servant-girls in search of husbands, by means of the white of an egg in a
glass.
Nevertheless, even Christians have to
this day their sacred birds; for instance, the dove, the symbol of the Holy
Ghost. Nor have they neglected the sacred animals. The Evangelical zoolatry --
the Bull, the Eagle, the Lion, and the Angel (in reality the Cherub, or Seraph,
the fiery-winged Serpent), is as much pagan as that of the Egyptians or the
Chaldeans. These four animals are, in reality, the symbols of the four
elements, and of the four lower principles in man. Nevertheless, they
correspond physically and materially to the four constellations that form, so
to speak, the suite or cortege of the Solar God, and occupy during the winter
solstice the four cardinal points of the zodiacal circle. These four
"animals" may be seen in many of the Roman Catholic New Testaments
where the portraits of the evangelists are given. They are the animals of
Ezekiel's Mercabah.
As truly stated by Ragon, "the
ancient Hierophants have combined so cleverly the dogmas and symbols of their
religious philosophies, that these symbols can be fully explained only by the
combination and knowledge of all the keys." They can be only approximately
interpreted, even if one finds out three out of these seven systems: the
anthropological, the psychic, and the astronomical. The two chief
interpretations, the highest and the lowest, the spiritual and the
physiological, they preserved in the greatest secrecy until the latter fell
into the dominion of the profane. Thus far, with regard only to the
pre-historic Hierophants, with whom that which has now become purely (or
impurely) phallic, was a science as profound and as mysterious as biology and
physiology are now. This was their exclusive property, the fruit of their
studies and discoveries. The other two were those which dealt with the creative
gods (theogony), and with creative man, i.e., the ideal and the practical
mysteries. These interpretations were so cleverly veiled and combined, that
many were those who, while arriving at the discovery of one meaning, were
baffled in understanding the significance of the others, and could never
unriddle them sufficiently to commit dangerous indiscretions. The highest, the
first and the fourth -- theogony in relation to anthropogony -- were almost
impossible to fathom. We find the proofs of this in the Jewish "Holy
Writ."
It is owing to the serpent being
oviparous, that it became a symbol of wisdom and an emblem of the Logoi, or the
self-born. In the temple of Philoe in Upper Egypt, an egg was artificially
prepared of clay made of
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various incenses, and it was made to
hatch by a peculiar process, when a cerastes (the horned viper) was born. The
same was done in antiquity for the cobra in the Indian temples. The creative
God emerges from the egg that issues from the mouth of Kneph -- as a winged
serpent -- because the Serpent is the symbol of the All-wisdom. With the
Hebrews he is glyphed by the "flying or fiery serpents" of the Wilderness
and Moses, and with the Alexandrian mystics he becomes the Ophio-Christos, the
Logos of the Gnostics. The Protestants try to show that the allegory of the
Brazen Serpent and of the "fiery serpents" has a direct reference to
the mystery of Christ and Crucifixion*; but it has a far nearer relation, in
truth, to the mystery of generation, when dissociated from the egg with the
central germ, or the circle with its central point. The brazen Serpent had no
such holy meaning as that; nor was it, in fact, glorified above the "fiery
serpents" for the bite of which it was only a natural remedy. The
symbological meaning of the word "brazen" being the feminine
principle, and that of fiery, or "gold," the male one.**
In the Book of the Dead, as just
shown, reference is often made to the Egg. Ra, the mighty one, remains in his
Egg, during the struggle between the "children of the rebellion" and
Shoo (the Solar Energy and the Dragon of Darkness) (ch. xvii.). The deceased is
resplendent in his
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* And this only because the brazen
serpent was lifted on a pole! It had rather a reference to Mico the Egyptian
egg standing upright supported by the sacred Tau; since the Egg and the Serpent
are inseparable in the old worship and symbology of Egypt, and since both the
Brazen and "fiery" serpents were Saraphs, the "burning
fiery" messengers, or the serpent Gods, the nagas of India. It was a
purely phallic symbol without the egg, while when associated with it -- it
related to cosmic creation.
** "Brass was a metal
symbolizing the nether world . . . . that of the womb where life should be
given . . . The word for serpent was in Hebrew Nakash, but this is the same
term for brass." It is said in Numbers (xxi.) that the Jews complained of
the Wilderness where there was no water (v. 5); after which "the Lord sent
fiery serpents" to bite them, when, to oblige Moses, he gives him as a
remedy the brazen serpent on a pole to look at; after which "any man when
he beheld the serpent of brass . . . . lived" (?). After that the
"Lord," gathering the people together at the well of Beer, gives them
water, (14-16), and grateful Israel sang this song, "Spring up, O
Well," (v. 17). When, after studying symbology, the Christian reader comes
to understand the innermost meaning of these three symbols -- water, brazen,
the serpent, and a few more -- in the sense given to them in the Holy Bible, he
will hardly like to connect the sacred name of his Saviour with the
"Brazen Serpent" incident. The Seraphim [[hebrew]] (fiery winged
serpents) are no doubt connected with, and inseparable from, the idea "of
the serpent of eternity -- God," as explained in Kenealy's Apocalypse. But
the word cherub also meant serpent, in one sense, though its direct meaning is
different; because the Cherubim and the Persian winged [[gruphes]]
"griffins" -- the guardians of the golden mountain -- are the same,
and their compound name shows their character, as it is formed of [[hebrew]]
(kr) circle, and [[hebrew]] "aub," or ob -- serpent -- therefore, a
"serpent in a circle." And this settles the phallic character of the
Brazen Serpent, and justifies Hezekiah for breaking it. (See II. Kings, 18, 4).
Verbum sat. sapienti.
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Egg when he crosses to the land of
mystery (xxii. i.). He is the Egg of Seb (liv. 1-3). . . . The Egg was the
symbol of life in immortality and eternity; as also the glyph of the generative
matrix; and the tau, associated with it, only of life and birth in generation.
The Mundane Egg was placed in Khnoom, the "Water of Space," or the
feminine abstract principle (Khnoom becoming, with the fall of mankind into
generation and phallicism, Ammon, the creative God); and when Phtah, the
"fiery god," carries the Mundane egg in his hand, then the symbolism
becomes quite terrestrial and concrete in its significance. In conjunction with
the hawk, the symbol of Osiris-Sun, the symbol is dual: it relates to both
lives -- the mortal and the immortal. In Kircher's OEdipus Egyptiacus (vol.
iii., p. 124) one can see, on the papyrus engraved in it, an egg floating above
the mummy. This is the symbol of hope and the promise of a second birth for the
Osirified dead; his Soul, after due purification in the Amenti, will gestate in
this egg of immortality, to be reborn from it into a new life on earth. For
this Egg, in the esoteric Doctrine, is the Devachan, the abode of Bliss; the
winged scarabeus being alike a symbol of it. The "winged globe" is
but another form of the egg, and has the same significance as the scarabeus,
the Khopiroo (from the root Khoproo "to become," "to be
reborn,") which relates to the rebirth of man, as well as to his spiritual
regeneration.
In the Theogony of Mochus, we find
AEther first, and then the air, from which Ulom, the intelligible ([[noetos]])
deity (the visible Universe of Matter) is born out of the Mundane Egg. (Mover's
Phoinizer, p. 282.)
In the Orphic Hymns, the Eros-Phanes
evolves from the divine Egg, which the AEthereal Winds impregnate, wind being
"the Spirit of the unknown Darkness" -- "the spirit of God"
(as explains K. O. Muller, 236); the divine "Idea," says Plato,
"who is said to move AEther."
In the Hindu Katakopanishad, Purusha,
the divine spirit, already stands before the original matter, "from whose
union springs the great soul of the world," Maha-Atma, Brahma, the Spirit
of Life,* etc., etc.** Besides this there are many charming allegories on this
subject scattered through the sacred books of the Brahmins. In one place it is
the female creator who is first a germ, then a drop of heavenly dew, a pearl,
and then an egg. In such cases -- of which there are too many to enumerate them
separately -- the Egg gives birth to the four elements within the fifth, Ether,
and is covered with seven coverings, which become later on the seven upper and
the seven lower worlds. Breaking in two, the shell becomes the heaven, and the
meat in the egg the earth, the white forming the terres-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The latter appellations are all
identical with Anima Mundi, or the "Universal Soul," the astral light
of the Kabalist and the Occultist, or the "Egg of Darkness."
** Weber, "Akad Vorles,"
pp. 213, 214 et seq.
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trial waters. Then again, it is
Vishnu who emerges from within the egg with a lotus in his hand. Vinata, a
daughter of Daksha and wife of Kasyapa ("the Self-born sprung from
Time," one of the seven "creators" of our world), brought forth
an egg from which was born Garuda, the vehicle of Vishnu, the latter allegory
having a relation to our Earth only, as Garuda is the Great Cycle.
The egg was sacred to Isis; the
priests of Egypt never ate eggs on that account.*
Diodorus Siculus states that Osiris
was born from an Egg, like Brahma. From Leda's Egg Apollo and Latona were born,
as also Castor and Pollux -- the bright Gemini. And though the Buddhists do not
attribute the same origin to their Founder, yet, no more than the ancient
Egyptians or the modern Brahmins, do they eat eggs, lest they should destroy
the germ of life latent in them, and commit thereby Sin. The Chinese believe
that their first man was born from an egg, which Tien, a god, dropped down from
heaven to earth into the waters.** This symbol is still regarded by some as
representing the idea of the origin of life, which is a scientific truth,
though the human ovum is invisible to the naked eye. Therefore we see respect
shown to it from the remotest past, by the Greeks, Phoenicians, Romans, the Japanese,
and the Siamese, the North and South American tribes, and even the savages of
the remotest islands.
With the Egyptians, the concealed god
was Ammon (Mon). All their gods were dual: the scientific reality for the
Sanctuary; its double, the fabulous and mythical Entity, for the masses. For
instance, as observed in "Chaos, Theos, Kosmos," the older Horus was
the Idea of the world remaining in the demiurgic mind "born in Darkness
before the creation of the world;" the second Horus*** was the same Idea
going forth from the Logos, becoming clothed with matter and assuming an actual
existence. (Compare Mover's "Phoinizer," p. 268.) The same with
Khnoum and Ammon;**** both are represented ram-headed, and both often confused,
though their functions are different. Khnoum is "the modeller of
men," fashioning men and things out of the Mundane Egg on a potter's
wheel;
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Isis is almost always represented
holding a lotus in one hand and in the other a circle and the Cross (crux
ansata), the Egg being sacred to her.
** The Chinese seem to have thus
anticipated Sir William Thomson's theory that the first living germ had dropped
to the Earth from some passing comet. Query! why should this be called scientific
and the Chinese idea a superstitious, foolish theory?
*** Horus -- the "older,"
or Haroiri, is an ancient aspect of the solar god, contemporary with Ra and
Shoo; Haroiri is often mistaken for Hor (Horsusi), Son of Osiris and Isis. The
Egyptians very often represented the rising Sun under the form of Hor the
older, rising from a full-blown lotus, the Universe, when the solar disc is
always found on the hawk-head of that god. Haroiri is Khnoum.
**** Ammon or Mon, the
"hidden," the Supreme Spirit.
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Ammon-Ra, the generator, is the
secondary aspect of the concealed deity. Khnoum was adored at Elephanta and
Philoe,* Ammon at Thebes. But it is Emepht, the One, Supreme Planetary
principle, who blows the egg out of his mouth, and who is, therefore, Brahma.
The shadow of the deity, Kosmic and universal, of that which broods over and permeates
the egg with its vivifying Spirit until the germ contained in it is ripe, was
the mystery god whose name was unpronounceable. It is Phtah, however, "he
who opens," the opener of life and Death,** who proceeds from the egg of
the world to begin his dual work. (Book of Numbers.)
According to the Greeks, the phantom
form of the Chemis (Chemi, ancient Egypt) which floats on the ethereal waves of
the Empyrean Sphere, was called into being by Horus-Apollo, the Sun god, who
caused it to evolve out of the Mundane egg.***
In the Scandinavian Cosmogony --
placed by Professor Max Muller, in point of time, as "far anterior to the
Vedas" in the poem of Voluspa (the song of the prophetess), the Mundane
egg is again discovered in the phantom-germ of the Universe, which is
represented as lying in the Ginnungagap -- the cup of illusion (Maya) the
boundless and void abyss. In this world's matrix, formerly a region of night
and desolation, Nebelheim (the mist-place, the nebular as it is called now, in
the astral light) dropped a ray of cold light which overflowed this cup and
froze in it. Then the Invisible blew a scorching wind which dissolved the
frozen waters and cleared the mist. These waters (chaos), called the streams of
Elivagar, distilling in vivifying drops, fell down and created the earth and
the giant Ymir, who only had "the semblance of man" (the Heavenly
man), and the cow, Audhumla (the "mother" or astral light, Cosmic
Soul) from whose udder flowed four streams of milk (the four cardinal points:
the four heads of the four rivers of Eden, etc., etc.) and which
"four" allegorically are symbolized by the cube in all its various
and mystical meanings.
The Christians -- especially the
Greek and Latin Churches -- have fully adopted the symbol, and see in it a
commemoration of life eternal,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* His triadic goddesses are Sati and
Anouki.
** Phtah was originally the god of
death, of destruction, like Siva. He is a solar god only by virtue of the sun's
fire killing as well as vivifying. He was the national god of Memphis, the
radiant and "fair-faced God." (See Saqquarah Bronzes, Saitic Epoch.)
*** The Brahmanda Purana contains the
mystery about Brahma's golden egg fully; and this is why, perhaps, it is
inaccessible to the Orientalists, who say that this Purana, like the Skanda, is
"no longer procurable in a collective body," but "is represented
by a variety of Khandas and Mahatmyas professing to be derived from it."
The "Brahmanda Purana" is described as "that which is declared
in 12,200 verses, the magnificence of the egg of Brahma, and in which an
account of the future Kalpas is contained as revealed by Brahma." Quite
so, and much more, perchance.
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of salvation and of resurrection.
This is found in and corroborated by the time-honoured custom of exchanging
"Easter Eggs." From the anguinum, the "Egg" of the
"pagan" Druid, whose name alone made Rome tremble with fear, to the
red Easter Egg of the Slavonian peasant, a cycle has passed. And yet, whether
in civilized Europe, or among the abject savages of Central America, we find
the same archaic, primitive thought; if we only search for it and do not
disfigure -- in the haughtiness of our fancied mental and physical superiority
-- the original idea of the symbol.
--------------
§ VII.
THE DAYS AND NIGHTS OF BRAHMA.
THIS is the name given to the Periods
called MANVANTARA (Manuantara, or between the Manus) and PRALAYA (Dissolution);
one referring to the active periods of the Universe, the other to its times of
relative and complete rest -- according to whether they occur at the end of a
"Day," or an "Age" (a life) of Brahma. These periods, which
follow each other in regular succession, are also called Kalpas, small and
great, the minor and the Maha Kalpa; though, properly speaking, the Maha Kalpa
is never a "day," but a whole life or age of Brahma, for it is said
in the Brahma Vaivarta: "Chronologers compute a Kalpa by the Life of
Brahma; minor Kalpas, as Samvarta and the rest, are numerous." In sober
truth they are infinite; as they have never had a commencement, i.e., there
never was a first Kalpa, nor will there ever be a last one, in Eternity.
One Parardha -- in the ordinary
acceptation of this measure of time -- or half of the existence of Brahma (in
the present Maha Kalpa) has already expired; the last Kalpa was the Padma, or
that of the Golden Lotos; the present one being Varaha* (the "boar"
incarnation, or Avatar).
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* There is a curious piece of
information in the Buddhist esoteric traditions. The exoteric or allegorical
biography of Gautama Buddha shows this great Sage dying of an indigestion of
pork and rice, a very prosaic end, indeed, having little of the solemn element
in it. This is explained as an allegorical reference to his having been born in
the "Boar," or Varaha-Kalpa when Brahma assumed the form of that
animal to raise the Earth out of the "Waters of Space." And as the
Brahmins descend direct from Brahma and are, so to speak, identified with him;
and as they are at the same time the mortal enemies of Buddha and Buddhism, we
have the curious allegorical hint and combination. Brahminism (of the Boar, or
Varaha Kalpa) has slaughtered the religion of Buddha in India, swept it away
from its face; therefore Buddha, identified with his philosophy, is said to
have died from the effects of eating of the flesh of a wild hog. [[Footnote
continued on next page]]
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By the scholar who studies the Hindu
religion from the Puranas, one thing is to be especially noted. He must not
take literally, and in one sense only, the statements therein found; since
those which especially concern the Manvantaras or Kalpas have to be understood
in their several references. So, for instance, these periods relate in the same
language to both the great and the small periods, to Maha Kalpas and to minor
Cycles. The Matsya, or Fish Avatar, happened before the Varaha or Boar Avatar;
the allegories, therefore, must relate to both the Padma and the present
manvantara, and also to the minor cycles which took place since the
reappearance of our Chain of Worlds and Earth. And, as the Matsya Avatar of
Vishnu and Vaivasvata's Deluge are correctly connected with an event that
happened on our Earth during this Round, it is evident that while it may relate
to pre-cosmic events (in the sense of our Kosmos or Solar system) it has
reference in our case to a distant geological period. Not even Esoteric
philosophy can claim to know, except by analogical inference, that which took
place before the reappearance of our Solar System and previous to the last Maha
Pralaya. But it teaches distinctly that after the first geological disturbance
in the Earth's axis which ended in the sweeping down to the bottom of the Seas
of the whole second Continent, with its primeval races -- of which successive
"Earths" or Continents Atlantis was the fourth -- there came another
disturbance by the axis resuming as rapidly its previous degree of inclination;
when the Earth was indeed raised once more out of the Waters, and -- as above
so it is below; and vice versa. There were "gods" on Earth in those
days -- gods, and not men, as we know them now, says the tradition. As will be
shown in Book II., the computation of periods in exoteric Hinduism refers to
both the great cosmic and the small terrestrial events and cataclysms, and the
same may be shown for names. For instance Yudishthira -- the first King of the
Sacea, who opens the Kali Yuga era, which has to last 432,000 years -- "an
actual King and man who lived 3,102 years B.C.," applies also, name and
all, to the great Deluge at the time of the first sinking of Atlantis. He is
the "Yudishthira* born on the mountain of the hundred peaks at the
extremity of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] The idea alone of one who established the most rigorous vegetarianism
and respect for animal life -- even to refusing to eat eggs as vehicles of a
latent future life -- dying of a meat indigestion, is absurdly contradictory
and has puzzled more than one Orientalist. But this explanation, unveiling the
allegory, explains all the rest. The Varaha, however, is no simple boar, and
seems to have meant at first some antediluvian lacustrine animal
"delighting to sport in water." (Vayu Purana.)
* According to Colonel Wilford, the
conclusion of the "Great War" was B.C. 1370. (See A. R., Vol.9, p.
116); according to Bentley, 575 B.C.!! We may hope, perhaps, that before the
end of this century, the Mahabharatean epics will be found and proclaimed
identical with the wars of the great Napoleon.
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the world beyond which nobody can
go" and "immediately after the flood." (See Royal Asiat. Soc.,
Vol. 9, p. 364.) We know of no "Flood" 3,102 years B.C. -- not even
that of Noah, for, agreeably with Judaeo-Christian chronology, it took place
2,349 years B.C.
This relates to an esoteric division
of time and a mystery explained elsewhere, and may therefore be left aside for
the present. Suffice to remark at this juncture that all the efforts of
imagination of the Wilfords, Bentleys, and other would-be OEdipuses of esoteric
Hindu Chronology have sadly failed. No computation of either the Four Ages, or
the Manvantaras, has ever been unriddled by our very learned Orientalists, who
have therefore cut the Gordian Knot by proclaiming the whole "a figment of
the Brahmanical brain." So be it, and may the great scholars rest in
peace. This "figment" is given in the Preliminary Sections which
preface Anthropogenesis in Book II., and with esoteric additions.
Let us see, however, what were the
three kinds of pralayas, and what is the popular belief about them. For once it
agrees with Esotericism.
Of the pralaya before which fourteen
Manvantaras elapse, having over them as many presiding Manus, and at whose
close occurs the "incidental" or Brahma's dissolution, it is said in
Vishnu Purana, in condensed form, that "at the end of a thousand periods
of four ages, which complete a day of Brahma, the earth is almost exhausted.
The eternal Avyaya (Vishnu) assumes then the character of Rudra (the destroyer,
Siva) and re-unites all his creatures to himself. He enters the Seven rays of
the Sun and drinks up all the waters of the globe; he causes the moisture to
evaporate, thus drying up the whole Earth. Oceans and rivers, torrents and
small streams, are all exhaled. Thus fed with abundant moisture the seven solar
rays become sevens suns by dilation, and they finally set the world on fire.
Hari, the destroyer of all things, who is 'the flame of time, Kalagni,' finally
consumes the Earth. Then Rudra, becoming Janardana, breathes clouds and
rain."
There are many kinds of Pralaya, but
three chief ones are specially mentioned in old Hindu books; and of these, as
Wilson shows:-- The first is called NAIMITTIKA* "occasional" or
"incidental," caused by the intervals of "Brahma's Days;"
it is the destruction of creatures, of all that lives and has a form, but not
of the substance which remains in statu quo till the new DAWN in that
"Night." The
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In the Vedanta and Nyaya
"nimitta" (from which "Naimittika") is rendered as the
efficient cause, when antithesized with upadana the physical or material cause.
In the Sankhya pradhana is a cause inferior to Brahma, or rather Brahma being
himself a cause, is superior to Pradhana. Hence "incidental" is
wrongly translated, and ought to be translated, as shown by some scholars,
"Ideal" cause, and even real cause would have been better.
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other is called PRAKRITIKA -- and
occurs at the end of the Age or Life of Brahma, when everything that exists is
resolved into the primal element, to be remodelled at the end of that longer
night. But the third, Atyantika, does not concern the Worlds or the Universe,
but only the individualities of some people; it is thus individual pralaya or
NIRVANA; after having reached which, there is no more future existence
possible, no rebirth till after the Maha Pralaya. The latter night, lasting as
it does 311,040,000,000,000 years, and having the possibility of being almost
doubled in case the lucky Jivanmukti reaches Nirvana at an early period of a
Manvantara, is long enough to be regarded as eternal, if not endless. The
Bhagavata (XII., iv, 35) speaks of a fourth kind of pralaya, the Nitya or
constant dissolution, and explains it as the change which takes place
imperceptibly in everything in this Universe from the globe down to the atom --
without cessation. It is growth and decay (life and death).
When the Maha Pralaya arrives, the
inhabitants of Swar-loka (the upper sphere) disturbed by the conflagration,
seek refuge "with the Pitris, their progenitors, the Manus, the Seven
Rishis, the various orders of celestial Spirits and the Gods, in
Maharloka." When the latter is reached also, the whole of the above
enumerated beings migrate in their turn from Maharloka, and repair to Jana-loka
in "their subtile forms, destined to become re-embodied, in similar
capacities as their former, when the world is renewed at the beginning of the
succeeding Kalpa;" (Vayu Purana).
" . . . . These clouds, mighty
in size, and loud in thunder, fill up all space (Nabhas-tala)," goes on
Vishnu Purana. -- (Book VI., ch. iii.) "Showering down torrents of water,
these clouds quench the dreadful fires, and then they rain uninterruptedly for
a hundred (divine) years, and deluge the whole world (Solar System). Pouring
down, in drops as large as dice, these rains overspread the earth, and fill the
middle region (Bhuvaloka) and inundate heaven. The world is now enveloped in
darkness, and all things animate, or inanimate, having perished, the clouds
continue to pour down their waters" . . . "and the Night of Brahma
reigns supreme over the scene of desolation . . . . ."
This is what we call in the Esoteric
Doctrine a "Solar Pralaya" . . . When the waters have reached the
region of the Seven Rishis, and the world (our Solar System) is one ocean, they
stop. The breath of Vishnu becomes a strong wind, which blows for another
hundred (divine) years until all clouds are dispersed. The wind is then
reabsorbed: and "THAT, of which all things are made, the Lord by whom all
things exist, He who is inconceivable, without beginning, the beginning of the
universe, reposes, sleeping upon Sesha (the Serpent of Infinity) in the midst
of the deep. The Adikrit
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(Creator?) Hari, sleeps upon the
ocean of Space in the form of Brahma -- glorified by Sanaka* and the Siddha
(Saints) of Jana-loka, and contemplated by the holy denizens of Brahma-loka,
anxious for final liberation, involved in mystic slumber, the celestial
personification of his own illusions. . . ." This is the Pratisanchara
(dissolution?) termed incidental because Hari is its incidental (ideal) Cause.
. . . .** When the Universal Spirit wakes, the world revives; when he closes
his eyes, all things fall upon the bed of mystic slumber. In like manner, as
1,000 great ages constitute a Day of Brahma (in the original it is Padma-yoni,
the same as Abjayoni -- "lotos-born," not Brahma), so his Night
consists of the same period. "Awaking at the end of his night, the unborn
. . . creates the Universe anew. . . ." (Vishnu Purana.)
This is "incidental"
pralaya; what is the Elemental Dissolution? "When by dearth and
fire," says Parasara to Maitreya, "all the worlds and Patalas (hells)
are withered up . . .*** the progress of elemental dissolution is begun. Then,
first the waters swallow up the property of Earth (which is the rudiment of
smell), and earth deprived of this property proceeds to destruction -- and
becomes one with water . . . . when the Universe is thus pervaded by the waves
of the watery Element, its rudimentary flavour is locked up by the elements of
fire . . . on account of which the waters themselves are destroyed . . . and
become one with fire; and the Universe is therefore, entirely filled with flame
(ethereal) which gradually overspreads the whole world. While Space is one
flame, the element of wind seizes upon the rudimental property or form, which
is the cause of light, and that being withdrawn (pralina) all becomes of the
nature of air. The rudiment of form being destroyed, and Vibhavasu (fire?)
deprived of its rudiment, air extinguishes fire and spreads over space, which
is deprived of light when fire merges into air. Air, then, accompanied by
sound, which is the source of Ether, extends everywhere throughout the ten
regions . . . . until Ether seizes upon cohesion (Sparsa -- Touch?) its
rudimental property, by the loss of which, air is destroyed, and KHA remains
unmodified; devoid of form, flavour, touch (Sparsa), and smell, it exists,
embodied (murttimat) and vast, and pervades the whole Space. Akasa, whose
characteristic property and rudiment is sound (the "Word"), occupies
the whole containment of Space. Then the origin (Noumenon?) of the Elements
(Bhutadi), devours sound (collective Demiurgos); and the hosts of Dhyan
Chohans, and all the existing
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The chief Kumara or Virgin-god (a
Dhyan Chohan) who refuses to create. A prototype of St. Michael, who refuses to
do the same.
** See concluding lines in Section,
"Chaos, Theos, Kosmos."
*** This prospect would hardly suit
Christian theology, which prefers an eternal, everlasting hell for its
followers.
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Elements* are at once merged into
their original. The primary Element, Consciousness, combined with tamasa
(spiritual darkness) is itself disintegrated by MAHAT (the Universal
Intellect), whose characteristic property is Buddhi, and earth and Mahat are
the inner and outer boundaries of the Universe." Thus as (in the
beginning) "were the seven forms of Prakriti (nature) reckoned from Mahat
to earth, so these seven successively re-enter into each other."**
"The Egg of Brahma
(Sarva-mandala) is dissolved in the waters that surround it, with its seven
zones (dwipas) seven oceans, seven regions, and their mountains; the investure
of water is drunk by the fire; the (stratum of) fire is absorbed by (that of)
air; air blends itself with ether (Akasa); the Bhutadi (the origin, or rather
the cause, of the primary element) devours the ether and is (itself) destroyed
by Mahat (the Great, the Universal mind), which along with all these is seized
upon by Prakriti and disappears. The Prakriti is essentially the same, whether
discrete or indiscrete; only that which is discrete is finally absorbed by and
lost in the indiscrete. PUMS (Spirit) also, which is one, pure, imperishable,
eternal, all-pervading, is a portion of that Supreme spirit which is all
things. That Spirit (Sarvesa) which is other than (embodied) Spirit, and in
which there are no attributes of name, species (naman and jati, or rupa, hence
body rather than species), or the like -- remains as the sole existence
(SATTA). . . Prakriti and Purusha both resolving finally into SUPREME SPIRIT. .
. ." (From Vishnu Purana, Wilson's mistakes being here corrected, and
original words put in brackets).
This is the final PRALAYA*** -- the
Death of Kosmos -- after which its Spirit rests in Nirvana, or in THAT for
which there is neither Day nor Night. All the other pralayas are periodical and
follow, in regular succession, the Manvantaras, as the night follows the day of
every human creature, animal, and plant. The cycle of creation of the lives of
Kosmos is run down, the energy of the manifested "Word" having
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The term "Elements" must
be understood here to mean not only the visible and physical Elements, but also
that which St. Paul calls Elements -- the spiritual, intelligent Potencies --
Angels and Demons in their Manvantaric form.
** When this description is correctly
understood by Orientalists in its esoteric significance then it will be found
that this Cosmic correlation of World-Elements may explain the correlation of
physical forces better than those now known. At any rate, theosophists will
perceive that Prakriti has seven forms, or principles, "reckoned from
Mahat to Earth." The "Waters" mean here the Mystic
"mother"; the Womb of abstract nature, in which the manifested
Universe is conceived. The Seven "zones" have reference to the Seven
Divisions of that Universe, or the Noumena of the Forces that bring it into
being. It is all allegorical.
*** As it is the Maha, the Great, or
so-called final PRALAYA which is here described, every thing is re-absorbed
into its original ONE Element -- the "Gods themselves, Brahma and the
rest" being said to die and disappear during that long NIGHT.
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its growth, culmination, and
decrease, as have all things temporary, however long their duration. The
Creative Force is Eternal as Noumenon; as a phenomenal manifestation in its
aspects, it has a beginning and must, therefore, have an end. During that
interval it has its periods of activity and its periods of rest. And these are
the "Days and the nights of Brahma." But Brahma, the Noumenon, never
rests, as IT never changes and ever IS, though IT cannot be said to be
anywhere. . . . .
The Jewish Kabalists felt this necessity
of immutability in an eternal, infinite Deity, and therefore applied the same
thought to the anthropomorphic god. The idea is poetical and very appropriate
in its application. In the Zohar we read as follows:--
"As Moses was keeping a vigil on
Mount Sinai, in company with the deity, who was concealed from his sight by a
cloud, he felt a great fear overcome him, and suddenly asked: 'Lord, where art
thou . . . . sleepest thou, O Lord? . . .' And the Spirit answered him: 'I
never sleep: were I to fall asleep for a moment BEFORE MY TIME, all the
creation would crumble into dissolution in one instant.' "
"Before my time" is very
suggestive. It shows the God of Moses to be only a temporary substitute, like
Brahma the male, a substitute and an aspect of THAT which is immutable, and
which therefore can take no part in the "days," or in the
"nights," nor have any concern whatever with reaction or dissolution.
While the Eastern Occultists have
seven modes of interpretation, the Jews have only four -- namely, the
real-mystical; the allegorical; the moral; and the literal or Pashut. The
latter is the key of the exoteric Churches and not worth discussion. Read in
the first, or mystical key, here are several sentences which show the identity
of the foundations of construction in every Scripture. It is given in Mr. T.
Myer's excellent book on the Kabalistic works he seems to have well studied. I
quote verbatim. "B'raisheeth barah elohim ath hash ama yem v'ath haa'retz
-- i.e., 'In the beginning the God(s) created the heavens and the earth;"
(the meaning of which is:) the six Sephiroth of Construction,* over which
B'raisheeth stands, all belong Below. It created six (and) on these stand all
Things. And those depend upon the seven forms of the Cranium up to the Dignity
of all Dignities. And the second 'Earth' does not come into calculation,
therefore it has been said: 'And from it (that Earth) which underwent the
curse, came it forth.' . . . . 'It (the Earth) was without form and void; and
darkness was over the face of the Abyss, and the Spirit of elohim . . . . was
breathing (me' racha 'phath) -- i.e., hovering, brooding over, moving. . . . .
Thirteen depend on thirteen
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The "Builders" of the
Stanzas.
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(forms) of the most worthy Dignity.
Six thousand years hang (are referred to) in the first six words. The seventh
(thousand, the millennium) above it (the cursed Earth) is that which is strong
by Itself. And it was rendered entirely desolate during twelve hours (one . . .
. Day) as is written. . . . . In the thirteenth, It (the Deity) shall restore
all . . . . and everything shall be renewed as before; and all those six shall
continue . . . . etc." (Qabbalah, p. 233, from Siphrah Dzeniuta, c. i., §
16, s. 9.)
The "Sephiroth of
Construction" are the six Dhyan Chohans, or Manus, or Prajapati,
synthesized by the seventh "B'raisheeth (the First Emanation or Logos),
and who are called, therefore, the Builders of the Lower or physical
Universe" all belong Below. These six [[diagram]] whose essence is of the
Seventh -- are the Upadhi, the base or fundamental stone on which the objective
Universe is built, the noumenoi of all things. Hence they are, at the same
time, the Forces of nature, the Seven Angels of the Presence, the sixth and
seventh principles in man; the spirito-psycho-physical spheres of the Septenary
chain, the Root Races, etc., etc. They all "depend upon the Seven forms of
the Cranium" up to the highest. The "second Earth" "does
not come into calculation" because it is no Earth, but the Chaos or Abyss
of Space in which rested the paradigmatic, or model universe in ideation of the
OVER-SOUL brooding over it. The term "Curse" is here very misleading,
for it means simply doom or destiny, or that fatality which sent it forth into
the objective state. This is shown by that "Earth" under the
"Curse" being described as "without form and void," in
whose abysmal depths the "Breath" of the Elohim (collective Logoi)
produced or photographed the first divine IDEATION of the things to be. This
process is repeated after every Pralaya before the beginnings of a new
Manvantara, or period of sentient individual being. "Thirteen depend on
thirteen forms," refers to the thirteen periods personified by the
thirteen Manus, with Swayambhuva the fourteenth (13, instead of 14, being an
additional veil): those fourteen Manus who reign within the term of a Mahayuga,
a "Day" of Brahma. These (thirteen-fourteen) of the objective
Universe depend on the thirteen (fourteen) paradigmatic, ideal forms. The
meaning of the "Six thousand years" which "hang in the first six
words," has again to be sought in the Indian Wisdom. They refer to the
primordial six (seven) "Kings of Edom" who typify the worlds (or
spheres) of our chain during the first Round, as well as the primordial men of
this Round. They are the septenary pre-Adamic (or before the Third, Separated
Race) first Root-race. As they were shadows, and senseless (they had not eaten
yet of the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge), they could not see the
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Parguphim, or "Face could not
see Face" (primeval men were unconscious), "therefore, the primordial
(seven) Kings died," i.e., were destroyed (vide Sepherah Djenioutha). Now,
who are they? They are the Kings who are "the Seven Rishis, certain
(secondary) divinities, Sakra (Indra), Manu, and the Kings his Sons, who are
created and perish at one period," as said in Vishnu Purana (Book I. chap.
iii.). For the seventh ("thousand") (not the millennium of exoteric
Christianity, but that of Anthropogenesis) represents both the "seventh
period of creation," that of physical man (Vishnu Purana), and the seventh
Principle -- both macrocosmic and microcosmic, -- as also the pralaya after the
Seventh period, the "Night" which has the same duration as the
"Day" of Brahma. "It was rendered entirely desolate during
twelve hours, as is written." It is in the Thirteenth (twice six and the Synthesis)
that everything shall be restored "and the six will continue."
Thus the author of the Qabbalah
remarks quite truly that "Long before his (Ibn Gebirol's) time . . . many
centuries before the Christian era, there was in Central Asia a 'Wisdom
Religion;' fragments of which subsequently existed among the learned men of the
archaic Egyptians, the ancient Chinese, Hindus, etc. . . ." and that . . .
. . "The Qabbalah most likely originally came from Aryan sources, through
Central Asia, Persia, India and Mesopotamia, for from Ur and Haran came Abraham
and many others into Palestine" (p. 221). And such was the firm conviction
of C. W. King, the author of "The Gnostics and their Remains."
Vamadeva Modelyar (Modely) describes
the coming "night" most poetically. Though it is given in Isis
Unveiled, it is worthy of repetition.
"Strange noises are heard,
proceeding from every point . . . These are the precursors of the Night of
Brahma; dusk rises at the horizon, and the Sun passes away behind the
thirteenth degree of Macara (sign of the Zodiac), and will reach no more the
sign of the Minas (zodiacal pisces, or fish). The gurus of the pagodas
appointed to watch the rasichakr (Zodiac), may now break their circle and
instruments, for they are henceforth useless.
"Gradually light pales, heat diminishes,
uninhabited spots multiply on the earth, the air becomes more and more
rarified; the springs of waters dry up, the great rivers see their waves
exhausted, the ocean shows its sandy bottom and plants die. Men and animals
decrease in size daily. Life and motion lose their force, planets can hardly
gravitate in space; they are extinguished one by one, like a lamp which the
hand of the chokra (servant) neglects to replenish. Surya (the Sun) flickers
and goes out, matter falls into dissolution (pralaya), and Brahma merges back
into Dayus, the Unrevealed God, and, his task being
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accomplished, he falls asleep.
Another day is passed, night sets in, and continues until the future dawn.
"And now again he re-enters into
the golden egg of His Thought, the germs of all that exist, as the divine Manu
tells us. During His peaceful rest, the animated beings, endowed with the
principles of action, cease their functions, and all feeling (manas) becomes
dormant. When they are all absorbed in the SUPREME SOUL, this Soul of all the
beings sleeps in complete repose till the day when it resumes its form, and
awakes again from its primitive darkness."*
As the "Satya-yuga" is
always the first in the series of the four ages or Yugas, so the Kali ever
comes the last. The Kali yuga reigns now supreme in India, and it seems to
coincide with that of the Western age. Anyhow, it is curious to see how
prophetic in almost all things was the writer of Vishnu Purana when foretelling
to Maitreya some of the dark influences and sins of this Kali Yug. For after
saying that the "barbarians" will be masters of the banks of the
Indus, of Chandrabhaga and Kasmera, he adds:
"There will be contemporary
monarchs, reigning over the earth -- kings of churlish spirit, violent temper,
and ever addicted to falsehood and wickedness. They will inflict death on
women, children, and cows; they will seize upon the property of their subjects,
and be intent upon the wives of others; they will be of unlimited power, their
lives will be short, their desires insatiable. . . . People of various
countries intermingling with them, will follow their example; and the
barbarians being powerful (in India) in the patronage of the princes, while
purer tribes are neglected, the people will perish (or, as the Commentator has
it, 'The Mlechchhas will be in the centre and the Aryas in the end.')** Wealth
and piety will decrease until the world will be wholly depraved. Property alone
will confer rank; wealth will be the only source of devotion; passion will be
the sole bond of union between the sexes; falsehood will be the only means of
success in litigation; and women will be objects merely of sensual
gratification. . . . . . External types will be the only distinction of the
several orders of life; . . . . . a man if rich will be reputed pure;
dishonesty (anyaya) will be the universal means of subsistence, weakness the
cause of dependence, menace and presumption will be substituted for learning;
liberality will be devotion; mutual assent, marriage; fine clothes, dignity. He
who is the strongest will reign; the people, unable to bear the heavy burthen, Khara
bhara (the load of taxes) will take refuge among the valleys. . . . Thus, in
the Kali age will decay constantly proceed, until
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Jacquolliot's "Les Fils de
Dieu"; l'Inde des Brahmes, p. 230.
** If this is not prophetic, what is?
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the human race approaches its
annihilation (pralaya) . . . . When the close of the Kali age shall be nigh, a
portion of that divine being which exists, of its own spiritual nature . . .
shall descend on Earth . . . (Kalki Avatar) endowed with the eight superhuman
faculties. . . . He will re-establish righteousness on earth, and the minds of
those who live at the end of Kali Yuga shall be awakened and become as pellucid
as crystal. The men who are thus changed . . . shall be the seeds of human
beings, and shall give birth to a race who shall follow the laws of the Krita
age, the age of purity. As it is said, 'When the sun and moon and the lunar
asterism Tishya and the planet Jupiter are in one mansion, the Krita (or Satya)
age shall return.' "
". . . . Two persons, Devapi, of
the race of Kuru and Moru, of the family of Ikshwaku, continue alive throughout
the four ages, residing at Kalapa.* They will return hither in the beginning of
the Krita age . . . Moru** the son of Sighru through the power of Yoga is still
living . . . . and will be the restorer of the Kshattriya race of the Solar
dynasty."*** (Vayu Purana, Vol. III, p. 197).
Whether right or wrong with regard to
the latter prophecy, the blessings of Kali Yuga are well described, and fit in
admirably even with that which one sees and hears in Europe and other civilized
and Christian lands in full XIXth, and at the dawn of the XXth century of our
great era of ENLIGHTENMENT.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Matsya Purana gives Katapa.
** Max Muller translates the name as
Morya, of the Morya dynasty, to which Chandragupta belonged (see Sanscrit
Literature). In Matsya Purana, chapter cclxxii, the dynasty of ten Moryas (or
Maureyas) is spoken of. In the same chapter, cclxxii, it is stated that the Moryas
will one day reign over India, after restoring the Kshattriya race many
thousand years hence. Only that reign will be purely Spiritual and "not of
this world." It will be the kingdom of the next Avatar. Colonel Tod
believes the name Morya (or Maureyas) a corruption of Mori, a Rajpoot tribe,
and the commentary on Mahavansa thinks that some princes have taken their name
Maurya from their town called Mori, or, as Professor Max Muller gives it,
Morya-Nagara, which is more correct, after the original Mahavansa.
Vachaspattya, we are informed by our Brother, Devan Badhadur R. Ragoonath Rao,
of Madras, a Sanscrit Encyclopedia, places Katapa (Kalapa) on the northern side
of the Himalayas, hence in Tibet. The same is stated in chapter xii. (Skanda)
of Bhagavat, Vol. III, p. 325.
*** The Vayu Purana declares that
Moru will re-establish the Kshattriya in the Nineteenth coming Yuga. (See
"Five years of Theosophy," p. 483. "The Moryas and
Koothoomi.")
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§ VIII.
THE LOTUS, AS A UNIVERSAL SYMBOL.
THERE are no ancient symbols, without
a deep and philosophical meaning attached to them; their importance and
significance increasing with their antiquity. Such is the LOTUS. It is the
flower sacred to nature and her Gods, and represents the abstract and the
Concrete Universes, standing as the emblem of the productive powers of both
spiritual and physical nature. It was held sacred from the remotest antiquity
by the Aryan Hindus, the Egyptians, and the Buddhists after them; revered in
China and Japan, and adopted as a Christian emblem by the Greek and Latin
Churches, who made of it a messenger as the Christians do now, who replace it
with the water lily.* It had, and still has, its mystic meaning which is
identical with every nation on the earth. We refer the reader to Sir William
Jones.** With the Hindus, the lotus is the emblem of the productive power of
nature, through the agency of fire and water (spirit and matter).
"Eternal!" says a verse in the Bhagavad Gita, "I see Brahm the
creator enthroned in thee above the lotus!"; and Sir W. Jones shows, as
noted in the Stanzas, that the seeds of the lotus contain, even before they
germinate, perfectly-formed leaves, the miniature shapes of what one day, as
perfected plants, they will become. The lotus, in India, is the symbol of
prolific earth, and what is more, of Mount Meru. The four angels or genii of
the four quarters of Heaven (the Maharajahs, see Stanzas) stand each on a
lotus. The lotus is the two-fold type of the Divine and human hermaphrodite,
being of dual sex, so to say.
The spirit of Fire (or Heat), which
stirs up, fructifies, and develops into concrete form everything (from its
ideal prototype), which is born of WATER or primordial Earth, evolved Brahma --
with the Hindus. The lotus flower, represented as growing out of Vishnu's navel
-- that God resting on the waters of space and his Serpent of Infinity -- is
the most graphic allegory ever made: the Universe evolving from the central
Sun, the POINT, the ever-concealed germ. Lakshmi, who is the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In the Christian religion Gabriel,
the Archangel, holding in his hand a spray of water lilies, appears to the
Virgin Mary in every picture of the Annunciation. This spray typifying fire and
water, or the idea of creation and generation, symbolizes precisely the same
idea as the lotus in the hand of the Bodhisat who announces to Maha-Maya,
Gautama's mother, the birth of the world's Saviour, Buddha. Thus also, Osiris
and Horus were represented by the Egyptians constantly in association with the
lotus-flower, the two being Sun-gods or Fire (the Holy Ghost being still
typified by "tongues of fire"), (Acts).
** See Sir William Jones'
"Dissertations Relating to Asia."
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female aspect of Vishnu,* and who is
also called Padma, the lotus, is likewise shown floating at
"Creation," on a lotus flower, and during the "churning of the
ocean" of space, springing from the "sea of milk," like Venus
from the froth.
". . . Then seated on a lotus
Beauty's bright goddess, peerless
Sri, arose
Out of the waves . . . "
sings an English Orientalist and poet
(Sir Monier Williams).
The underlying idea in this symbol is
very beautiful, and it shows, furthermore, its identical parentage in all the
religious systems. Whether in the lotus or water-lily shape it signifies one
and the same philosophical idea -- namely, the emanation of the objective from
the subjective, divine Ideation passing from the abstract into the concrete or
visible form. For, as soon as DARKNESS -- or rather that which is
"darkness" for ignorance -- has disappeared in its own realm of
eternal Light, leaving behind itself only its divine manifested Ideation, the
creative Logoi have their understanding opened, and they see in the ideal world
(hitherto concealed in the divine thought) the archetypal forms of all, and
proceed to copy and build or fashion upon these models forms evanescent and
transcendent.
At this stage of action, the
Demiurge** is not yet the Architect. Born in the twilight of action, he has yet
to first perceive the plan, to realise the ideal forms which lie buried in the
bosom of Eternal Ideation, as the future lotus-leaves, the immaculate petals,
are concealed within the seed of that plant. . . . .
In chapter lxxxi. of the Ritual (Book
of the Dead), called "Transformation into the Lotus," a head emerging
from this flower, the god exclaims: "I am the pure lotus, emerging from
the Luminous one. . . . . I carry the messages of Horus. I am the pure lotus
which comes from the Solar Fields. . . . ."
The lotus-idea may be traced even in
the Elohistic chapter, the 1st of Genesis, as stated in Isis.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Lakshmi is Venus -- Aphrodite, and,
like the latter, she sprang from the froth of the ocean with a lotus in her
hand. In the Ramayana she is called Padma.
** In Esoteric philosophy the
Demiurge or Logos, regarded as the CREATOR, is simply an abstract term, an
idea, like "army." As the latter is the all-embracing term for a body
of active forces or working units -- soldiers -- so is the Demiurge the
qualitative compound of a multitude of Creators or Builders. Burnouf, the great
Orientalist, has seized the idea perfectly when saying that Brahma does not
create the earth, any more than the rest of the universe. "Having evolved
himself from the soul of the world, once separated from the first cause, he evaporates
with, and emanates all nature out of himself. He does not stand above it, but
is mixed up with it; Brahma and the universe form one Being, each particle of
which is in its essence Brahma himself, who proceeded out of himself."
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It is in this idea that we must look
for the origin and explanation of the verse in the Jewish cosmogony, which
reads: "And God said, Let the earth bring forth . . . . the fruit-tree
yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself." In all the
primitive religions, the "Son of the Father" is the creative God --
i.e., His thought made visible; and before the Christian era, from the Trimurti
of the Hindus down to the three kabalistic heads of the scriptures as explained
by the Jews, the triune godhead of each nation was fully defined and
substantiated in its allegories.
Such is the cosmic and ideal
significance of this great symbol with the Eastern peoples. But, applied to
practical and exoteric worship -- which had also its esoteric symbology -- the
lotus became in time the carrier and container of a more terrestrial idea. No
dogmatic religion has ever escaped the sexual element in it; and to this day it
soils the moral beauty of the root idea. The following is quoted from the same
Kabalistic MSS. already mentioned:--
"Pointing to like signification
was the lotus growing in the waters of the Nile. Its mode of growth peculiarly
fitted it as a symbol of the generative activities. The flower of the lotus,
which is the bearer of the seed for reproduction, as the result of its
maturing, is connected by its placenta-like attachment with mother-earth, or
the womb of Isis, through the water of the womb, that is, the river Nile, by
means of the long cord-like stalk, the umbilicus. Nothing can be plainer than
the symbol, and to make it perfect in its intended signification, a child is
sometimes represented as seated in or issuing from the flower.* Thus Osiris and
Isis, the children of Chronos, or time without end, in the development of their
nature-forces, in this picture become the parents of man under the name Horus.
. ." (See § X., "Deus Lunus.")
"We cannot lay too great stress
upon the use of this generative function as a basis for a symbolical language
and a scientific art-speech. Thought upon the idea leads at once to reflection
upon the subject of creative cause. In its workings Nature is observed to have
fashioned a wonderful piece of living mechanism governed by an added living
soul; the life development and history of which soul, as to its whence, its
present, and its whither, surpasses all efforts of the human intellect.** The
new born is an ever-recurring miracle, an evidence that
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In Indian Puranas it is Vishnu, the
first, and Brahma, the second logos, or the ideal and practical creators, who
are respectively represented, one as manifesting the lotus, the other as
issuing from it.
** Not the "efforts" of the
trained psychic faculties of an Initiate into Eastern metaphysics, and the
mysteries of creative Nature. It is the profane of the past ages who have
degraded the pure ideal of cosmic creation into an emblem of mere human
reproduction and sexual functions: it is the esoteric teachings, and the
initiates of the Future, whose mission it is, and will be, to redeem and ennoble
once more the primitive conception so sadly profaned by its crude and gross
application to exoteric dogmas and personations by theological and
ecclesiastical religionists. The silent worship of abstract or noumenal Nature,
the only divine manifestation, is the one ennobling religion of Humanity.
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within the workshop of the womb an
intelligent creative power has intervened to fasten a living soul to a physical
machine. The amazing wonderfulness of the fact attaches a holy sacredness to
all connected with the organs of reproduction, as the dwelling and place of
evident constructive intervention of deity."
This is a correct rendering of the
underlying ideas of old, of the purely pantheistic conceptions, impersonal and
reverential, of the archaic philosophers of the prehistoric ages. Not so,
however, when applied to sinful humanity, to the gross ideas attached to
personality. Therefore, no pantheistic philosopher would fail to find the
remarks that follow the above and which represent the anthropomorphism of
Judean symbology, other than dangerous for the sacredness of true religion, and
fitting only our materialistic age, which is the direct outcome and result of
that anthropomorphic character. For this is the key-note to the entire spirit
and essence of the Old Testament. "Therefore," goes on the MSS.,
treating of the symbolism of art-speech of the Bible:--
"The locality of the womb is to
be taken as the MOST HOLY PLACE, the SANCTUM SANCTORUM, and the veritable
TEMPLE OF THE LIVING GOD.* With man the possession of the woman has always been
considered as an essential part of himself, to make one out of two, and
jealously guarded as sacred. Even the part of the ordinary house or home
consecrated to the dwelling of the wife was called the penetralia, the secret
or sacred, and hence the metaphor of the Holy of Holies of sacred constructions
taken from the idea of the sacredness of the organs of generation. Carried to
the extreme of description** by metaphor, this part of the house is described
in the Sacred Books as the "between the thighs of the house," and
sometimes the idea is carried out constructively in the great door-opening of
Churches placed inward between flanking buttresses."
No such thought "carried to the
extreme" ever existed among the old primitive Aryans. This is proven by
the fact that in the Vedic period their women were not placed apart from men in
penetralia, or "Zenanas." Their seclusion began when the Mahomedans
-- the next heirs to Hebrew symbolism after Christian ecclesiasticism -- had
conquered the land and gradually enforced their ways and customs upon the
Hindus. The pre- and post-Vedic woman was as free as man; and no impure
terrestrial thought was ever mixed with the religious symbo-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Surely the words of the old
Initiate into the primitive mysteries of Christianity, "Know ye not ye are
the Temple of God" (I Corinth. iii. 16) could not be applied in this sense
to men? The meaning may have been, and was so, undeniably, in the minds of the
Hebrew compilers of the Old Testament. And here is the abyss that lies between
the symbolism of the New Testament and the Jewish canon. This gulf would have
remained and ever widened, had not Christianity -- especially and most
glaringly the Latin Church -- thrown a bridge over it? Modern Popery has now
spanned it entirely, by its dogma of the two immaculate conceptions, and the
anthropomorphic and at the same time idolatrous character it has conferred upon
the Mother of its God.
** It was so carried only in the
Hebrew Bible, and its servile copyist, Christian theology.
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logy of the early Aryans. The idea
and application are purely Semitic. This is corroborated by the writer of the
said intensely learned and Kabalistic revelation himself, when he closes the
above-quoted passages by adding:--
"If to these organs as symbols
of creative cosmic agencies the idea of the origin of measures as well as of
time-periods can be attached, then indeed, in the constructions of the Temples
as Dwellings of Deity, or of Jehovah, that part designated as the Holy of
Holies, or the Most Holy place, should borrow its title from the recognised sacredness
of the generative organs, considered as symbols of measures as well as of
creative cause. With the ancient WISE, there was no name and no idea, and no
symbol of A FIRST CAUSE." . . . .
Most decidedly not. Rather never give
a thought to it and leave it for ever nameless, as the early Pantheists did,
than degrade the sacredness of that Ideal of Ideals, by dragging down its
symbols into such anthropomorphic forms! Here again one perceives the immense
chasm between Aryan and Semitic religious thought: two opposite poles --
Sincerity and Concealment. With the Brahmins, who have never invested with an
"original Sin" element the natural procreative functions of mankind,
it is a religious duty to have a son. A Brahmin, in days of old, having accomplished
his mission of human creator, retired to the jungle and passed the rest of his
days in religious meditations. He had accomplished his duty to nature as mortal
man and its co-worker, and henceforth gave all his thoughts to the spiritual
immortal portion in himself, regarding the terrestrial as a mere illusion, an
evanescent dream -- which it is. With the Semite, it was different. He invented
a temptation of flesh in a garden of Eden; showed his God (esoterically, the
Tempter and the Ruler of Nature) CURSING for ever an act, which was in the
logical programme of that nature.* All this exoterically, as in the cloak and
dead letter of Genesis and the rest; and at the same time esoterically he
regarded the supposed sin and FALL as an act so sacred, as to choose the organ,
the perpetrator of the original sin, as the fittest and most sacred symbol to
represent that God, who is shown as branding its entering into function as
disobedience and everlasting SIN!
Who can ever fathom the paradoxical
depths of the Semitic mind? And this paradoxical element, minus its innermost
significance, has now passed entirely into Christian theology and dogma!
Whether the early Fathers of the
Church knew the esoteric meaning of the Hebrew (Old) Testament, or whether only
a few of them were aware of it, while the others remained ignorant of the
secret, is for
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The same idea is carried out
exoterically in the incidents of Egypt. The Lord God tempts sorely Pharaoh and
"plagues him with great plagues," lest the king should escape
punishment, and thus afford no pretext for one more triumph to his "Chosen
people."
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posterity to decide. One thing is
certain, at any rate. As the esotericism of the New Testament agrees perfectly
with that of the Hebrew Mosaic Books; and since, at the same time, a number of
purely Egyptian symbols and pagan dogmas in general -- the Trinity for example
-- have been copied by, and incorporated into, the Synoptics and St. John, it
becomes evident that the identity of those symbols was known to the writers of
the New Testament, whoever they were. They must have been aware also of the
priority of the Egyptian esotericism, since they have adopted several such
symbols that typify purely Egyptian conceptions and beliefs -- in their outward
and inward meaning -- and which are not to be found in the Jewish Canon. One of
such is the water-lily in the hands of the Archangel in the early
representations of his appearance to the Virgin Mary; and these symbolical
images are preserved to this day in the iconography of the Greek and Roman
Churches. Thus water, fire, the Cross, as well as the Dove, the Lamb, and other
sacred animals, with all their combinations, yield esoterically an identical
meaning, and must have been accepted as an improvement upon Judaism pure and
simple.
For the Lotus and Water are among the
oldest symbols, and in their origin are purely Aryan, though they became common
property during the branching-off of the fifth race. Let us give an example.
Letters, as much as numbers, were all mystic, whether in combination or each taken
separately. The most sacred of all is the letter M. It is both feminine and
masculine, or androgyne, and is made to symbolize WATER, the great deep, in its
origin. It is mystic in all the languages, Eastern and Western, and stands as a
glyph for the waves, thus: [[diagram]]. In the Aryan Esotericism, as in the
Semitic, this letter has always stood for the waters; e.g., in Sanskrit MAKARA
-- the tenth sign of the Zodiac -- means a crocodile, or rather an aquatic
monster associated always with water. The letter MA is equivalent to and
corresponds with number 5 -- composed of a binary, the symbol of the two sexes
separated, and of the ternary, symbol of the third life, the progeny of the
binary. This, again, is often symbolised by a Pentagon, the latter being a
sacred sign, a divine Monogram. MAITREYA is the secret name of the Fifth
Buddha, and the Kalki Avatar of the Brahmins -- the last MESSIAH who will come
at the culmination of the Great Cycle. It is also the initial letter of the
Greek Metis or Divine Wisdom; of Mimra, the "word" or Logos; and of
Mithras (the Mihr), the Monad, Mystery. All these are born in, and from, the
great Deep, and are the Sons of Maya -- the Mother; in Egypt, Mouth, in Greece
Minerva (divine wisdom), Mary, or Miriam, Myrrha, etc.; of the Mother of the
Christian Logos, and of Maya, the mother of Buddha. Madhava and Madhavi are the
titles of the most important gods and goddesses of the Hindu Pantheon. Finally,
Mandala is in
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Sanskrit "a circle," or an
orb (the ten divisions of the Rig Veda). The most sacred names in India begin
with this letter generally -- from Mahat, the first manifested intellect, and
Mandara, the great mountain used by the gods to churn the Ocean, down to
Mandakin, the heavenly Ganga (Ganges), Manu, etc., etc.
Shall this be called a coincidence? A
strange one it is then, indeed, when we find even Moses -- found in the water
of the Nile -- having the symbolical consonant in his name. And Pharaoh's
daughter "called his name Moses . . . because," she said, "I
drew him out of WATER" (Exod. ii., 10.)* Besides which the Hebrew sacred
name of God applied to this letter M is Meborach, the "Holy" or the
"Blessed," and the name for the water of the Flood is M'bul. A
reminder of the "three Maries" at the Crucifixion and their
connection with Mar, the Sea, or Water, may close this example. This is why in
Judaism and Christianity the Messiah is always connected with Water, Baptism,
the Fishes (the sign of the Zodiac called Meenam in Sanskrit), and even with
the Matsya (fish) Avatar, and the Lotus -- the symbol of the womb, or the
water-lily, which is the same.
In the relics of ancient Egypt, the
greater the antiquity of the votive symbols and emblems of the objects exhumed,
the oftener are the lotus flowers and the water found in connection with the
Solar Gods. The god Khnoom -- the moist power -- water, as Thales taught it,
being the principle of all things, sits on a throne enshrined in a lotus
(Saitic epoch, Serapeum). The god Bes stands on a lotus, ready to devour his
progeny. (Ibid, Abydos.) Thot, the god of mystery and Wisdom, the sacred Scribe
of Amenti, wearing the Solar disc as head gear, sits with a bull's head (the
sacred bull of Mendes being a form of Thot) and a human body, on a full blown
lotus. (IVth Dynasty.) Finally it is the goddess Hiquet, under her shape of a
frog, who rests on the lotus, thus showing her connection with water. And it is
this frog-symbol, undeniably the most ancient of their Egyptian deities, from
whose unpoetical shape the Egyptologists have been vainly trying to unravel her
mystery and functions. Its adoption in the Church by the early Christians shows
that they knew it better than our modern Orientalists. The "frog or toad
goddess" was one of the chief cosmic deities connected with creation, on
account of her amphibious nature, and chiefly because of her apparent
resurrection, after long ages of solitary life enshrined in old walls, in
rocks, etc. She not only participated in the organization of the world,
together with Khnoom, but was also connected with the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Even to the seven daughters of the
Midian priest, who, coming to draw the water, had Moses water their flock, for
which service the Midian gives to Moses Zipporah (sippara = the shining wave)
as wife (Exod. ii.) All this has the same secret meaning.
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dogma of resurrection.* There must
have been some very profound and sacred meaning attached to this symbol, since,
notwithstanding the risk of being charged with a disgusting form of zoolatry,
the early Egyptian Christians adopted it in their Churches. A frog or toad
enshrined in a lotus flower, or simply without the latter emblem, was the form
chosen for the Church lamps, on which were engraved the words "I am the
resurrection" "[[ego eimi anastasis]]."** These frog goddesses
are also found on all the mummies.
-------------
§ IX
THE MOON, DEUS LUNUS, PHOEBE.
THIS archaic symbol is the most
poetical of all symbols, as also the most philosophical. The ancient Greeks
brought it into prominence, and the modern poets have worn it threadbare. The
Queen of Night, riding in the majesty of her peerless light in heaven, throwing
all, even Hesperos, into darkness, and spreading her silver mantle over the
whole sidereal world, has ever been a favourite theme with all the poets of
Christendom, from Milton and Shakespeare down to the latest versifier. But the
refulgent lamp of night, with her suite of stars unnumbered, spoke only to the
imagination of the profane. Until lately, Religion and Science had nought to do
with the beautiful mythos. Yet, the cold chaste moon, she, in the words of
Shelley --
. . . . "Who makes all beautiful
on which she smiles
That wandering shrine of soft, yet
icy flame,
Which ever is transformed, yet still
the same,
And warms, but not illumines." .
. . .
stands in closer relations to Earth
than any other sidereal orb. The Sun is the giver of life to the whole
planetary system; the Moon is the giver of life to our globe; and the early
races understood and knew it, even in their infancy. She is the Queen and she
is the King, and was King Soma before she became transformed into Phoebe and
the chaste Diana. She is pre-eminently the deity of the Christians, through the
Mosaic and Kabalistic Jews, though the civilized world may have remained
ignorant of the fact for long ages; in fact, ever since the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* With the Egyptians it was the
resurrection in rebirth after 3,000 years of purification, either in Devachan
or "the fields of bliss."
** Such "frog-goddesses"
may be seen at Bulaq, in the Cairo Museum. For the statement about the Church
lamps and inscriptions it is the learned ex-director of the Bulaq Museum, Mr.
Gaston Maspero, who must be held responsible. (See his "Guide du Visiteur
au Musee de Bulaq," p. 146.)
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last initiated Father of the Church
died, carrying with him into his grave the secrets of the pagan temples. For
the "Fathers" -- such as Origen or Clemens Alexandrinus -- the Moon
was Jehovah's living symbol: the giver of Life and the giver of Death, the
disposer of being -- in our World. For, if Artemis was Luna in Heaven, and,
with the Greeks, Diana on Earth, who presided over child-birth and life: with
the Egyptians, she was Hekat (Hecate) in Hell, the goddess of Death, who ruled
over magic and enchantments. More than this: as the personified moon, whose
phenomena are triadic, Diana-Hecate-Luna is the three in one. For she is Diva
triformis, tergemina, triceps -- three heads on one neck,* like
Brahma-Vishnu-Siva. Hence she is the prototype of our Trinity, which has not
always been entirely male. The number seven, so prominent in the Bible, so
sacred in its seventh (Sabbath) day, came to the Jews from Antiquity, deriving
its origin from the four-fold number 7 contained in the 28 days of the lunar
month, each septenary portion thereof being typified by one quarter of the
moon.
It is worth the trouble of presenting
in this work a bird's-eye view of the origin and development of the lunar myth
and worship in historical antiquity, on our side of the globe. Its earlier
origin is untraceable by exact science, rejecting as it does tradition; while
for Theology, which, under the guidance of the crafty Popes, has put a brand on
every fragment of literature that does not bear the imprimatur of the Church of
Rome, its archaic history is a sealed book. Whether the Egyptian or the Aryan
Hindu religious philosophy is the more ancient -- and the Secret Doctrine says
it is the latter -- does not much matter in this instance, as the lunar and
solar "worship" are the most ancient in the world. Both have
survived, and prevail to this day throughout the whole world, with some openly,
with others -- e.g., in Christian symbolics -- secretly. The cat, a lunar
symbol, was sacred to Isis, herself the Moon in one sense, as Osiris was the
Sun. The cat is often seen on the top of the Sistrum in the hand of the
goddess. This animal was held in great veneration in the city of Bubaste, which
went into deep mourning after the death of every sacred cat, because Isis, as
the Moon, was particularly worshipped in this city of mysteries. The
astronomical symbolism connected with it has already been given in Section I.
of "Symbolism," and no one has better described it than Mr. G.
Massey, in his Lectures and in "The Natural Genesis." The eye of the
cat, it is said, seems to follow the lunar phases in its growth and decline,
and its orbs shine like two stars in the darkness of night. Hence the
mythological allegory which shows Diana hiding under the shape of a cat in the
Moon, when, in company with other deities, she was seeking to
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The goddess [[Trimorphos]] in the
statuary of Alcamenes.
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escape the pursuit of Typhon (Vide
the Metamorphoses of Ovid). The moon in Egypt was both the "Eye of
Horus" and the "Eye of Osiris," the Sun.
The same with the Cynocephalus. The
dog-headed ape was a glyph to symbolise the sun and moon, in turn, though the
Cynocephalus is more a Hermetic than a religious symbol. For it is the
hieroglyph of Mercury, the planet, as of the Mercury of the Alchemical
philosophers, "as," say the Alchemists, "Mercury has to be ever
near Isis, as her minister, as without Mercury neither Isis nor Osiris can
accomplish anything in the GREAT WORK." Cynocephalus, whenever represented
with the Caduceus, the Crescent, or the Lotus, is a glyph of the
"philosophical" Mercury; but when seen with a reed, or a roll of
parchment, he stands for Hermes, the secretary and adviser of Isis, as Hanuman
filled the same office with Rama.
Though the regular Sun-Worshippers,
the Parsis, are few, yet not only is the bulk of the Hindu mythology and
history based upon and interblended with these two worships, but so is also the
Christian religion itself. From their origin down to our modern day it has
coloured the theologies of both the Roman Catholic and Protestant Churches. The
difference, indeed, between the Aryan Hindu and the Aryan European faiths is
very small, if only the fundamental ideas of both are taken into consideration.
Hindus are proud of calling themselves Suryas and Chandravansas (of the Solar
and Lunar dynasties). The Christians pretend to regard it as idolatry, and yet
they adhere to a religion entirely based upon the solar and lunar worships. It
is useless and vain for the Protestants to exclaim against the Roman Catholics
for their "Mariolatry," based on the ancient cult of lunar goddesses,
when they themselves worship Jehovah, pre-eminently a lunar god, and when both
Churches have accepted in their theologies the "Sun"-Christ and the
lunar trinity.
What is known of Chaldaean
Moon-Worship, of the Babylonian god, Sin, called by the Greeks "Deus
Lunus," is very little, and that little is apt to mislead the profane
student who fails to grasp the esoteric significance of the symbols. As
popularly known to the ancient profane philosophers and writers (for those who
were initiated were pledged to silence) the Chaldaea were the worshippers of
the moon under her (and his) various names, just as were the Jews, who came
after them.
In the unpublished MSS. on the Art
Speech, already mentioned, giving a key to the formation of the ancient
(symbolical) languages a logical raison d'etre is brought forward for this
double worship. It is written by a wonderfully well-informed and acute scholar
and Mystic, who gives it in the comprehensive form of a hypothesis. The latter,
however, becomes forcibly a proven fact in the history of religious
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evolution in human thought, to anyone
who has ever had a glimpse into the secret of ancient Symbology. Thus, he
says:--
"One of the first occupations
among men, connected with those of actual necessity, would be the perception of
time periods,* marked on the vaulted arch of the heavens sprung and rising over
the level floor of the horizon, or the plain of still water. These would come
to be marked as those of day and night, of the phases of the moon, of its
stellar or synodic revolutions, and of the period of the solar year with
recurrence of the seasons, and with the application to such periods of the
natural measure of day or night, or of the day divided into the light and the
dark. It would also be discovered that there was a longest and shortest solar
day, and two solar days of equal day and night, within the period of the solar
year; and the points in the year of these could be marked with the greatest
precision in the starry groups of the heavens or the constellations, subject to
that retrograde movement thereof, which in time would require a correction by
intercalation, as was the case in the description of the Flood, where correction
of 150 days was made for a period of 600 years, during which confusion of
landmarks had increased. . . . This would naturally come to pass . . . . with
all races in all time; and such knowledge must be taken to have been inherent
in the human race, prior to what we call the historic period. . . . ."
On this basis, the author seeks for
some natural physical function possessed in common by the human race, and
connected with the periodical manifestations, such that "the connection
between the two kinds of phenomena . . . became fixed in popular usage."
He finds it "(a) in the feminine physiological phenomena every lunar month
of 28 days, or" 4 weeks of 7 days each, so that 13 occurrences of the
period should happen in 364 days, which is the solar week year of 52 weeks of 7
days each. (b) The quickening of the foetus is marked by a period of 126 days,
or 18 weeks of 7 days each. (c) That period which is called "the period of
viability" is one of 210 days, or 30 weeks of 7 days each. (d) The period
of parturition is accomplished in 280 days, or a period of 40 weeks of 7 days
each, or 10 lunar months of 28 days each, or of 9 calendar months of 31 days
each, counting on the royal arch of heavens for the measure of the period of
traverse from the darkness of the womb to the light and glory of conscious
existence, that continuing inscrutable mystery and miracle . . . Thus the
observed periods of time marking the workings of the birth function would
naturally become a basis of astronomical calculation . . . We may almost affirm
. . . that this was the mode of reckoning among all nations, either
independently, or intermediately and indirectly by tuition. It was the mode
with the Hebrews, for even to-day they calculate the calendar by means of the
354 and 355 of the lunar year, and we possess a special evidence that it was
the mode with the ancient Egyptians, as to which this is the proof:--
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Ancient Mythology includes ancient
Astronomy as well as Astrology. The planets were the hands pointing out, on the
dial of our solar system, the hours of certain periodical events. Thus, Mercury
was the messenger appointed to keep time during the daily solar and lunar
phenomena, and was otherwise connected with the God and Goddess of Light.
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"The basic idea underlying the
religious philosophy of the Hebrews was that God contained all things within
himself*; and that man was his image, man including woman . . . The place of
the man and woman with the Hebrews was among the Egyptians occupied by the bull
and the cow, sacred to Osiris and Isis,** who were represented, respectively,
by a man having a bull's head, and a woman having the head of a cow, which
symbols were worshipped. Notoriously Osiris was the Sun and the river Nile, the
tropical year of 365 days, which number is the value of the word Neilos, and
the bull, as he was also the principle of fire and of life-giving force, while
Isis was the Moon, the bed of the river Nile, or the Mother Earth, for the
parturient energies of which water was a necessity, the lunar year of 354-364
days, the time-maker of the periods of gestation, and the cow marked by, or
with, the crescent new moon." . . . .
"But the use of the cow of the
Egyptians for the women of the Hebrews was not intended as of any radical
difference of signification, but a concurrence in the teaching intended, and
merely as a substitution of a symbol of common import, which was this, viz.,
the period of parturition with the cow and the woman was held to be the same,
or 280 days, or ten lunar months of four weeks each. And in this period
consisted the essential value of this animal symbol, whose mark was that of the
crescent moon.*** . . . These parturient and natural periods are found to have
been subjects of symbolism all over the world. They were thus used by the
Hindus, and are found to be most plainly set forth by the ancient Americans, in
the Richardson and Gest tablets, in the Palenque Cross; and manifestly lay at
the base of the formation of the calendar forms of the Mayas of Yucatan, the
Hindus, the Assyrians, and the ancient Babylonians, as well as the Egyptians
and old Hebrews. The natural symbols . . . would be either the phallus or the
phallus and yoni, . . . or male and female. Indeed, the words translated by the
generalizing terms male and female, in the 27th verse of the 1st chapter of
Genesis are . . . sacr and n'cabrah, or literally, phallus and yoni,**** while
the representation of the phallic emblems would barely indicate the genital
members of the human body, when their functions and the development of the
seed-vesicles emanating from them was considered; then would come into
indication a mode of measures of lunar time, and, through lunar, of solar
time." . . .
This is the physiological or
anthropological key to the Moon symbol. The key that opens the mystery of
theogony, or the evolution of the Manvantaric gods, is more complicated, and
has nothing phallic in it. All is mystical and divine there. But the Jews,
beyond connecting Jehovah directly with the Moon as a generative god, preferred
to ignore the higher hierarchies, and have made of some of them (zodiacal
constellations and planetary gods) their Patriarchs, thus euhemerizing the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* A caricatured and dwarfed Vedantin
notion of Parabrahmam containing within itself the whole Universe as being that
boundless Universe itself, and there existing nothing outside of itself.
** Just as they are to this day in
India, the bull of Siva and the cow representing several Sakti -- goddesses.
*** Hence the worship of the moon by
the Hebrews.
**** "Male and female, created
he them."
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purely theosophical idea and dragging
it down to the level of sinful humanity. (See section "Holy of
Holies" in the "Symbolism" of Book II.) The MSS. from which the
above is extracted explains very clearly to what hierarchy of gods Jehovah belonged,
and who this Jewish GOD was; for it shows in clear language that which the
writer has always insisted upon -- namely, that the God with which the
Christians have burdened themselves was no better than the lunar symbol of the
reproductive or generative faculty in nature. They have ever ignored even the
Hebrew secret god of the Kabalists, Ain-Soph, as grand as Parabrahmam in the
earliest Kabalistic and mystical conceptions. But it is not the Kabala of
Rosenroth that can ever give the true original teachings of Simeon-Ben-Iochai,
as metaphysical and philosophical as any. And how many are there among the
students of the Kabala who knew anything of them except in their distorted
Latin translations. Let us glance at the idea which led the ancient Jews to
adopt a substitute for the ever UNKNOWABLE, and which has misled the Christians
into mistaking the substitute for the reality.
"If to these organs (phallus and
yoni) as symbols of creative cosmic agencies the idea of . . . . time periods
can be attached, then, indeed, in the construction of Temples as Dwellings of
Deity, or of Jehovah, that post designated as the Holy of Holies, or the most
High Place, should borrow its title from the recognized sacredness of the
generative organs, considered as symbols of measures as well as of creative
Cause."
"With the ancient wise, there
was no name, and no idea, and no symbol, of a First Cause.* With the Hebrews,
the indirect conception of such was couched in a term of negation of
comprehension -- viz., Ain-Soph, or the Without Bounds. But the symbol of its
first comprehensible manifestation, was the conception of a circle with its
diameter line. . . . . (See the Proem of Book I., Part I.) to carry at once a
geometric, phallic, and astronomic idea . . . . for the one takes its birth
from the nought or the Circle, without which it could not be, and from one, or
primal one, spring the nine digits, and, geometrically, all plane shapes. So in
the Kabala this Circle, with its diameter line, is the picture of the ten
Sephiroth or Emanations, composing the Adam Kadmon, the Archetypal Man, the
creative origin of all things. . . . . This idea of connecting the circle and
its diameter line, that is, number ten, with the signification of the
reproductive organs, and the Most Holy Place, was carried out constructively in
the King's Chamber, or Holy of Holies, of the great Pyramid, in the Tabernacle
of Moses, and in the Holy of Holies of the Temple of Solomon. . . . . It is the
picture of a double-womb, for in Hebrew the letter he [[diagram]] is at the same
time the number 5 and symbol of the womb, and twice 5 is 10, or the phallic
number."
This "double womb" also
shows the duality of the idea carried from
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* Because it was too sacred. It is
referred to as THAT in the Vedas: it is the "Eternal Cause," and
cannot, therefore, be spoken of as a "First Cause," a term implying
the absence of any cause, at one time.
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the highest, spiritual, down to the
lowest or terrestrial plane; and by the Jews limited to the latter. With them,
therefore the number 7 has acquired the most prominent place in their exoteric
religion, a cult of external forms and empty rituals; as their Sabbath, for
instance, the seventh day sacred to their deity, the moon, symbolical of the
generative Jehovah. While with other nations the number seven was typical of
theogonic evolution, of cycles, cosmic planes, and the Seven Forces and Occult
Powers in Kosmos, as a boundless whole, whose first upper triangle was
unreachable to the finite intellect of man -- while other nations, therefore,
busied themselves, in their forcible limitation of Kosmos in Space and Time,
only with its septenary manifested plane, the Jews centred this member solely
in the moon, and based all their sacred calculations thereupon. Hence we find
the thoughtful author of the MSS. just quoted, remarking, in reference to the
metrology of the Jews that: "If 20,612 be multiplied by 4/3 the product
will afford a base for the ascertainment of the mean revolution of the moon,
and if this product be again multiplied by 4/3, this continued product will
afford a base for finding the exact period of the mean solar year, . . . this
form . . . becoming, for the finding of astronomical periods of time, of very
great service." This double number (male and female) is symbolized also in
some well-known idols: e.g., "Ardanari-Iswara, the Isis of the Hindus,
Eridanus, or Ardan, or the Hebrew Jordan, or source of descent. She is standing
on a lotus-leaf flowing on the water. But the signification is, that it is
androgyne or hermaphrodite, that is phallus and yoni combined, the number 10,
the Hebrew letter Jod [[diagram]], the containment of Jehovah. She, or rather
she-he, gives the minutes of the same circle of 360 degrees."
"Jehovah," in its best
aspect is Binah, "the Upper mediating Mother, the Great Sea or Holy
Spirit;" therefore rather a synonym of Mary, the Mother of Jesus, than of
his Father; that "Mother, being the Latin Mare" the Sea is here also,
Venus, the Stella del Mare, or "Star of the Sea."
The ancestors of the mysterious
Akkadians -- the Chandra or Indovansas, the Lunar Kings whom tradition shows
reigning at Prayag (Allahabad) ages before our era -- had come from India, and
brought with them the worship of their forefathers, of Soma, and his son Budha,
which afterwards became that of the Chaldeans. Yet such adoration, apart from
popular Astrolatry and Heliolatry, was in no sense idolatry. No more, at any
rate, than the modern Roman Catholic symbolism which connects their Virgin Mary
-- the Magna Mater of the Syrians and Greeks -- with the Moon.
Of this worship, the most pious Roman
Catholics feel quite proud,
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and loudly confess to it. In a
Memoire to the French Academy, the Marquis De Mirville says:--
"It is only natural that, as an
unconscious prophecy, Ammon-Ra should be his mother's husband, since the Magna
Mater of the Christians is precisely the spouse of that son she conceives. . .
. We (Christians) can understand now why Neithis throws radiance on the sun,
while remaining the Moon, since the VIRGIN, who is the QUEEN OF HEAVEN, as
Neith was, clothes herself in her radiance, and clothes in his turn the
CHRIST-SUN. "Tu vestis solem et te sol vestit.". . . is sung by the
Roman Catholics during their service, and he adds:--
"We (Christians) understand also
how it is that the famous inscription at Sais should have stated that 'none has
ever lifted my peplum (veil),' considering that this sentence, literally
translated, is the summary of what is sung in the Church on the day of the
immaculate conception." (ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE VIRGIN MOTHER," p. 117.)
Surely nothing could be more sincere
than this! It justifies entirely what Mr. Gerald Massey has said in his Lecture
on "Luniolatry, Ancient and Modern":--
"The man in the moon
(Osiris-Sut, Jehovah-Satan, Christ-Judas, and other Lunar twins) is often
charged with bad conduct. . . . In the lunar phenomena the moon was one as the
moon, which was two-fold in sex, and three-fold in character -- as mother,
child, and adult male. Thus the child of the moon became the consort of his own
mother! It could not be helped if there was to be any reproduction. He was
compelled to be his own father! These relationships were repudiated by later
sociology, and the primitive man in the moon got tabooed. Yet, in its latest,
most inexplicable phase, this has become the central doctrine of the grossest
superstition the world has seen, for these lunar phenomena and their humanly
represented relationships, the incestuous included, are the very foundations of
the Christian Trinity in Unity. Through ignorance of the symbolism, the simple
representation of early time has become the most profound religious mystery in
modern Luniolatry. The Roman Church, without being in any wise ashamed of the
proof, portrays the Virgin Mary arrayed with the sun, and the horned moon at
her feet, holding the lunar infant in her arms -- as child and consort of the
mother moon. The mother, child, and adult male, are fundamental."
"In this way it can be proved
that our Christology is mummified mythology, and legendary lore, which have
been palmed off upon us in the Old Testament and the New, as divine revelation
uttered by the very voice of God."
A charming allegory is found in the
Zohar, one which unveils better than anything ever did the true character of
Jehovah or YHVH in the primitive conception of the Hebrew Kabalists. It is now
found in the philosophy of I'bn Gebirol's Kabbalah, translated by Isaac Myer.
"In the introduction written by R'Hez'quee-yah, which is very old,"
says our author, "and forms part of our Brody edition of the Zohar (I, 5b.
sq.) is an account of a journey taken by R. El'azar, son of R. Shim-on b. Io'hai,
and Rabbi Abbah." They met a man with a heavy burden and asked his name;
but he refused to give it and proceeded to explain to them Thorah
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(Law). "They asked: 'Who caused
thee thus to walk and carry such a heavy load?' He answered: 'The letter
[[diagram]], (Yod, which = 10, and is the symbolical letter of Kether and the
essence and germ of the Holy name [[diagram]] YHVH) . . . . They said to him:
'If thou wilt tell us the name of thy father, we will kiss the dust of thy
feet.' He replied: 'As to my father, he had his dwelling in the Great Sea, and
was a fish therein' (like Vishnu and Dagon or Oannes), 'which (first) destroyed
the great sea' . . . . . and he was great and mighty and 'Ancient of Days,'
until he swallowed all the other fishes in the (Great) Sea . . . R. El'azar
listened and said to him: 'Thou art the Son of the Holy Flame, thou art the Son
of Rab Ham -- 'nun-ah Sabah [the old: the fish in Aramaic or Chaldee is nun
(noon)] thou art the Son of the Light of the Thorah," (Dharma) etc. Then
the author explains that the feminine Sephiroth, Binah, is termed by the Kabalist
the great sea: therefore Binah, whose divine names are Jehovah, Yah, and
Elohim, is simply the Chaldean Tiamat, the female power, the Thalatth of
Berosus, who presides over the Chaos, and was made out later by Christian
theology to be the serpent and the Devil. She-He (Yah-hovah) is the supernal
(Heh, and Eve). This Yah-hovah then or Jehovah, is identical with our Chaos --
Father, Mother, Son, -- on the material plane and in the purely physical World.
Demon and Deus at one and the same time; the sun and moon, good and evil, God
and Demon.
Lunar magnetism generates life,
preserves and destroys it, psychically as well as physically. And if,
astronomically, she is one of the seven planets of the ancient world, in
theogony she is one of the regents thereof; with Christians now as much as with
Pagans, the former referring to her under the name of one of their archangels,
and the latter under that of one of their gods.
Therefore the meaning of the
"fairy tale" translated by Chwolson from an old Chaldean MSS. translated
into Arabic, about Qu-tamy being instructed by the idol of the moon, is easily
understood (vide Book III.) Seldenus tells us the secret as well as Maimonides
(More Nevochim, Book III., ch. xxx). The worshippers of the Teraphim (the
Jewish Oracles) "carved images and claimed that the light of the principal
stars (planets) permeating these through and through, the angelic VIRTUES (or
the regents of the stars and planets) conversed with them, teaching them many
most useful things and arts." And Seldenus explains that the Teraphim were
built and composed after the position of certain planets, those which the
Greeks called [[stoicheia]], and according to figures that were located in the
sky and called [[alexeteroi]], or the tutelary gods. Those who traced out the
[[stoicheia]] were called [[stoicheiomatichoi]], or the diviners by the
[[stoicheia]]. (De Diis Syriis, Teraph, II. Synt. p. 31) vide infra, the
Teraphim.
It is such sentences, however, in the
"Nabathean agriculture," that
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have frightened the men of science
and made them proclaim the work "either an apocrypha or a fairy tale,
unworthy of the notice of an Academician." At the same time, as shown,
zealous Roman Catholics and Protestants tore it metaphorically to pieces; the
former because "it described the worship of demons," the latter
because it is "ungodly." They are all wrong, once more. It is not a
fairy tale; and as far as regards pious Churchmen, the same worship may be
shown in the Scriptures, however disfigured by translation. Solar and Lunar
worship, as well as that of the Stars and Elements, are traced, and figure in
the Christian theology; defended by Papists, they are stoutly denied by the
Protestants only at their own risk and peril. Two instances may be given.
Ammianus Marcellinus teaches that
ancient divinations were always accomplished with the help of the Spirits of
the Elements, "Spiritus elementorum, and in Greek [[pneumata ton
stoicheion]]" (1. I., 21).
But it is found now that the planets,
the Elements, and the Zodiac, were figured not only in Heliopolis by the twelve
stones called "mysteries of the elements," elementorum arcana, but
also in Solomon's temple, and, as pointed out by various writers, in several
old Italian churches and even at Notre Dame de Paris where they can be seen to
this day.
No symbol -- the sun included -- was
more complex in its manifold meanings than the lunar symbol. The sex was, of
course, dual. With some it was male, e.g., the Hindu "King Soma," and
the Chaldean Sin; with other nations it was female, the beauteous goddesses
Diana-Luna, I'lythia, Lucina. In Tauris, human victims were sacrificed to
Artemis, a form of the lunar goddess; the Cretans called her Dictynna, and the
Medes and Persians Anaitis, as shown by an inscription of Koloe: '[[Artemidi
'Anaeiti]]. But, we are now concerned chiefly with the most chaste and pure of
the virgin goddesses, Luna-Artemis, to whom Pamphos was the first to give the
surname of [[Kalliste]], and of whom Hippolitus wrote: [[Kallista polu
parthenon]]. (See Pausanias viii., 35, 8.) This Artemis-Lochia, the goddess
that presided at conception and child-birth (Iliad, Pausanias, etc., etc.), is,
in her functions and as the triple Hecate, the Orphic deity, the predecessor of
the God of the Rabbins and pre-Christian Kabalists, and his lunar type. The
goddess [[Trimorphos]] was the personified symbol of the various and successive
aspects represented by the moon in each of her three phases; and this
interpretation was already that of the Stoics (Cornut. De Nat, D. 34, 1), while
the Orpheans explained the epithet ([[Trimorphos]]) by the three kingdoms of
nature over which she reigned. jealous, blood-thirsty, revengeful and exacting,
Hecate-Luna is a worthy counterpart of the "Jealous God" of the
Hebrew prophets.
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The whole riddle of the solar and
lunar worship, as now traced in the churches, hangs indeed on this world-old
mystery of lunar phenomena. The correlative forces in the "Queen of
Night," that lie latent for modern science, but are fully active to the
knowledge of Eastern adepts, explain well the thousand and one images under
which the moon was represented by the ancients. It also shows how much more
profoundly learned in the Selenic mysteries were the ancients than are now our
modern astronomers. The whole Pantheon of the lunar gods and goddesses, Nephtys
or Neith, Proserpina, Melytta, Cybele, Isis, Astarte, Venus, and Hecate, on the
one hand, and Apollo, Dionysius, Adonis, Bacchus, Osiris, Atys, Thammuz, etc.,
etc., on the other, all show on the face of their names and titles -- those of
"Sons" and "Husbands" of their mothers -- their identity
with the Christian Trinity. In every religious system the gods were made to
merge their functions as Father, Son, and Husband, into one, and the goddesses
were identified as "Wife, Mother, and Sister" of the male God; the
former synthesizing the human attributes as the "Sun, the giver of
Life," the latter merging all the other titles in the grand synthesis
known as Maia, Maya, Maria, etc., a generic name. Maia, in its forced
derivation, has come to mean with the Greeks, "mother," from the root
ma (nurse), and even gave its name to the month of May, which was sacred to all
those goddesses before it became consecrated to Mary.* Its primitive meaning,
however, was Maya, Durga, translated by the Orientalists as
"inaccessible," but meaning in truth the "unreachable," in
the sense of illusion and unreality; as being the source and cause of spells,
the personification of ILLUSION.
In religious rites the moon served a
dual purpose. Personified as a female goddess for exoteric purposes, or as a
male god in allegory and symbol, in occult philosophy our satellite was
regarded as a sexless Potency to be well studied, because it was to be dreaded.
With the initiated Aryans, Khaldii, Greeks and Romans, Soma, Sin, Artemis
Soteira (the hermaphrodite Apollo, whose attribute is the lyre, and the bearded
Diana of the bow and arrow), Deus Lunus, and especially Osiris-lunus and
Thot-lunus,** were the occult potencies of the moon. But whether male or
female, whether Thot or Minerva, Soma or Astoreth, the Moon is the Occult
mystery of mysteries, and more a symbol of evil than of good. Her seven phases
(original, esoteric division) are divided into three astronomical phenomena and
four
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Roman Catholics are indebted
for the idea of consecrating the month of May to the Virgin, to the pagan
Plutarch, who shows that "May is sacred to Maia ([[Maia]]) or Vesta"
(Aulus-Gellius, word Maia) -- our mother-earth, our nurse and nourisher
personified.
** Thot-Lunus is
"Budha-Soma" of India, or "Mercury and the Moon."
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purely psychic phases. That the moon
was not always reverenced is shown in the Mysteries, in which the death of the
moon-god (the three phases of gradual waning and final disappearance) was
allegorized by the moon standing for the genius of evil that triumphs for the
time over the light and life-giving god (the sun), and all the skill and
learning of the ancient Hierophants in Magic was required to turn this triumph
into a defeat.
It was the most ancient worship of
all, that of the third Race of our Round, the Hermaphrodites, to whom the
male-moon became sacred, when after the "Fall" so-called, the sexes
had become separated. "Deus Lunus" then became an androgyne, male and
female in turn; to serve finally, for purposes of sorcery, as a dual power, to
the Fourth Root-race, the Atlanteans. With the Fifth (our own) the lunar-solar
worship divided the nations into two distinct, antagonistic camps. It led to
events described aeons later in the Mahabharatan War, which to the Europeans is
the fabulous, to the Hindus and Occultists the historical, strife between the
Suryavansas and the Indovansas. Originating in the dual aspect of the moon, the
worship of the female and the male principles respectively, it ended in
distinct solar and lunar cults. Among the Semitic races, the sun was for a very
long time feminine and the moon masculine -- the latter notion being adopted by
them from the Atlantean traditions. The moon was called "the Lord of the
sun," Bel-Skemesh,* before the Shemesh worship. The ignorance of the
incipient reasons for such a distinction, and of occult principles, led the
nations into anthropomorphic idol-worship. But the religion of every ancient
nation had been primarily based upon the Occult manifestations of a purely
abstract Force or Principle now called "God." The very establishment
of such worship shows, in its details and rites, that the philosophers who
evolved those systems of nature, subjective and objective, possessed profound
knowledge, and were acquainted with many facts
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* During that period which is absent
from the Mosaic books -- from the exile of Eden to the allegorical Flood -- the
Jews worshipped with the rest of the Semites Dayanisi [[hebrew]] "the
Ruler of Men," the "Judge," or the SUN. Though the Jewish canon
and Christianism have made the sun become the "Lord God" and Jehovah
in the Bible, yet the latter is full of indiscreet traces of the androgyne
Deity, which was Jehovah the sun, and Astoreth the moon in its female aspect,
and quite free from the present metaphorical element given to it. God is a
"consuming fire," appears in, and is encompassed by fire." It
was not only in vision that Ezekiel (viii., 16) saw the Jews "worshipping
the sun." The Baal of the Israelites (the Shemesh of the Moabites and the
Moloch of the Ammonites) was the identical "Sun-Jehovah," and he is
till now "the King of the Host of Heaven," the Sun, as much as
Astoreth was the "Queen of Heaven" -- or the moon. The "Sun of
Righteousness" has become a metaphorical expression only now.
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of a scientific nature. For besides
being purely Occult, the rites of lunar worship were based, as just shown, upon
a knowledge of physiology (quite a modern science with us), psychology, sacred
mathematics, geometry and metrology, in their right applications to symbols and
figures, which are but glyphs, recording observed natural and scientific facts;
in short, upon a most minute and profound knowledge of nature. Lunar magnetism
generates life, preserves and kills it. Soma embodies the triple power of the
Trimurti, though it passes unrecognized by the profane to this day. The
allegory that makes Soma, the moon, produced by the churning of the Ocean of
Life (Space) by the gods in another Manvantara (i.e., in the pregenetic day of
our planetary system), and that other allegory, which shows "the Rishis
milking the earth, whose calf was Soma, the moon," has a deep cosmographical
meaning; for it is neither our earth which is milked, nor was the moon, which
we know, the calf.* Had our wise men of science known as much of the mysteries
of nature as the ancient Aryans did, they would surely never have imagined that
the moon was projected from the Earth. Once more, the oldest of permutations in
theogony, the Son becoming his own father and the mother generated by the Son,
has to be remembered and taken into consideration if the symbolical language of
the ancients is to be understood by us. Otherwise mythology will be ever
haunting the Orientalists as simply "the disease which springs up at a
peculiar stage of human culture!" -- as Renouf gravely observes in a
Hibbert lecture.
The ancients taught the, so to speak,
auto-generation of the Gods: the one divine essence, unmanifested, perpetually
begetting a second-self, manifested, which second-self, androgynous in its
nature, gives birth in an immaculate way to everything macro- and
micro-cosmical in this universe. This was shown in the Circle and the Diameter,
or the Sacred 10, a few pages back.
But our Orientalists, their extreme
desire to discover one homogeneous element in nature notwithstanding, will not
see it; cramped in their researches by such ignorance, they -- the Aryanists
and Egyptologists -- are constantly led astray from truth in their
speculations. Thus, de Rouge is unable to understand, in the text which he
translates, the meaning of Ammon-Ra saying to King Amenophes (supposed to be
Memnon), "Thou art my Son, I have begotten thee"; and as he
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The earth flees for her life in the
allegory, before Prithu, who pursues her. She assumes the shape of a cow, and,
trembling with terror, runs away and hides even in the regions of Brahma.
Therefore, it is not our Earth. Again, in every Purana, the calf changes name.
In one it is Manu Swayambhuva, in another Indra, in a third the Himavat
(Himalayas) itself, while Meru was the milker. This is a deeper allegory than
one thinks.
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finds the same idea in many a text
and under various forms, this very Christian Orientalist is finally compelled
to exclaim that "for this idea to have entered the mind of a
hierogrammatist, there must have been in their religion a more or less defined
doctrine, indicating as a possible fact that might come to pass, a divine and immaculate
incarnation under a human form." Precisely. But why throw the explanation
on an impossible prophecy, when the whole secret is explained by the later
religion copying the earlier?
That doctrine was universal, and it
was not the mind of any one hierogrammatist that evolved it; for the Indian
avatars are a proof to the contrary. After which, having come "to realize
clearer"* what "the Divine Father and Son" were with the
Egyptians, de Rouge still fails to account for, and perceive what were the functions
attributed to the feminine principle in that primordial generation. He does not
find it in the goddess Neith, of Sais. Yet he quotes the sentence of the
Commander to Cambyses when introducing that king into the Saitic temple:
"I made known to his Majesty the dignity of Sais, which is the abode of
Neith, the great (female) producer, genitrix of the Sun, who is the first-born,
and who is not begotten, but only brought forth," and hence is the fruit
of an immaculate mother.
How much more grandiose, philosophical
and poetical is the real distinction -- for whoever is able to understand and
appreciate it -- made between the immaculate virgin of the ancient Pagans and
the modern Papal conception. With the former, the ever-youthful mother nature,
the antitype of her prototypes, the sun and moon, generates and brings forth
her "mind-born" son, the Universe. The Sun and Moon, as male-female
deities, fructify the earth, the microcosmical mother, and the latter conceives
and brings forth, in her turn. With the Christians, "the first-born"
(primogenitus) is indeed generated, i.e., begotten, "genitum, non
factum," and positively conceived and brought forth -- "Virgo
pariet," explains the Latin Church. Thus, she drags down the noble spiritual
ideal of the Virgin Mary to the earth, and, making her "of the earth
earthy," degrades that ideal to the lowest of the anthropomorphic
goddesses of the rabble.
Truly, Neith, Isis, Diana, etc.,
etc., were each of them "a demiurgical goddess, at once visible and
invisible, having her place in Heaven, and helping to the generation of
species" -- the moon, in short. Her occult aspects and powers are
numberless, and, in one of them, the moon becomes with
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* His clear realization of it is,
that the Egyptians prophesied Jehovah (!) and his incarnated Redeemer (the good
serpent), etc., etc.; even to identifying Typhon with the wicked dragon of the
garden of Eden, and this passes as serious and sober science.
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the Egyptians Hathor, another aspect
of Isis,* and both of these goddesses are shown suckling Horus. Behold in the
Egyptian Hall of the British Museum, Hathor worshipped by Pharaoh Thotmes, who
stands between her and the Lord of Heavens. The monolith was taken from Karnac;
and the same goddess has the following legend inscribed on her throne:
"THE DIVINE MOTHER AND LADY, OR QUEEN OF HEAVEN"; also "the
MORNING STAR," and the "LIGHT OF THE SEA" (Stella matutina and
Lux maris). All the lunar goddesses had a dual aspect -- one divine, the other
infernal. All were the virgin mothers of an immaculately born Son -- the SUN.
Raoul Rochetti shows the moon-goddess of the Athenians -- Pallas, or Cybele,
Minerva, or again Diana -- holding her child-son on the lap, invoked in her
festivals as [[Monogenes Theou]], "the one Mother of God," sitting on
a lion, and surrounded by twelve personages; in whom the Occultist recognises
the twelve great gods, and the pious Christian Orientalist the apostles, or
rather the Grecian pagan prophecy thereof.
They are both right, for the
immaculate goddess of the Latin Church is a faithful copy of the older pagan
goddesses; the number (twelve) of the apostles is that of the twelve tribes,
and the latter are a personification of the twelve great gods, and of the
twelve signs of the Zodiac. Every detail almost in the Christian dogma is
borrowed from the heathens. Semele, the wife of Jupiter and mother of Bacchus,
the Sun, is, according to Nonnus, also "carried," or made to ascend
to heaven after her death, where she presides between Mars and Venus, under the
name of the Queen of the World, or the universe, [[panbasileia]]; "at the
names of which, as at the names of Hathor, Hecate, and other infernal
goddesses," "tremble all the demons."**
"[[Semelen premousi
daimones]]." This Greek inscription on a small temple, reproduced on a
stone that was found by somebody, and copied by Montfaucon, as De Mirville
tells us (113, Archaeologie de la Vierge mere) informs us of the stupendous
fact, that the Magna Mater of the old world was an impudent plagiarism, perpetrated
by the Demon, of the Immaculate Virgin Mother of his Church. Whether so, or
vice versa, is of no importance. That which is interesting to note is the
perfect identity between the ARCHAIC COPY and the MODERN ORIGINAL.
Did space permit we might show the
inconceivable coolness and unconcern exhibited by certain followers of the
Roman Catholic Church, when made to face the revelations of the Past. To
Maury's remark that "the Virgin took possession of all the Sanctuaries of
Ceres and
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Hathor is the infernal Isis, the
goddess pre-eminently of the West or the nether world.
** This is De Mirville, who proudly
confesses the similarity, and he ought to know.
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Venus, and that the pagan rites,
proclaimed and practised in honour of those goddesses, were in a good measure
transferred to the mother of Christ," the advocate of Rome answers:--
"That such is the fact, and that
it is just as it should be and quite natural. As the dogma, the liturgy, and
the rites professed by the Roman Apostolical Church in 1862 are found engraved
on monuments, inscribed on papyri, and cylinders hardly posterior to the
Deluge, it does seem impossible to deny the existence of a FIRST
ANTE-HISTORICAL (Roman) CATHOLICISM OF WHICH OUR OWN IS BUT THE FAITHFUL
CONTINUATION. . . . But while the former was the culmination, the summum of the
impudence of demons and Goetic necromancy . . . . the latter is divine. If in
our (Christian) Revelation (l'Apocalypse), Mary, clothed with the Sun and
having the moon under her feet, has nothing more in common with the humble
servant of Nazareth (sic.), it is because she has now become the greatest of
theological and cosmological powers in our universe." -- (Archaeol. de la
Vierge, pp. 116 and 119, and by the Marquis de Mirville).
Verily so, since Pindar's Hymns to
Minerva (p. 19) . . . "who sits at the right hand of her Father Jupiter,
and who is more powerful than all the other (angels or) gods," are
likewise applied to the Virgin. It is St. Bernard, who, quoted by Cornelius a
Lapide, is made to address the Virgin Mary in this wise:--
"The Sun-Christ lives in thee
and thou livest in him." (Sermon on the Holy Virgin.) . . . .
Again the Virgin is admitted to be
the MOON by the same unsophisticated holy man. Being the Lucina of the Church,
that is in childbirth, the verse of Virgil -- "Casta fove Lucina, tuus jam
regnat Apollo" -- is applied to her. Like the moon, the Virgin is the
Queen of Heaven," adds the innocent saint; (Apocal., ch. xii., Comm. by
Cornelius a Lapide).
This settles the question. The more
similarity, according to such writers as De Mirville, there exists between the
pagan conceptions and the Christian dogmas, the more divine appears the
Christian religion, and the more is it seen to be the only truly inspired one,
especially in its Roman Catholic form. The unbelieving scientists and the
academicians who think they see in the Latin Church quite the opposite of
divine inspiration, and who will not believe in the satanic tricks of
plagiarism by anticipation, are severely taken to task. But then "they
believe in nothing and reject even the 'Nabathean Agriculture' as a romance and
a pack of superstitious nonsense," complains the memorialist. "In
their perverted opinion Qu-ta-my's 'idol of the moon' and the statue of the
Madonna are one!" A noble Marquis wrote twenty years ago six huge volumes,
or, as he calls them "Memoires to the French Academy," with the sole
object of showing Roman Catholicism an inspired and revealed faith. As a proof
thereof, he furnishes numberless facts, all tending to show that the entire
ancient world, ever since
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the deluge, had been, with the help
of the devil, systematically plagiarizing the rites, ceremonies, and dogmas of
the future Holy Church to be born ages later. What would that faithful son of
Rome have said had he heard his co-religionist -- M. Renouf, the distinguished
Egyptologist of the British Museum -- declaring, in one of his learned
lectures, that "neither Hebrews nor Greeks borrowed any of their ideas
from Egypt?"*
But perhaps it is just this that M.
Renouf intended to say namely -- that it is the Egyptians, the Greeks, and the
Aryans, who borrowed theirs from the Latin Church? And if so, why, in the name
of logic, do the Papists reject the additional information which the Occultists
may give them on Moon-worship, since it all tends to show their (the Roman
Catholic) worship as old as the world -- OF SABAEANISM AND ASTROLATRY?
The reason of early Christian and
later Roman Catholic astrolatry, or the symbolical worship of Sun and Moon --
identical with that of the Gnostics, though less philosophical and pure than
the "Sun worship" of the Zoroastrians -- is a natural consequence of
its birth and origin. The adoption by the Latin Church of such symbols as the
water, fire, sun, moon and stars, and a good many other things, is simply a
continuation by the early Christians of the old worship of Pagan nations. Thus
Odin got his wisdom, power, and knowledge, by sitting at the feet of Mimir, the
thrice-wise Jotun, who passed his life by the fountain of primeval Wisdom, the
crystalline waters of which increased his knowledge daily. Mimir "drew the
highest knowledge from the fountain, because the world was born of water; hence
primeval wisdom was to be found in that mysterious element" ("Asgard
and the Gods," 86). The eye which Odin had to pledge to acquire that knowledge
may be "the Sun, which enlightens and penetrates all things; his other eye
being the moon, whose reflection gazes out of the deep, and which at last, when
setting, sinks into the Ocean." (Ibid.) But it is something more, besides
this. Loki, the fire-god, is said to have hidden in the water, as well as in
the moon, the light-giver, whose reflection he found therein; and this belief
that the fire finds refuge in the water was not limited to the old
Scandinavians. It was shared by all nations and was finally taken up by the early
Christians, who symbolized the Holy Ghost under the shape of Fire, "cloven
tongues like as fire" -- the breath of the Father-SUN. This
"Fire" descends also into the Water or the Sea: Mar, Mary. The dove
was the symbol of the Soul with several nations, it was sacred to Venus, the
goddess born from the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Quoted in Mr. G. Massey's Lecture.
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sea-foam, and it became later the
symbol of the Christian Anima Mundi, or the Holy Spirit.
One of the most occult chapters in
the "Book of the Dead" is ch. lxxx., entitled: "To make the
transformation into the god giving light to the path of Darkness," wherein
"Woman-light of the Shadow" serves Thot in his retreat in the moon.
Thot-Hermes is said to hide therein, because he is the representative of the
Secret Wisdom. He is the manifested logos of its light side, the concealed
deity or "Dark Wisdom" when he is supposed to retire to the opposite
hemisphere. Speaking of her power, the moon calls herself repeatedly: "The
Light which shineth in Darkness," the "Woman-Light." Hence it
became the accepted symbol of all the Virgin-Mother goddesses. As the wicked
"evil" spirits warred against the moon in days of yore, so they are
supposed to war now, without being able to prevail, however, against the actual
Queen of Heaven, Mary, the moon. Hence also the moon was intimately connected
in all the Pagan theogonies with the Dragon, her eternal enemy; the Virgin, or
Madonna, standing on the mythical Satan under that form, crushed and made
powerless, under her feet. This, because the head and tail of the Dragon, which
represent in Eastern astronomy to this day the ascending and descending nodes
of the moon, were also symbolized in ancient Greece by the two serpents.
Hercules kills them on the day of his birth, and so does the babe in his virgin
mother's arms. As Mr. Gerald Massey aptly observes in this connection:
"All such symbols figured their own facts from the first, and did not
pre-figure others of a totally different order. The Iconography (and dogmas,
too) had survived in Rome from a period remotely pre-Christian. There was
neither forgery nor interpolation of types; nothing but a continuity of imagery
with a perversion of its meaning."
--------------
§ X.
TREE, SERPENT, AND CROCODILE WORSHIP.
"Object of horror or of
adoration, men have for the serpent an implacable hatred, or prostrate
themselves before its genius. Lie calls it, Prudence claims it, Envy carries it
in its heart, and Eloquence on its caduceus. In hell it arms the whip of the
Furies; in heaven Eternity makes of it its symbol."
DE CHATEAUBRIAND.
THE Ophites asserted that there were
several kinds of genii, from god to man; that the relative superiority of these
was ruled by the degree
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of light that was accorded to each;
and they maintained that the serpent had to be constantly called upon and to be
thanked for the signal service it had rendered humanity. For it taught Adam
that if he ate of the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, he would
raise his being immensely by the learning and wisdom he would thus acquire.
Such was the exoteric reason given.
It is easy to see whence the primal
idea of this dual, Janus-like character of the Serpent: the good and the bad.
This symbol is one of the most ancient, because the reptile preceded the bird,
and the bird the mammal. Thence the belief, or rather the superstition, of the
savage tribes who think that the souls of their ancestors live under this form,
and the general association of the Serpent with the tree. The legends about the
various things it represents are numberless; but, as most of them are
allegorical, they have now passed into the class of fables based on ignorance
and dark superstition. For instance, when Philostratus narrates that the
natives of India and Arabia fed on the heart and liver of serpents in order to
learn the language of all the animals, the serpent being credited with that faculty,
he certainly never meant his words to be accepted literally. (See De Vita
Apollonii, lib. 1, c. xiv.) As will be found more than once as we proceed, the
"Serpent" and "Dragon" were the names given to the
"Wise Ones," the initiated adepts of olden times. It was their wisdom
and their learning that were devoured or assimilated by their followers, whence
the allegory. When the Scandinavian Sigurd is fabled to have roasted the heart
of Fafnir, the Dragon, whom he had slain, becoming thereby the wisest of men,
it meant the same thing. Sigurd had become learned in the runes and magical
charms; he had received the "word" from an initiate of that name, or
from a sorcerer, after which the latter died, as many do, after "passing
the word." Epiphanius lets out a secret of the Gnostics while trying to
expose their heresies. The Gnostic Ophites, he says, had a reason for honouring
the Serpent: it was because he taught the primeval men the Mysteries (Adv.
Haeres. 37). Verily so; but they did not have Adam and Eve in the garden in
their minds when teaching this dogma, but simply that which is stated above.
The Nagas of the Hindu and Tibetan adepts were human Nagas (Serpents), not
reptiles. Moreover, the Serpent has ever been the type of consecutive or serial
rejuvenation, of IMMORTALITY and TIME.
The numerous and extremely
interesting readings, the interpretations and facts about Serpent worship,
given in "The Natural Genesis," are very ingenious and scientifically
correct. But they are far from covering the whole of the meanings implied. They
divulge only the astronomical and physiological mysteries, with the addition of
some cosmic phenomena. On the lowest plane of materiality the Serpent was, no
doubt,
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"the great mystery in the
mysteries," and was, very likely, "adopted as a type of feminine
pubescence, on account of its sloughing and self-renewal." It was so,
however, only with regard to mysteries concerning terrestrial animal life, for
as symbol of "reclothing and rebirth in the (universal) mysteries"
its "final phase"* -- or shall we rather say its incipient and
culminating phases -- they were not of this plane. They were generated in the
pure realm of ideal light, and having accomplished the round of the whole cycle
of adaptations and symbolism, the "mysteries" returned from whence
they had come -- into the essence of immaterial causality. They belonged to the
highest gnosis. And surely this could have never obtained its name and fame
solely on account of its penetration into physiological and especially feminine
functions!
As a symbol, the Serpent had as many
aspects and occult meanings as the Tree itself; the "Tree of Life,"
with which it was emblematically and almost indissolubly connected. Whether
viewed as a metaphysical or a physical symbol, the Tree and Serpent, jointly,
or separately, have never been so degraded by antiquity as they are now, in
this our age of the breaking of idols, not for truth's sake, but to glorify the
more gross matter. The revelations and interpretations in "The Rivers of
Life" would have astounded the worshippers of the Tree and Serpent in the
days of archaic Chaldean and Egyptian wisdom; and even the early Saivas would
have recoiled in horror at the theories and suggestions of the author of the
said work. "The notion of Payne Knight and Inman that the cross or Tau is
simply a copy of the male organs in a triadic form is radically false,"
writes Mr. G. Massey, who proves what he says. But this is a statement that
could be as justly applied to almost all the modern interpretations of ancient
symbols. "The Natural Genesis," a monumental work of research and
thought, the most complete on that subject that has ever been published,
covering as it does a wider field, and explaining much more than all the
symbologists who have hitherto written, does not yet go beyond the
"psycho-theistic" stage of ancient thought. Nor were Payne Knight and
Inman altogether wrong; except in entirely failing to see that their
interpretations of the "Tree of Life," as the cross and phallus,
fitted the symbol, and approximated it, only on the lowest and last stage of
the evolutionary development of the idea of the GIVER OF LIFE. It was the last
and the grossest physical transformation of nature, in animal, insect, bird,
and even plant; for biune, creative magnetism, in the form of the attraction of
the contraries, or sexual polarization, acts in the constitution of reptile and
bird as it does in that of man. Moreover, the modern symbologists and
Orientalists -- from first to last --
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Natural Genesis, by Gerald
Massey, Vol. 1, p. 340.
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being ignorant of the real mysteries
revealed by occultism, can necessarily see but this last stage. If told that
this mode of procreation, which the whole world of being has now in common on
this earth, is but a passing phase, a physical means of furnishing the
conditions to, and producing the phenomena of life which will alter with this,
and disappear with the next Root-Race -- they would laugh at such a
superstitious and unscientific idea. But the most learned Occultists assert
this because they know it. The universe of living beings, of all those which
procreate their species, is the living witness to the various modes of
procreation in the evolution of animal and human species and races; and the
naturalist ought to sense this truth intuitionally, even though he is yet
unable to demonstrate it. And how could he, indeed, with the present modes of
thought! The landmarks of the archaic history of the past are few and scarce,
and those that men of science come across are mistaken for finger-posts of our
little era. Even so-called "universal" (?) history embraces but a
tiny field in the almost boundless space of the unexplored regions of our
latest, fifth Root-Race. Hence, every fresh sign-post, every new glyph of the
hoary Past that is discovered, is added to the old stock of information, to be interpreted
on the same lines of pre-existing conceptions, and without any reference to the
special cycle of thought which that particular glyph may belong to. How can
Truth ever come to light if this method is never changed!
Thus, in the beginning of their joint
existence as a glyph of Immortal Being, the Tree and Serpent were divine
imagery, truly. The tree was reversed, and its roots were generated in Heaven
and grew out of the Rootless Root of all-being. Its trunk grew and developed,
crossing the planes of Pleroma, it shot out crossways its luxuriant branches,
first on the plane of hardly differentiated matter, and then downward till they
touched the terrestrial plane. Thus, the Asvattha, tree of Life and Being,
whose destruction alone leads to immortality, is said in the Bhagavatgita to
grow with its roots above and its branches below (ch. xv.). The roots represent
the Supreme Being, or First Cause, the LOGOS; but one has to go beyond those
roots to unite oneself with Krishna, who, says Arjuna (XI.), is "greater
than Brahman, and First Cause . . . the indestructible, that which is, that
which is not, and what is beyond them." Its boughs are Hiranyagharba
(Brahma or Brahman in his highest manifestations, say Sridhara and
Madhusudana), the highest Dhyan Chohans or Devas. The Vedas are its leaves. He
only who goes beyond the roots shall never return, i.e., shall reincarnate no
more during this "age" of Brahma.
It is only when its pure boughs had
touched the terrestrial mud of the garden of Eden, of our Adamic race, that
this Tree got soiled by the contact and lost its pristine purity; and that the
Serpent of
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Eternity -- the heaven-born LOGOS --
was finally degraded. In days of old -- of the divine Dynasties on Earth -- the
now dreaded Reptile was regarded as the first beam of light that radiated from
the abyss of divine Mystery. Various were the forms which it was made to
assume, and numerous the natural symbols adapted to it, as it crossed aeons of
Time: as from Infinite Time itself -- Kala -- it fell into the space and time
evolved out of human speculation. These forms were Cosmic and astronomical,
theistic and pantheistic, abstract and concrete. They became in turn the Polar
Dragon and the Southern Cross, the Alpha Draconis of the Pyramid, and the
Hindu-Buddhist Dragon, which ever threatens, yet never swallows the Sun during
its eclipses. Till then, the Tree remained ever green, for it was sprinkled by
the waters of life; the great Dragon, ever divine, so long as it was kept
within the precincts of the sidereal fields. But the tree grew and its lower
boughs touched at last the infernal regions -- our Earth. Then the great
serpent Nidhogg -- he who devours the corpses of the evil-doers in the
"Hall of Misery" (human life), so soon as they are plunged into
"Hwergelmir," the roaring cauldron (of human passions) -- gnawed the
World-tree. The worms of materiality covered the once healthy and mighty roots,
and are now ascending higher and higher along the trunk; while the
Midgard-snake coiled at the bottom of the Seas, encircles the Earth, and,
through its venomous breath, makes her powerless to defend herself.
They are all seven-headed, the
dragons and serpents of antiquity -- "one head for each race, and every
head with seven hairs on it," as the allegory has it. Aye, from Ananta,
the Serpent of Eternity which carries Vishnu through the Manvantara, from the
original primordial Sesha, whose seven heads become "one thousand
heads" in the Puranic fancy, down to the seven-headed Akkadian Serpent.
This typifies the Seven principles throughout nature and man; the highest or
middle head being the seventh. It is not of the Mosaic, Jewish Sabbath that
Philo speaks in his Creation of the World, when saying that the world was
completed "according to the perfect nature of number 6." For,
"when that reason (nous) which is holy in accordance with the number
seven, has entered the soul (rather the living body), the number six is thus
arrested, and all the mortal things which that number makes." And again:
"Number 7 is the festival day of all the earth, the birthday of the world.
I know not whether any one would be able to celebrate the number 7 in adequate
terms." . . . (Par. pp. 30 and 419). The author of The Natural Genesis
thinks that "the Septenary of Stars seen in the great bear (the
Septarshis) and seven-headed Dragon furnished a visible origin for the symbolic
seven of time above. The goddess of the seven stars," he adds --
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"Was the mother of time, as Kep;
whence Kepti and Sebti for the two times and number seven. So this is the star
of the Seven by name. Sevekt (Kronos), the Son of the goddess, has the name of
the seven or seventh. So has Sefekh Abu who builds the house on high, as Wisdom
(Sophia) built hers with seven pillars. . . The primary Kronotypes were seven,
and thus the beginning of time in heaven is based on the number and the name of
seven, on account of the starry demonstrators. The seven stars as they turned
round annually kept pointing, as it were, with the forefinger of the right
hand, and describing a circle in the upper and lower heaven.* The number seven
naturally suggested a measure by seven, that led to what may be termed
Sevening, and to the marking and mapping out of the circle in seven
corresponding divisions which were assigned to the seven great constellations;
and thus was formed the celestial heptanomis of Egypt in the heavens. . . .
When the stellar heptanomis was broken up and divided into four quarters, it
was multiplied by four, and the twenty-eight signs took the place of the
primary seven constellations, the lunar zodiac of twenty-eight days being the
registered result.** . . . In the Chinese arrangement the four sevens are given
to four genii that preside over the four cardinal points. . . ." (In
Chinese Buddhism and Esotericism the genii are represented by four Dragons --
the "Maharajahs" of the Stanzas.) "The seven Northern
constellations make up the Black Warrior; the seven Eastern (Chinese autumn)
constitute the White Tiger; the seven Southern are the Vermilion Bird; and the
seven Western (called Vernal) are the Azure Dragon. Each of these four Spirits
presides over its heptanomis during one lunar week. The genetive of the first
heptanomis (Typhon of the Seven Stars) now took a lunar character; . . . in
this phase we find the goddess Sefekh, whose name signifies number 7, is the
feminine word, or logos in place of the mother of Time, who was the earlier
Word, as goddess of the Seven Stars" ("Typology of Time," Vol.
II. p. 313, Nat. Gen.).
The author shows that it was the
goddess of the Great Bear and mother of Time who was in Egypt from the earliest
times the "Living Word," and that "Sevekh-Kronus, whose type was
the Crocodile-Dragon, the pre-planetary form of Saturn, was called her son and
consort; he was her Word-Logos" (p. 321, Vol. I.).
The above is quite plain, but it was
not the knowledge of astronomy only that led the ancients to the process of
Sevening. The primal cause goes far deeper and will be explained in its place.
The above quotations are no
digressions. They are brought forward as showing (a) the reason why a full
Initiate was called a "Dragon," a "Snake" a
"Naga"; and (b) that our septenary division was used by the priests
of the earliest dynasties in Egypt, for the same reason and on the same basis
as by us. This needs further elucidation, however. As already stated, that
which Mr. G. Massey calls the four genii of the four cardinal points; and the
Chinese, the Black Warrior, White Tiger, Ver-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* For the same reason the division of
the principles in man into seven are thus reckoned, as they describe the same
circle in the human higher and lower nature.
** Thus the septenary division is the
oldest and preceded the four-fold division. It is the root of archaic
classification.
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milion Bird, and Azure Dragon, is
called in the Secret Books, -- the "Four Hidden Dragons of Wisdom"
and the "Celestial Nagas." Now, as shown, the seven-headed or
septenary DRAGON-LOGOS had been in course of time split up, so to speak, into
four heptanomic parts or twenty-eight portions. Each lunar week has a distinct
occult character in the lunar month; each day of the twenty-eight has its
special characteristics; as each of the twelve constellations, whether
separately or in combination with other signs, has an occult influence either
for good or for evil. This represents the sum of knowledge that men can acquire
on this earth; yet few are those who acquire it, and still fewer are the wise
men who get to the root of knowledge symbolized by the great Root Dragon, the
spiritual LOGOS of these visible signs. But those who do, receive the name of
"Dragons," and they are the "Arhats of the Four Truths of the 28
Faculties," or attributes, and have always been so called.
The Alexandrian Neo-Platonists
asserted that to become real Chaldees or Magi, one had to master the science or
knowledge of the periods of the Seven Rectors of the world, in whom is all
wisdom. In "Proclus in Timaeus," b. 1, Jamblichus is credited with
another version, which does not however, alter, the meaning. He says that
"the Assyrians have not only preserved the records of seven and twenty
myriads of years, as Hipparchus says they have, but likewise of the whole
apocatastases and periods of the Seven Rulers of the World." The legends
of every nation and tribe, whether civilized or savage, point to the once
universal belief in the great wisdom and cunning of the Serpents. They are
"charmers." They hypnotise the bird with their eye, and man himself,
very often, does not feel above their fascinating influence; therefore the
symbol is a most fitting one.
The crocodile is the Egyptian dragon.
It was the dual symbol of Heaven and Earth, of Sun and Moon, and was made
sacred, in consequence of its amphibious nature, to Osiris and Isis. According
to Eusebius, the Egyptians represented the sun in a ship as its pilot, this
ship being carried along by a crocodile "to show the motion of the Sun in
the moyst (Space)", (Prepar. Evang., 1, 3, c. 3). The crocodile was
moreover, the symbol of Egypt herself -- the lower, as being the more swampy of
the two countries. The Alchemists claim another interpretation. They say that
the symbol of the sun in the ship on the Ether of Space meant that the hermetic
matter is the principle, or basis, of gold, or again the philosophical sun; the
water, within which the crocodile is swimming, is that water or matter made
liquid; the ship herself, finally, representing the vessel of nature, in which
the sun, or the sulphuric, igneous principle, acts as a pilot: because it is
the sun
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which conducts the work by his action
upon the moist or mercury. The above is only for the Alchemists.
The Serpent became the type and
symbol of evil, and of the Devil, only during the middle ages. The early
Christians -- besides the Ophite Gnostics -- had their dual Logos: the Good and
the Bad Serpent, the Agathodaemon and the Kakodaemon. This is demonstrated by
the writings of Marcus, Valentinus, and many others, and especially in Pistis
Sophia -- certainly a document of the earliest centuries of Christianity. On
the marble sarcophagus of a tomb, discovered in 1852 near the Porta Pia, one
sees the scene of the adoration of the Magi, "or else," remarks the
late C. W. King in "The Gnostics," "the prototype of that scene,
the 'Birth of the New Sun.'" The mosaic floor exhibited a curious design
which might have represented either (a) Isis suckling the babe Harpocrates, or
(b) the Madonna nursing the infant Jesus. In the smaller sarcophagi that
surrounded the larger one, eleven leaden plates rolled like scrolls were found,
three of which have been deciphered. The contents of these ought to be regarded
as final proof of a much-vexed question, for they show that either the early
Christians, up to the VIth Century, were bond fide pagans, or that dogmatic
Christianity was borrowed wholesale, and passed in full into the Christian
Church -- Sun, Tree, Serpent, Crocodile and all.
"On the first is seen Anubis . .
. holding out a scroll; at his feet are two female busts; below all are two
serpents entwined . . . a corpse swathed up like a mummy. In the second scroll
. . . is Anubis, holding out a cross, the "Sign of Life." Under his
feet lies the corpse encircled in the numerous folds of a huge serpent, the
Agathodaemon, guardian of the deceased. . . . . In the third scroll, Anubis
bears on his arm . . . . . the outline of . . a complete Latin cross . . . At
the god's foot is a rhomboid, the Egyptian 'Egg of the World,' towards which
crawls a serpent coiled into a circle . . . . Under the busts is the letter
[[omega]] repeated seven times in a line, reminding one of the 'names' . . .
Very remarkable also is the line of characters, apparently Palmyrene, upon the
legs of the first Anubis. As for the figure of the serpent, supposing these
talismans to emanate not from the Isiac but the newer Ophite creed, it may well
stand for that "True and perfect Serpent," who leads forth the souls
of all that put their trust in him out of the Egypt of the body, and through
the Red Sea of Death into the Land of Promise, saving them on their way from
the Serpents of the Wilderness, that is, from the Rulers of the Stars."
(King's "Gnostics," p. 366.)
And this "True and Perfect
Serpent" is the seven-lettered God who is now credited with being Jehovah,
and Jesus One with him. To this Seven-vowelled god the candidate for initiation
is sent by Christos, in the Pistis Sophia, a work earlier than St. John's
Revelation, and evidently of the same school. "The (Serpent of the) Seven
Thunders uttered
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these seven vowels," but
"Seal up those things which the seven thunders uttered, and write them
not," says Revelation. "Do ye seek after these mysteries?"
inquiries Jesus in Pistis Sophia. "No mystery is more excellent than they
(the seven vowels): for they shall bring your souls unto the Light of Lights"
-- i.e., true Wisdom. "Nothing, therefore, is more excellent than the
mysteries which ye seek after, saving only the mystery of the Seven Vowels and
their FORTY AND NINE Powers, and the numbers thereof."
In India, it was the mystery of the
Seven FIRES and their forty-nine fires or aspects, or "the members
thereof," just the same.
These seven vowels are represented by
the Swastika signs on the crowns of the seven heads of the Serpent of Eternity,
in India, among esoteric Buddhists, in Egypt, in Chaldea, etc. etc., and among
the Initiates of every other country. It is on the Seven zones of post mortem
ascent, in the Hermetic writings, that the "mortal" leaves, on each,
one of his "Souls" (or Principles); until arrived on the plane above
all zones he remains as the great Formless Serpent of absolute wisdom -- or the
Deity itself. The seven-headed serpent has more than one signification in the
Arcane teachings. It is the seven-headed Draco, each of whose heads is a star
of the Lesser Bear; but it was also, and pre-eminently, the Serpent of Darkness
(i.e., inconceivable and incomprehensible) whose seven heads were the seven
Logoi, the reflections of the one and first manifested Light -- the universal
LOGOS.
--------------
§ XI.
DEMON EST DEUS INVERSUS.
THIS symbolical sentence, in its
many-sided forms, is certainly most dangerous and iconoclastic in the face of
all the dualistic later religions -- or rather theologies -- and especially so
in the light of Christianity. Yet it is neither just nor correct to say that it
is Christianity which has conceived and brought forth Satan. As an
"adversary," the opposing Power required by the equilibrium and
harmony of things in Nature -- like Shadow to throw off still brighter the
Light, like Night to bring into greater relief the Day, and like cold to make
one appreciate the more the comfort of heat -- SATAN has ever existed.
Homogeneity is one and indivisible. But if the homogeneous One and Absolute is
no mere figure of speech, and if heterogeneity in its dualistic aspect, is its
offspring -- its bifurcous shadow or reflection -- then even that divine
Homogeneity must contain in itself the essence of
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both good and evil. If
"God" is Absolute, Infinite, and the Universal Root of all and
everything in Nature and its universe, whence comes Evil or D'Evil if not from
the same "Golden Womb" of the absolute? Thus we are forced either to
accept the emanation of good and evil, of Agathodaemon and Kakodaemon as
offshoots from the same trunk of the Tree of Being, or to resign ourselves to
the absurdity of believing in two eternal Absolutes!
Having to trace the origin of the
idea to the very beginnings of human mind, it is but just, meanwhile, to give
his due even to the proverbial devil. Antiquity knew of no isolated, thoroughly
and absolutely bad "god of evil." Pagan thought represented good and evil
as twin brothers, born from the same mother -- Nature; so soon as that thought
ceased to be Archaic, Wisdom too became Philosophy. In the beginning the
symbols of good and evil were mere abstractions, Light and Darkness; then their
types became chosen among the most natural and ever-recurrent periodical Cosmic
phenomena -- the Day and the Night, or the Sun and Moon. Then the Hosts of the
Solar and Lunar deities were made to represent them, and the Dragon of Darkness
was contrasted with the Dragon of Light (See Stanzas V., VII. of Book I.) The
Host of Satan is a Son of God, no less than the Host of the B'ni Alhim, these
children of God coming to "present themselves before the Lord," their
father (see Job ii.). "The Sons of God" become the "Fallen
Angels" only after perceiving that the daughters of men were fair,
(Genesis vi.) In the Indian philosophy, the Suras are among the earliest and
the brightest gods, and become Asuras only when dethroned by Brahminical fancy.
Satan never assumed an anthropomorphic, individualized shape, until the
creation by man, of a "one living personal god," had been
accomplished; and then merely as a matter of prime necessity. A screen was
needed; a scape-goat to explain the cruelty, blunders, and but too-evident
injustice, perpetrated by him for whom absolute perfection, mercy, and goodness
were claimed. This was the first Karmic effect of abandoning a philosophical
and logical Pantheism, to build, as a prop for lazy man, "a merciful
father in Heaven," whose daily and hourly actions as Natura naturans, the
"comely mother but stone cold," belie the assumption. This led to the
primal twins, Osiris-Typhon, Ormazd-Ahriman, and finally Cain-Abel and the
tutti-quanti of contraries.
Having commenced by being synonymous
with Nature, "God," the Creator, ended by being made its author.
Pascal settles the difficulty very cunningly: "Nature has perfections, in
order to show that she is the image of God: and defects, in order to show that
she is only his image," he says.
The further back one recedes into the
darkness of the prehistoric
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ages, the more philosophical does the
prototypic figure of the later Satan appear. The first "Adversary" in
individual human form that one meets with in old Puranic literature is one of
her greatest Rishis and Yogis -- Narada, surnamed the "Strife-maker."
And he is a Brahmaputra, a son of
Brahma, the male. But of him later on. Who the great "Deceiver"
really is, one can ascertain by searching for him with open eyes and an
unprejudiced mind, in every old cosmogony and Scripture.
It is the anthropomorphised Demiurge,
the Creator of Heaven and Earth, when separated from the collective Hosts of
his fellow-Creators, whom, so to speak, he represents and synthesizes. It is
now the God of theologies. "The thought is father to the wish." Once
upon a time, a philosophical symbol left to perverse human fancy; afterwards
fashioned into a fiendish, deceiving, cunning, and jealous God.
Dragons and other fallen angels being
described in other parts of this work, a few words upon the much-slandered
Satan will be sufficient. That which the student will do well to remember is
that, with every people except the Christian nations, the Devil is to this day
no worse an entity than the opposite aspect in the dual nature of the so-called
Creator. This is only natural. One cannot claim God as the synthesis of the
whole Universe, as Omnipresent and Omniscient and Infinite, and then divorce
him from evil. As there is far more evil than good in the world, it follows on
logical grounds that either God must include evil, or stand as the direct cause
of it, or else surrender his claims to absoluteness. The ancients understood
this so well that their philosophers -- now followed by the Kabalists --
defined evil as the lining of God or Good: Demon est Deus inversus, being a
very old adage. Indeed, evil is but an antagonizing blind force in nature; it
is reaction, opposition, and contrast, -- evil for some, good for others. There
is no malum in se: only the shadow of light, without which light could have no
existence, even in our perceptions. If evil disappeared, good would disappear
along with it from Earth. The "Old Dragon" was pure spirit before he
became matter, passive before he became active. In the Syro-Chaldean magic both
Ophis and Ophiomorphos are joined in the Zodiac, at the sign of the Androgyne
Virgo-Scorpio. Before its fall on earth the "Serpent" was
Ophis-Christos, and after its fall it became Ophiomorphos-CHRESTOS. Everywhere
the speculations of the Kabalists treat of Evil as a FORCE, which is
antagonistic, but at the same time essential, to Good, as giving it vitality
and existence, which it could never have otherwise. There would be no life
possible (in the Mayavic sense) without Death, nor regeneration and
reconstruction without destruction. Plants would perish in eternal sunlight,
and so would man, who would become an automaton without the exercise of his
free will and aspirations
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after that sunlight, which would lose
its being and value for him had he nothing but light. Good is infinite and
eternal only in the eternally concealed from us, and this is why we imagine it
eternal. On the manifested planes, one equilibrates the other. Few are those
theists and believers in a personal God, who do not make of Satan the shadow of
God; or who, confounding both, do not believe they have a right to pray to that
idol asking its help and protection for the exercise and impunity of their evil
and cruel deeds. "Lead us not into Temptation" is addressed daily to
"our Father, which art in Heaven," and not to the Devil, by millions
of human Christian hearts. They do so, repeating the very words put in the
mouth of their Saviour, and do not give one thought to the fact that their
meaning is contradicted point blank by James "the brother of the
Lord." "Let no man say when he is tempted, I am tempted of God: for
God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth he any man." -- (The
Gen. Ep. of James, i, 13). Why, then, say that it is the Devil who tempts us,
when the Church teaches us on the authority of Christ that it is God who does
so? Open any pious volume in which the word "temptation" is defined
in its theological sense, and forthwith you find two definitions: (1)
"Those afflictions and troubles whereby God tries his people;" (2)
Those means and enticements which the Devil makes use of to ensnare and allure
mankind. (St. James i., 2, 12, and Mat. vi., 13.) If accepted literally, the two
teachings of Christ and James contradict each other, and what dogma can
reconcile the two if the occult meaning is rejected?
Between the alternative allurements,
wise will be that philosopher who will be able to decide where God disappears
to make room for the Devil! Therefore when we read that "the Devil is a
liar and the father of it," i.e., INCARNATE LIE, and are told in the same
breath that Satan -- the Devil -- was a son of God and the most beautiful of
his archangels, rather than believe that Father and Son are a gigantic,
personified and eternal LIE, we prefer to turn to Pantheism and to Pagan
philosophy for information.
Once that the key to Genesis is in
our hands, it is the scientific and symbolical Kabala which unveils the secret.
The great Serpent of the Garden of Eden and the "Lord God" are
identical, and so are Jehovah and Cain ONE -- that Cain who is referred to in
theology as the "murderer" and the LIAR to God! Jehovah tempts the
King of Israel to number the people, and Satan tempts him to do the same in
another place. Jehovah turns into the fiery serpents to bite those he is
displeased with; and Jehovah informs the brazen serpent that heals them.
These short, and seemingly
contradictory, statements in the Old Testament (contradictory because the two
Powers are separated instead of being regarded as the two faces of one and the
same thing) are the
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echoes -- distorted out of
recognition by exotericism and theology -- of the universal and philosophical
dogmas in nature, so well understood by the primitive Sages. We find the same
groundwork in several personifications in the Puranas, only far more ample and
philosophically suggestive.
Thus Pulastya, a "Son of
God" -- one of the first progeny -- is made the progenitor of Demons, the
Rakshasas, the tempters and the Devourers of men. Pisacha (female Demon) is a
daughter of Daksha, a "Son of God" too, and a God, and the mother of
all the Pisachas (Padma Purana). The Demons, so called in the Puranas, are very
extraordinary devils when judged from the standpoint of European and orthodox views
about these creatures, since all of them -- Danavas, Daityas, Pisachas, and the
Rakshasas -- are represented as extremely pious, following the precepts of the
Vedas, some of them even being great Yogis. But they oppose the clergy and
Ritualism, sacrifices and forms -- just what the full-blown Yogins do to this
day in India -- and are no less respected for it, though they are allowed to
follow neither caste nor ritual; hence all those Puranic giants and Titans are
called Devils. The Missionaries, ever on the watch to show, if they can, the
Hindu traditions no better than a reflection of the Jewish Bible, have evolved
a whole romance on the alleged identity of Pulastya with Cain, and of the
Rakshasas with the Cainites, "the accursed," the cause of the Noachian
Deluge. (See the work of Abbe Gorresio, who "etymologises" Pulastya's
name as meaning the "rejected," hence Cain, if you please). Pulastya
dwells in Kedara, he says, which means a "dug-up place," a mine, and
Cain is shown in tradition and the Bible as the first worker in metals and a
miner thereof!
While it is very probable that the
Gibborim (the giants) of the Bible are the Rakshasas of the Hindus, it is still
more certain that both are Atlanteans, and belong to the submerged races.
However it may be, no Satan could be more persistent in slandering his enemy,
or more spiteful in his hatred, than the Christian theologians are in cursing
him as the father of every evil. Compare their vituperations and opinions given
about the Devil with the philosophical views of the Puranic sages and their
Christ-like mansuetude. When Parasara, whose father was devoured by a Rakshasa,
was preparing himself to destroy (magically) the whole race, his grandsire,
Vasishta, says a few extremely suggestive words to him. He shows the irate
Sage, on his own confession, that there is Evil and Karma, but no "evil
spirits." "Let thy wrath be appeased," he says. "The
Rakshasas are not culpable; thy father's death was the work of Karma. Anger is
the passion of fools; it becometh not a wise man. By whom, it may be asked, is
any one killed? Every man reaps the consequences of his own acts. Anger, my
son, is the destruction of
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all that man obtains . . . and
prevents the attainment of emancipation. The sages shun wrath. Be not thou, my
child, subject to its influence. Let not those unoffending spirits of darkness
be consumed; let thy sacrifice cease. Mercy is the might of the righteous"
(Vishnu Purana, Book i., ch. i.). Thus, every such "sacrifice" or
prayer to God for help is no better than an act of black magic. That which
Parasara prayed for, was the destruction of the Spirits of Darkness, for his
personal revenge. He is called a Pagan, and the Christians have doomed him as
such, to eternal hell. Yet, in what respect is the prayer of sovereigns and
generals, who pray before every battle for the destruction of their enemy, any
better? Such a prayer is in every case black magic of the worst kind, concealed
like a demon "Mr. Hyde" under a sanctimonious "Dr. Jekyll."
In human nature, evil denotes only
the polarity of matter and Spirit, a struggle for life between the two
manifested Principles in Space and Time, which principles are one per se,
inasmuch they are rooted in the Absolute. In Kosmos, the equilibrium must be
preserved. The operations of the two contraries produce harmony, like the
centripetal and centrifugal forces, which are necessary to each other --
mutually inter-dependent -- "in order that both should live." If one
is arrested, the action of the other will become immediately self-destructive.
Since the personification called
Satan has been amply analyzed from its triple aspect -- in the Old Testament,
Christian theology and the ancient Gentile attitude of thought -- those who
would learn more of it are referred to Vol. II. of ISIS UNVEILED, chap. x. See
also several sections in Book II., Part II. of this work. The present subject
is touched upon and fresh explanations attempted for a very good reason. Before
we can approach the evolution of physical and divine man, we have first to
master the idea of cyclic evolution, to acquaint ourselves with the philosophies
and beliefs of the four races which preceded our present race, to learn what
were the ideas of those Titans and giants -- giants, verily, mentally as well
as physically. The whole of antiquity was imbued with that philosophy which
teaches the involution of spirit into matter, the progressive, downward cyclic
descent, or active, self-conscious evolution. The Alexandrian Gnostics have
sufficiently divulged the secret of initiations, and their records are full of
"the sliding down of AEons" in their double qualification of Angelic
Beings and Periods: the one the natural evolution of the other. On the other
hand, Oriental traditions on both sides of the "black water" -- the
oceans that separate the two Easts -- are as full of allegories about the
downfall of Pleroma, of that of the gods and Devas. One and all, they
allegorized and explained the FALL as the
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desire to learn and acquire knowledge
-- to KNOW. This is the natural sequence of mental evolution, the spiritual
becoming transmuted into the material or physical. The same law of descent into
materiality and re-ascent into spirituality asserted itself during the
Christian era, the reaction having stopped only just now, in our own special
sub-race.
That which, perhaps ten millenniums
ago, was allegorized in Pymander in a triune character of interpretation, meant
as a record of an astronomical, anthropological, and even alchemical fact,
namely, the allegory of the seven rectors breaking through the seven circles of
fire, was dwarfed into one material and anthropomorphic interpretation -- the
rebellion and Fall of the Angels. The multivocal, profoundly philosophical
narrative, under its poetical form of the "Marriage of Heaven with
Earth," the love of nature for Divine form and the "Heavenly
man," enraptured with his own beauty mirrored in nature -- i.e., Spirit
attracted into matter -- has now become, under theological handling: "the
seven Rectors disobeying Jehovah, self admiration generating Satanic Pride,
followed by their FALL, Jehovah permitting no worship to be lost save upon
himself." In short, the beautiful Planet-Angels, the glorious cyclic aeons
of the ancients, became henceforward synthesized in their most orthodox shape
in Samael, the chief of the Demons in the Talmud, "That great serpent with
twelve wings that draws down after himself, in his Fall, the solar system, or
the Titans." But Schemal, the alter ego and the Sabean type of Samael,
meant, in his philosophical and esoteric aspect, the "year" in its
astrological evil aspect, its twelve months or wings of unavoidable evils, in
nature; and in esoteric theogony (see Chwolson in NABATHEAN AGRICULTURE, Vol.
II., p. 217), both Schemal and Samael represented a particular divinity. With
the Kabalists they are "the Spirit of the Earth," the personal god
that governs it, identical de facto with Jehovah. For the Talmudists admit themselves
that SAMAEL is a god-name of one of the seven Elohim. The Kabalists, moreover,
show the two, Schemal and Samael, as a symbolical form of Saturn, CHRONOS, the
twelve wings standing for the 12 months, and the symbol in its collectivity
representing a racial cycle. Jehovah and Saturn are also glyphically identical.
This leads in its turn to a very
curious deduction from a Roman Catholic dogma. Many renowned writers belonging
to the Latin Church admit that a difference exists, and should be made, between
the Uranian Titans, the antediluvian giants (also Titans), and those
post-diluvian giants in whom they (the Roman Catholics) will see the
descendants of the mythical Ham. In clearer words, there is a difference to be
made between the Cosmic, primordial opposing Forces -- guided by cyclic law --
the Atlantean human giants, and the post-diluvian great adepts, whether
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of the right or the left hand. At the
same time they show that Michael, "the generalissimos of the fighting
Celestial Host, the bodyguard of Jehovah," as it would seem (see de
Mirville) is also a Titan, only with the adjective of "divine" before
the cognomen. Thus those "Uranides" who are called everywhere
"divine Titans," and who, having rebelled against Kronos (Saturn),
are therefore also shown to be the enemies of Samael (an Elohim, also and
synonymous with Jehovah in his collectivity), are identical with Michael and
his host. In short, the roles are reversed, all the combatants are confused,
and no student is able to distinguish clearly which is which. Esoteric
explanation may, however, bring some order into this confusion, in which
Jehovah becomes Saturn, and Michael and his army, Satan and the rebellious
angels, owing to the indiscreet endeavours of the too faithful zealots to see
in every pagan god a devil. The true meaning is far more philosophical, and the
legend of the first "Fall" (of the angels) assumes a scientific
colouring when correctly understood.
Kronos stands for endless (hence
immovable) Duration, without beginning, without an end, beyond divided Time and
beyond Space. Those "Angels," genii, or Devas, who were born to act
in space and time, i.e., to break through the seven circles of the
superspiritual planes into the phenomenal, or circumscribed, super-terrestrial
regions, are said allegorically to have rebelled against Kronos and fought the
(then) one living and highest God. In his turn, when Kronos is represented as
mutilating Uranus, his father, the meaning of this mutilation is very simple:
Absolute Time is made to become the finite and the conditioned; a portion is
robbed from the whole, thus showing that Saturn, the father of the gods, has
been transformed from Eternal Duration into a limited Period. Chronos cuts down
with his scythe even the longest and (to us) seemingly endless cycles, yet, for
all that, limited in Eternity, and puts down with the same scythe the mightiest
rebels. Aye, not one will escape the scythe of Time! Praise the god or gods, or
flout, one or both, and that scythe will not be made to tremble one millionth
of a second in its ascending or descending course.
The Titans of Hesiod's Theogony were
copied in Greece from the Suras and Asuras of India. These Hesiodic Titans, the
Uranides, numbered once upon a time as only six, have been recently discovered
to be seven -- the seventh being called Phoreg -- in an old fragment relating
to the Greek myth. Thus their identity with the Seven rectors is fully
demonstrated. The origin of the "War in Heaven" and the FALL has, in
our mind, to be traced unavoidably to India, and perhaps far earlier than the
Puranic accounts thereof. For TARAMAYA was in a later age, and there are three
accounts, each of a distinct war, to be traced in almost every Cosmogony.
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The first war happened in the night
of time, between the gods the (A)-suras, and lasted for the period of one
"divine year."* On this occasion the deities were defeated by the
Daityas, under the leadership of Hrada. After that, owing to a device of
Vishnu, to whom the conquered gods applied for help, the latter defeated the
Asuras. In the Vishnu Purana no interval is found between the two wars. In the
Esoteric Doctrine, one war takes place before the building of the Solar system;
another, on earth, at the "creation" of man; and a third
"war" is mentioned as taking place at the close of the 4th Race,
between its adepts and those of the 5th Race, i.e., between the Initiates of
the "Sacred Island" and the Sorcerers of Atlantis. We shall notice
the first contest, as recounted by Parasara, while trying to separate the two
accounts, purposely blended together. It is there stated that as the Daityas
and Asuras were engaged in the duties of their respective orders (Varna) and followed
the paths prescribed by holy writ, practising also religious penance (a queer
employment for demons if they are identical with our devils, as it is claimed)
-- it was impossible for the gods to destroy them. The prayers addressed by the
gods to Vishnu are curious as showing the ideas involved in an anthropomorphic
deity. Having, after their defeat, "fled to the Northern shore of the
Milky Ocean (Atlantic Ocean),** the discomfited gods address many supplications
"to the first
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* One "Day of Brahma"
lasting 4,320,000,000 years -- multiply this by 365! The Asuras here (no-gods,
but demons) are still Suras, gods higher in hierarchy than such secondary gods
as are not even mentioned in the Vedas. The duration of the war shows its
significance, and that they are only the personified Cosmic powers. It is
evidently for sectarian purposes and out of odium theologicum that the illusive
form assumed by Vishnu Mayamoha, was attributed in later rearrangements of old
texts to Buddha and the Daityas, in the Vishnu Purana, unless it was a fancy of
Wilson himself. He also fancied he found an allusion to Buddhism in
Bhagavatgita, whereas, as proved by K. T. Telang, he had only confused the
Buddhists and the older Charvaka materialists. The version exists nowhere in
other Puranas if the inference does, as Professor Wilson claims, in the
"Vishnu Purana"; the translation of which, especially of Book iii.,
ch. xviii., where the reverend Orientalist arbitrarily introduces Buddha, and
shows him teaching Buddhism to Daityas -- led to another "great war"
between himself and Col. Vans Kennedy. The latter charged him publicly with
wilfully distorting Puranic texts. "I affirm," wrote the Colonel at
Bombay, in 1840, "that the Puranas do not contain what Professor Wilson
has stated is contained in them . . . until such passages are produced I may be
allowed to repeat my former conclusions, that Professor Wilson's opinion, that
the Puranas as now extant are compilations made between the eighth and
seventeenth centuries (A.D.!) rests solely on gratuitous assumptions and
unfounded assertions, and that his reasoning in support of it is either futile,
fallacious, contradictory, or improbable." (See Vishnu Purana, trans. by
Wilson, edit. by Fitzedward Hall, Vol. V., Appendix.)
** This statement belongs to the
third War, since the terrestrial continents, seas and rivers are mentioned in
connection with it.
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of beings, the divine Vishnu,"
and among others this one: "Glory to thee, who art one with the Saints,
whose perfect nature is ever blessed. . . . Glory to thee, who art one with the
Serpent-race, double-tongued, impetuous, cruel, insatiate of enjoyment and
abounding with wealth. . . . Glory to thee, . . . . O Lord, who hast neither
colour nor extension, nor size (ghana), nor any predicable qualities, and whose
essence (rupa), purest of the pure is appreciable only by holy Paramarshi
(greatest of sages or Rishis). We bow to thee, in the nature of Brahma
uncreated, undecaying (avyaya), who art in our bodies and in all other bodies,
and in all living creatures, and beside whom nothing exists. We glorify that
Vasudeva, the lord of all, who is without soil, the seed of all things, exempt
from dissolution, unborn, eternal; being in essence Paramapadatmavat (beyond
the condition of spirit) and in essence and substance (rupa), the whole of this
(Universe)." (Book III., ch. xvii., Vish. Purana.)
The above is quoted as an
illustration of the vast field offered by the Puranas to adverse and erroneous
criticism, by every European bigot who forms an estimate of an alien religion
on mere external evidence. Any man accustomed to subject what he reads to
thoughtful analysis, will see at a glance the incongruity of addressing the
accepted "Unknowable," the formless, and attributeless ABSOLUTE, such
as the Vedantins define BRAHMA, as being "one with the serpent-race,
double-tongued, cruel and insatiable," thus associating the abstract with
the concrete, and bestowing adjectives on that which is freed from any
limitations, and conditionless. Even Dr. Wilson, who, after living surrounded
by Brahmins and Pundits in India for so many years, ought to have known better
-- even that scholar lost no opportunity to criticize the Hindu Scriptures on
this account. Thus, he exclaims:--*
"The Puranas constantly teach
incompatible doctrines! According to this passage, the Supreme being is not the
inert cause of creation only, but exercises the functions of an active
providence. The Commentator quotes a text of the Veda in support of this view:
'Universal Soul entering into men, governs their conduct.' Incongruities,
however, are as frequent in the Vedas as in the Puranas. . . . ."
Less frequent, in sober truth, than
in the Mosaic Bible. But prejudice is great in the hearts of our Orientalists
-- especially in those of "reverend" scholars. UNIVERSAL SOUL is not
the inert Cause of Creation or (Para) Brahma, but simply that which we call the
sixth principle of intellectual Kosmos, on the manifested plane of being. It is
Mahat, or Mahabuddhi, the great Soul, the vehicle of Spirit, the first primeval
reflection of the formless CAUSE, and that which is even beyond SPIRIT.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In Book I., chap. xvii., narrating
the story of Prahlada -- the Son of Hiranyakasipu, the Puranic Satan, the great
enemy of Vishnu, and the King of the three worlds -- into whose heart Vishnu
entered.
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So much for Professor Wilson's
uncalled-for fling. As for the apparently incongruous appeal to Vishnu by the
defeated gods, the explanation is there, in the text of Vishnu Purana, if
Orientalists would only notice it.* There is Vishnu, as Brahma, and Vishnu in
his two aspects, philosophy teaches. There is but one Brahma, "essentially
prakriti and Spirit," &c.
Therefore, it is not Vishnu --
"the inert cause of creation" -- which exercised the functions of an
active Providence, but the Universal Soul, that which E. Levi calls Astral
Light in its material aspect. And this "Soul" is, in its dual aspect
of spirit and matter, the true anthropomorphic God of the Theists; as this God
is a personification of that Universal Creative Agent, pure and impure both,
owing to its manifested condition and differentiation in this Mayavic World --
God and Devil -- truly. But Dr. Wilson failed to see how Vishnu, in this
character, closely resembles the Lord God of Israel, "especially in his
policy of deception, temptation, and cunning."
In the Vishnu Purana this is made as
plain as can be. For it is said there, that "at the conclusion of their
prayers (stotra) the gods beheld the Sovereign Deity Hari (Vishnu) armed with
the conch, the discus, and the mace, riding on Garuda. ." Now
"Garuda" is the manvantaric cycle, as will be shown in its place.
Vishnu, therefore, is the deity in space and time; the peculiar God of the
Vaishnavas (a tribal or racial God, as they are called in esoteric philosophy):
i.e., one of the many Dhyanis or Gods, or Elohim, one of whom was generally
chosen for some special reasons by a nation or a tribe, and thus became
gradually a "God above all Gods" (2 Chronicles ii. 5,) the
"highest God" as Jehovah, Osiris, Bel, or any other of the Seven
Regents.
"The tree is known by its
fruit," -- the nature of a God by his actions. The latter, we have either
to judge by the dead-letter narratives, or to accept allegorically. If we
compare the two -- Vishnu, as the defender and champion of the defeated gods;
and Jehovah, the defender and champion of the "chosen" people, so
called by antiphrasis, no doubt, as it is the Jews who had chosen that
"jealous" God -- we shall find that both use deceit and cunning. They
do so on the principle of "the end justifying the means," in order to
have the best of their
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This ignorance is truly and
beautifully expressed in the praise of the Yogins to Brahma, "the upholder
of the earth" (in Book I., chap. iv. of V. P.), when they say, "Those
who have not practised devotion conceive erroneously of the nature of the
world. The ignorant who do not perceive that this Universe is of the nature of
wisdom, and judge of it as an object of perception only, are lost in the ocean
of spiritual ignorance. But they who know true wisdom, and whose minds are
pure, behold this whole world as one with divine knowledge, as one with thee, O
God! Be favourable, O universal Spirit!"
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respective opponents and foes -- the
demons. Thus while (according to the Kabalists) Jehovah assumes the shape of
the tempting Serpent in the Garden of Eden; sends Satan with a special mission
to tempt Job; and harasses and wearies Pharaoh with Sarai, Abraham's wife, and
"hardens" his heart against Moses, lest there should be no
opportunity for plaguing his victims "with great plagues" (Genesis
xii., Exodus) -- Vishnu is made in his Purana to resort to a trick no less
unworthy of any respectable god.
"Have compassion upon us, O
Lord, and protect us, who have come to thee for succour from the Daityas (demons)!"
pray the defeated Gods. "They have seized upon the three worlds, and
appropriated the offerings which are our portion, taking care not to transgress
the Precepts of the Veda. Although we, as well as they, are parts of thee.* . .
. . engaged as they are in the paths prescribed by the holy writ . . . . it is
impossible for us to destroy them. Do thou, whose wisdom is immeasurable
(Ameyatman) instruct us in some device by which we may be able to exterminate
the enemies of the gods!"
"When the mighty Vishnu heard
their request, he emitted from his body an illusory form (Mayamoha, "the
deluder by illusion") which he gave to the Gods and thus spake: "This
Mayamoha shall wholly beguile the Daityas, so that being led astray from the
path of the Vedas, they may be put to death. . . . Go then and fear not. Let
this delusive vision precede you. It shall this day be of great service unto
you, O Gods!"
"After this, the great Delusion,
Mayamoha, descending to earth, beheld the Daityas engaged in ascetic penances,
and approaching them, in the semblance of a Digambara (naked mendicant) with
his head shaven . . . he thus addressed them, in gentle accents: "Ho,
lords of the Daitya race, wherefore is it that you practise these acts of
penances?" etc., etc. (Book II., xviii.).
Finally the Daityas were seduced by
the wily talk of Mahamoha, as Eve was seduced by the advice of the Serpent.
They became apostates to the Vedas. As Dr. Muir translates the passage:--
"The great Deceiver, practising
illusion, next beguiled other Daityas, by means of many other sorts of heresy.
In a very short time, these Asuras (-Daityas) deluded by the Deceiver (who was
Vishnu) abandoned the entire system founded on the ordinances of the triple
Veda. Some reviled the Vedas, others the Gods, others the ceremonial of
sacrifice, and others the Brahmans. This, they exclaimed, is a doctrine which
will not bear discussion. The slaughter of animals in sacrifice is not
conducive to religious merit. To say that oblations of butter consumed in the
fire produce any future reward, is the assertion of a child. . . . If it be a
fact that a beast slain in sacrifice is exalted to heaven, why does not the
worshipper slaughter his own father? . . . . Infallible utterances do not,
great Asuras, fall from the skies; it is only assertions founded on reasoning
that are accepted by me and by other intelligent persons like yourselves! Thus
by numerous methods the Daityas were unsettled by the great Deceiver (Reason).
. . . When
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "There was a day when the Sons
of God came before the Lord, and Satan came with his brothers, also before the
Lord" (Job ii., Abyss., Ethiopic text).
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they had entered on the path of
error, the gods mustered all their energies and approached to battle. Then
followed a combat between the gods and the Asuras; and the latter, who had
abandoned the right road, were smitten by the former. In previous times they
had been defended by the armour of righteousness which they bore, but when that
had been destroyed they, also, perished." (Journal of the Royal Asiat.
Society, Vol. XIX., p. 302.)
Whatever may be thought of Hindus, no
enemy of theirs can regard them as fools. A people whose holy men and sages
have left to the world the greatest and most sublime philosophies that ever
emanated from the minds of men, must have known the difference between right
and wrong. Even a savage can discern white from black, good from bad, and
deceit from sincerity and truthfulness. Those who had narrated this event in
the biography of their god, must have seen that in this case it was that God
who was the arch-Deceiver, and the Daityas, who "never transgressed the
precepts of the Vedas," who had the sunny side in the transaction, and who
were the true "Gods." Thence there must have been, and there is a
secret meaning hidden under this allegory. In no class of Society, in no
nation, are deceit and craft considered as Divine virtues -- except perhaps in
the clerical classes of theologians and modern Jesuitism.
The Vishnu Purana,* like all other
works of this kind, has passed at a later period into the hands of the
temple-Brahmins, and the old MSS. have, no doubt, been once more tampered with
by sectarians. But there was a time when the Puranas were esoteric works, and
so they are still for the Initiates who can read them with the key that is in
their possession.
Whether the Brahmin Initiates will
ever give out the full meaning of these allegories, is a question with which
the writer is not concerned. The present object is to show that, while
honouring the creative Powers in their multiple forms, no philosopher could, or
ever has, accepted the allegory for the true Spirit, except, perhaps, some
philosophers belonging to the present "superior and civilized"
Christian races. For, as shown, Jehovah is not one whit the superior of Vishnu
on the plane of ethics. This is why the Occultists and even some Kabalists,
whether they regard or not those creative Forces as living and conscious
Entities -- and one does not see why they should not be so accepted -- will
never confuse the CAUSE with the effect, and accept the Spirit of the Earth for
Parabrahm or Ain-Soph. At all events they know well the true nature of what was
called Father-AEther by the Greeks, Jupiter-Titan, etc., etc. They know that
the soul of the ASTRAL LIGHT is divine, and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Wilson's opinion that the
"Vishnu Purana" is a production of our era, and that in its present
form it is not earlier than between the VIIIth and the XVIIth (!!) century, is
absurd beyond noticing.
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its body (the light-waves on the
lower planes) infernal. This Light is symbolized by the "Magic Head"
in the Zohar, the double Face on the double Pyramid: the black pyramid rising
against a pure white ground, with a white head and face within its black
triangle; the white pyramid, inverted -- the reflection of the first in the
dark waters, showing the black reflection of the white face. . . . .
This is the "Astral Light,"
or DEMON EST DEUS INVERSUS.
--------------
§ XII.
THE THEOGONY OF THE CREATIVE GODS.
TO thoroughly comprehend the idea
underlying every ancient cosmology necessitates the study, in a comparative
analysis, of all the great religions of antiquity; as it is only by this method
that the root idea will be made plain. Exact science -- could the latter soar so
high, while tracing the operations of nature to their ultimate and original
sources -- would call this idea the hierarchy of Forces. The original,
transcendental and philosophical conception was one. But as systems began to
reflect with every age more and more the idiosyncracies of nations; and as the
latter, after separating, settled into distinct groups, each evolving along its
own national or tribal groove, the main idea gradually became veiled with the
overgrowth of human fancy. While in some countries the FORCES, or rather the
intelligent Powers of nature, received divine honours they were hardly entitled
to, in others -- as now in Europe and the civilized lands -- the very thought
of any such Force being endowed with intelligence seems absurd, and is proclaimed
unscientific. Therefore one finds relief in such statements as are found in the
Introduction to "Asgard and the Gods: Tales and Traditions of our Northern
Ancestors," by W. S. W. Anson. The author remarks, on p. 3: "Although
in Central Asia, or on the banks of the Indus, in the land of the Pyramids, and
in the Greek and Italian peninsulas, and even in the North, whither Kelts,
Teutons and Slavs wandered, the religious conceptions of the people have taken
different forms, yet their common origin is still perceptible. We point out
this connection between the stories of the gods, and the deep thought contained
in them, and their importance, in order that the reader may see that it is not
a magic world of erratic fancy which opens out before him, but that . . . Life
and nature formed the basis of the existence and action of these
divinities." And though it is impossible for any Occultist or student of
Eastern Esotericism to concur in the strange idea that "the religious con-
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ceptions of the most famous nations
of antiquity are connected with the beginnings of civilization amongst the
Germanic races," he is yet glad to find such truths expressed as that:
"These fairy tales are not senseless stories written for the amusement of
the idle; they embody the profound religion of our forefathers . . . "
Precisely so. Not only their religion,
but likewise their History. For a myth, in Greek [[mythos]], means oral
tradition, passed from mouth to mouth from one generation to the other; and
even in the modern etymology the term stands for a fabulous statement conveying
some important truth; a tale of some extraordinary personage whose biography
has become overgrown, owing to the veneration of successive generations, with
rich popular fancy, but which is no wholesale fable. Like our ancestors, the
primitive Aryans, we believe firmly in the personality and intelligence of more
than one phenomenon-producing Force in nature.
As time rolled on, the archaic
teaching grew dimmer; and those nations more or less lost sight of the highest
and One principle of all things, and began to transfer the abstract attributes
of the "causeless cause" to the caused effects -- become in their
turn causative -- the creative Powers of the Universe: the great nations, out
of the fear of profaning the IDEA, the smaller, because they either failed to
grasp it or lacked the power of philosophic conception needed to preserve it in
all its immaculate purity. But one and all, with the exception of the latest
Aryans, now become Europeans and Christians, show this veneration in their
Cosmogonies. As Thomas Taylor,* the most intuitional of all the translators of
Greek Fragments, shows, no nation has ever conceived the One principle as the
immediate creator of the visible Universe, for no sane man would credit a
planner and architect with having built the edifice he admires with his own
hands. On the testimony of Damascius ([[Peri archon]]) they referred to it as
"the Unknown DARKNESS." The Babylonians passed over this principle in
silence: "To that god," says Porphyry, in [[Peri apoches empsuchon]],
"who is above all things, neither external speech ought to be addressed,
nor yet that which is inward. . . . ." Hesiod begins his theogony with:
"Chaos of all things was the first produced,"** thus allowing the
inference that its cause or producer must be passed over in reverential silence.
Homer in his poems ascends no higher than Night, whom he represents Zeus as
reverencing. According to all the ancient theologists, and to the doctrines of
Pythagoras and Plato, Zeus, or the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See "Magazine" for April,
1797.
** [[Etoi men protista chaos genet;
geneto]] being considered in antiquity as meaning "Was generated" and
not simply was. (See "Taylor's Introd. to the Parmenides of Plato,"
p. 260.
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immediate artificer of the universe,
is not the highest god; any more than Sir Christopher Wren in his physical,
human aspect is the MIND in him which produced his great works of art. Homer,
therefore, is not only silent with respect to the first principle, but likewise
with respect to those two principles immediately posterior to the first, the
AEther and Chaos of Orpheus and Hesiod, and the bound and infinity of
Pythagoras and Plato.* . . . . Proclus says of this highest principle that it
is. . . . "the Unity of Unities, and beyond the first adyte. . . . . more
ineffable than all silence, and more occult than all Essence. . . . . concealed
amidst the intelligible gods." (Ibid.)
To what was written by Thomas Taylor
in 1797 -- namely, that the "Jews appear to have ascended no higher. . . .
than the immediate artificer of the universe"; as "Moses introduces a
darkness on the face of the deep, without even insinuating that there was any
cause of its existence,"** one might add something more. Never have the
Jews in their Bible (a purely esoteric, symbolical work) degraded so profoundly
their metaphorical deity as have the Christians, by accepting Jehovah as their
one living yet personal God.
This first, or rather ONE, principle
was called "the circle of Heaven," symbolized by the hierogram of a
point within a circle or equilateral triangle, the point being the LOGOS. Thus,
in the Rig Veda, wherein Brahma is not even named, Cosmogony is preluded with
the Hiranyagharha, "the Golden Egg," and Prajapati (Brahma later on),
from whom emanate all the hierarchies of "Creators." The Monad, or
point, is the original and is the unit from which follows the entire numeral
system. This Point is the First Cause, but THAT from which it emanates, or of
which, rather, it is the expression, the Logos, is passed over in silence. In
its turn, the universal symbol, the point within the circle, was not yet the
Architect, but the cause of that Architect; and the latter stood to it in
precisely the same relation as the point itself stood to the circumference of
the Circle, which cannot be defined, according to Hermes Trismegistus. Porphyry
shows that the Monad and the Duad of Pythagoras are identical with Plato's
infinite and finite in "Philebus" -- or what Plato calls the
[[apeiron]] and [[peras]]. It is the latter only (the mother) which is
substantial, the former being the "cause of all unity and measure of all
things" (Vit. Pyth. p. 47); the Duad (Mulaprakriti, the VEIL) being thus
shown to be the mother of the Logos and, at the same time, his daughter --
i.e., the object of his perception -- the produced
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is the "bound"
confused with the "Infinite," that Kapila overwhelms with sarcasms in
his disputations with the Brahman Yogis, who claim in their mystical visions to
see the "Highest One."
** See T. Taylor's article in his
Monthly Magazine quoted in the Platonist, edited by T. M. Johnson, F.T.S.,
Osceola, Missouri. (Feb. Number of 1887.)
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producer and the secondary cause of
it. With Pythagoras, the MONAD returns into silence and Darkness as soon as it
has evolved the triad, from which emanate the remaining seven numbers of the 10
(ten) numbers which are at the base of the manifested universe.
In the Norse cosmogony it is again
the same. "In the beginning was a great abyss (Chaos), neither day nor
night existed; the abyss was Ginnungagap, the yawning gulf, without beginning,
without end. ALL FATHER, the Uncreated, the Unseen, dwelt in the depth of the
'Abyss' (SPACE) and willed, and what was willed came into being." (See
"Asgard and the Gods.") As in the Hindu cosmogony, the evolution of
the universe is divided into two acts: called in India the Prakriti and Padma
Creations. Before the warm rays pouring from the "Home of Brightness"
awake life in the Great Waters of Space, the Elements of the first creation
come into view, and from them is formed the Giant Ymir (also Orgelmir) --
primordial matter differentiated from Chaos (literally seething clay). Then
comes the cow Audumla, the nourisher,* from whom is born Buri (the Producer)
who, by Bestla, the daughter of the "Frost-Giants" (the sons of Ymir)
had three sons, Odin, Willi and We, or "Spirit," "Will,"
and "Holiness." (Compare the Genesis of the Primordial Races, in this
work.) This was when Darkness still reigned throughout Space, when the Ases,
the creative Powers (Dhyan Chohans) were not yet evolved, and the Yggdrasil,
the tree of the universe of Time and of Life, had not yet grown, and there was,
as yet, no Walhalla, or Hall of Heroes. The Scandinavian legends of creation,
of our earth and world, begin with time and human life. All that precedes it is
for them "Darkness," wherein All-Father, the cause of all, dwells. As
observed by the editor of "Asgard and the Gods," though these legends
have in them the idea of that ALL-FATHER, the original cause of all, "he
is scarcely more than mentioned in the poems," not because, as he thinks,
before the preaching of the gospel, the idea "could not rise to distinct
conceptions of the Eternal," but on account of its great esoteric
character. Therefore, all the creative gods, or personal Deities, begin at the
secondary stage of Cosmic evolution. Zeus is born in, and out of Kronos --
Time. So is Brahma the production and emanation of Kala, "eternity and
time," Kala being one of the names of Vishnu. Hence we find Odin, the
father of the gods and of the Ases, as Brahma is the father of the gods and of
the Asuras, and hence also the androgyne character of all the chief creative
gods, from the second MONAD of the Greeks down to the Sephiroth Adam Kadmon,
the Brahma or Prajapati-Vach of the Vedas, and the androgyne of Plato, which is
but another version of the Indian symbol.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Vach -- the "melodious cow,
who milks sustenance and water," and yields us "nourishment and
sustenance" as described in Rig-Veda.
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The best metaphysical definition of
primeval theogony in the spirit of the Vedantins may be found in the
"Notes on the Bhagavat-Gita," by Mr. T. Subba Row. (See
"Theosophist" for February, 1887.) Parabrahmam, the unknown and the
incognisable, as the lecturer tells his audience:
". . . . . Is not Ego, it is not
non-ego, nor is it consciousness . . . . . it is not even Atma" . . . . .
"but though not itself an object of knowledge, it is yet capable of
supporting and giving rise to every kind of object and every kind of existence
which becomes an object of knowledge. It is the one essence from which starts
into existence a centre of energy . . . . ." which he calls Logos.
This Logos is the Sabda Brahmam of
the Hindus, which he will not even call Iswara (the "lord" God), lest
the term should create confusion in the people's minds. But it is the
Avalokiteswara of the Hindus, the Verbum of the Christians in its real esoteric
meaning, not in the theological disfigurement.
"It is," he says, "the
Gnatha or the Ego in the Kosmos, and every other Ego . . . . . . is but its
reflection and manifestation. . . . . . It exists in a latent condition in the
bosom of Parabrahmam at the time of Pralaya. . . ." (During Manvantara)
"it has a consciousness and an individuality of its own . . . . ."
(It is a centre of energy, but) . . . . . such centres of energy are almost
innumerable in the bosom of Parabrahmam . . . . ." "It must not be
supposed, that even the logos is the Creator, or that it is but a single centre
of energy . . . . . . their number is almost infinite." "This
Ego," he adds, "is the first that appears in Kosmos, and is the end
of all evolution. It is the abstract Ego" . . . . . "this is the
first manifestation (or aspect) of Parabrahmam." "When once it starts
into conscious being . . . . . . from its objective standpoint, Parabrahmam
appears to it as Mulaprakriti." "Please bear this in mind,"
observes the lecturer, "for here is the root of the whole difficulty about
Purusha and Prakriti felt by the various writers on Vedantic philosophy. This
Mulaprakriti is material to it (the Logos), as any material object is material
to us. This Mulaprakriti is no more Parabrahmam than the bundle of attributes
of a pillar is the pillar itself; Parabrahmam is an unconditioned and absolute
reality, and Mulaprakriti is a sort of veil thrown over it. Parabrahmam by
itself cannot be seen as it is. It is seen by the Logos with a veil thrown over
it, and that veil is the mighty expanse of Cosmic matter. . . ."
"Parabrahmam, after having appeared on the one hand as the Ego, and on the
other as Mulaprakriti, acts as the one energy through the Logos."
And the lecturer explains what he
means by this acting of something which is nothing, though it is the ALL, by a
fine simile. He compares the Logos to the sun through which light and heat
radiate, but whose energy, light and heat, exist in some unknown condition in
Space and are diffused in Space only as visible light and heat, the sun being
only the agent thereof. This is the first triadic hypostasis. The quaternary is
made up by the energizing light shed by the Logos.
The Hebrew Kabalists give it in a
shape which esoterically is
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identical with the Vedantic.
AIN-SOPH, they taught, could not be comprehended, could not be located, nor
named, though the causeless cause of all. Hence its name -- AIN-SOPH -- is a
term of negation, "the inscrutable, the incognizable, and the unnameable."
They made of it, therefore, a boundless circle, a sphere, of which human
intellect, with the utmost stretch, could only perceive the vault. In the words
of one who has unriddled much in the Kabalistical system, in one of its
meanings thoroughly, in its numerical and geometrical esotericism:--
"Close your eyes, and from your own consciousness of perception try and
think outward to the extremest limits in every direction. You will find that
equal lines or rays of perception extend out evenly in all directions, so that
the utmost effort of perception will terminate in the vault of a sphere. The
limitation of this sphere will, of necessity, be a great Circle, and the direct
rays of thought in any and every direction must be right line radii of the
circle. This, then, must be, humanly speaking, the extremest all-embracing
conception of the Ain-Soph manifest, which formulates itself as a geometrical
figure, viz., of a circle, with its elements of curved circumference and right
line diameter divided into radii. Hence, a geometrical shape is the first
recognisable means of connection between the Ain-Soph and the intelligence of
man."*
This great circle (which Eastern
Esotericism reduces to the point within the Boundless Circle) is the
Avalokiteswara, the Logos or Verbum of which Mr. Subba Row speaks. But this
circle or manifested God is as unknown to us, except through its manifested
universe, as the ONE, though easier, or rather more possible to our highest
conceptions. This Logos which sleeps in the bosom of Parabrahmam during
Pralaya, as our "Ego is latent (in us) at the time of sushupti,
sleep"; which cannot cognize Parabrahmam otherwise than as Mulaprakriti --
the latter being a cosmic veil which is "the mighty expanse of cosmic
matter" -- is thus only an organ in cosmic creation, through which radiate
the energy and wisdom of Parabrahmam, unknown to the Logos, as it is to
ourselves. Moreover, as the Logos is as unknown to us as Parabrahmam is unknown
in reality to the Logos, both Eastern Esotericism and the Kabala -- in order to
bring the Logos within the range of our conceptions -- have resolved the
abstract synthesis into concrete images; viz., into the reflections or
multiplied aspects of that Logos or Avalokiteswara, Brahma, Ormazd, Osiris,
Adam-Kadmon, call it by any of these names -- which aspects or Manvantaric
emanations are the Dhyan Chohans, the Elohim, the Devas, the Amshaspends,
&c., &c. Metaphysicians explain the root and germ of the latter,
according to Mr. Subba Row, as the first manifestation of Parabrahmam,
"the highest trinity that we
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* From the Masonic Review for June,
1886.
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are capable of understanding,"
which is Mulaprakriti (the veil), the Logos, and the conscious energy "of
the latter," or its power and light*; or -- "matter, force and the
Ego, or the one root of self, of which every other kind of self is but a
manifestation or a reflection." It is then only in this "light"
(of consciousness) of mental and physical perception, that practical Occultism
can throw this into visibility by geometrical figures; which, when closely
studied, will yield not only a scientific explanation of the real, objective,
existence** of the "Seven sons of the divine Sophia," which is this
light of the Logos, but show by means of other yet undiscovered keys that, with
regard to Humanity, these "Seven Sons" and their numberless
emanations, centres of energy personified, are an absolute necessity. Make away
with them, and the mystery of Being and Mankind will never be unriddled, not
even closely approached.
It is through this light that
everything is created. This ROOT of mental SELF is also the root of physical
Self, for this light is the permutation, in our manifested world, of
Mulaprakriti, called Aditi in the Vedas. In its third aspect it becomes
Vach,*** the daughter and the mother of the Logos, as Isis is the daughter and
the mother of Osiris, who is Horus; and Mout, the daughter, wife, and mother of
Ammon, in the Egyptian Moon-glyph. In the Kabala, Sephira is the same as
Shekinah, and is, in another synthesis, the wife, daughter, and mother of the
"Heavenly man," Adam Kadmon, and is even identical with him, just as
Vach is identical with Brahma, and is called the female Logos. In the Rig-Veda,
Vach is "mystic speech," by whom Occult Knowledge and Wisdom are
communicated to man, and thus Vach is said to have "entered the
Rishis." She is "generated by the gods;" she is the divine Vach
-- the "Queen of gods"; and she is associated -- like Sephira with
the Sephiroth -- with the Prajapati in their work of creation. Moreover, she is
called "the mother of the Vedas," "since it is through her power
(as mystic speech) that Brahma revealed them, and also owing to her power that
he produced the universe" -- i.e., through speech, and words (synthesized
by the "WORD") and numbers.****
But Vach being also spoken of as the
daughter of Daksha -- "the god who lives in all the Kalpas" -- her
Mayavic character is thereby shown:
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Called, in the Bhagavat-Gita,
Daiviprakriti.
** Objective -- in the world of Maya,
of course; still as real as we are.
*** "In the course of cosmic
manifestation, this Daiviprakriti, instead of being the mother of the Logos,
should, strictly speaking, be called his daughter." ("Notes on the
Bhagavat-Gita," p. 305, Theosophist.)
**** The wise men, like Stanley
Jevons amongst the moderns, who invented the scheme which makes the
incomprehensible assume a tangible form, could only do so by resorting to
numbers and geometrical figures.
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during the pralaya she disappears,
absorbed in the one, all-devouring Ray.
But there are two distinct aspects in
universal Esotericism, Eastern and Western, in all those personations of the
female Power in nature, or nature -- the noumenal and the phenomenal. One is
its purely metaphysical aspect, as described by the learned lecturer in his
"Notes on the Bhagavat-Gita;" the other terrestrial and physical, and
at the same time divine from the stand-point of practical human conception and
Occultism. They are all the symbols and personifications of Chaos, the
"Great Deep" or the Primordial Waters of Space, the impenetrable VEIL
between the INCOGNISABLE and the LOGOS of Creation. "Connecting himself
through his mind with Vach, Brahma (the Logos) created the primordial
waters." In the Kathaka Upanishad it is stated still more clearly:
"Prajapati was this Universe. Vach was a second to him. He associated with
her . . . she produced these creatures and again re-entered Prajapati."*
And here we may incidentally point
out one of the many unjust slurs thrown by the pious and good missionaries in
India on the religion of the land. This allegory -- in the "Satapatha
Brahmana" -- namely, that Brahma, as the father of men, performed the work
of procreation by incestuous intercourse with his own daughter Vach, also
called Sandhya (twilight), and Satarupa (the hundred formed), is incessantly
thrown into the teeth of the Brahmins, as condemning their "detestable,
false religion." Besides the fact, conveniently forgotten by the
Europeans, that the Patriarch Lot is shown guilty of the same crime under the
human form, whereas Brahma, or rather Prajapati, accomplished the incest under
the form of a buck with his daughter, who had that of a hind (rohit), the
esoteric reading of Genesis (ch. iii.) shows the same. Moreover, there is
certainly a cosmic, not a physiological meaning attached to the Indian
allegory, since Vach is a permutation of Aditi and Mulaprakriti (Chaos), and
Brahma a permutation of Narayana, the Spirit of God entering into, and
fructifying nature; therefore, there is nothing phallic in the conception at
all.
As already stated, Aditi-Vach is the
female Logos, or the "word," Verbum; and Sephira in the Kabala is the
same. These feminine Logoi are all correlations, in their noumenal aspect, of
Light, and Sound, and Ether, showing how well-informed were the ancients both
in
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This connects Vach and Sephira with
the goddess Kwan-Yin, the "merciful mother," the divine VOICE of the
soul even in Exoteric Buddhism; and with the female aspect of Kwan-Shai-yin,
the Logos, the verbum of Creation, and at the same time with the voice that
speaks audibly to the Initiate, according to Esoteric Buddhism. Bath Kol, the
filia Vocis, the daughter of the divine voice of the Hebrews, responding from
the mercy seat within the veil of the temple is -- a result.
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physical science (as now known to the
moderns), and as to the birth of that science in the Spiritual and Astral
spheres.
"Our old writers said that Vach
is of four kinds . . . . para, pasyanti, madhyama, vaikhari (a statement found
in the Rig-Veda and the Upanishads) . . . . Vaikhari Vach is what we
utter." It is sound, speech, that again which becomes comprehensive and
objective to one of our physical senses and may be brought under the laws of
perception. Hence: "Every kind of Vaikhari-Vach exists in its Madhyama . .
. . Pasyanti and ultimately in its Para form. . . . . The reason why this
Pranava* is called Vach is this, that these four principles of the great Kosmos
correspond to these four forms of Vach. . . . . The whole Kosmos in its
objective form is Vaikhari Vach; the light of the Logos is the madhyama form;
and the Logos itself the pasyanti form; while Parabrahmam is the para (beyond
the noumenon of all Noumena) aspect of that Vach." (Notes on the
Bhagavad-Gita).
Thus Vach, Shekinah, or the
"music of the spheres" of Pythagoras, are one, if we take for our
example instances in the three most (apparently) dissimilar religious
philosophies in the world -- the Hindu, the Greek and the Chaldean Hebrew.
These personations and allegories may be viewed under four (chief) and three
(lesser) aspects or seven in all, as in Esotericism. The para form is the ever
subjective and latent Light and Sound, which exist eternally in the bosom of
the INCOGNISABLE; when transferred into the ideation of the Logos, or its
latent light, it is called pasyanti, and when it becomes that light expressed,
it is madhyama.
Now the Kabala gives the definition
thus: "There are three kinds of light, and that (fourth) which
interpenetrates the others; (1) the clear and the penetrating, the objective
light, (2) the reflected light, and (3) the abstract light. The ten Sephiroth,
the three and the Seven, are called in the Kabala the 10 words, D-BRIM
(Dabarim), the numbers and the Emanations of the heavenly light, which is both
Adam Kadmon and Sephira, or (Brahma) Prajapati-Vach. Light, Sound, Number, are
the three factors of creation in the Kabala. Parabrahmam cannot be known except
through the luminous Point (the LOGOS), which knows not Parabrahmam but only
Mulaprakriti. Similarly Adam Kadmon knew only Shekinah, though he was the
vehicle of Ain-Soph. And, as Adam Kadmon, he is in the esoteric interpretation
the total of the number ten, the Sephiroth (himself a trinity, or the three
attributes of the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Pranava, like Om, is a mystic term
pronounced by the Yogis during meditation; of the terms called, according to
exoteric Commentators, Vyahritis, or "Om, Bhur, Bhuva, Swar" (Om,
earth, sky, heaven) -- Pranava is the most sacred, perhaps. They are pronounced
with breath suppressed. See Manu II. 76-81, and Mitakshara commenting on the
Yajnavahkya-Suriti, i. 23. But the esoteric explanation goes a great deal
further.
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incognisable DEITY in One).*
"When the Heavenly man (or LOGOS) first assumed the form of the Crown**
(Kether) and identified himself with Sephira, he caused seven splendid lights
to emanate from it (the Crown)," which made in their totality ten; so the
Brahma-Prajapati, once he became separated from, yet identical with Vach,
caused the seven Rishis, the seven Manus or Prajapatis to issue from that
crown. In Exotericism one will always find 10 and 7, of either Sephiroth or
Prajapati; in Esoteric rendering always 3 and 7, which yield also 10. Only when
divided in the manifested sphere into 3 and 7, they form [[diagram]], the
androgyne, and [[diagram]], or the figure X manifested and differentiated.
This will help the student to
understand why Pythagoras esteemed the Deity (the Logos) to be the centre of
unity and "Source of Harmony." We say this Deity was the Logos, not
the MONAD that dwelleth in Solitude and Silence, because Pythagoras taught that
UNITY being indivisible is no number. And this is also why it was required of
the candidate, who applied for admittance into his school, that he should have
already studied as a preliminary step, the Sciences of Arithmetic, Astronomy,
Geometry and Music, held as the four divisions of Mathematics.*** Again, this
explains why the Pythagoreans asserted that the doctrine of Numbers -- the
chief of all in Esotericism -- had been revealed to man by the celestial deities;
that the world had been called forth out of Chaos by Sound or Harmony, and
constructed according to the principles of musical proportion; that the seven
planets which rule the destiny of mortals have a harmonious motion "and
intervals corresponding to musical diastemes, rendering various sounds, so
perfectly consonant, that they produce the sweetest melody, which is inaudible
to us, only by reason of the greatness of the sound, which our ears are
incapable of receiving." (Censorinus.)
In the Pythagorean Theogony the
hierarchies of the heavenly Host and Gods were numbered and expressed
numerically. Pythagoras had studied Esoteric Science in India; therefore we
find his pupils saying "The monad (the manifested one) is the principle of
all things. From the Monad and the indeterminate duad (Chaos), numbers; from
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is this trinity that is meant by
the "three steps of Vishnu"; which means: (Vishnu being considered as
the Infinite in exotericism) -- that from the Parabrahm issued Mulaprakriti,
Purusha (the Logos), and Prakriti: the four forms (with itself, the synthesis)
of Vach. And in the Kabala -- Ain-Soph, Shekinah, Adam Kadmon and Sephirah, the
four -- or the three emanations being distinct -- yet ONE.
** Chaldean Book of Numbers. In the
current Kabala the name Jehovah replaces Adam Kadmon.
*** Justin Martyr tells us that,
owing to his ignorance of these four sciences, he was rejected by the
Pythagoreans as a candidate for admission into their school.
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numbers, Points; from points, Lines;
from lines, Superficies; from superficies, Solids; from these, solid Bodies,
whose elements are four -- Fire, Water, Air, Earth; of all which transmuted
(correlated), and totally changed, the world consists." -- (Diogenes
Laertius in Vit. Pythag.)
And this may also, if it does not
unriddle the mystery altogether, at any rate lift a corner of the veil off
those wondrous allegories that have been thrown upon Vach, the most mysterious
of all the Brahmanical goddesses, she who is termed "the melodious cow who
milked forth sustenance and water" (the Earth with all her mystic powers);
and again she "who yields us nourishment and sustenance" (physical
Earth). Isis is also mystic Nature and also Earth; and her cow's horns identify
her with Vach. The latter, after having been recognised in her highest form as
para, becomes at the lower or material end of creation -- Vaikhari. Hence she
is mystic, though physical, Nature, with all her magic ways and properties.
Again, as goddess of Speech and of
Sound, and a permutation of Aditi -- she is Chaos, in one sense. At any rate,
she is the "Mother of the gods," and it is from Brahma (Iswara, or
the Logos) and Vach, as from Adam Kadmon and Sephira, that the real manifested
theogony has to start. Beyond, all is darkness and abstract speculation. With
the Dhyan Chohans, or the gods, the Seers, the Prophets and the adepts in
general are on firm ground. Whether as Aditi, or the divine Sophia of the Greek
Gnostics, she is the mother of the seven sons: the "Angels of the
Face," of the "Deep," or the "Great Green One" of the
"Book of the Dead." Says the Book of Dzyan (Knowledge through
meditation) --
"The great mother lay with
[[diagram]], and the |, and the [[diagram]], the second | and the [[diagram]]*
in her bosom, ready to bring them forth, the valiant sons of the [[diagram]]
[[diagram]] || (or 4,320,000, the Cycle) whose two elders are the [[diagram]]
and the (Point)."
At the beginning of every cycle of
4,320,000, the Seven (or, as some nations had it, eight) great gods, descended
to establish the new order of things and give the impetus to the new cycle.
That eighth god was the unifying Circle or LOGOS, separated and made distinct
from its host, in exoteric dogma, just as the three divine hypostases of the
ancient Greeks are now considered in the Churches as three distinct personae.
"The MIGHTY ONES perform their great works, and leave behind them
everlasting monuments to commemorate their visit, every time they penetrate
within our mayavic veil (atmosphere)," says a
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* 31415, or [[pi]]. The synthesis, or
the Host unified in the Logos and the Point called in Roman Catholicism the
"Angel of the Face," and in Hebrew [[hebrew]] "who is (like
unto, or the same) as God" -- the manifested representation.
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Commentary.* Thus we are taught that
the great Pyramids were built under their direct supervision, "when Dhruva
(the then Pole-star) was at his lowest culmination, and the Krittika (Pleiades)
looked over his head (were on the same meridian but above) to watch the work of
the giants." Thus, as the first Pyramids were built at the beginning of a
Sidereal year, under Dhruva (Alpha Polaris), it must have been over 31,000
years (31,105) ago. Bunsen was right in admitting for Egypt an antiquity of
over 21,000 years, but this concession hardly exhausts truth and fact in this
question. "The stories told by Egyptian priests and others of time-keeping
in Egypt, are now beginning to look less like lies in the sight of all who have
escaped from biblical bondage," writes the author of "The Natural
Genesis." "Inscriptions have lately been found at Sakkarah, making
mention of two Sothiac cycles . . . registered at that time, now some 6,000
years ago. Thus when Herodotus was in Egypt, the Egyptians had -- as now known
-- observed at least five different Sothiac cycles of 1,461 years. The priests
informed the Greek inquirer that time had been reckoned by them for so long
that the sun had twice risen where it then set, and twice set where it then
arose. This . . . can only be realized as a fact in nature by means of two
cycles of Precession, or a period of 51,736 years," (vol. ii, p. 318. But
see in our Book II., "CHRONOLOGY OF THE BRAHMINS.")
Mor Isaac (See Kircher's OEdipus,
vol. ii., p. 425) shows the ancient Syrians defining their world of the
"Rulers" and "active gods" in the same way as the
Chaldeans. The lowest world was the SUBLUNARY -- our own -- watched by the
"Angels" of the first or lower order; the one that came next in rank,
was Mercury, ruled by the "ARCHANGELS"; then came Venus, whose gods
were the PRINCIPALITIES; the fourth was that of the SUN, the domain and region
of the highest and mightiest gods of our system, the solar gods of all nations;
the fifth was Mars, ruled by the "VIRTUES"; the sixth -- that of Bel
or Jupiter -- was governed by the DOMINIONS; the seventh -- the world of Saturn
-- by the THRONES. These are the worlds of form. Above come the four higher
ones, making seven again, since the three highest are "unmentionable and
unpronounceable." The eighth, composed of 1,122 stars, is the domain of
the Cherubs; the ninth, belonging to the walking and numberless stars on
account of their distance, has the seraphs; as to the tenth -- Kircher, quoting
Mor Isaac, says that it is composed "of invisible stars that could be
taken, they said, for clouds -- so massed are they in the zone that we call Via
Straminis, the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Appearing at the beginning of
Cycles, as also of every sidereal year (of 25,868 years) therefore the Kabeiri
or Kabarim received their name in Chaldea, as it means the measures of Heaven
from Kob -- measure of, and Urim -- heavens.
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Milky Way"; and he hastens to
explain that "these are the stars of Lucifer, engulfed with him in his
terrible shipwreck." That which comes after and beyond the tenth world
(our Quaternary, or the Arupa world), the Syrians could not tell. "All
they knew was that it is there that begins the vast and incomprehensible ocean
of the infinite, the abode of the true divinity without boundary or end."
Champollion shows the same belief
among the Egyptians. Hermes having spoken of the Father-Mother and Son, whose
spirit (collectively the DIVINE FIAT) shapes the Universe, says:-- "Seven
Agents (mediums) were also formed, to contain the material (or manifested)
worlds, within their respective circles and the action of these agents was
named DESTINY." He further enumerates seven and ten and twelve orders,
which would take too long to detail here.
As the "Rig Vidhana"
together with the "Brahmanda Purana" and all such works, whether
describing the magic efficacy of the Rig-Vedic Mantras or the future Kalpas,
are declared by Dr. Weber and others to be modern compilations "belonging
probably only to the time of the Puranas," it is useless to refer the
reader to their mystic explanations; and one may as well quote simply from the
archaic books utterly unknown to the Orientalists. These works explain that
which so puzzles the scholars, namely that the Saptarshi, the "mind-born
sons" of Brahma, are referred to in the Satapatha Brahmana under one set
of names; in the Mahabharata under another set; and that the Vayu Purana makes
even nine instead of seven Rishis, by adding the names of Bhrigu and Daksha to
the list. But the same occurs in every exoteric Scripture. The secret doctrine
gives a long genealogy of Rishis, but separates them into many classes. Like
the Gods of the Egyptians, who were divided into seven, and even twelve,
classes, so are the Indian Rishis in their Hierarchies. The first three groups
are the Divine, the Cosmical and the Sub-lunary. Then come the Solar Gods of
our system, the Planetary, the Sub-Mundane, and the purely human -- the heroes
and the Manoushi.
At present, however, we are only
concerned with the pre-cosmic, divine gods, the Prajapati or the "Seven
Builders." This group is found unmistakably in every Cosmogony. Owing to
the loss of Egyptian archaic documents -- since, according to M. Maspero,
"the materials and historical data on hand to study the history of the
religious evolution in Egypt are neither complete nor very often intelligible"
-- in order to have the statements brought forward from the Secret Doctrine
corroborated partially and indirectly, the ancient hymns and inscriptions on
the tombs must be appealed to. One such, at any rate, shows that Osiris was,
like Brahma-Prajapati, Adam Kadmon, Ormazd, and so many other Logoi, the chief
and synthesis of the
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group of "Creators" or
Builders. Before Osiris became the "One" and the highest god of Egypt
he was worshipped at Abydos as the head or leader of the Heavenly Host of the
Builders belonging to the higher of the three orders. The hymn engraved on the
votive stela of a tomb from Abydos (3rd register) addresses Osiris thus:
"Salutations to thee, Osiris, elder son of Sib; thou the greatest over the
six gods issued from the goddess Noo (primordial Water), thou the great
favourite of thy father Ra; father of fathers, King of Duration, master in the
eternity . . . who, as soon as these issued from thy mother's bosom, gathered
all the crowns and attached the Uraeus (serpent or naja)* on thy head;
multiform god, whose name is unknown and who has many names in towns and
provinces. . ." Coming out from the primordial water crowned with the
uraeus, which is the serpent emblem of Cosmic fire, and himself the seventh
over the six primary gods issued from Father-Mother, Nou and Nout (the sky),
who can Osiris be, but the chief Prajapati, the chief Sephiroth, the chief
Amshaspend-Ormazd! That this latter solar and cosmic god stood, in the
beginning of religious evolution, in the same position as the archangel
"whose name was secret," is certain. This Archangel was the representative
on earth of the Hidden Jewish God, Michael, in short: it is his
"Face" that is said to have gone before the Jews like a "Pillar
of Fire." Burnouf says, "The seven Amshaspends, who are most
assuredly our archangels, designate also the personifications of the divine
Virtues." (Comment on the Yacna, p. 174.) And these archangels, therefore,
are as "certainly" the Saptarishi of the Hindus, though it is next to
impossible to class each with its pagan prototype and parallel, since, as in the
case of Osiris, they have all so "many names in towns and provinces."
Some of the most important, however, will be shown in their order.
One thing is thus undeniably proven.
The more one studies their Hierarchies and finds out their identity, the more
proofs one acquires that there is not one of the past and present personal
gods, known to us from the earliest days of History, that does not belong to
the third stage of Cosmic manifestation. In every religion we find the
concealed deity forming the ground work; then the ray therefrom, that falls
into primordial Cosmic matter (first manifestation); then the androgyne result,
the dual Male and Female abstract Force, personified (second stage); this
separates itself finally, in the third, into seven Forces, called the creative
Powers by all the ancient Religions, and the
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* This Egyptian word Naja reminds one
a good deal of the Indian Naga, the Serpent-God. Brahma and Siva and Vishnu are
all crowned with, and connected with Nagas -- a sign of their cyclic and cosmic
character.
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"Virtues of God" by the
Christians. The later explanation and metaphysical abstract qualifications have
never prevented the Roman and Greek Churches from worshipping these
"Virtues" under the personifications and distinct names of the seven
Archangels. In the Book of Druschim (p. 59, 1st Treatise) in the Talmud, a
distinction between these groups is given which is the correct Kabalistical
explanation. It says:
"There are three groups (or
orders) of Sephiroth. 1st. The Sephiroth called "the divine
attributes" (abstract). 2nd. The physical or sidereal Sephiroth (personal)
-- one group of seven, the other of ten. 3rd. The metaphysical Sephiroth, or
periphrasis of Jehovah, who are the first three Sephiroth (Kether, Chochma and
Binah), the rest of the seven being the (personal) seven spirits of the
Presence" (also of the planets).
The same division has to be applied
to the primary, secondary and tertiary evolution of gods in every theogony, if
one wishes to translate the meaning esoterically. We must not confuse the
purely metaphysical personifications of the abstract attributes of Deity, with
their reflection -- the sidereal gods. This reflection, however, is in reality
the objective expression of the abstraction: living Entities and the models
formed on that divine prototype. Moreover, the three metaphysical Sephiroth or
"the periphrasis of Jehovah" are not Jehovah; it is the latter
himself with the additional titles of Adonai, Elohim, Sabbaoth, and the
numerous names lavished on him, who is the periphrasis of the Shaddai,
[[hebrew]], the Omnipotent. The name is a circumlocution, indeed, a too
abundant figure of Jewish rhetoric, and has always been denounced by the
Occultists. To the Jewish Kabalists, and even the Christian Alchemists and
Rosicrucians, Jehovah was a convenient screen, unified by the folding of its
many flaps, and adopted as a substitute: one name of an individual Sephiroth
being as good as another name, for those who had the secret. The
Tetragrammaton, the Ineffable, the sidereal "Sum Total," was invented
for no other purpose than to mislead the profane and to symbolize life and
generation.* The real secret and unpronounceable name -- "the word that is
no word" -- has to be sought in the seven names of the first seven
emanations, or the "Sons of the Fire,"
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Says the translator of Avicebron's
"Qabbalah" (Mr. Isaac Myer, LL.B., of Philadelphia) of this "Sum
Total": "The letter of Kether is [[hebrew]] (Yod), of Binah
[[hebrew]](Heh), together YaH, the feminine Name; the third letter, that of
Hokhmah, is [[hebrew]] (Vau), making together, [[hebrew]] YHV of [[hebrew]]
YHVH, the Tetragrammaton, and really the complete symbols of its
efficaciousness. The last [[hebrew]](Heh) of this Ineffable Name being always
applied to the Six Lower and the last, together the Seven remaining
Sephiroth." . . . Thus the Tetragrammaton is holy only in its abstract
synthesis. As a quaternary containing the lower Seven Sephiroth, it is phallic.
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in the secret Scriptures of all the
great nations, and even in the Zohar, the Kabalistic lore of that smallest of
all, the Jewish. This word, composed of seven letters in each tongue, is found
embodied in the architectural remains of every grand building in the world;
from the Cyclopean remains on Easter Island (part of a continent buried under
the seas nearer four million years ago* than 20,000) down to the earliest
Egyptian pyramids.
We shall have to enter more fully
upon this subject, and bring practical illustrations to prove the statements
made in the text.
For the present it is sufficient to show,
by a few instances, the truth of what was asserted at the beginning of this
Monograph, namely, that no Cosmogony, the world over, with the sole exception
of the Christian, has ever attributed to the One Highest cause, the UNIVERSAL
Deific Principle, the immediate creation of our Earth, man, or anything
connected with these. This statement holds as good for the Hebrew or Chaldean
Kabala as it does for Genesis, had the latter been ever thoroughly understood,
and -- what is still more important -- correctly translated.** Everywhere there
is either a LOGOS -- a "Light shining
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The statement will, of course, be
found preposterous and absurd, and simply laughed at. But if one believes in
the final submersion of Atlantis 850,000 years ago, as taught in "Esoteric
Buddhism" (the gradual first sinking having begun during the Eocene age),
one has to accept the statement for the so-called Lemuria, the continent of the
Third Root Race, first nearly destroyed by combustion, and then submerged. This
is what the Commentary says: "The first earth having been purified by the
forty-nine fires, her people, born of Fire and Water, could not die . . . etc.;
the Second Earth (with its race) disappeared as vapour vanishes in the air . .
. the Third Earth had everything consumed on it after the separation, and went
down into the lower Deep (the Ocean). This was twice eighty-two cyclic years
ago." Now a cyclic year is what we call a sidereal year, and is founded on
the precession of the equinoxes, or 25,868 years each, and this is equal,
therefore, in all to 4,242,352 years. More details will be found in the text of
Book II. Meanwhile, this doctrine is embodied in the "Kings of Edom."
** The same reserve is found in the
Talmud and in every national system of religion whether monotheistic or
exoterically polytheistical. From the superb religious poem by the Kabalist
Rabbi Solomon Ben Gabirol in "the Kether Malchuth," we select a few
definitions given in the prayers of Kippur. . . . "Thou art one, the
beginning of all numbers, and the foundation of all edifices; Thou art One, and
in the secret of Thy unity the wisest of men are lost, because they know it
not. Thou art one, and Thy Unity is never diminished, never extended, and
cannot be changed. Thou art one, but not as an element of numeration; for Thy
Unity admits not of multiplication, change or form. Thou art existent; but the
understanding and vision of mortals cannot attain to thy existence, nor
determine for thee the Where, the How, and the Why. Thou art Existent, but in
thyself alone, there being none other that can exist with thee. Thou art
Existent, before all time and without Place. Thou art Existent, and thy
existence is so profound and secret that none can penetrate and discover thy
secrecy. Thou art Living, but within no time that can be fixed or known; Thou
art Living, but not by a spirit or a soul, for Thou art thyself, THE SOUL OF
ALL SOULS," etc., etc. There is [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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in DARKNESS," truly -- or the
Architect of the Worlds is esoterically a plural number. The Latin Church,
paradoxical as ever, while applying the epithet of Creator to Jehovah alone,
adopts a whole Kyriel of names for the working FORCES of the latter, those
names betraying the secret. For if the said Forces had nought to do with
"Creation" so-called, why call them Elohim (Alhim) in plural;
"divine workmen" and Energies ([['Energeia]]), incandescent celestial
stones (lapides igniti coelorum), and especially, "supporters of the
World" ([[Kosmokratores]]), governors or RULERS of the World (rectores
mundi), the "Wheels" of the World (Rotae), Ophanim, Flames and
POWERS, "Sons of God" (B'ne Alhim), "Vigilant COUNSELLORS,"
etc., etc.
It was often premised (and as
unjustly as usual) that China, nearly as old a country as India, had no
cosmogony. "It was unknown to Confucius, and the Buddhists extended their
Cosmogony without introducing a personal God,"* it is complained. The
Yi-King, "the very essence of ancient thought and the combined work of the
most venerated sages, fails to show a distinct cosmogony." Nevertheless,
there is one, and a very distinct one. Only as Confucius did not admit of a
future life** and the Chinese Buddhists reject the idea of One Creator,
accepting one cause and its numberless effects, they are misunderstood by the
believers in a personal God. The "great Extreme" as the commencement
"of changes" (transmigrations) is the shortest and perhaps the most
suggestive of all Cosmogonies, for those who, like the Confucianists, love
virtue for its own sake, and try to do good unselfishly without perpetually
looking to reward and profit. The "great Extreme" of Confucius
produces "two figures." These "two" produce in their turn
"the four images"; these again "the eight symbols." It is
complained that though the Confucianists see in them "Heaven, Earth and
man in miniature," . . . we can see in them anything we like. No doubt,
and so it is with regard to many symbols, especially in those of the latest
religions. But they who know something of Occult numerals, see in these "figures"
the symbol, however rude, of a harmonious progressive Evolution of Kosmos and
its beings, both the Heavenly and the Terrestrial. And any one who has studied
the numerical evolution in the primeval cosmogony of Pythagoras (a contemporary
of Confucius) can never fail to find in his Triad, Tetractis and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] a distance between this Kabalistical Deity and the Biblical Jehovah, the
spiteful and revengeful God of Abram, Isaac, and Jacob, who tempted the former
and wrestled with the last. No Vedantin but would repudiate such a Parabrahm.
* Rev. Joseph Edkins "On
Cosmogony," p. 320. And very wisely they have acted.
** If he rejected it, it was on the
ground of what he calls the changes -- in other words, rebirths -- of man, and
constant transformations. He denied immortality to the personality of man -- as
we do -- not to MAN.
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Decade emerging from the ONE and
solitary Monad, the same idea. Confucius is laughed at by his Christian
biographer for "talking of divination" before and after this passage,
and is represented as saying: "The eight symbols determine good and ill
fortune, and these lead to great deeds. There are no imitable images greater
than heaven and earth. There are no changes greater than the four seasons
(meaning North, South, East and West, et seq.). There are no suspended images
brighter than the sun and moon. In preparing things for use, there is none
greater than the sage. In determining good and ill-luck there is nothing
greater than the divining straws and the tortoise."*
Therefore, the "divining
straws" and the "tortoise," the "symbolic sets of
lines," and the great sage who looks at them as they become one and two,
and two become four, and four become eight, and the other sets "three and
six," are laughed to scorn, only because his wise symbols are
misunderstood.
So the author and his colleagues will
scoff no doubt at the Stanzas given in our text, for they represent precisely
the same idea. The old archaic map of Cosmogony is full of lines in the
Confucian style, of concentric circles and dots. Yet all these represent the
most abstract and philosophical conceptions of the Cosmogony of our Universe.
At all events it may answer, perhaps, better to the requirements and the
scientific purposes of our age, than the cosmogonical essays of St. Augustine
and the "Venerable Bede," though these were published over a
millennium later than the Confucian.
Confucius, one of the greatest sages
of the ancient world, believed in ancient magic, and practised it himself
"if we take for granted the statements of Kin-yu" . . . . and
"he praised it to the skies in Yi-kin," we are told by his reverend
critic. Nevertheless, even in his age -- i.e., 600 B.C., Confucius and his
school taught the sphericity of the Earth and even the heliocentric system;
while, at about thrice 600 years after the Chinese philosopher, the Popes of
Rome threatened and even burnt "heretics" for asserting the same. He
is laughed at for speaking of the "Sacred Tortoise." No unprejudiced
person can see any great difference between a tortoise and a lamb as candidates
for sacredness, as both are symbols and no more. The Ox, the Eagle,** the Lion,
and occasionally
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* He may be laughed at by the
Protestants; but the Roman Catholics have no right to mock him, without
becoming guilty of blasphemy and sacrilege. For it is over 200 years since
Confucius was canonized as a Saint in China by the Roman Catholics, who have
thereby obtained many converts among the ignorant Confucianists.
** The animals regarded as sacred in
the Bible are not few: the goat for one, the Azaz-el, or God of Victory. As
Aben Ezra says: "If thou art capable of comprehending the mystery of
Azazel, thou wilt learn the mystery of His (God's) name, for it has similar
associates in Scriptures. I will tell thee by allusion one portion of the
mystery; [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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the Dove, are "the sacred
animals" of the Western Bible, the first three being found grouped round
the Evangelists; and the fourth (the human face) is a Seraph, i.e., a fiery
serpent, the Gnostic Agathodaemon probably.* As explained, the "sacred
animals" and the Flames or "Sparks" within the "Holy
Four" refer to the prototypes of all that is found in the Universe in the
Divine Thought, in the ROOT, which is the perfect cube, or the foundation of
the Kosmos collectively and individually. They have all an occult reference to
primordial Cosmic forms and its first concretions, work, and evolution.
In the earliest Hindu exoteric
cosmogonies, it is not even the Demiurge who creates. For it is said in one of
the Puranas that: "The great Architect of the World gives the first
impulse to the rotatory motion of our planetary system by stepping in turn over
each planet and body." It is this action "that causes each sphere to
turn around itself, and all around the Sun." After which action, "it
is the Brahmandica, the Solar and Lunar Pitris (the Dhyani-Chohans)" who
take charge of their respective spheres (earths and planets), to the end of the
Kalpa." The Creators are the Rishis; most of whom are credited with the
authorship of the mantras or Hymns of the Rig Veda. They are sometimes seven,
sometimes ten, when they become prajapati, the "Lord of Beings"; then
they rebecome the seven and the fourteen Manus, as the representatives of the seven
and fourteen cycles of Existence ("Days of Brahma"); thus answering
to the seven AEons, when at the end of the first stage of Evolution they are
transformed into the seven stellar Rishis, the Saptarishis; while their human
doubles appear as heroes, Kings and Sages on this earth.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] when thou shalt have thirty three years of age thou wilt comprehend
me." So with the mystery of the tortoise. Rejoicing over the poetry of
Biblical metaphors, associating with the name of Jehovah, "incandescent
stones," "sacred animals," etc., and quoting from the Bible de
Vence (Vol. XIX. p. 318) a French pious writer says: "Indeed all of them
are Elohim like their God; for, these Angels assume, through a holy usurpation,
the very divine name of Jehovah each time they represent him."
(Pneumatologie, Vol. II., p. 294). No one ever doubted that the NAME must have
been assumed, when under the guise of the Infinite, One Incognizable, the
Malachim (messengers) descended to eat and drink with men. But if the Elohim
(and even lower Beings), assuming the god-name, were and are still worshipped,
why should the same Elohim be called devils, when appearing under the names of
other Gods?
* The choice is curious, and shows
how paradoxical were the first Christians in their selections. For why should
they have chosen these symbols of Egyptian paganism, when the eagle is never
mentioned in the New Testament save once, when Jesus refers to it as a carrion
eater? (Matt. xxiv. 28); and in the Old Testament it is called unclean; that
the Lion is made a point of comparison with Satan, both roaring for men to
devour; and the oxen are driven out of the Temple. On the other hand the
Serpent, brought as an exemplar of wisdom to follow, is now regarded as the
symbol of the Devil. The esoteric pearl of Christ's religion degraded into
Christian theology, may indeed be said to have chosen a strange and unfitting
shell to be born in and evolved from.
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The Esoteric doctrine of the East
having thus furnished and struck the key-note -- which is as scientific as it
is philosophical and poetical, as may be seen, under its allegorical garb --
every nation has followed its lead. It is from the exoteric religions that we
have to dig out the root-idea before we turn to esoteric truths, lest the latter
should be rejected. Furthermore, every symbol -- in every national religion --
may be read esoterically, and the proof furnished for its being correctly read
by transliterating it into its corresponding numerals and geometrical forms --
by the extraordinary agreement of all -- however much the glyphs and symbols
may vary among themselves. For in the origin those symbols were all identical.
Take, for instance, the opening sentences in various cosmogonies: in every case
it is either a circle, an egg, or a head. DARKNESS is always associated with
this first symbol and surrounds it, -- as shown in the Hindu, the Egyptian, the
Chaldeo-Hebrew and even the Scandinavian systems -- hence black ravens, black
doves, black waters and even black flames; the seventh tongue of Agni, the
fire-god being called "Kali," "the black," as it was a
black flickering flame. Two black doves flew from Egypt and settling on the
oaks of Dodona, gave their names to the Grecian gods. Noah lets out a black
raven after the deluge, which is a symbol for the Cosmic pralaya, after which
began the real creation or evolution of our earth and humanity. Odin's black
ravens fluttered around the Goddess Saga and "whispered to her of the past
and of the future." What is the real meaning of all those black birds?
They are all connected with the primeval wisdom, which flows out of the
pre-cosmic Source of all, symbolised by the Head, the Circle, the Egg; and they
all have an identical meaning and relate to the primordial Archetypal man (Adam
Kadmon) the creative origin of all things, which is composed of the Host of
Cosmic Powers -- the Creative Dhyan-Chohans, beyond which all is darkness.
Let us inquire of the wisdom of the
Kabala -- even veiled and distorted as it now is, -- to explain in its numerical
language an approximate meaning, at least of the word "raven." This
is its number value as given in the "Source of Measures."
"The term Raven is used but
once, and taken as eth-h'orebv [[diagram]], = 678, or 113 x 6; while the Dove
is mentioned five times. Its value is 71, and 71 x 5 = 355. Six diameters, or
the raven, crossing, would divide the circumference of a circle of 355 into 12
parts or compartments; and 355 subdivided for each unit by 6, would equal
213-0, or the head ("beginning") in the first verse of Genesis. This
divided or subdivided, after the same fashion, by 2, or the 355 by 12, would
give 213-2, or the word B'rash, [[diagram]], or the first word of Genesis, with
its prepositional prefix, signifying the same concreted general form
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astronomically, with the one here
intended." Now the secret reading of the first verse of Genesis being:
"In Rash (B'rash) or head, developed gods, the Heavens and the Earth"
-- it is easy to comprehend the esoteric meaning of the raven, once that the
like meaning of the Flood (or Noah's Deluge) is ascertained. Whatever the many
other meanings of this emblematical allegory may be, its chief meaning is that
of a new cycle and a new Round (our Fourth Round.)* The "Raven," or
the Eth-H'Orebv, yields the same numerical value as the "Head," and
returned not to the ark, while the dove returned, carrying the olive-branch,
when Noah, the new man of the new Race (whose prototype is Vaivasvata Manu),
prepared to leave the ark, the womb (or Argha) of terrestrial nature, is the
symbol of the purely spiritual, sexless and androgyne man of the first three
Races, who vanished from earth for ever. Numerically Jehovah, Adam, Noah, are
one in the Kabala: at best, then, it is Deity descending on to Ararat (later on
Sinai), to incarnate in man his image, through the natural process, henceforth:
the mother's womb, whose symbols are the ark, the mount (Sinai), etc., in
Genesis. The Jewish allegory is at once astronomical, and purely physiological
rather than anthropomorphic.
And here lies the abyss between the
two systems (Aryan and Semitic), though built on the same foundation. As shown
by an expounder of the Kabala, "the basic idea underlying the philosophy
of the Hebrews was that God contained all things within himself and that man
was his image; man, including woman (as Androgynes);" and that "geometry
and numbers (and measures applicable to astronomy) are contained in the terms
man and woman; and the apparent incongruity of such a mode was eliminated by
showing the connection of man and woman with a particular system of numbers and
measures and geometry, by the parturient time-periods, which furnished the
connecting link between the terms and the facts shown, and perfected the mode
used." It is argued that, the primal cause being absolutely incognizable,
"the symbol of its first comprehensible manifestation was the conception
of a circle with its diameter line, so as at once to carry the idea of
geometry, phallicism, and astronomy;" and this was finally applied to the
"signification of simply human generative organs."** Hence the whole
cycle of events
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Bryant is right in saying
"Druid Bardesin says of Noah that when he came out of the ark (the birth
of a new cycle), after a stay therein of a year and a day, that 364 + 1 = 365
days, he was congratulated by Neptune upon his birth from the waters of the
Flood, who wished him a happy New Year." The "Year," or cycle,
esoterically, was the new race of men born from woman after the separation of
the sexes, which is the secondary meaning of the allegory: its primary meaning
being the beginning of the Fourth Round, or the new Creation.
** Unpubl. MSS. (But see "Source
of Measures.")
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from Adam and the Patriarchs down to
Noah is made to apply to phallic and astronomical uses, the one regulating the
other, as the lunar periods, for instance. Hence, too, their genesis begins
after their coming out of the Ark, and the close of the flood -- at the Fourth
Race. With the Aryan people it is different.
Eastern Esotericism has never
degraded the One Infinite Deity, the container of all things, to such uses; and
this is shown by the absence of Brahma from the Rig Veda and the modest
positions occupied therein by Rudra and Vishnu, who became the powerful and
great Gods, the "Infinites" of the exoteric creeds, ages later. But
even they, "Creators" as the three may be, are not the direct
creators and "forefathers of men." The latter are shown occupying a
still lower scale, and are called Prajapatis, the Pitris (our lunar ancestors),
etc., etc. -- never the "One Infinite God." Esoteric philosophy shows
only physical man as created in the image of the Deity: but the latter is but
"the minor gods." It is the HIGHER-SELF, the real EGO who alone is
divine and GOD.
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§ XIII.
THE SEVEN CREATIONS.
"THERE was neither day nor
night, nor sky nor earth, nor darkness nor light, nor any other thing save only
ONE, unapprehensible by intellect, or THAT which is Brahma and Pumis (Spirit)
and Pradhana (crude matter)" (Veda: "Vishnu Purana Commentary");
or literally: "One Pradhanika Brahma Spirit: THAT was." The
"Pradhanika Brahma Spirit" is Mulaprakriti and Parabrahmam.
In Vishnu Purana, Parasara says to
Maitreya, his pupil:-- "I have thus explained to you, excellent Muni, six
creations. . . . the creation of the Arvaksrotas beings was the seventh, and
was that of man." Then he proceeds to speak of two additional and very
mysterious creations, variously interpreted by the commentators.
Origen, commenting upon the books
written by Celsus, his opponent -- books which were all destroyed by the
prudent Church Fathers -- evidently answers the objections of his contradictor
and reveals his system at the same time. This was evidently septenary. But his
theogony, the genesis of the stars or planets, that of sound and colour, all
found as an answer satire, and no better. Celsus, you see, "desiring to
exhibit his learning," speaks of a ladder of creation with seven gates,
and on the top
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of it the eighth -- ever closed. The
mysteries of the Persian Mithras are explained and "musical reasons,
moreover, are added." . . . . And to these again he strives "to add a
second explanation connected also with musical considerations,"* -- i.e.,
with the seven notes of the scale, the Seven Spirits of the Stars, &c.,
&c.
Valentinus expatiates upon the power
of the great Seven, who were called to bring forth this universe after
Ar(r)hetos, or the Ineffable, whose name is composed of seven letters, had
represented the first hebdomad. This name (Ar(r)hetos) is one to indicate the
Sevenfold nature of the One (the logos). "The goddess Rhea," says
Proclus in Timaeus (p. 121), "is a Monad, Duad, and Heptad,"
comprehending in herself all the Titanidae, "who are seven."
The Seven Creations are found in
almost every Purana. They are all preceded by what Wilson translates --
"the indiscrete Principle," absolute Spirit independent of any
relation with objects of sense. They are -- (1) Mahattattwa, the Universal Soul,
Infinite Intellect, or Divine Mind; (2) Bhuta or Bhutasarga, elemental
creation, the first differentiation of Universal indiscrete Substance; (3)
Indriya or Aindriyaka, organic evolution. "These three were the Prakrita
creations, the developments of indiscrete nature preceded by indiscrete
principle"; (4) Mukhya, the fundamental creation of perceptible things,
was that of inanimate bodies**; (5) Tairyagyonya, or Tiryaksrotas, was that of
animals; (6) Urdhwasrotas, or that of divinities*** (?); (7) Arvaksrotas, was that
of man. (See Vishnu Purana.)
This is the order given in the
exoteric texts. According to esoteric teaching there are seven primary, and
seven secondary "creations;" the former being the Forces
self-evolving from the one causeless FORCE; the latter, showing the manifested
Universe emanating from the already differentiated divine elements.
Esoterically, as well as
exoterically, all the above enumerated Creations stand for the (7) periods of
Evolution, whether after an "Age" or a "Day" of Brahma.
This is the teaching par excellence of Occult Philosophy, which, however, never
uses the term "creation," nor even that of evolution, "with
regard to primary 'Creation':" but calls all such forces "the aspects
of the Causeless Force." In the Bible
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Origen contra Celsum, b. vi., chap.
xxii.
** The text says: "And the
fourth creation is here the primary, for things immovable are emphatically
known as primary." (See Fitzedward Hall's Corrections.)
*** How can "divinities"
have been created after the animals? The esoteric meaning of the expression
"animals" is the germs of all animal life including man. Man is
called a sacrificial animal, and an animal that is the only one among animal
creation who sacrifices to the gods. Moreover, by the "sacred
animals," the 12 signs of the zodiac are often meant in the sacred texts,
as already stated.
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the seven periods are dwarfed into
the six days of creation and the seventh day of rest, and the Westerns adhere
to the letter. In the Hindu philosophy, when the active Creator has produced
the world of gods, the germs of all the undifferentiated elements and the
rudiments of future senses (the world of noumena, in short), the Universe
remains unaltered for a "Day of Brahma," a period of 4,320,000,000
years. This is the seventh passive period or the "Sabbath day" of
Eastern philosophy, that follows six periods of active evolution. In the
Satapatha Brahmana "Brahma" (neuter), the absolute Cause of all
Causes, radiates the gods. Having radiated the gods (through its inherent
nature) the work is interrupted. In the 1st Book of Manu it is said, "At
the expiration of each night (pralaya) Brahma, having been asleep, awakes, and,
through the sole energy of the motion, CAUSES to emanate from itself the
spirit, which in its essence is, and yet is not."
In the Sepher Jezirah, the Kabalistic
Book of Creation, the author has evidently repeated the words of Manu. In it
the Divine Substance is represented as having alone existed from the eternity,
boundless and absolute; and as having emitted from itself the Spirit. "One
is the Spirit of the living God, blessed be his Name, who liveth for ever!
Voice, Spirit, and Word, this is the Holy Spirit." (Sepher Jezireh, chap.
1, Mishna IX.) And this is the Kabalistic abstract Trinity, so unceremoniously
anthropomorphized by the Fathers. From this triple ONE emanated the whole
Kosmos. First from ONE emanated number TWO, or Air, the creative element; and
then number THREE, Water, proceeded from the air; Ether or Fire complete the
mystic four, the Arba-il. (Ibid.) In the Eastern doctrine Fire is the first
Element -- Ether, synthesizing the whole (since it contains all of them).
In the Vishnu Purana, the whole seven
periods are given, and the progressive Evolution of "Spirit-Soul," and
of the seven forms of matter (or principles) are shown. It is impossible to
enumerate them in this work. The reader is asked to peruse one of the Puranas.
"R. Yehudah began, it is
written: 'Elohim said: Let there be a firmament, in the midst of waters. . . .
. At the time that the Holy . . . created the world, He (they) created seven
heavens Above. He created seven earths Below, seven seas, seven days, seven
rivers, seven weeks, seven years, seven times, and 7,000 years that the world
has been. . . . . the seventh of all the millennium. So here are seven earths
Below, they are all inhabited except those which are above, and those . . . .
below. And . . . . between each earth, a heaven (firmament) is spread out
between each other. . . . . And there are in them (these earths) creatures who
look different from each other . . . . but if you object and say that all the
children of the world came out from Adam,
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it is not so. . . . . And the lower
earths, where do they come from? They are from the chain of the earth, and from
the heaven below," etc., etc.*
Irenaeus is our witness (and a very
unwilling one, too) that the Gnostics taught the same system, veiling very
carefully the true esoteric meaning. This "veiling," however, is
identical with that of the Vishnu Purana and others. Thus Irenaeus writes of
the Marcosians: "They maintain that first of all the four elements, fire,
water, earth and air, were produced after the image of the primary tetrad
above, and that then if we add their operations, namely, heat, cold, dryness
and moisture, an exact likeness of the ogdoad is presented." (B. i. ch.
xvii.)
Only this "likeness" and
the ogdoad itself is a blind, just as in the seven creations of the Vishnu
Puranas, to which two more are added of which the eighth, termed Anugraha,
"possesses both the qualities of goodness and darkness," a Sankhyan
more than a Puranic idea. For Irenaeus says again (b. I. xxx. 6) that
"they (the Gnostics) had a like eighth creation which was good and bad,
divine and human. They affirm that man was formed on the eighth day. Sometimes
they affirm that he was made on the sixth day, and at others on the eighth;
unless, perchance, they mean that his earthly part was formed on the sixth day
and his fleshly part (?) on the eighth day; these two being distinguished by
them."
They were so
"distinguished," but not as Irenaeus gives it. The Gnostics had a
superior Hebdomad, and an inferior one, in Heaven; and a third terrestrial
Hebdomad, on the plane of matter. IAO, the mystery god and the Regent of the
Moon, as given in Origen's chart, was the chief of these superior "Seven Heavens,"**
hence identical with the chief of the lunar Pitris, that name being given by
them to the lunar Dhyan-Chohans. "They affirm that these seven heavens are
intelligent, and speak of them as being angels," writes the same Irenaeus;
and adds that on this account they termed Iao Hebdomas, while his mother was
called "Ogdoas," because, as he explains, "she preserved the
number of the first begotten and primary Ogdoad of the Pleroma." (Ibid. b.
I, v. 2).
This "first begotten
Ogdoad" was (a) in theogony the second Logos (the manifested) because he
was born of the Seven-fold first Logos, hence he is the eighth on this
manifested plane; and (b) in astrolatry, it was the Sun, Martanda -- the eighth
son of Aditi, whom she rejects while preserving her Seven Sons, the planets.
For the ancients have never regarded the Sun as a planet, but as a central and
fixed Star. This, then, is the second Hebdomad born of the Seven-rayed one,
Agni, the Sun
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Qabbalah, p. 415-16, by T. Myer,
Philadelphia.
** Superior to the Spirits or
"Heavens" of the Earth only.
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and what not, only not the seven
planets, which are Surya's brothers, not his Sons. These Astral gods, whose
chief with the Gnostics was Ildabaoth* (from Ilda "child," and Baoth
"the egg"), the son of Sophia Achamoth, the daughter of Sophia
(Wisdom), whose region is the Pleroma, were his (Ildabaoth's) sons. He produces
from himself these six stellar spirits: Jove (Jehovah), Sabaoth, Adonai, Eloi,
Osraios, Astaphaios,** and it is they who are the second, or inferior Hebdomad.
As to the third, it is composed of the seven primeval men, the shadows of the
lunar gods, projected by the first Hebdomad. In this the Gnostics did not, as
seen, differ much from the esoteric doctrine except that they veiled it. As to
the charge made by Irenaeus, who was evidently ignorant of the true tenets of
the "Heretics," with regard to man being created on the sixth day,
and man being created on the eighth, this relates to the mysteries of the inner
man. It will become comprehensible to the reader only after he has read Book
II., and understood well the Anthropogenesis of the Esoteric doctrine.
Ildabaoth is a copy of Manu. The
latter boasts, "Oh, best of twice-born men! Know that I (Manu) am he, the
creator of all this world, whom that male Viraj . . . spontaneously
produced" (I., 33). He first creates the ten lords of Being, the
Prajapatis, who, as verse 36 says . . . "produce seven other Manus."
(The Ordinances of Manu.) Ildabaoth does likewise: "I am Father and God,
and there is no one above me," he exclaims. For which his mother coolly
puts him down by saying, "Do not lie, Ildabaoth, for the father of all,
the first man (Anthropos) is above thee, and so is Anthropos, the Son of
Anthropos" (Irenaeus, b. I, ch. xxx., 6). This is a good proof that there were
three Logoi (besides the Seven born of the First), one of these being the Solar
Logos. And, again, who was that "Anthropos" himself, so much higher
than Ildabaoth? The Gnostic records alone can solve this riddle. In Pistis
Sophia the four-vowelled name IEOV is in each case accompanied by the epithet
of "the Primal, or First man." This shows again that the gnosis was
but an echo of our archaic doctrine. The names answering to Parabrahm, to
Brahm, and Manu (the first thinking man) are composed of one-vowelled,
three-vowelled and seven-vowelled sounds. Marcus, whose philosophy was
certainly more Pythagorean than anything else, speaks of a revelation to him of
the seven heavens sounding each one vowel as they pronounced the seven names of
the seven (angelic) hierarchies.
When spirit has permeated every
minutest atom of the seven principles of Kosmos, then the secondary creation,
after the above-mentioned period of rest, begins.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See "Isis Unveiled," Vol.
II., p. 183.
** See also King's Gnostics. Other
sects regarded Jehovah as Ildabaoth himself King identifies him with Saturn.
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"The creators (Elohim) outline
in the second 'hour' the shape of man," says Rabbi Simeon (The Nuctameron
of the Hebrews). "There are twelve hours in the day," says the
Mishna, "and it is during these that creation is accomplished." The
"twelve hours of the day" are again the dwarfed copy, the faint, yet
faithful, echo of primitive Wisdom. They are like the 12,000 divine years of
the gods, a cyclic blind. Every "Day of Brahma" has 14 Manus, which
the Hebrew Kabalists, following, however, in this the Chaldeans, have disguised
into 12 "Hours."* The Nuctameron of Apollonius of Tyana is the same
thing. "The Dodecahedron lies concealed in the perfect Cube," say the
Kabalists. The mystic meaning of this is, that the twelve great transformations
of Spirit into matter (the 12,000 divine years) take place during the four
great ages, or the first Mahayuga. Beginning with the metaphysical and the
supra-human, it ends in the physical and purely human natures of Kosmos and
man. Eastern philosophy can give the number of mortal years that run along the
line of spiritual and physical evolutions of the seen and the unseen, if
Western science fails to do so.
Primary Creation is called the
Creation of Light (Spirit); and the Secondary -- that of Darkness (matter).**
Both are found in Genesis, chap. i., v. 2, and at the beginning of chapter ii.
The first is the emanation of self-born gods (Elohim); the second of physical
nature.
This is why it is said in the
Zohar:-- "Oh, companions, companions, man as emanation was both man and
woman; as well on the side of the FATHER as on the side of the MOTHER. And this
is the sense of the words:-- And Elohim spoke: 'Let there be Light and it was
Light!' . . . And this is the 'two-fold man'" Light, moreover, on our
plane, is darkness in the higher spheres.
"Man and woman on the side of
the FATHER" (Spirit) refers to Primary Creation; and on the side of the
Mother (matter) to the secondary. The two-fold man is Adam Kadmon, the male and
female abstract prototype and the differentiated Elohim. Man proceeds from the
Dhyan Chohan, and is a "Fallen Angel," a god in exile, as will be
shown.
In India these creations were
described as follows:--
(I.) Mahat-tattwa creation --
so-called because it was the primordial self-evolution of that which had to
become Mahat -- the "divine MIND, conscious and intelligent";
esoterically, "the spirit of the Universal soul." . . .
"Worthiest of ascetics, through its potency (the potency of that cause);
every produced cause comes by its proper nature." (Vishnu Purana.)
"Seeing that the potencies of all beings are under-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Elsewhere, however, the identity is
revealed. See supra, the quotation from Ibn-Gabirol and his 7 heavens, 7
earths, etc.
** This must not be confused with
precosmic "DARKNESS," the Divine ALL.
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stood only through the knowledge of
That (Brahma), which is beyond reasoning, creation, and the like, such
potencies are referable to Brahma." THAT, then, precedes the manifestation.
"The first was Mahat," says Linga Purana; for the ONE (the That) is
neither first nor last, but ALL. Exoterically, however, this manifestation is
the work of the "Supreme One" (a natural effect, rather, of an
Eternal Cause); or, as the Commentator says, it might have been understood to
mean that Brahma was then created (?), being identified with Mahat, active
intelligence or the operating will of the Supreme. Esoteric philosophy renders
it "the operating LAW."
It is on the right comprehension of
this tenet in the Brahmanas and Puranas that hangs, we believe, the apple of
discord between the three Vedantin Sects: the Advaita, Dwaita, and the
Visishtadvaitas. The first arguing rightly that Parabrahman, having no
relation, as the absolute all, to the manifested world -- the Infinite having
no connection with the finite -- can neither will nor create; that, therefore,
Brahma, Mahat, Iswara, or whatever name the creative power may be known by,
creative gods and all, are simply an illusive aspect of Parabrahmam in the
conception of the conceivers; while the other sects identify the impersonal
Cause with the Creator, or Iswara.
Mahat (or Maha-Buddhi) is, with the
Vaishnavas, however, divine mind in active operation, or, as Anaxagoras has it,
"an ordering and disposing mind, which was the cause of all things,"
-- [[Nous o diakosmonte kai panton aitios]].
Wilson saw at a glance the suggestive
connection between Mahat and the Phoenician Mot, or Mut, who was female with
the Egyptians -- the Goddess Mout, the "Mother" -- "which, like
Mahat," he says, "was the first product of the mixture (?) of Spirit
and matter, and the first rudiment of Creation": "Ex connexione autem
ejus spiritus prodidit Mot . . . . . From whose seed were created all living
things" -- repeats Brucker (I., 240) -- giving it a still more
materialistic and anthropomorphic colouring.
Nevertheless, the esoteric sense of
the doctrine is seen through every exoteric sentence on the very face of the
old Sanscrit texts that treat of primordial Creation. "The Supreme Soul,
the all permeant (Sarvaga) Substance of the World, having entered (been drawn)
into matter (prakriti) and Spirit (purusha), agitated the mutable and the
immutable principles the season of Creation (manvantara) having arrived."*
. . .
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The nous of the Greeks, which is
(spiritual or divine) mind, or mens, "Mahat," operates upon matter in
the same way; it "enters into" and agitates it:
"Spiritus intus alit, totamque
infusa per artus,
Mens agitat molem, et magno se
corpore miscet."
In the Phoenician Cosmogony,
"Spirit mixing with its own principles gives rise to [[Footnote continued
on next page]]
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Esoteric doctrine teaches that the
Dhyan Chohans are the collective aggregate of divine Intelligence or primordial
mind, and that the first Manus -- the seven "mind-born" Spiritual
Intelligences -- are identical with the former. Hence the
"Kwan-shi-yin" -- "the golden Dragon in whom are the
seven," of Stanza III. -- is the primordial Logos, or Brahma, the first
manifested creative Power; and the Dhyani-Energies are the Manus, or
Manu-Swayambhuva collectively. The direct connection, moreover, between the
"Manus" and "Mahat" is easy to see. Manu is from the root
man, "to think"; and thinking proceeds from the mind. It is, in
Cosmogony, the pre-nebular period.
(II.) "The second
Creation," "Bhuta," was of the rudimental principles
(Tanmatras), thence termed the elemental creation (Bhuta-sarga).* It is the
period of the first breath of the differentiation of the pre-Cosmic Elements or
matter. Bhutadi means literally "the origin of the Elements," and
precedes Bhuta-sarga -- the "creation" or differentiation of those
Elements in primordial "Akasa" (Chaos or Vacuity).** In the
"Vishnu Purana" it is said to proceed along, and belong to, the
triple aspect of Ahankara, translated Egotism, but meaning rather that
untranslateable term the "I-AM-NESS," that which first issues from
"Mahat," or divine mind; the first shadowy outline of Self-hood, for
"pure" Ahankara becomes "passionate" and finally
"rudimental"
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] creation" also; (Brucker, I., 240); the Orphic triad shows an
identical doctrine: for there Phanes (or Eros), Chaos, containing crude
undifferentiated Cosmic matter, and Chronos (time), are the three co-operating
principles, emanating from the Unknowable and concealed point, which produce
the work of "Creation." And they are the Hindu Purusha (phanes),
Pradhana (chaos), and Kala (Chronos) or time. The good Professor Wilson does
not like the idea, as no Christian clergyman, however liberal, would. He
remarks that "as presently explained,. the mixture (of the Supreme Spirit
or Soul) is not mechanical; it is an influence or effect exerted upon
intermediate agents which produce effects." The sentence in Vishnu Purana:
"As fragrance affects the mind from its proximity merely, and not from any
immediate operation upon mind itself, so the Supreme influenced the elements of
creation," the reverend and erudite Sanscritist correctly explains . . . :
"As perfumes do not delight the mind by actual contact, but by the
impression they make upon the sense of smelling, which communicates it to the
mind," adding: "The entrance of the Supreme into spirit, as well as
matter, is less intelligible than the view elsewhere taken of it, as the
infusion of spirit, identified with the supreme, into Prakriti or matter
alone." He prefers the verse in Padma Purana: "He who is called the
male (spirit) of Prakriti . . . that same divine Vishnu entered into
Prakriti." This "view" is certainly more akin to the plastic
character of certain verses in the Bible concerning the Patriarchs, such as Lot
(Gen. xix., 34-38) and even Adam (iv., v. 1), and others of a still more
anthropomorphic nature. But it is just that which led Humanity to Phallicism,
Christian religion being honeycombed with it, from the first chapter of Genesis
down to the Revelation.
* All these sentences are quoted from
"Vishnu Purana," Book I., ch. v.
** Vishnu is both Bhutesa, "Lord
of the Elements, and all things," and Viswarupa, "Universal Substance
or Soul."
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(initial); it is "the origin of
conscious as of all unconscious being," though the Esoteric school rejects
the idea of anything being "unconscious" -- save on this (our) plane
of illusion and ignorance. At this stage of the Second Creation, the second
hierarchy of the Manus appear, the Dhyan Chohans or Devas, who are the origin
of Form (rupa): the Chitrasikhandina (bright-crested) or the Riksha -- those
Rishis who have become the informing souls of the seven stars (of the Great
Bear).* In astronomical and Cosmogonical language this Creation relates to the
first stage of Cosmic-life, the Fire-Mist Period after its Chaotic stage,**
when atoms issue from Laya.
(III.) The third (the Indriya) was
the modified form of Ahankara, the conception of "I," (from
"Aham," "I") termed the organic Creation, or creation of
the senses (Aindriyaka). "These three were the Prakrita creation, the
(discrete) developments of indiscrete nature preceded by the indiscrete
principle." "Preceded by," ought to be replaced here with
"beginning by," Buddhi; for the latter is neither a discrete nor an
indiscrete quantity, but partakes of the nature of both, in man as in Kosmos: a
unit -- a human MONAD on the plane of illusion -- when once freed from the
three forms of Ahankara and liberated from its terrestrial manas, Buddhi
becomes truly a continued quantity, both in duration and extension, because
eternal and immortal. Earlier it is stated, that the third Creation "abounding
with the quality of goodness, is termed Urdhvasrotas"; and a page or two
further the Urdhvasrotas creation is referred to as "the sixth creation .
. . that of the divinities" (p. 75). This shows plainly that earlier as
well as later manvantaras have been purposely confused, to prevent the pro-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See concerning their post-types,
the Treatise written by Trithemius (Agrippa's master, 16th cent.).
"Concerning the seven secondaries, or Spiritual Intelligences, who, after
God, actuate the Universe;" giving out, besides secret cycles and several
prophecies, certain facts and beliefs about the Genii, or the Elohim, which
preside over and guide the septenary stages of the World's Course.
** From the first, the Orientalists
have found themselves beset by great difficulties with regard to any possible
order in the Puranic Creations. Brahma is very often confused with Brahm, by
Wilson, for which he is criticised by his successors. The "Original Sanscrit
Texts" are preferred by Mr. Fitzedward Hall for the translation of Vishnu
Purana and texts, to those used by Wilson. "Had Professor Wilson enjoyed
the advantages which are now at the command of the student of Indian
philosophy, unquestionably he would have expressed himself differently,"
as said by the editor of his works. This reminds one of the answer given by one
of Thomas Taylor's admirers to those scholars who criticised his translations
of Plato. "Thomas Taylor may have had less knowledge of the Greek than his
critics have, but he understood Plato far better than they do," he said.
Our present Orientalists disfigure the mystic sense of the Sanskrit texts far
more than Wilson ever did, though the latter is undeniably guilty of very gross
errors.
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fane from perceiving the truth. This
is called "incongruity" and "contradictions" by the
Orientalists.*
This "creation" of the
immortals, the "Deva-Sarga," is the last of the first series, and has
a universal reference; namely, to Evolutions in general, not specifically to
our Manvantara; but the latter begins with the same over and over again,
showing that it refers to several distinct Kalpas. For it is said "at the
close of the past (Padma) Kalpa the divine Brahma awoke from his night of sleep
and beheld the universe void." Then Brahma is shown going once more over
the "seven creations" in the secondary stage of evolution, repeating
the first three on the objective plane.
(IV.) The Mukhya, the Primary as it
begins the series of four. Neither the word "inanimate" bodies nor
yet immovable things, as translated by Wilson, gives a correct idea of the
Sanskrit terms used. Esoteric philosophy is not the only one to reject the idea
of any atom being inorganic, for it is found also in orthodox Hinduism.
Moreover, Wilson himself says (in his collected Works, vol. iii., p. 381):
"All the Hindu systems consider vegetable bodies as endowed with life . .
. " Charachara, or the synonymous sthavara and jangama, is, therefore,
inaccurately rendered by "animate and inanimate," "sentient
beings," and "unconscious," or "conscious and unconscious
beings," etc., etc. "Locomotive and fixed" would be better,
since trees are considered to possess souls." Mukhya is the
"creation" or organic evolution of the vegetable kingdom. In this
secondary Period, the three degrees of Elemental or Rudimental Kingdoms are evolved
in this world, corresponding inversely in order to the three Prakritic
creations during the Primary period of Brahma's activity. As in that period, in
the words of "Vishnu Purana": "The first creation was that of
Mahat (Intellect), the second, of Tanmatras (rudimental principles), and the
third, that of the senses (Aindriyaka)"; in this one, the order of the
Elemental Forces stands thus: (1) The nascent centres of Force (intellectual
and physical); (2) the rudimental principles -- nerve force, so to say; and (3)
nascent apperception, which is the Mahat of the lower kingdoms, especially
developed in the third order of Elementals; these are succeeded by the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "The three Creations beginning
with Intelligence are elemental, but the six creations which proceed from the
series of which Intellect is the first are the work of Brahma"
(Vayu-Purana). Here "creations" mean everywhere stages of Evolution.
Mahat, "Intellect" or mind (which corresponds with Manas, the former
being on the Cosmic, and the latter on the human plane) stands here, too, lower
than Buddhi or Supra-divine Intelligence. Therefore, when we read in Linga
Purana that "the first Creation was that of Mahat, Intellect being the
first in manifestation," we must refer that (specified) creation to the
first evolution of our system or even our Earth, none of the preceding ones
being discussed in the Puranas, but only occasionally hinted at.
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objective kingdom of minerals, in
which latter that apperception is entirely latent, to re-develop only in the
plants). The mukhya "Creation," then, is the middle point between the
three lower and the three higher kingdoms, which represent the seven esoteric
kingdoms of Kosmos, as of Earth.
(V.) The Tiryaksrotas (or
Tairyagyonya) creation,* that of the "(sacred) animals," corresponding
only on Earth, to the dumb animal creation. That which is meant by
"animals," in primary Creation, is the germ of awakening
consciousness or of apperception, that which is faintly traceable in some
sensitive plants on Earth and more distinctly in the protistic monera.** On our
globe, during the first round, animal "creation" precedes that of
man, while the former (or mammal) evolves from the latter in our fourth round
-- on the physical plane: in Round I. the animal atoms are drawn into a
cohesion of human physical form; while in Round IV. the reverse occurs
according to magnetic conditions developed during life. And this is
metempsychosis (See "Mineral Monad" in "Five Years of
Theosophy," p. 276). This fifth stage of evolution, called exoterically
"Creation," may be viewed in both the Primary and Secondary periods,
one as the Spiritual and Cosmic, the other as the material and terrestrial. It
is Archibiosis, or life-origination -- "origination," so far, of
course, as the manifestation of life on all the seven planes is concerned. It
is at this period of Evolution that the absolutely eternal universal motion, or
vibration, that which is called in Esoteric language "the GREAT
BREATH," differentiates in the primordial, first manifested ATOM. More and
more, as chemical and physical sciences progress, does this occult axiom find
its corroboration in the world of knowledge: the scientific hypothesis, that
even the simplest elements of matter are identical in nature and differ from
each other only owing to the variety of the distributions of atoms in the
molecule or speck of substance, or by the modes of its atomic vibration, gains
every day more ground.
Thus, as the differentiation of the
primordial germ of life has to precede the evolution of the Dhyan Chohan of the
third group or hierarchy of Being in Primary Creation, before those
"gods" can become rupa (embodied in their first ethereal form), so
animal creation has to precede,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Professor Wilson translates it, as
though animals were higher on the scale of "creation" than
divinities, or angels, although the truth about the devas is very plainly
stated further on. This "creation," says the text, is both primary
(Prakrita) and secondary (Vaikrita). It is the latter, as regards the origin of
the gods from Brahma (the personal anthropomorphic creator of our material
universe); it is the former (primary) as affecting Rudra, who is the immediate
production of the first principle. Rudra is not alone a title of Siva, but
embraces agents of creation, angels and men, as will be shown further on.
** Neither plant nor animal, but an
existence between the two.
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for that same reason, divine MAN on
earth. And this is why we find in the Puranas: "The fifth, the
Tairyagyonya creation, was that of animals, and --
(VI). The Urdhvasrotas creation, or
that of divinities (Vishnu Purana Book I. chap. i.). But these (divinities) are
simply the prototypes of the First Race, the fathers of their
"mind-born" progeny with the soft bones.* It is these who became the
Evolvers of the "Sweat-born" -- an expression explained in Book II.
Finally, the sixth "Creation" is followed, and "Creation in
general, closed by --
(VII.) The evolution of the
"Arvaksrotas beings, which was the seventh, and was that of man"
(Vishnu Purana, Book I.).
The "eighth creation"
mentioned is no Creation at all; it is a blind again, for it refers to a purely
mental process: the cognition of the "ninth" creation, which, in its
turn, is an effect, manifesting in the secondary of that which was a
"Creation" in the Primary (Prakrita) Creation.** The Eighth, then,
called Anugraha (the Pratyayasarga or the intellectual creation of the
Sankhyas, explained in Karika, v. 46, p. 146), is "that creation of which
we have a perception" -- in its esoteric aspect -- and "to which we
give intellectual assent (Anugraha) in contradistinction to organic
creation." It is the correct perception of our relations to the whole
range of "gods" and especially of those we bear to the Kumaras -- the
so-called "Ninth Creation" -- which is in reality an aspect of or
reflection of the sixth in our manvantara (the Vaivasvata). "There is a
ninth, the Kumara Creation, which is both primary and secondary," says
Vishnu Purana, the oldest of such texts.*** "The Kumaras," explains an
esoteric text,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Created beings" --
explains Vishnu Purana -- "although they are destroyed (in their
individual forms) at the periods of dissolution, yet being affected by the good
or evil acts of former existences, are never exempted from their consequences.
And when Brahma produces the world anew, they are the progeny of his will . .
." "Collecting his mind into itself (Yoga willing), Brahma creates
the four orders of beings, termed gods, demons, progenitors, and MEN" . .
. "progenitors" meaning the prototypes and Evolvers of the first Root
Race of men. The progenitors are the Pitris, and are of seven classes. They are
said in exoteric mythology to be born of Brahma's side, like Eve from the rib
of Adam.
** "These notions," remarks
Dr. Wilson, "the birth of Rudra and the saints, seem to have been borrowed
from the Saivas, and to have been awkwardly engrafted upon the Vaishnava
system." The esoteric meaning ought to have been consulted before
venturing such a hypothesis.
*** Parasara, the Vedic Rishi, who
received the Vishnu Purana from Pulastya and taught it to Maitreya, is placed
by the Orientalists at various epochs. As correctly observed, in the Hindu
Class. Dict:-- "Speculations as to his era differ widely from 575 B.C. to
1391 B.C., and cannot be trusted." Quite so; but no less, however, than
any other date as assigned by the Sanskritists, so famous in this department of
arbitrary fancy.
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"are the Dhyanis, derived
immediately from the supreme Principle, who reappear in the Vaivasvata Manu
period, for the progress of mankind."* The commentator of the Vishnu
Purana corroborates it, by remarking that "these sages live as long as
Brahma; and they are only created by him in the first Kalpa, although their
generation is very commonly and inconsistently introduced in the Varaha, or Padma
Kalpa" (the secondary). Thus, the Kumaras are, exoterically, "the
creation of Rudra or Nilalohita, a form of Siva, by Brahma, and of certain
other mind-born sons of Brahma. But, in the esoteric teaching, they are the
progenitors of the true spiritual SELF in the physical man -- the higher
Prajapati, while the Pitris, or lower Prajapati, are no more than the fathers
of the model, or type of his physical form, made "in their image."
Four (and occasionally five) are mentioned freely in the exoteric texts, three Kumaras
being secret.** (Compare what is said of "The Fallen Angels" in Book
II.).
The Exoteric four are: Sanat-Kumara,
Sananda, Sanaka, and Sanatana; and the esoteric three are: Sana, Kapila, and
Sanat-sujata. Special attention is once more drawn to this class of Dhyan
Chohans, for herein lies the mystery of generation and heredity hinted at in
Book I. (See the four Orders of Angelic Beings; Comment on Stanza VII.). Book
II. explains their position in the divine Hierarchy. Meanwhile, let us see what
the exoteric texts say about them.
They do not say much; nothing to him
who fails to read between the lines. "We must have recourse, here, to
other Puranas for the elucidation of this term," remarks Wilson, who does
not suspect for one moment that he is in the presence of the "Angels of
Darkness," the mythical "great enemy" of his Church. Therefore,
he contrives to elucidate no more than that these (divinities) DECLINING TO
CREATE PROGENY*** (and thus rebelling against Brahma), remained, as the name
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* They may indeed mark a
"special" or extra creation, since it is they who, by incarnating
themselves within the senseless human shells of the two first Root-races, and a
great portion of the Third Root-race -- create, so to speak, a new race: that
of thinking, self-conscious and divine men.
** "The four Kumaras (are) the
mind-born Sons of Brahma. Some specify seven" (H. Class. Dict.). All these
seven Vaidhatra, the patronymic of the Kumaras, "the Maker's Sons,"
are mentioned and described in Iswara Krishna's "Sankhya Karika" with
the Commentary of Gaudapadacharya (Sankaracharya's Paraguru) attached to it. It
discusses the nature of the Kumaras, though it refrains from mentioning by name
all the seven Kumaras, but calls them instead "the seven sons of
Brahma," which they are, as they are created by Brahma in Rudra. The list
of names it gives us is: Sanaka, Sanandana, Sanatana, Kapila, Ribhu, and
Panchasikha. But these are again all aliases.
*** So untrustworthy are some
translations of the Orientalists that in the French Translation of Hari-Vamsa,
it is said "The seven Prajapati, Rudra, Skanda (his son) [[Footnote
continued on next page]]
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of the first implies, ever boys,
Kumaras: that is, ever pure and innocent, whence their creation is also called
the "Kumara." (Book I. chap. v., Vishnu Purana.) The Puranas,
however, may afford a little more light. "Being ever as he was born, he is
here called a youth; and hence his name is well known as Sanat-Kumara"
(Linga purana, prior section LXX. 174.) In the Saiva Purana, the Kumaras are
always described as Yogins. The Kurma Purana, after enumerating them, says:
"These five, O Brahmans, were Yogins, who acquired entire exemption from
passion." They are five, because two of the Kumaras fell.
Of all the seven great divisions of
Dhyan-Chohans, or Devas, there is none with which humanity is more concerned
than with the Kumaras. Imprudent are the Christian Theologians who have
degraded them into fallen Angels, and now call them "Satan" and
Demons; as among these heavenly denizens who refuse to create, the Archangel
Michael -- the greatest patron Saint of Western and Eastern Churches, under his
double name of St. Michael and his supposed copy on earth, St. George
conquering the DRAGON -- has to be allowed one of the most prominent places. (See
Book II., "The Sacred Dragons and their Slayers.")
The Kumaras, the "mind-born
Sons" of Brahma-Rudra (or Siva)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] and Sanat-Kumara proceeded to create beings." Whereas, as Wilson
shows, the original is: "These seven . . . created progeny; and so did
Rudra, but Skanda and Sanat Kumara, restraining their power, abstained from
creation." The "four orders of beings" are referred to sometimes
as "Ambhamsi," which Wilson renders: "literally Waters,"
and believes it "a mystic term." It is one, no doubt; but he
evidently failed to catch the real esoteric meaning. "Waters" and
"water" stand as the symbol for Akasa, the "primordial Ocean of
Space," on which Narayana, the self-born Spirit, moves: reclining on that
which is its progeny (See Manu). "Water is the body of Nara; thus we have
heard the name of water explained. Since Brahma rests on the water, therefore
he is termed Narayana" (Linga, Vayu, and Markandeya Puranas) ". . .
Pure, Purusha created the Waters pure . . ." at the same time Water is the
third principle in material Kosmos, and the third in the realm of the
Spiritual: Spirit of Fire, Flame, Akasa, Ether, Water, Air, Earth, are the
cosmic, sidereal, psychic, spiritual and mystic principles, pre-eminently
occult, in every plane of being. "Gods, Demons, Pitris and men," are
the four orders of beings to whom the term Ambhamsi is applied (in the Vedas it
is a synonym of gods): because they are all the product of WATERS (mystically),
of the Akasic Ocean, and of the Third Principle in nature. Pitris and men on
earth are the transformations (rebirths) of gods and demons (Spirits) on a
higher plane. Water is, in another sense, the feminine principle. Venus Aphrodite
is the personified Sea, and the mother of the god of love, the generator of all
the gods as much as the Christian Virgin Mary is Mare (the sea), the mother of
the Western God of Love, Mercy and Charity. If the student of Esoteric
philosophy thinks deeply over the subject he is sure to find out all the
suggestiveness of the term Ambhamsi, in its manifold relations to the Virgin in
Heaven, to the Celestial Virgin of the Alchemists, and even to the "Waters
of Grace" of the modern Baptist.
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the howling and terrific destroyer of
human passions and physical senses, which are ever in the way of the
development of the higher spiritual perceptions and the growth of the inner
eternal man -- mystically,* are the progeny of Siva, the Mahayogi, the great
patron of all the Yogis and mystics of India. They themselves, being the "Virgin-Ascetics,"
refuse to create the material being MAN. Well may they be suspected of a direct
connection with the Christian Archangel Michael, the "Virgin
Combatant" of the Dragon Apophis, whose victim is every soul united too
loosely to its immortal Spirit, the Angel who, as shown by the Gnostics,
refused to create just as the Kumaras did. (See Book II., "The Mystic
Dragons and their Slayers.") . . . Does not that patron-Angel of the Jews
preside over Saturn (Siva or Rudra), and the Sabbath, the day of Saturn? Is he
not shown of the same essence with his father (Saturn), and called the
"Son of Time," Kronos, or Kala (time), a form of Brahma (Vishnu and
Siva)?" And is not "Old Time" of the Greeks, with its scythe and
sand-glass, identical with the "Ancient of Days" of the Kabalists,
the latter "Ancient" being one with the Hindu "Ancient of
Days," Brahma (in his triune form), whose name is also "Sanat,"
the Ancient? Every Kumara bears the prefix of Sanat and Sana; and Sanaischara
is Saturn, the planet (Sani and Sarra), the King Saturn whose Secretary in
Egypt was Thot-Hermes the first. They are thus identified both with the planet
and the god (Siva), who are, in their turn, shown the prototypes of Saturn, who
is the same as Bel, Baal, Siva, and Jehovah Sabbaoth, The angel of whose face
is MIKAEL ([[diagram]] "who is as God"). He is the patron, and
guardian Angel of the Jews, as Daniel tells us (v. 21); and, before the Kumaras
were degraded, by those who were ignorant of their very name, into demons and fallen
angels, the Greek Ophites, the occultly inclined predecessors and precursors of
the Roman Catholic Church after its secession and separation from the primitive
Greek Church, had identified Michael with their Ophiomorphos, the rebellious
and opposing spirit. This means nothing more than the reverse aspect
(symbolically) of Ophis -- divine Wisdom or Christos. In the Talmud, Mikael
(Michael) is "Prince of Water" and the chief of the seven Spirits,
for the same reason that his prototype (among many others) Sanat-Sujata,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Siva-Rudra is the Destroyer, as
Vishnu is the preserver; and both are the regenerators of spiritual as well as
of physical nature. To live as a plant, the seed must die. To live as a
conscious entity in the Eternity, the passions and senses of man must first DIE
before his body does. "To live is to die and to die is to live," has
been too little understood in the West. Siva, the destroyer, is the creator and
the Saviour of Spiritual man, as he is the good gardener of nature. He weeds
out the plants, human and cosmic, and kills the passions of the physical, to
call to life the perceptions of the spiritual, man.
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-- the chief of the Kumaras -- is
called Ambhamsi, "Waters," -- according to the commentary on Vishnu
Purana. Why? Because the "Waters" is another name of the "Great
Deep," the primordial Waters of space or Chaos, and also means
"Mother," Amba, meaning Aditi and Akasa, the Celestial Virgin-Mother
of the visible universe. Furthermore, the "Waters of the flood" are
also called "the GREAT DRAGON," or Ophis, Ophio-Morphos.
The Rudras will be noticed in their
Septenary character of "Fire-Spirits" in the "Symbolism"
attached to the Stanzas in Book II. There we shall also consider the Cross (3 +
4) under its primeval and later forms, and shall use for purposes of comparison
the Pythagorean numbers side by side with Hebrew Metrology. The immense
importance of the number seven will thus become evident, as the root number of
nature. We shall examine it from the standpoints of the Vedas and the Chaldean
Scriptures, as it existed in Egypt thousands of years B.C., and as treated in
the Gnostic records; we shall show how its importance as a basic number has
gained recognition in physical Science; and we shall endeavour to prove that
the importance attached to the number seven throughout all antiquity was due to
no fanciful imaginings of uneducated priests, but to a profound knowledge of
natural law.
--------------
§ XIV.
THE FOUR ELEMENTS.
METAPHYSICALLY and esoterically there
is but One ELEMENT in nature, and at the root of it is the Deity; and the
so-called seven elements, of which five have already manifested and asserted
their existence, are the garment, the veil, of that deity; direct from the
essence whereof comes MAN, whether physically, psychically, mentally or
spiritually considered. Four elements only are generally spoken of in later
antiquity, five admitted only in philosophy. For the body of ether is not fully
manifested yet, and its noumenon is still "the Omnipotent Father --
AEther, the synthesis of the rest." But what are these
"ELEMENTS" whose compound bodies have now been discovered by
Chemistry and Physics to contain numberless sub-elements, even the sixty or
seventy of which no longer embrace the whole number suspected. (Vide Addenda,
§§ XI. and XII., quotations from Mr. Crookes' Lectures.) Let us follow their
evolution from the historical beginnings, at any rate.
The four Elements were fully
characterized by Plato when he said that they were that "which composes
and decomposes the compound bodies."
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Hence Cosmolatry was never, even in
its worst aspect, the fetishism which adores or worships the passive external
form and matter of any object, but looked ever to the noumenon therein. Fire,
Air, Water, Earth, were but the visible garb, the symbols of the informing,
invisible Souls or Spirits -- the Cosmic gods to whom worship was offered by
the ignorant, and simple, respectful recognition by the wiser. In their turn
the phenomenal subdivisions of the noumenal Elements were informed by the
Elementals, so called, the "Nature Spirits" of lower grades.
In the Theogony of Mochus, we find Ether
first, and then the air; the two principles from which Ulom the intelligible
([[noetos]]) God (the visible universe of matter) is born.*
In the Orphic hymns, the Eros-Phanes
evolves from the Spiritual Egg, which the AEthereal winds impregnate, Wind being
"the Spirit of God," who is said to move in AEther, "brooding
over the chaos" -- the Divine "Idea." In the Hindu
Katakopanisad, Purusha, the Divine Spirit, already stands before the original
matter, from whose union springs the great Soul of the World, "Maha =
Atma, Brahm, the Spirit of Life;"** these latter appellations being again
identical with the Universal Soul, or Anima Mundi, the Astral Light of the
Theurgists and Kabalists, being its last and lowest division."
The [[stoicheia]], (Elements) of
Plato and Aristotle, were thus the incorporeal principles attached to the four
great divisions of our Cosmic World, and it is with justice that Creuzer
defines those primitive beliefs . . . as a species of magism, a psychic
paganism, and a deification of potencies; a spiritualization which placed the
believers in a close community with these potencies," (Book IX, p. 850).
So close, indeed, that the hierarchies of those potencies or Forces have been
classified on a graduated scale of seven from the ponderable to the
imponderable. They are Septenary, -- not as an artificial aid to facilitate
their comprehension -- but in their real Cosmic gradation, from their chemical
(or physical) to their purely spiritual composition. Gods -- with the ignorant
masses -- gods independent and supreme; daemons with the fanatics, who,
intellectual as they often may be, are unable to understand the Spirit of the
philosophical sentence, in pluribus unum. With the hermetic philosopher they
are FORCES relatively "blind," or "intelligent," according
to which of the principles in them he deals with. It required long millenniums
before they found themselves, in our cultured age, finally degraded into simple
chemical elements.
At any rate, good Christians, and
especially the Biblical Protestants,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Movers: "Phoinizer," 282.
** Weber: "Akad. Vorles,"
213, 214, etc.
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ought to show more reverence for the
four Elements, if they would show any for Moses. For the Bible manifests the
consideration and mystic significance in which they were held by the Hebrew
Lawgiver, on every page of the Pentateuch. The tent which contained the Holy of
Holies " was a Cosmic Symbol, sacred, in one of its meanings, to the
Elements, the four cardinal points, and ETHER. Josephus shows it built in
white, the colour of Ether. And this explains also why, in the Egyptian and the
Hebrew temples -- according to Clemens Alexandrinus -- a gigantic curtain,
supported by five pillars, separated the sanctum sanctorum (now represented by
the altar in Christian churches) wherein the priests alone were permitted to
enter, from the part accessible to the profane. By its four colours the curtain
symbolized the four principal Elements, and signified the knowledge of the
divine that the five senses of men can enable man to acquire with the help of
the four Elements. (See Stromata I., v. § 6).
In Cory's Ancient Fragments, one of
the "Chaldean Oracles" expresses ideas about the elements and Ether
in language singularly like that of the Unseen Universe, written by two eminent
scientists of our day.
It states that "from ether have
come all things, and to it all will return; that the images of all things are
indelibly impressed upon it; and that it is the store-house of the germs or of
the remains of all visible forms, and even ideas. It appears as if this case
strangely corroborates our assertion that whatever discoveries may be made in
our days will be found to have been anticipated by many thousand years by our
'simple-minded ancestors.' " -- (Isis Unveiled.)
Whence came the four elements and the
malachim of the Hebrews? They have been made to merge, by a theological
sleight-of-hand on the part of the Rabbins and the later Fathers of the Church
into Jehovah, but their origin is identical with that of the Cosmic gods of all
other nations. Their symbols, whether born on the shores of the Oxus, on the
burning sands of Upper Egypt, or in the wild forests, weird and glacial, which
cover the slopes and peaks of the sacred snowy mountains of Thessaly, or again,
in the pampas of America, their symbols, we repeat, when traced to their
source, are ever one and the same. Whether Egyptian or Pelasgian, Aryan or
Semitic, the genius loci, the local god, embraced in its unity all nature; but
not especially the four elements any more than one of their creations, such as
trees, rivers, mounts or stars. The genius loci -- a very late after-thought of
the last sub-races of the Fifth Root-race, when the primitive and grandiose
meaning had become nearly lost -- was ever the representative in his
accumulated titles of all his colleagues. It was the god of fire, symbolised by
thunder, as Jove or Agni; the god of water, symbolised by the fluvial bull or
some sacred river or fountain, as Varuna, Neptune, etc.; the god of air,
manifesting in the hurricane and tempest, as Vayu and Indra; and the god or
spirit
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of the earth, who appeared in
earthquakes, like Pluto, Yama, and so many others.
These were the Cosmic gods, ever
synthesizing all in one, as found in every cosmogony or mythology. Thus, the
Greeks had their Dodonean Jupiter, who included in himself the four elements
and the four cardinal points, and who was recognized, therefore, in old Rome
under the pantheistic title of Jupiter Mundus; and who now, in modern Rome, has
become the Deus Mundus, the one mundane god, who is made to swallow all others
in the latest theology -- by the arbitrary decision of his special ministers.
As gods of Fire, Air, Water, they
were celestial gods; as gods of the lower region, they were infernal deities:
the latter adjective applying simply to the Earth. They were "Spirits of
the Earth" under their respective names of Yama, Pluto, Osiris, the
"Lord of the lower kingdom, etc., etc.," and their tellurial
character proves it sufficiently.* The ancients knew of no worse abode after
death than the Kamaloka, the limbus on this Earth. If it is argued that the
Dodonean Jupiter was identified with Aidoneus, the king of the subterranean
world, and Dis, or the Roman Pluto and the Dionysius Chthonios, the
subterranean, wherein, according to Creuzer (I, vi., ch. 1), oracles were
rendered, then it will become the pleasure of the Occultists to prove that both
Aidoneus and Dionysius are the bases of Adonai, or "Jurbo Adonai," as
Jehovah is called in Codex Nazaraeus. "Thou shalt not worship the Sun, who
is named Adonai, whose name is also Kadush and El-El" (Cod. Naz., I, 47;
see also Psalm lxxxix., 18), and also "Lord Bacchus." Baal-Adonis of
the Sods or Mysteries of the pre-Babylonian Jews became the Adonai by the
Massorah, the later-vowelled Jehovah. Hence the Roman Catholics are right. All
these Jupiters are of the same family; but Jehovah has to be included therein
to make it complete. Jupiter-Aerios or Pan, the Jupiter Ammon, and the
Jupiter-Bel-Moloch, are all correlations and one with Yurbo-Adonai, because
they are all one cosmic nature. It is that nature and power which create the specific
terrestrial symbol, and the physical and material fabric of the latter, which
proves the Energy manifesting through it as extrinsic.
For primitive religion was something
better than simple pre-occupation about physical phenomena, as remarked by
Schilling; and principles, more elevated than we modern Sadducees know of,
"were hidden under the transparent veil of such merely natural divinities
as thunder,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Gehenna of the Bible was a
valley near Jerusalem, where the monotheistic Jews immolated their children to
Moloch, if the prophet Jeremiah is to be believed on his word. The Scandinavian
Hel or Hela was a frigid region -- again Kamaloka -- and the Egyptian Amenti a
place of purification. (See Isis Unveiled, Vol. II., p. 11.)
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the winds, and rain." The
ancients knew and could distinguish the corporeal from the spiritual elements,
in the forces of nature.
The four-fold Jupiter, as the
four-faced Brahma -- the aerial, the fulgurant, the terrestrial, and the marine
god -- the lord and master of the four elements, may stand as a representative
for the great Cosmic gods of every nation. While passing power over the fire to
Hephaistos-Vulcan, over the sea, to Poseidon-Neptune, and over the Earth, to
Pluto-Aidoneus -- the AERIAL Jove was all these; for AETHER, from the first,
had pre-eminence over, and was the synthesis of, all the elements.
Tradition points to a grotto, a vast
cave in the deserts of Central Asia, whereinto light pours through its four
seemingly natural apertures or clefts placed crossways at the four cardinal
points of the place. From noon till an hour before sunset that light streams
in, of four different colours, as averred -- red, blue, orange-gold, and white
-- owing to some either natural or artificially prepared conditions of vegetation
and soil. The light converges in the centre around a pillar of white marble
with a globe upon it, which represents our earth. It is named the "grotto
of Zaratushta."
When included under the arts and
sciences of the fourth race, the Atlanteans, the phenomenal manifestation of
the four elements, justly attributed by the believers in Cosmic gods to the
intelligent interference of the latter, assumed a scientific character. The
magic of the ancient priests consisted, in those days, in addressing their gods
in their own language. "The speech of the men of the earth cannot reach
the Lords. Each must be addressed in the language of his respective
element" -- is a sentence which will be shown pregnant with meaning.
"The Book of Rules" cited adds as an explanation of the nature of
that Element-language: "It is composed of sounds, not words; of sounds,
numbers and figures. He who knows how to blend the three, will call forth the
response of the superintending Power" (the regent-god of the specific element
needed).
Thus this "language" is
that of incantations or of MANTRAS, as they are called in India, sound being
the most potent and effectual magic agent, and the first of the keys which
opens the door of communication between Mortals and the Immortals. He who believes
in the words and teachings of St. Paul, has no right to pick out from the
latter those sentences only that he chooses to accept, to the rejection of
others; and St. Paul teaches most undeniably the existence of cosmic gods and
their presence among us. Paganism preached a dual and simultaneous evolution:
"creation" -- "spiritualem ac mundanum," as the Roman
Church has it -- ages before the advent of that Roman Church. Exoteric
phraseology has changed little with respect to divine hierarchies since the
most palmy days of Paganism, or "Idolatry." Names alone have changed,
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along with claims which have now
become false pretences. For when Plato put in the mouth of the Highest
Principle -- "Father AEther" or Jupiter -- these words, for instance:
"The gods of the gods of whom I am the maker (opifex) as I am the father
of all their works (operumque parens)"; he knew the spirit of this
sentence as fully, we suspect, as St. Paul did, when saying: "For though
there be that are called gods, whether in heaven or in earth, as there be gods
many and lords many," . . . . etc. (1 Cor. viii. 5.)* Both knew the sense
and the meaning of what they put forward in such guarded terms.
Says Sir W. Grove, F.R.S., speaking
of the correlation of forces, "The ancients when they witnessed a natural
phenomenon, removed from ordinary analogies, and unexplained by any mechanical
action known to them, referred it to a soul, a spiritual or preternatural
power. . . . Air and gases were also at first deemed spiritual, but
subsequently they became invested with a more material character; and the same
words [[pneuma]], spirit, etc., were used to signify the soul or a gas; the
very word gas, from geist, a ghost or spirit, affords us an instance of the
gradual transmutation of a spiritual into a physical conception . . . . .
." (P. 89.) This, the great man of science (in his preface to the fifth
edition of "Correlation of Physical Forces") considers as the only
concern of exact science, which has no business to meddle with the CAUSES.
"Cause and effect," he explains, "are therefore, in their
abstract relation to these forces, words solely of convenience. We are totally
unacquainted with the ultimate generating power of each and all of them, and
probably shall ever remain so; we can only ascertain the norma of their
actions; we must humbly refer their causation to one omnipresent influence, and
content ourselves with studying their effects and developing, by experiment,
their mutual relations" (p. xiv.).
This policy once accepted, and the
system virtually admitted in the above-quoted words, namely, the spirituality
of the "ultimate generating power," it would be more than illogical
to refuse to recognise this quality which is inherent in the material elements,
or rather, in their com-
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* We cannot be taken to task by the
Protestants for interpreting the verse from the Corinthians as we do; for, if
the translation in the English Bible is made ambiguous, it is not so in the
original texts, and the Roman Catholic Church accepts the words of the Apostle
in their true sense. For a proof see the Commentaries on St. Paul's Epistles,
by St. John Chrysostom "directly inspired by the Apostle," and
"who wrote under his dictation," as we are assured by the Marquis de
Mirville, whose works are approved by Rome. And St. Chrysostom says, commenting
on that special verse, "And, though there are (in fact) they who are
called gods . . . . -- for it seems, there are really several gods -- withal,
and for all that, the God-principle and the Superior God ceasing to remain
essentially one and indivisible." . . . Thus spoke the old Initiates also,
knowing that the worship of minor gods could never affect the "God
Principle" (See de Mirville, "Des Esprits," vol. ii., 322).
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pounds -- as present in the fire,
air, water or earth. The ancients knew these powers so well, that, while
concealing their true nature under various allegories, for the benefit (or to
the detriment) of the uneducated rabble, they never departed from the multiple
object in view, while inverting them. They contrived to throw a thick veil over
the nucleus of truth concealed by the symbol, but they ever tried to preserve
the latter as a record for future generations, sufficiently transparent to
allow their wise men to discern that truth behind the fabulous form of the
glyph or allegory. They are accused of superstition and credulity, those
ancient sages; and this by those very nations, which, learned in all the modern
arts and sciences, cultured and wise in their generation, accept to this day as
their one living and infinite God, the anthropomorphic "Jehovah" of
the Jews.
What were some of the alleged
"superstitions"? Hesiod believed, for instance, that "the winds
were the sons of the giant Typhoeus," who were chained and unchained at
will by AEolus, and the polytheistic Greeks accepted it along with Hesiod. Why
should not they, since the monotheistic Jews had the same beliefs, with other
names for their dramatis personae, and since Christians believe in the same to
this day? The Hesiodic AEolus, Boreas, etc., etc., were named Kadim, Tzaphon,
Daren, and Ruach Hajan by the "chosen people" of Israel. What is,
then, the fundamental difference? While the Hellenes were taught that AEolus
tied and untied the winds, the Jews believed as fervently that their Lord God,
"with smoke coming out of his nostrils and fire out of his mouth, rode
upon a cherub and did fly; and was seen upon the wings of the wind" (II.
Sam., xxii. 9 and 11). The expressions of the two nations are either both
figures of speech, or both superstitions. We think they are neither; but only
arise from a keen sense of oneness with nature, and a perception of the
mysterious and the intelligent behind every natural phenomenon, which the
moderns no longer possess. Nor was it "superstitious" in the Greek
pagans to listen to the oracle of Delphi, when, at the approach of the fleet of
Xerxes, that oracle advised them to "sacrifice to the Winds," if the
same has to be regarded as Divine Worship in the Israelites, who sacrificed as
often to the wind and fire -- especially to the latter element. Do they not say
that their "God is a consuming fire" (Deut. iv., 24), who appeared
generally as Fire and "encompassed by fire"? and did not Elijah seek
for him (the Lord) in the "great strong wind, and in the earthquake"?
Do not the Christians repeat the same after them? Do not they, moreover,
sacrifice to this day, to the same "God of Wind and Water?" They do;
because special prayers for rain, dry weather, trade-winds and the calming of
storms on the seas exist to this hour in the prayer-books of the three
Christian churches; and the several hundred sects of the Protestant religion
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offer them to their God upon every
threat of calamity? The fact that they are no more answered by Jehovah, than
they were, probably, by Jupiter Pluvius, does not alter the fact of these
prayers being addressed to the Power or Powers supposed to rule over the
Elements, or of these Powers being identical in Paganism and Christianity; or
have we to believe that such prayers are crass idolatry and absurd
"superstition" only when addressed by a Pagan to his idol, and that
the same superstition is suddenly transformed into praiseworthy piety and
religion whenever the name of the celestial addressee is changed? But the tree
is known by its fruit. And the fruit of the Christian tree being no better than
that of the tree of Paganism, why should the former command more reverence than
the latter.
Thus, when we are told by the
Chevalier Drach, a converted Jew, and the Marquis de Mirville, a Roman Catholic
fanatic of the French aristocracy, that in Hebrew lightning is a synonym of
fury, and is always handled by an evil Spirit; that Jupiter Fulgur or Fulgurans
is also called by the Christians oelicius, and denounced as the soul of
lightning, its daemon*; we have either to apply the same explanation and
definitions to the "Lord God of Israel," under the same
circumstances, or renounce our right of abusing the gods and creeds of other
nations.
The foregoing statements emanating as
they do from two ardent and learned Roman Catholics, are, to say the least,
dangerous, in the presence of the Bible and its prophets. Indeed, if Jupiter,
the "chief Daemon of the Pagan Greeks," hurled his deadly
thunder-bolts and lightnings at those who excited his wrath, so did the Lord
God of Abraham and Jacob. We find in I. Samuel, that "the Lord thundered
from heaven, and the most High uttered his voice, and he sent out arrows
(thunder bolts) and scattered them (Saul's armies) with lightning, and
discomforted them." (Chap. xxii. 14, 15.)
The Athenians are accused of having
sacrificed to Boreas; and this "Demon" is charged with having
submerged and wrecked 400 ships of the Persian fleet on the rocks of Mount
Pelion, and of having become so furious "that all the Magi of Xerxes could
hardly counteract it by offering contra-sacrifices to Tethys" [Herodotus
"Polym." cxc]. Very fortunately, no authenticated instance is on the
records of Christian wars showing a like catastrophe on the same scale
happening to one Christian fleet owing to the "prayers" of its enemy
-- another Christian nation. But this is from no fault of theirs, for each
prays as ardently to Jehovah for the destruction of the other, as the Athenians
prayed to Boreas. Both resorted to a neat little piece of black magic con
amore. Such abstinence from divine interference being hardly due to lack of
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* Cosmolatry, p. 415.
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prayers, sent to a common Almighty
God for mutual destruction, where, then, shall we draw the line between Pagan
and Christian? And who can doubt that all Protestant England would rejoice and
offer thanks to the Lord, if, during some future war, 400 ships of the hostile
fleet were to be wrecked owing to such holy prayers. What is, then, the
difference, we ask again, between a Jupiter, a Boreas, and a Jehovah? No more
than this: The crime of one's own next-of-kin -- say of one's
"father" -- is always excused and often exalted, whereas the crime of
our neighbour's parent is ever gladly punished by hanging. Yet the crime is the
same.
So far the "blessings of
Christianity" do not seem to have made any appreciable advance on the
morals of the converted Pagans.
The above is not a defence of Pagan
gods, nor is it an attack on the Christian deity, nor does it mean belief in
either. The writer is quite impartial, and rejects the testimony in favour of
either, neither praying to, believing in, nor dreading any such "personal"
and anthropomorphic God. The parallels are brought forward simply as one more
curious exhibition of the illogical and blind fanaticism of the civilized
theologian. For, so far, there is not a very great difference between the two
beliefs, and there is none in their respective effects upon morality, or
spiritual nature. The "light of Christ" shines upon as hideous
features of the animal-man now, as the "light of Lucifer" did in days
of old.
"Those unfortunate heathens in
their superstition regard even the Elements as something that has
comprehension! . . . . They still have faith in their idol Vayu -- the god or,
rather, Demon of the Wind and Air . . . they firmly believe in the efficacy of
their prayers, and in the powers of their Brahmins over the winds and storms. .
. . ." (The Missionary Lavoisier, of Cochin, in the Journal des Colonies.)
In reply to this, we may quote from Luke viii., 24: "And he (Jesus) arose
and rebuked the Wind and the raging of the Water, and they ceased and there was
a calm." And here is another quotation from a prayer book: . . . "Oh,
Virgin of the Sea, blessed Mother and Lady of the Waters, stay thy waves . .
." etc., etc. (prayer of the Neapolitan and Provencal sailors, copied
textually from that of the Phoenician mariners to their Virgingoddess Astarte.)
The logical and irrepressible conclusion arising from the parallels brought
forward, and the denunciation of the Missionary is this: The commands of the
Brahmins to their element-gods not remaining "ineffectual," the power
of the Brahmins is thus placed on a par with that of Jesus. Moreover, Astarte
is shown not a whit weaker in potency than the "Virgin of the Sea" of
Christian sailors. It is not enough to give a dog a bad name, and then hang
him; the dog has to be proven guilty. Boreas and Astarte may be devils in
theological
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fancy, but, as just remarked, the
tree has to be judged by its fruit. And once the Christians are shown as
immoral and wicked as the pagans ever were, what benefit has humanity derived
from its change of gods and idols?
That, however, which God and the
Christian Saints are justified in doing, becomes a crime, if successful, in
simple mortals. Sorcery and incantations are regarded as fables now; yet from
the day of the Institutes of Justinian down to the laws against witchcraft of
England and America -- obsolete but not repealed to this day -- such
incantations, even when only suspected, were punished as criminal. Why punish a
chimera? And still we read of Constantine, the Emperor, sentencing to death the
philosopher Sopatrus for unchaining the winds, and thus preventing ships loaded
with grain from arriving in time to put an end to famine. Pausanias, when
affirming that he saw with his own eyes "men who by simple prayers and
incantations" stopped a strong hail-storm, is derided. This does not
prevent modern Christian writers from advising prayer during storm and danger,
and believing in its efficacy. Hoppo and Stadlein two magicians and sorcerers
-- were sentenced to death for throwing charms on fruit and transferring a
harvest by magic arts from one field to another, hardly a century ago, if we
can believe Sprenger, the famous writer, who vouches for it: "Qui fruges
excantassent segetem pellicentes incantando."
Let us close by reminding the reader
that, without the smallest shadow of superstition, one may believe in the dual
nature of every object on Earth -- in the spiritual and the material, the
visible and the invisible nature, and that science virtually proves this, while
denying its own demonstration. For if, as Sir William Grove has it, the
electricity we handle is but the result of ordinary matter affected by
something invisible, the "ultimate generating power" of every Force,
the "one omnipresent influence," then it only becomes natural that
one should believe as the ancients did; namely, that every Element is dual in
its nature. "ETHEREAL fire is the emanation of the KABIR proper; the
aerial is but the union (correlation) of the former with terrestrial fire, and
its guidance and application on our earthly plane belongs to a Kabir of a
lesser dignity" -- an Elemental, perhaps, as an Occultist would call it;
and the same may be said of every Cosmic Element.
No one will deny that the human being
is possessed of various forces: magnetic, sympathetic, antipathetic, nervous,
dynamical, occult, mechanical, mental -- every kind of force; and that the
physical forces are all biological in their essence, seeing that they
intermingle with, and often merge into, those forces that we have named
intellectual and moral -- the first being the vehicles, so to say, the upadhi,
of the second. No one, who does not deny soul in man, would hesitate in
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saying that their presence and commingling
are the very essence of our being; that they constitute the Ego in man, in
fact. These potencies have their physiological, physical, mechanical, as well
as their nervous, ecstatic, clairaudient, and clairvoyant phenomena, which are
now regarded and recognised as perfectly natural, even by science. Why should
man be the only exception in nature, and why cannot even the ELEMENTS have
their vehicles, their "Vahans" in what we call the PHYSICAL FORCES?
And why, above all, should such beliefs be called "superstition"
along with the religions of old?
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§ XV.
ON KWAN-SHI-YIN AND KWAN-YIN.
LIKE Avalokiteshwara, Kwan-shi-yin
has passed through several transformations, but it is an error to say of him
that he is a modern invention of the Northern Buddhists, for under another
appellation he has been known from the earliest times. The Secret Doctrine
teaches that "He who is the first to appear at Renovation will be the last
to come before Re-absorption (pralaya)." Thus the logoi of all nations,
from the Vedic Visvakarma of the Mysteries down to the Saviour of the present
civilised nations, are the "Word" who was "in the
beginning" (or the reawakening of the energising powers of Nature) with
the One ABSOLUTE. Born of Fire and Water, before these became distinct
elements, IT was the "Maker" (fashioner or modeller) of all things;
"without him was not anything made that was made"; "in whom was
life, and the life was the light of men"; and who finally may be called,
as he ever has been, the Alpha and the Omega of manifested Nature. "The
great Dragon of Wisdom is born of Fire and Water, and into Fire and Water will
all be re-absorbed with him" (Fa-Hwa-King). As this Bodhisatva is said "to
assume any form he pleases" from the beginning of a Manvantara to its end,
though his special birthday (memorial day) is celebrated according to the
Kin-kwang-ming-King ("Luminous Sutra of Golden Light") in the second
month on the nineteenth day, and that of "Maitreya Buddha" in the
first month on the first day, yet the two are one. He will appear as Maitreya
Buddha, the last of the Avatars and Buddhas, in the seventh Race. This belief
and expectation are universal throughout the East. Only it is not in the Kali
yug, our present terrifically materialistic age of Darkness, the "Black
Age," that a new Saviour of Humanity can ever appear. The Kali yug is
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"l'Age d'Or" (!) only in
the mystic writings of some French pseudo-Occultists. (See "La Mission des
Juifs.")
Hence the ritual in the exoteric
worship of this deity was founded on magic. The Mantras are all taken from
special books kept secret by the priests, and each is said to work a magical
effect; as the reciter or reader produces, by simply chanting them, a secret
causation which results in immediate effects. Kwan-Shi-Yin is Avalokiteshwara,
and both are forms of the seventh Universal Principle; while in its highest
metaphysical character this deity is the synthetic aggregation of all the
planetary Spirits, Dhyani Chohans. He is the "Self-manifested;" in
short, the "Son of the Father." Crowned with seven dragons, above his
statue there appears the inscription Pu-Tsi-K'iun-ling, "the universal
Saviour of all living beings."
Of course the name given in the
archaic volume of the Stanzas is quite different, but Kwan-Yin is a perfect equivalent.
In a temple of Pu'to, the sacred island of the Buddhists in China, Kwan-Shi-Yin
is represented floating on a black aquatic bird (Kala-Hansa), and pouring on
the heads of mortals the elixir of life, which, as it flows, is transformed
into one of the chief Dhyani-Buddhas -- the Regent of a star called the
"Star of Salvation." In his third transformation Kwan-Yin is the
informing spirit or genius of Water. In China the Dalai-Lama is believed to be
an incarnation of Kwan-Shi-Yin, who in his third terrestrial appearance was a
Bodhisattva, while the Teshu Lama is an incarnation of Amitabha Buddha, or
Gautama.
It may be remarked en passant that a
writer must indeed have a diseased imagination to discover phallic worship
everywhere, as do the authors of "China Revealed" (McClatchey) and
"Phallicism." The first discovers "the old phallic gods,
represented under two evident symbols -- the Khan or Yang, which is the membrum
virile, and the Kwan or Yin, the pudendum muliebre." (See
"Phallicism," p. 273.) Such a rendering seems the more strange as
Kwan-Shi-Yin (Avalokiteswara) and Kwan-Yin, besides being now the patron
deities of the Buddhist ascetics, the Yogis of Thibet, are the gods of
chastity, and are, in their esoteric meaning, not even that which is implied in
the rendering of Mr. Rhys Davids' "Buddhism," (p. 202): "The
name Avalokiteshwara . . . means 'the Lord who looks down from on high.'
"Nor is Kwan-Shi-Yin "the Spirit of the Buddhas present in the
Church," but, literally interpreted, it means "the Lord that is
seen," and in one sense, "the divine SELF perceived by Self"
(the human) -- the Atman or seventh principle merged in the Universal,
perceived by, or the object of perception to, Buddhi, the sixth principle or
divine Soul in man. In a still higher sense, Avalokiteshwara = Kwan-Shi-Yin,
referred to as the seventh Universal principle, is the Logos
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perceived by the Universal Buddhi --
or Soul, as the synthetic aggregate of the Dhyani-Buddhas: and is not the
"Spirit of Buddha present in the Church," but the omnipresent
universal Spirit manifested in the temple of Kosmos or Nature. This
Orientalistic etymology of Kwan and Yin is on a par with that of
"Yogini," which, we are told by Mr. Hargrave Jennings, "is a
Sanskrit word, in the dialects pronounced Yogi or Zogee (!), and is equivalent
to Sena, and exactly the same as Duti or Duti-Ca' -- i.e., a sacred prostitute
of the temple, worshipped as Yoni or Sakti" (p. 60). "The books of
morality," in India, "direct a faithful wife to shun the society of
Yogini or females who have been adored as Sakti . . . amongst the votaries of a
most licentious description." Nothing should surprise us after this. And
it is, therefore, with hardly a smile that we find another preposterous
absurdity quoted about "Budh," as being a name "which signifies
not only the sun as the source of generation but also the male organ (Round
Towers of Ireland; quoted by Mr. Hargrave Jennings in "Phallicism,"
p. 264). Max Muller, in his "False Analogies," says that "the
most celebrated Chinese scholar of his time, Abel Remusat," maintains
"that the three syllables I Hi Wei (in the fourteenth chapter of the
Tao-te-king) were meant for Je-ho-vah (Science of Religion, p. 332); and again,
Father Amyot, who "feels certain that the three persons of the Trinity
could be recognised" in the same work. And if Abel Remusat, why not
Hargrave Jennings? Every scholar will recognise the absurdity of ever seeing in
Budh, "the enlightened" and "the awakened," a "phallic
symbol."
Kwan-shi-yin, then, is "the Son
identical with his Father" mystically, or the Logos -- the word. He is
called the "Dragon of Wisdom" in Stanza III., as all the Logoi of all
the ancient religious systems are connected with, and symbolised by, serpents.
In old Egypt, the God Nahbkoon, "he who unites the doubles," (astral
light re-uniting by its dual physiological and spiritual potency the divine
human to its purely divine Monad, the prototype "in heaven" or
Nature) was represented as a serpent on human legs, either with or without
arms. It was the emblem of the resurrection of Nature, as also of Christ with
the Ophites, and of Jehovah as the brazen serpent healing those who looked at
him; the serpent being an emblem of Christ with the Templars also, (see the
Templar degree in Masonry). The symbol of Knouph (Khoum also), or the soul of
the world, says Champollion (Pantheon, text 3), "is represented among
other forms under that of a huge serpent on human legs; this reptile, being the
emblem of the good genius and the veritable Agathodaemon, is sometimes
bearded." The sacred animal is thus identical with the serpent of the
Ophites, and is figured on a great number of engraved stones, called Gnostic or
Basilidean gems. This serpent appears with various heads (human and animal),
but its gems
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are always found inscribed with the
name [[CHNOUBIS]] (Chnoubis). This symbol is identical with one which,
according to Jamblichus and Champollion, was called "the first of the
celestial gods"; the god Hermes, or Mercury with the Greeks, to which god
Hermes Trismegistos attributes the invention of, and the first initiation of
men into, magic; and Mercury is Budh, Wisdom, Enlightenment, or
"Re-awakening" into the divine Science.
To close, Kwan-Shi-Yin and Kwan-Yin
are the two aspects (male and female) of the same principle in Kosmos, Nature
and Man, of divine wisdom and intelligence. They are the
"Christos-Sophia" of the mystic Gnostics -- the Logos and its Sakti.
In their longing for the expression of some mysteries never to be wholly
comprehended by the profane, the Ancients, knowing that nothing could be
preserved in human memory without some outward symbol, have chosen the (to us)
often ridiculous images of the Kwan-Yins to remind man of his origin and inner
nature. To the impartial, however, the Madonnas in crinolines and the Christs
in white kid gloves must appear far more absurd than the Kwan-Shi-Yin and
Kwan-Yin in their dragon garb. The subjective can hardly be expressed by the
objective. Therefore, since the symbolic formula attempts to characterise that
which is above scientific reasoning, and as often far beyond our intellects, it
must needs go beyond that intellect in some shape or other, or else it will fade
out from human remembrance.
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BOOK I. -- PART III.
ADDENDA.
SCIENCE AND THE SECRET
DOCTRINE CONTRASTED.
"The knowledge of this nether
world --
Say, friend, what is it, false or
true?
The false, what mortal cares to know?
The true, what mortal ever
knew?"
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CONTENTS.
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PAGE
I. REASONS FOR THESE ADDENDA ... 477
II.MODERN PHYSICISTS ARE PLAYING AT
BLIND MAN'S BUFF ... 482
III. "AN LUMEN SIT CORPUS, NEC
NON" ... 483
IV. IS GRAVITATION A LAW? ... 490
V. THE THEORIES OF ROTATION IN
SCIENCE ... 500
VI. THE MASKS OF SCIENCE ... 506
VII. AN ATTACK ON THE SCIENTIFIC
THEORY OF FORCE BY A MAN OF SCIENCE ... 523
VIII. LIFE, FORCE, OR GRAVITY? ...
529
IX. THE SOLAR THEORY ... 540
X. THE COMING FORCE ... 554
XI. ON THE ELEMENTS AND ATOMS ... 566
XII. ANCIENT THOUGHT IN MODERN DRESS
... 579
XIII. THE MODERN NEBULAR THEORY ...
588
XIV. FORCES -- MODES OF MOTION OR
INTELLIGENCES? ... 601
XV. GODS, MONADS, AND ATOMS ... 610
XVI. CYCLIC EVOLUTION AND KARMA ...
634
XVII. THE ZODIAC AND ITS ANTIQUITY
... 647
XVIII. SUMMARY OF THE MUTUAL POSITION
... 668
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ADDENDA TO BOOK I.
--------------
I.
REASONS FOR THESE ADDENDA.
MANY of the doctrines contained in
the foregoing Seven Stanzas and Commentaries having been studied and critically
examined by some Western Theosophists, certain of the occult teachings have
been found wanting from the ordinary stand-point of modern scientific
knowledge. They seemed to encounter insuperable difficulties in the way of
their acceptance, and to require reconsideration in view of scientific
criticism. Some friends have already been tempted to regret the necessity of so
often calling in question the assertions of modern Science. It appeared to them
-- and I here repeat only their arguments -- that "to run counter to the
teachings of its most eminent exponents, was to court a premature discomfiture
in the eyes of the Western World."
It is, therefore, desirable to define
once and for all the position which the writer, who does not agree in this with
her friends, intends to maintain. So far as Science remains what in the words
of Prof. Huxley it is, viz., "organized common sense"; so far as its
inferences are drawn from accurate premises -- its generalizations resting on a
purely inductive basis -- every Theosophist and Occultist welcomes respectfully
and with due admiration its contributions to the domain of cosmological law.
There can be no possible conflict between the teachings of occult and so-called
exact Science, where the conclusions of the latter are grounded on a substratum
of unassailable fact. It is only when its more ardent exponents, over-stepping
the limits of observed phenomena in order to penetrate into the arcana of
Being, attempt to wrench the formation of Kosmos and its living Forces from
Spirit, and attribute all to blind matter, that the Occultists claim the right
to dispute and call in question their theories. Science cannot, owing to the
very nature of things, unveil the mystery of the universe around us. Science
can, it is true, collect, classify, and generalize upon phenomena; but the
occultist, arguing from admitted metaphysical data, declares that the daring
explorer, who would probe the inmost secrets of Nature, must transcend the
narrow limitations of sense, and transfer his consciousness into the region of
noumena and the sphere of primal causes. To effect this, he must develop
faculties which are absolutely
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dormant -- save in a few rare and
exceptional cases -- in the constitution of the off-shoots of our present Fifth
Root-race in Europe and America. He can in no other conceivable manner collect
the facts on which to base his speculations. Is this not apparent on the principles
of Inductive Logic and Metaphysics alike?
On the other hand, whatever the
writer may do, she will never be able to satisfy both Truth and Science. To
offer the reader a systematic and uninterrupted version of the Archaic Stanzas
is impossible. A gap of 43 verses or Slokas has to be left between the 7th
(already given) and the 51st, which is the subject of Book II., though the
latter are made to run from 1 et seq. for easier reading and reference. The
appearance of man on Earth alone occupies as many stanzas, which describe
minutely his primal evolution from the human Dhyan Chohans; the state of the
globe at that time, etc., etc. A great number of names referring to chemical
substances and other compounds, which have now ceased to combine together, and
are therefore unknown to the later offshoots of our Fifth Race, occupy a
considerable space. As they are simply untranslateable, and would remain in
every case inexplicable, they are omitted, along with those which cannot be
made public. Nevertheless, even the little that is given will irritate any
follower and defender of dogmatic materialistic Science who happens to read
this.
Before proceeding to other Stanzas,
it is proposed, therefore, to defend those already given. They are not in
perfect accord or harmony with modern Science -- this we all know. Had they
been, however, as much in agreement with the views of modern knowledge as a
lecture by Sir W. Thomson, they would have been rejected all the same. For they
teach belief in conscious Powers and Spiritual Entities; in terrestrial,
semi-intelligent, and highly intellectual Forces on other planes*; and in
Beings that dwell around us in spheres imperceptible, whether through telescope
or microscope. Hence the necessity of examining the beliefs of materialistic
Science: of comparing its views about the "Elements" with the
opinions of the ancients, and of analysing the physical Forces as they exist in
modern perception before the Occultists admit themselves to be in the wrong. We
shall touch upon the constitution of the Sun and planets, and the occult
characteristics of what are called Devas and Genii, and are now termed by
Science, Force, or "modes of motion," and see whether esoteric belief
is defensible or not (Vide infra, "Gods, Monads, and Atoms)".
Notwithstanding the efforts made to the contrary, an unprejudiced mind will
discover
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Their intellection, of course,
being of quite a different nature to any we can conceive of on Earth.
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under Newton's "agent, material
or immaterial" (of his third letter to Bentley), the agent which causes
gravity, and, in his personal working God, one finds just as much of the
metaphysical devas and genii, as in Kepler's angelus rector conducting each
planet, and the species immateriata by which the celestial bodies were carried
along in their courses, according to that astronomer.
We shall have, in Book II., to openly
approach dangerous subjects. We must bravely face Science and declare, in the
teeth of materialistic learning, of Idealism, Hylo-Idealism, Positivism and
all-denying modern Psychology, that the true Occultist believes in "Lords
of Light;" that he believes in a Sun, which, far from being simply "a
lamp of day" moving in accordance with physical law, and far from being
merely one of those Suns, which according to Richter -- ". . . . are
Sun-flowers of a higher light" -- is, like milliards of other Suns, the
dwelling or the vehicle of a god, and a host of gods.
In this question, of course, it is
the Occultists who will be worsted. They will be considered on the prima facie
aspect of the dispute to be ignoramuses, and labelled with more than one of the
usual epithets given to those whom the superficially judging public, itself
ignorant of the great underlying truths in nature, accuses of believing in
mediaeval superstitions. Let it be so. Submitting beforehand to every criticism
in order to go on with their task, they only claim the privilege of showing
that the physicists are as much at loggerheads among themselves in their
speculations, as the latter are with the teachings of Occultism.
The Sun is matter, and the Sun is
Spirit. Our ancestors -- the "heathen," -- along with their modern
successors, the Parsis -- were, and are, wise enough in their generation to see
in it the symbol of Divinity, and at the same time to sense within, concealed
by the physical Symbol, the bright God of Spiritual and terrestrial Light. Such
belief is now regarded as a superstition only by rank materialism, which denies
Deity, Spirit, Soul, and admits no intelligence outside the mind of man. But if
too much of wrong superstition bred by "Churchianity" -- as Lawrence
Oliphant calls it -- "renders a man a fool," too much scepticism
makes him mad. We prefer the charge of folly in believing too much, to that of
a madness which denies everything, as do Materialism and Idealism. Hence, the
Occultists are fully prepared to receive their dues from Materialism, and to
meet the adverse criticism which will be poured on this work, not for writing
it, but for believing in that which it contains.
Therefore the discoveries,
hypotheses, and unavoidable objections which will be brought forward by the
scientific critics must be anticipated and disposed of. It has also to be shown
how far the
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occult teachings depart from real
science, and whether the ancient or the modern theories are the most logically
and philosophically correct. The unity and mutual relations of all parts of
Kosmos were known to the ancients, before they became evident to modern
astronomers and philosophers. And if even the external and visible portions of
the Universe and their mutual relations cannot be explained in any other terms
than those used by the adherents of the mechanical theory of the Universe in
physical science, it follows that no materialist, who denies that the Soul of
Kosmos (which appertains to metaphysical philosophy) exists, has the right to
trespass upon that metaphysical domain. That physical science is trying to, and
actually does, encroach upon it, is only one more proof that "might is
right," and no more.
Another good reason for these Addenda
is this. Since only a certain portion of the Secret teachings can be given out
in the present age, if they were published without any explanations or
commentary, the doctrines would never be understood even by theosophists.
Therefore they must be contrasted with the speculations of modern science.
Archaic axioms must be placed side by side with modern hypotheses and
comparison left to the sagacious reader.
On the question of the "Seven
Governors," as Hermes calls the "Seven Builders," the Spirits
which guide the operations of nature, the animated atoms of which are the
shadows, in their world, of their Primaries in the astral realms -- this work
will, of course, besides the men of Science, have every materialist against it.
But this opposition can, at most, be only temporary. People have laughed at
everything and scouted every unpopular idea at first, and then ended by
accepting it. Materialism and scepticism are evils that must remain in the
world as long as man has not quitted his present gross form to don the one he
had during the first and second races of this Round. Unless scepticism and our
present natural ignorance are equilibrated by intuition and a natural
spirituality, every being afflicted with such feelings will see in himself no
better than a bundle of flesh, bones, and muscles, with an empty garret inside
him which serves the purpose of storing his sensations and feelings. Sir
Humphry Davy was a great scientist, as deeply versed in physics as any theorist
of our day, yet he loathed materialism. "I heard with disgust," he
says, "in the dissecting-rooms, the plan of the physiologist, of the
gradual secretion of matter, and its becoming endued with irritability,
ripening into sensibility, and acquiring such organs as were necessary, by its
own inherent forces, and at last rising into intellectual existence."
Nevertheless, physiologists are not the most to be blamed for speaking of that
only which they can see and estimate on the evidence of their physical senses.
Astronomers
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and physicists are, we consider, far
more illogical in their materialistic views than even physiologists, and this
has to be proved. Milton's --
. . . . . . . . . . . . "Light
Ethereal, first of things,
quintessence pure,"
has become with the materialists only
--
. . . . . . Prime cheerer, light,
Of all material beings, first and
best.
For the occultists it is both Spirit
and Matter. Behind the "mode of motion," now regarded as "the
property of matter" and nothing more, they perceive the radiant noumenon.
It is the "Spirit of Light," the first born of the Eternal pure
Element, whose energy (or emanation) is stored in the Sun, the great Life-Giver
of the physical world, as the hidden Concealed Spiritual Sun is the Light- and
Life-Giver of the Spiritual and Psychic Realms. Bacon was one of the first to
strike the key-note of materialism, not only by his inductive method (renovated
from ill-digested Aristotle), but by the general tenor of his writings. He
inverts the order of mental Evolution when saying that "the first Creation
of God was the light of the sense; the last was the light of the reason; and
his Sabbath work ever since is the illumination of the Spirit." It is just
the reverse. The light of Spirit is the eternal Sabbath of the mystic or
occultist, and he pays little attention to that of mere sense. That which is
meant by the allegorical sentence, "Fiat Lux" is,-- when esoterically
rendered -- "Let there be the 'Sons of Light,' " or the noumena of
all phenomena. Thus the Roman Catholics rightly interpret the passage as
referring to Angels, and wrongly as meaning Powers created by an
anthropomorphic God, whom they personify in the ever thundering and punishing
Jehovah.
These beings are the "Sons of
Light," because they emanate from, and are self-generated in, that
infinite Ocean of Light, whose one pole is pure Spirit lost in the absoluteness
of Non-Being, and the other, the matter in which it condenses, crystallizing
into a more and more gross type as it descends into manifestation. Therefore
matter, though it is, in one sense, but the illusive dregs of that Light whose
limbs are the Creative Forces, yet has in it the full presence of the Soul
thereof, of that Principle, which none -- not even the "Sons of
Light," evolved from its ABSOLUTE DARKNESS -- will ever know. The idea is
as beautifully, as it is truthfully, expressed by Milton, who hails the holy
Light, which is the --
". . . . . Offspring of Heaven,
first-born,
And of th' Eternal co-eternal beam;
. . . . . Since God is light,
And never but in unapproached Light
Dwelt from Eternity,. dwelt then in
thee
Bright effluence, of bright essence
increate."
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II.
MODERN PHYSICISTS ARE PLAYING AT
BLIND MAN'S BUFF.
AND now Occultism puts to Science the
question: "Is light a body, or is it not?" Whatever the answer of the
latter, the former is prepared to show that, to this day, the most eminent
physicists know neither one way nor the other. To know what is light, and
whether it is an actual substance or a mere undulation of the "ethereal
medium," Science has first to learn what are in reality Matter, Atom,
Ether, Force. Now, the truth is, that it knows nothing of any of these, and
admits it. It has not even agreed what to believe in, as dozens of hypotheses
emanating from various and very eminent Scientists on the same subject, are
antagonistic to each other and often self-contradictory. Thus their learned
speculations may, with a stretch of good-will, be accepted as "working
hypotheses" in a secondary sense, as Stallo puts it. But being radically
inconsistent with each other, they must finally end by mutually destroying
themselves. As declared by the author of "Concepts of Modern
Physics":--
"It must not be forgotten that
the several departments of Science are simply arbitrary divisions of labour. In
these several departments the same physical object may be considered under
different aspects. The physicist may study its molecular relations, while the
chemist determines its atomic constitution. But when they both deal with the
same element or agent, it cannot have one set of properties in physics, and
another set contradictory of them, in chemistry. If the physicist and chemist
alike assume the existence of ultimate atoms absolutely invariable in bulk and
weight, the atom cannot be a cube or oblate spheroid for physical, and a sphere
for chemical purposes. A group of constant atoms cannot be an aggregate of
extended and absolutely inert and impenetrable masses in a crucible or retort,
and a system of mere centres of force as part of a magnet or of a Clamond
battery. The universal Ether cannot be soft and mobile to please the chemist,
and rigid-elastic to satisfy the physicist; it cannot be continuous at the
command of Sir William Thomson and discontinuous on the suggestion of Cauchy or
Fresnel."*
The eminent physicist, G. A. Hirn,
may likewise be quoted saying the same in the 43rd Volume of the Memoires de
l'Academie Royale de Belgique, which we translate from the French, as cited:
"When one sees the assurance with which are to-day affirmed doctrines
which attribute the collectivity, the universality of the phenomena to the
motions alone of the atom, one has a right to expect to find likewise unanimity
on the qualities described to this unique being, the foundation of all that
exists. Now, from the first examination of the particular systems proposed, one
feels the strangest deception; one perceives that the atom of the chemist, the
atom of the physicist, that of the metaphysician, and that of the mathematician
. . . . have absolutely nothing in common but the name! The inevitable result
is the existing
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Concepts of Modern
Physics," p. xi-xii., Introd. to the 2nd Edit.
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subdivision of our sciences, each of
which, in its own little pigeon-hole, constructs an atom which satisfies the
requirements of the phenomena it studies, without troubling itself in the least
about the requirements proper to the phenomena of the neighbouring pigeon-hole.
The metaphysician banishes the principles of attraction and repulsion as
dreams; the mathematician, who analyses the laws of elasticity and those of the
propagation of light, admits them implicitly, without even naming them. . . .
The chemist cannot explain the grouping of the atoms, in his often complicated
molecules, without attributing to his atoms specific distinguishing qualities;
for the physicist and the metaphysician, partisans of the modern doctrines, the
atom is, on the contrary, always and everywhere the same. What am I saying? THERE
IS NO AGREEMENT EVEN IN ONE AND THE SAME SCIENCE AS TO THE PROPERTIES OF THE
ATOM. Each constructs an atom to suit his own fancy, in order to explain some
special phenomenon with which he is particularly concerned."*
The above is the photographically correct
image of modern Science and physics. The "pre-requisite of that incessant
play of the 'scientific imagination,' " which is so often found in
Professor Tyndall's eloquent discourses, is vivid indeed, as shown by Stallo,
and for contradictory variety leaves far behind it any "phantasies"
of occultism. However it may be, if physical theories are confessedly
"mere formal, explanatory, didactic devices," and if "atomism is
only a symbolical graphic system,"** then the occultist can hardly be
regarded as assuming too much, when he places alongside of these devices and
"symbolical systems" of modern Science, the symbols and devices of
Archaic teachings.
--------------
III.
"AN LUMEN SIT CORPUS, NEC
NON?"
MOST decidedly Light is not a body,
we are told. Physical Sciences say Light is a Force, a vibration, the
undulation of ether. It is the property or quality of matter, or even an
affection thereof -- never a body!
Just so. For this discovery, the
knowledge -- whatever it may be worth -- that light or caloric is not a motion
of material particles, Science is chiefly indebted, if not solely, to Sir W.
Grove. It was he who was the first in a lecture at the London Institution, in
1842, to show that
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Recherches experimentales sur
la relation qui existe entre la resistance de Pair et sa temperature," p.
68.
** From the criticism of
"Concepts of Modern Physics" in Nature. See Stallo's work, p. xvi. of
Introduction.
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"light, heat, etc., etc.* are
affections of matter itself, and not a distinct ethereal, 'imponderable,' fluid,
(a state of matter now) permeating it." (See "Correlation of the
Physical Forces," Preface). Yet, perhaps, for some physicists -- as for
Oersted, a very eminent Scientist -- FORCE and FORCES were tacitly "Spirit
(and hence Spirits) in Nature." What several rather mystical Scientists
taught was that light, heat, magnetism, electricity and gravity, etc., were not
the final causes of the visible phenomena, including planetary motion, but
themselves the Secondary effects of other Causes, for which Science in our day
cares very little, but in which Occultism believes, for the Occultists have
exhibited proofs of the validity of their claims in every age. And in what age
were there no Occultists and no ADEPTS?
Sir Isaac Newton held to the
Pythagorean corpuscular theory, and was also inclined to admit its
consequences; which made the Count de Maistre hope, at one time, that Newton
would ultimately lead Science back to the recognition of the fact that Forces
and the Celestial bodies were propelled and guided by Intelligences (Soirees,
vol. ii.). But de Maistre counted without his host. The innermost thoughts and
ideas of Newton were perverted, and of his great mathematical learning only the
mere physical husk was turned to account. Had poor Sir Isaac foreseen to what
use his successors and followers would apply his " gravity,"** that
pious and religious man would surely have quietly eaten his apple, and never
breathed a word about any mechanical ideas connected with its fall.
Great contempt is shown for metaphysics
generally and for onto-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Mr. Robert Ward, discussing the
questions of Heat and Light in the November Journal of Science, 1881, shows us
how utterly ignorant is Science about one of the commonest facts of nature --
the heat of the sun. He says:-- "The question of the temperature of the
sun has been the subject of investigation with many scientists: Newton, one of
the first investigators of this problem, tried to determine it, and after him
all the scientists who have been occupied with calorimetry have followed his
example. All have believed themselves successful, and have formulated their
results with great confidence. The following, in the chronological order of the
publication of the results, are the temperatures (in centigrade degrees) found
by each of them: Newton, 1,699,300 deg.; Pouillet, 1,461 deg.; Tollner, 102,200
deg.; Secchi, 5,344,840 deg.; Ericsson, 2,726,700 deg.; Fizeau, 7,500 deg.;
Waterston, 9,000,000 deg.; Spoeren, 27,000 deg.; Deville, 9,500 deg.; Soret,
5,801,846 deg.; Vicaire, 1,500 deg.; Rosetti, 20,000 deg. The difference is as
1,400 deg. against 9,000,000 deg., or no less than 8,998,600 deg.!! There
probably does not exist in science a more astonishing contradiction than that
revealed in these figures. And yet without doubt if an Occultist were to give
out an estimate, each of these gentlemen would vehemently protest in the name
of 'EXACT' Science at the rejection of his special result." (From the
Theosophist.)
** According to one atheistic
idealist -- Dr. Lewins -- "When Sir Isaac, in 1687 . . . . showed mass and
atom acted upon . . . . by innate activity . . . . he effectually disposed of
Spirit, Anima, or Divinity, as supererogatory."
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logical metaphysics especially. But
we see, whenever the Occultists are bold enough to raise their diminished
heads, that materialistic, physical science is honey-combed with metaphysics;*
that its most fundamental principles, while inseparably wedded to
transcendentalism, are nevertheless, in order to show modern science divorced
from such "dreams," tortured and often ignored in the maze of
contradictory theories and hypotheses. A very good corroboration of this charge
lies in the fact that Science finds itself absolutely compelled to accept the
"hypothetical" Ether and to try to explain it on the materialistic
grounds of atomo-mechanical laws. This attempt has led directly to the most
fatal discrepancies and radical inconsistencies between the assumed nature of
Ether and its physical actions. A second proof is found in the many
contradictory statements about the atom -- the most metaphysical object in
creation.
Now, what does the modern science of
physics know of AEther, the first concept of which belongs undeniably to
ancient philosophers, the Greeks having borrowed it from the Aryans, and the
origin of modern AEther being found in, and disfigured from, AKASA? This
disfigurement
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Stallo's above-cited work,
"Concepts of Modern Physics," a volume which has called forth the
liveliest protests and criticisms, is recommended to anyone inclined to doubt
this statement. "The professed antagonism of Science to metaphysics,"
he writes, "has led the majority of scientific specialists to assume that
the methods and results of empirical research are wholly independent of the
control of the laws of thought. They either silently ignore, or openly
repudiate, the simplest canons of logic, including the laws of
non-contradiction and . . . resent with the utmost vehemence, every application
of the rule of consistency to their hypotheses and theories . . . . and they
regard an examination (of these) . . . . in the light of these laws as an
impertinent intrusion of 'a priori principles and methods' into the domains of
empirical science. Persons of this cast of mind find no difficulty in holding
that atoms are absolutely inert, and at the same time asserting that these
atoms are perfectly elastic; or in maintaining that the physical universe, in
its last analysis, resolves itself into 'dead' matter and motion, and yet
denying that all physical energy is in reality kinetic; or in proclaiming that
all phenomenal differences in the objective world are ultimately due to the
various motions of absolutely simple material units, and, nevertheless,
repudiating the proposition that these units are equal" . . . . (p. xix.)
"The blindness of eminent physicists to some of the most obvious
consequences of their own theories is marvellous . . . . When Prof. Tait, in
conjunction with Prof. Stewart, announces that 'matter is simply passive' (The
Unseen Universe, sec. 104), and then, in connection with Sir W. Thomson,
declares that 'matter has an innate power of resisting external influences'
(Treat. on Nat. Phil., Vol. I., sec. 216), it is hardly impertinent to inquire
how these statements are to be reconciled. When Prof. Du Bois Reymond . . . .
insists upon the necessity of reducing all the processes of nature to motions
of a substantial, indifferent substratum, wholly destitute of quality ('Ueber die
Grenzen des Naturerkennens,' p. 5), having declared shortly before in the same
lecture that 'resolution of all changes in the material world into motions of
atoms caused by their constant central forces would be the completion of
natural science,' we are in a perplexity from which we have to be
relieved." (Pref. xliii.)
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is claimed to be a modification and
refinement of the idea of Lucretius. Let us then examine the modern concept
from several scientific volumes containing the admissions of the physicists
themselves.
The existence of Ether is accepted by
physical astronomy, in ordinary physics, and in chemistry. Astronomers, who
first began by regarding it as a fluid of extreme tenuity and mobility,
offering no sensible resistance to the motions of celestial bodies, never gave
a thought to its continuity or discontinuity. "Its main function in modern
astronomy has been to serve as a basis for hydrodynamical theories of
gravitation. In physics this fluid appeared for some time in several roles in
connection with the 'imponderables'" -- so cruelly put to death by Sir W.
Grove. Some physicists have even identified the ether of space with those
"imponderables." Then came their Kinetic theories; and from the date
of the dynamical theory of heat, it was chosen in optics as a substratum for
luminous undulations. Then, in order to explain the dispersion and polarization
of light, physicists had to resort once more to their "scientific
imagination" and forthwith endowed the Ether with (a) atomic or molecular
structure, and (b) with an enormous elasticity, "so that its resistance to
deformation far exceeded that of the most rigid elastic bodies" (Stallo).
This necessitated the theory of the essential discontinuity of matter, hence of
Ether. After having accepted this discontinuity, in order to account for
dispersion and polarization, theoretical impossibilities were discovered with
regard to such dispersions. Cauchy's "scientific imagination" saw in
atoms "material points without extension," and he proposed, in order
to obviate the most formidable obstacles to the undulatory theory (namely, some
well-known mechanical theorems which stood in the way), to assume that the
ethereal medium of propagation, instead of being continuous, should consist of
particles separated by sensible distances. Fresnel rendered the same service to
the phenomena of polarization. E. B. Hunt upset the theories of both
(Silliman's Journal, vol. viii., p. 364 et seq.) There are now men of Science
who proclaim them "materially fallacious," while others -- the
"atomo-mechanicalists" -- cling to to them with desperate tenacity.
The supposition of an atomic or molecular constitution of ether is upset,
moreover, by thermodynamics, for Clerk Maxwell showed that such a medium would
be simply gas.* The hypothesis of "finite intervals" is thus proven
of no avail as a supplement to the undulatory theory. Besides, eclipses fail to
reveal any such variation of colour as supposed by Cauchy (on the assumption
that the chromatic rays are propagated with different velocities).
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Clerk Maxwell's "Treatise
on Electricity of Magnetism" and compare with Cauchy's "Memoire sur
la Dispersion de la lumiere."
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Astronomy has pointed out more than
one phenomenon absolutely at variance with this doctrine.
Thus, while in one department of
physics the atomo-molecular constitution of the ether is accepted in order to
account for one set of special phenomena, in another department such a
constitution is found quite subversive of a number of well-ascertained facts,
Hirn's charges being thus justified (vide supra). Chemistry deemed it
impossible to concede enormous elasticity to the ether without depriving it of
other properties, upon the assumption of which the construction of its modern
theories depended. This ended in a final transformation of ether. The
exigencies of the atomo-mechanical theory have led distinguished mathematicians
and physicists to attempt to substitute for the traditional atoms of matter,
peculiar forms of vortical motion in a "universal homogeneous,
incompressible, and continuous material medium," or AEther. (See Stallo.)
The present writer, claiming no great
scientific education, but only a tolerable acquaintance with modern theories,
and a better one with Occult Sciences, picks up weapons against the detractors
of the esoteric teaching in the very arsenal of modern Science. The glaring
contradictions, the mutually-destructive hypotheses of world-renowned
Scientists, their mutual accusations, denunciations and disputes, show plainly
that, whether accepted or not, the Occult theories have as much right to a
hearing as any of the so-called learned and academical hypotheses. Thus whether
the followers of the Royal Society choose to accept ether as a continuous or a
discontinuous fluid matters little, and is indifferent to the present purpose.
It simply points to one certainty: Official Science knows nothing to this day
of the constitution of ether. Let Science call it matter, if it likes; only
neither as akasa nor as the one sacred AEther of the Greeks, is it to be found
in any of the states of matter known to modern physics. It is MATTER on quite
another plane of perception and being, and it can neither be analyzed by
scientific apparatus, appreciated, nor even conceived by "scientific
imagination," unless the possessors thereof study the Occult Sciences.
That which follows proves this statement.
It is clearly demonstrated by Stallo
as regards the crucial problems of modern physics (as was done by De
Quatrefages and several others in those of anthropology, biology, etc., etc.)
that, in their efforts to support their individual hypotheses and systems, the
majority of the eminent and learned materialists very often utter the greatest
fallacies. Let us take the following case. Most of them reject actio in distans
(one of the fundamental principles in the question of AEther or Akasa in
Occultism), while, as Stallo justly observes, there is no physical action,
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"which, on close examination,
does not resolve itself into actio in distans"; and he proves it.
Now, metaphysical arguments,
according to Professor Lodge (Nature, vol. xxvii., p. 304), are
"unconscious appeals to experience." And he adds that if such an
experience is not conceivable, then it does not exist, etc. In his own words:--
". . . If a highly-developed mind or set of minds, find a doctrine about
some comparatively simple and fundamental matter absolutely unthinkable, it is
an evidence . . . that the unthinkable state of things has no existence,
etc."
And thereupon, toward the end of his
lecture, Professor Lodge indicates that the explanation of cohesion, as well as
of gravity, "is to be looked for in the vortex-atom theory of Sir William
Thomson" (Stallo).
It is needless to stop to inquire
whether it is to this vortex-theory, also, that we have to look for the
dropping down on earth of the first life-germ by a passing meteor or comet (Sir
W. Thomson's hypothesis). But Mr. Lodge might be reminded of the wise criticism
on his lecture in the same "Concepts of Modern Physics." Noticing the
above-quoted declaration by the London Professor, the author asks "whether
. . . the elements of the vortex-theory are familiar, or even possible, facts
of experience? For, if they are not, clearly that theory is obnoxious to the
same criticism which is said to invalidate the assumption of ACTIO IN
DISTANS" (p. xxiv). And then the able critic shows clearly what the Ether
is not, nor can ever be, notwithstanding all scientific claims to the contrary.
And thus he opens widely, if unconsciously, the entrance door to our occult
teachings. For, as he says:--
"The medium in which the
vortex-movements arise is, according to Professor Lodge's own express statement
(NATURE, vol. xxvii., p. 305), 'a perfectly homogeneous, incompressible,
continuous body, incapable of being resolved into simple elements or atoms: it
is, in fact, continuous, not molecular.' And after making this statement
Professor Lodge adds: 'There is no other body of which we can say this, and
hence the Properties of the aether must be somewhat DIFFERENT from those of
ordinary matter.' It appears, then, that the whole vortex-atom theory, which is
offered to us as a substitute for the 'metaphysical theory' of actio in distans,
rests upon the hypothesis of the existence of a material medium which is
utterly unknown to experience, and which has properties somewhat different*
from those of ordinary matter. Hence this theory, instead of being, as is
claimed, a reduction of an unfamiliar fact of experience to a familiar fact,
is,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Somewhat different!"
exclaims Stallo. "The real import of this 'somewhat' is, that the medium
in question is not, in any intelligible sense, material at all, having none of
the properties of matter." All the properties of matter depend upon
differences and changes, and the "hypothetical" aether here defined
is not only destitute of differences, but incapable of difference and change --
(in the physical sense let us add). This proves that if aether is
"matter" it is so only as something visible, tangible and existing,
for spiritual senses alone; that it is a Being indeed -- but not of our plane:
Pater AEther, or Akasa.
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on the contrary, a reduction of a
fact which is perfectly familiar, to a fact which is not only unfamiliar, but
wholly unknown, unobserved and unobservable. Furthermore, the alleged vortical
motion of, or rather in, the assumed ethereal medium is . . . impossible,
because "motion in a perfectly homogeneous, incompressible, and therefore
continuous fluid, is not sensible motion." . . . . It is manifest,
therefore, that wherever the vortex-atom theory may lead us, it certainly does
not lead us anywhere in the region of physics, or in the domain of verae
causae.* And I may add that, inasmuch as the hypothetical undifferentiated**
and undifferentiable medium is clearly an involuntary re-ification of the old
ontological concept pure being, the theory under discussion has all the
attributes of an inapprehensible metaphysical phantom."
A "phantom" indeed, which
can be made apprehensible only by Occultism. From such scientific metaphysics
to Occultism there is hardly one step. Those physicists who hold the view that
the atomic constitution of matter is consistent with its penetrability, need
not go far out of their way to be able to account for the greatest phenomena of
Occultism, now so derided by physical scientists and materialists. Cauchy's
"material points without extension" are Leibnitz's monads, and at the
same time the materials out of which the "Gods" and other invisible
powers clothe themselves in bodies (vide infra, "Gods, Monads and
Atoms"). The disintegration and reintegration of "material"
particles without extension as a chief factor in phenomenal manifestations
ought to suggest themselves very easily as a clear possibility, at any rate to
those few scientific minds which accept M. Cauchy's views. For, disposing of
that property of matter which they call impenetrability by simply regarding the
atoms as "material points exerting on each other attractions and
repulsions which vary with the distances that separate them" -- the French
theorist explains that: "From this it follows that, if it pleased the
author of nature*** simply to modify the laws according to which the atoms
attract or repel each other, we might instantly see the hardest bodies
penetrating each other, the smallest particles of matter occupying immense
spaces, or the largest masses reducing themselves to the smallest volumes, the
entire universe concentrating itself, as it were, in a single point."
(Sept lecons de physique Generale, p. 38 et seq., ed. Moigno.)
And that "point," invisible
on our plane of perception and matter, is quite visible to the eye of the adept
who can follow and see it present on other planes.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Verae causae for physical science
are mayavic or illusionary causes to the Occultist, and vice versa.
** Very much
"differentiated," on the contrary, since the day it left its laya
condition.
*** For the Occultists who say that
the author of nature is nature itself, something indistinct and inseparable
from the Deity, it follows that those who are conversant with the occult laws
of nature, and know how to change and provoke new conditions in ether, may --
not modify the laws, but work and do the same in accordance with those
immutable laws.
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IV.
IS GRAVITATION A LAW?
THE corpuscular theory has been
unceremoniously put aside; but gravitation -- the principle that all bodies
attract each other with a force proportional directly to their masses, and
inversely to the squares of the distances between them -- survives to this day
and reigns, supreme as ever, in the alleged ethereal waves of Space. As a
hypothesis, it had been threatened with death for its inadequacy to embrace all
the facts presented to it; as a physical law, it is the King of the late and
once all-potent "Imponderables." "It is little short of
blasphemy . . . . an insult to Newton's grand memory to doubt it, . . . ."
is the exclamation of an American reviewer of "Isis Unveiled." Well;
what is finally that invisible and intangible God in whom we should believe on
blind faith? Astronomers who see in gravitation an easy-going solution for many
things, and an universal force which allows them to calculate thereby planetary
motions, care little about the Cause of Attraction. They call Gravity a law, a
cause in itself. We call the forces acting under that name effects, and very
secondary effects, too. One day it will be found that the scientific hypothesis
does not answer after all; and then it will follow the corpuscular theory of
light and be consigned to rest for many scientific aeons in the archives of all
exploded speculations. Has not Newton himself expressed grave doubts about the
Nature of Force and the corporeality of the "Agents," as they were
then called? So has Cuvier, another scientific light shining in the night of
research. He warns his readers, in the Revolution du Globe, about the doubtful
nature of the so-called Forces, saying that "it is not so sure whether
those agents were not Spiritual Powers after all (des agents spirituels). At
the outset of his "Principia," Sir Isaac Newton took the greatest
care to impress upon his school that he did not use the word
"attraction" with regard to the mutual action of bodies in a physical
sense. To him it was, he said, a purely mathematical conception involving no
consideration of real and primary physical causes. In one of the passages of
his "Principia" (Defin. 8, B. I. Prop. 69, "Scholium"), he
tells us plainly that, physically considered, attractions are rather impulses.
In section XI. (Introduction) he expresses the opinion that "there is some
subtle spirit by the force and action of which all movements of matter are
determined" (see Mod. Mater., by Rev. W. F. Wilkinson); and in his third
Letter to Bentley he says: "It is inconceivable that inanimate brute
matter should, without the mediation of something else which is not material,
operate upon and affect other matter, without mutual contact, as it must do if
gravi-
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tation, in the sense of Epicurus, be
essential and inherent in it. . . . That gravity should be innate, inherent and
essential to matter, so that one body may act upon another at a distance,
through a vacuum, without the mediation of anything else by and through which
their action may be conveyed from one to another, is to me so great an
absurdity that I believe no man, who has in philosophical matters a competent
faculty of thinking, can ever fall into it. Gravity must be caused by an agent
acting constantly according to certain laws; but whether this agent be material
or immaterial I have left to the consideration of my readers."
At this, even Newton's contemporaries
got frightened -- at the apparent return of occult causes into the domain of
physics. Leibnitz called his principle of attraction "an incorporeal and
inexplicable power." The supposition of an attractive faculty and a perfect
void was characterized by Bernoulli as "revolting," the principle of
actio in distans finding thus no more favour then than it does now. Euler, on
the other hand, thought the action of gravity was due to either a Spirit or
some subtle medium. And yet Newton knew of, if he did not accept, the Ether of
the Ancients. He regarded the intermediate space between the sidereal bodies as
vacuum. Therefore he believed in "subtle spirit" and Spirits as we
do, guiding the so-called attraction. The above-quoted words of the great man
have produced poor results. The "absurdity" has now become a dogma in
the case of pure materialism, which repeats, "No matter without force, no
force without matter; matter and force are inseparable, eternal and indestructible
(true); there can be no independent force, since all force is an inherent and
necessary property of matter (false); consequently, there is no immaterial
creative power." Oh, poor Sir Isaac!
If, leaving aside all the other
eminent men of Science who shared in the same opinion as Euler and Leibnitz,
the Occultists claim as their authorities and supporters only Sir Isaac Newton
and Cuvier, as above cited, they need fear little from modern Science, and may
loudly and proudly proclaim their beliefs. But, the hesitation and doubts of
the two before cited authorities, and of many others, too, whom we could name,
did not in the least prevent scientific speculation from wool-gathering on the
fields of brute matter just as before. First it was matter and an imponderable
fluid distinct from it; then came the imponderable fluid so much criticised by
Grove; and AEther, which was at first discontinuous and then became continuous;
after which came the "mechanical" Forces. These have now settled in
life as "modes of motion" and the aether has become more mysterious
and problematical than ever. More than one man of Science objects to such crude
materialistic views. But then since the days of Plato, who repeatedly asks his
readers not to confuse incorporeal Elements with
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their PRINCIPLES -- transcendental or
spiritual Elements; from those of the great Alchemists, who, like Paracelsus,
made a great difference between phenomenon and its cause, or the Noumenon; and
Grove, who, though he sees "no reason to divest universally diffused
matter of the functions common to all matter," yet uses the term Forces where
his critics, "who do not attach to the word any idea of a specific
action," say Force -- from those days to this nothing has proved competent
to stem the tide of brutal materialism. Gravitation is the sole cause, the
acting God, and matter is its prophet, said the men of science only a few years
ago.
They have changed their views several
times since then. But do the men of Science understand the innermost thought of
Newton, one of the most spiritual-minded and religious men of his day, any
better now than they did then? It is certainly to be doubted. Newton is
credited with having given the death-blow to the Elemental Vortices of
Descartes (the idea of Anaxagoras, resurrected, by-the-bye), though the last modern
"vortical atoms" of Sir W. Thomson do not, in truth, differ much from
the former. Nevertheless, when his disciple Forbes wrote in the Preface to the
chief work of his Master a sentence declaring that "attraction was the
cause of the System," Newton was the first to solemnly protest. That which
in the mind of the great mathematician assumed the shadowy, but firmly rooted
image of God, as the noumenon of all,* was called more philosophically by the
ancient (and modern) philosophers and Occultists -- "Gods," or the
creative fashioning Powers. The modes of expression may have been different,
and the ideas more or less philosophically enunciated by all sacred and profane
Antiquity; but the fundamental thought was the same.** For Pythagoras the
Forces were Spiritual Entities, Gods inde-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Attraction," Le
Couturier, a materialist, writes, "has now become for the public that
which it was for Newton himself -- a simple word, an idea" (Panorama des
Mondes), since its cause is unknown. Herschell virtually says the same, when
remarking, that whenever studying the motion of the heavenly bodies, and the
phenomena of attraction, he feels penetrated at every moment with the idea of
"the existence of causes that act for us under a veil, disguising their
direct action." (Musee des Sciences, August, 1856.)
** If we are taken to task for
believing in operating "Gods" and "Spirits" while rejecting
a personal God, we answer to the Theists and Monotheists: "Admit that your
Jehovah is one of the Elohim, and we are ready to recognise him. Make of him,
as you do, the Infinite, the ONE and the Eternal God, and we will never accept
him in this character." Of tribal Gods there were many; the One Universal
Deity is a principle, an abstract Root-Idea which has nought to do with the
unclean work of finite Form. We do not worship the Gods, we only honour Them,
as beings superior to ourselves. In this we obey the Mosaic injunction, while
Christians disobey their Bible -- Missionaries foremost of all. "Thou
shalt not revile the gods," says one of them -- (Jehovah) -- in Exodus
xxii. 28); but at the same time in verse 20 it is commanded, "He that
sacrificeth to any God, save unto the Lord, he shall be utterly
destroyed." Now in the [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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pendent of planets and Matter as we
see and know them on Earth, who are the rulers of the Sidereal Heaven. Plato
represented the planets as moved by an intrinsic Rector, one with his dwelling,
like "A boatman in his boat." As for Aristotle, he called those
rulers "immaterial substances;"* though as one who had never been
initiated, he rejected the gods as Entities (See Vossius, Vol. II., p. 528).
But this did not prevent him from recognising the fact that the stars and
planets "were not inanimate masses but acting and living bodies indeed. .
. . . . ." As if "sidereal spirits were the divine portion of their
phenomena, [[ta theoitera pon phaneron]]" (De Caelo. I. 9).
If we look for corroboration in more
modern and Scientific times, we find Tycho Brahe recognising in the stars a
triple force, divine, spiritual and vital. Kepler, putting together the
Pythagorean sentence, "The Sun, guardian of Jupiter," and the verses
of David, "He placed his throne in the Sun," and "The Lord is
the Sun," etc., said that he understood perfectly how the Pythagoreans
could believe that all the globes disseminated through Space were rational
Intelligences, facultates ratiocinativae, circulating around the Sun, "in
which resides a pure Spirit of fire; the source of the general harmony"
(De Motibus planetarum harmonicis, p. 248).
When an Occultist speaks of Fohat --
the energising and guiding intelligence in the Universal Electric or Vital
Fluid, -- he is laughed at. Withal, as now shown, neither the nature of
electricity, nor of Life nor even of Light, are to this day understood. The
Occultist sees in the manifestation of every force in Nature, the action of the
quality, or the special characteristic of its noumenon; which noumenon is a
distinct and intelligent Individuality on the other side of the manifested mechanical
Universe. Now the Occultist does not deny -- on the contrary he will support
the claim -- that light, heat, electricity and so on are affections (not
properties or qualities) of matter. To put it more clearly: matter is the
condition -- the necessary basis or vehicle, a sine qua non -- for the
manifestation of these forces, or agents, on this plane.
But in order to gain the point the
Occultists have to examine the credentials of the law of gravity, first of all,
of "Gravitation, the King
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] original texts it is not "god" but Elohim, -- and we challenge
contradiction -- and Jehovah is one of the Elohim, as proved by his own words
in Genesis iii. 22, when "the Lord God said: Behold the Man has become as
one of us," etc. Hence both those who worship and sacrifice to the Elohim,
the angels, and to Jehovah, those who revile the gods of their fellow-men, are
far greater transgressors than the Occultists or any Theosophist. Meanwhile
many of the latter prefer believing in some one "Lord" or other, and
are quite welcome to do as they like.
* To liken the "immateriate
species to wooden iron," and laugh at Spiller referring to them as
"incorporeal matter" does not solve the mystery (See "Concepts
of Modern Physics," p. 165 et infra).
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and Ruler of Matter," under
every form. To do so effectually, the hypothesis in its earliest appearance has
to be recalled to mind. To begin with, is it Newton who was the first to
discover it? The Athenaeum of Jan. 26, 1867, has some curious information upon
this subject. It says that "positive evidence can be adduced that Newton
derived all his knowledge of gravitation and its laws from Boehme, with whom
gravitation or ATTRACTION is the first property of Nature." . . . For with
him "his (Boehme's) system, shows us the inside of things, while modern
physical science is content with looking at the outside." Then again,
"the science of electricity, which was not yet in existence when he
(Boehme) wrote, is there anticipated (in his writings); and not only does
Boehme describe all the now known phenomena of that force, but he even gives us
the origin, generation, and birth of electricity, itself, etc."
Thus Newton, whose profound mind read
easily between the lines, and fathomed the spiritual thought of the great Seer
in its mystic rendering, owes his great discovery to Jacob Boehme, the nursling
of the genii (Nirmanakayas) who watched over and guided him, of whom the author
of the article in question so truly remarks, that "every new scientific
discovery goes to prove his profound and intuitive insight into the most secret
workings of nature." And having discovered gravity, Newton, in order to
render possible the action of attraction in space, had, so to speak, to
annihilate every physical obstacle capable of impeding its free action; ether
among others, though he had more than a presentiment of its existence.
Advocating the corpuscular theory, he made an absolute vacuum between the
heavenly bodies. . . . Whatever may have been his suspicions and inner
convictions about Ether; however many friends he may have unbosomed himself to
-- as in the case of his correspondence with Bentley -- his teachings never
showed that he had any such belief. If he was "persuaded that the power of
attraction could not be exerted by matter across a vacuum,"* how is it
that so late as 1860, French astronomers (Le Couturier, for instance), combated
"the disastrous results of the theory of vacuum established by the great
man?"** Professor Winchell writes, "These passages (letter to
Bentley) show what were his views respecting the nature of the interplanetary
medium of communication. Though declaring that the heavens 'are void of
sensible matter,' he elsewhere excepted 'perhaps
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* World-Life. Prof. Winchell, LL.D
(pp. 49 and 50).
** "Il n'est plus possible
aujourd'hui, de soutenir comme Newton, que les corps celestes se mouvent au
milieu du VIDE immense des espaces. . . . Parmi les consequences de la theorie
du vide etablie par ce grand homme, il ne reste plus debout que le mot
'attraction,' et nous verrons le jour ou ce dernier mot disparaitra du
vocabulaire scientifique." ("Panorama des mondes," pp. 47 and
53.)
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some very thin vapours, streams, and
effluvia, arising from the atmospheres of the earth, planets, and comets, and
from such an exceedingly rare ethereal medium as we have elsewhere
described." (Newton, Optics, III., query 28, 1704; quoted in
"World-Life.")
This only shows that even such great
men as Newton have not always the courage of their opinions. Dr. T. S. Hunt
"called attention to some long-neglected passages in Newton's works, from
which it appears that a belief in such universal, intercosmical medium
gradually took root in his mind." (Ibid.) But such attention was never
called to the said passages before Nov. 28, 1881, when Dr. Hunt read his
"Celestial Chemistry, from the time of Newton." "Till then the
idea was universal, even among the men of Science, that Newton had, while
advocating the corpuscular theory, preached a void," as Le Couturier says.
The passages had been "long neglected," no doubt because they
contradicted and clashed with the preconceived pet theories of the day, till
finally the undulatory theory imperiously required the presence of an
"ethereal medium" to explain it. This is the whole secret.
Anyhow, it is from that theory of
Newton's of a universal void -- taught, if not believed in by himself, -- that
dates the immense scorn now shown by modern for ancient physics. The old sages
had maintained that "Nature abhorred vacuum," and the greatest mathematicians
of the world (read of the Western races) had discovered the antiquated
"fallacy" and exposed it. And now modern science vindicates, however
ungracefully, archaic knowledge, having, moreover, to vindicate Newton's
character and powers of observation at this late hour, after having neglected
for one century and a half to pay any attention to such very important passages
-- perchance, because it was wiser not to attract any notice to them. Better
late than never.
And now Father AEther is re-welcomed with
open arms; and wedded to gravitation; linked to it for weal or woe, until the
day when it, or both, shall be replaced by something else. Three hundred years
ago it was plenum everywhere, then it became one dismal vacuity; later still
the sidereal ocean-beds, dried up by science, rolled onward once more their
ethereal waves. Recede ut procedes must become the motto of exact Science --
"exact," chiefly, in finding itself inexact every leap-year.
But we will not quarrel with the
great men. They had to go back to the earliest "Gods of Pythagoras and old
Kanada" for the very backbone and marrow of their correlations and
"newest" discoveries, and this may well afford good hope to the
Occultists, for their minor gods. For we believe in Le Couturier's prophecy
about gravitation. We know the day is approaching when an absolute reform will
be demanded in the present modes of Science by the scientists themselves -- as
was done by Sir W. Grove, F.R.S. Till that day there is nothing to be done. For
if gravitation
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were dethroned to-morrow, the day
after the Scientists would discover some other new mode of mechanical motion.*
Rough and up-hill is the path of true Science, and its days are full of
vexation of Spirit. But in the face of its "thousand" contradictory
hypotheses to explain physical phenomena, there never was yet a better one than
that of "motion" -- however paradoxically interpreted by materialism.
As may be found on the first pages of Book I., Occultists have nothing surely
against motion** the GREAT BREATH of Mr. Herbert Spencer's "UNKNOWN."
But, believing that everything on Earth is the shadow of something in space --
they believe in smaller "Breaths," which, living, intelligent and
independent of all but Law, blow in every direction during Manvantaric periods.
These Science will reject. But whatever replaces attraction, alias gravitation,
the result will be the same. Science will be as far from the solution of its
difficulties as it is now, unless it comes to some compromise with Occultism
and even with Alchemy -- which supposition will be regarded as an impertinence,
but remains a fact, nevertheless. As Faye says: "Il manque quelque chose
aux geologues pour faire la geologie de la Lune, c'est d'etre astronomes. A la
verite il manque aussi quelquechose aux astronomes pour aborder avec fruit
cette etude, c'est d'etre geologues." But he might have added, with still
more pointedness, "Ce qui manque a tous les deux, c'est l'intuition du
mystique."
Let us remember Sir William Grove's
wise "concluding remarks," on the ultimate structure of matter, or
the minutiae of molecular actions, which, he thought, man will never know.
"Much harm has already been done
by attempting hypothetically to dissect matter and to discuss the shapes,
sizes, and numbers of atoms, and their atmospheres of heat, ether, or
electricity. . . . . Whether the regarding electricity, light, magnetism, etc.,
as simply motions of ordinary matter, be or be not admissible, certain it is
that all past theories have resolved, and all existing theories do resolve, the
action of these forces into motion. Whether it be that, on account of our
familiarity with motion, we refer other affections to it, as to a language
which is most easily construed, and most capable of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* When read in a fair and
unprejudiced spirit, Sir Isaac Newton's works are an ever ready witness to show
how he must have hesitated between gravitation and attraction, impulse and some
other unknown cause to explain the regular course of the planetary motion. But
see Treatise on Colour (Vol. III., question 31.) We are told by Herschell that
Newton left with his successors the duty of drawing all the scientific
conclusions from his discovery. How modern Science abused the privilege of
building its newest theories upon the law of gravitation, may be realised when
one remembers how profoundly religious was that great man.
** The materialistic notion that
because, in physics real or sensible motion is impossible in pure space or
vacuum, therefore, the eternal MOTION of and in Cosmos (regarded as infinite
Space) is a fiction -- only shows once more that such words as "pure
space," "pure Being," "the Absolute," etc., of Eastern
metaphysics have never been understood in the West.
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explaining them, or whether it be
that it is in reality the only mode in which our minds as contra-distinguished
from our senses, are able to conceive material agencies, certain it is that
since the period at which the mystic notions of spiritual or preternatural
powers were applied to account for physical phenomena, all hypotheses framed to
explain them have resolved them into MOTION."
And then the learned gentleman states
a purely occult tenet:--
"The term perpetual motion,
which I have not infrequently used in these pages, is itself equivocal. If the
doctrines here advanced be well founded, all motion is, in one sense,
perpetual. In masses, whose motion is stopped by mutual concussion, heat or
motion of the particles is generated; and thus the motion continues, so that if
we could venture to extend such thoughts to the universe, we should assume the
same amount of motion affecting the same amount of matter for ever."*
Thus, supposing attraction or
gravitation should be given up in favour of the Sun being a huge magnet --
which is a theory already accepted by some physicists -- a magnet that acts on
the planets as attraction is now supposed to do, whereto, or how much farther
would it lead the astronomers from where they are now? Not an inch farther.
Kepler came to this "curious hypothesis" nearly 300 years ago. He had
not discovered the theory of attraction and repulsion in Kosmos, for it was
known from the days of Empedocles, the two opposite forces being called by him
"hate" and "love" -- which comes to the same thing. But
Kepler gave a pretty fair description of cosmic magnetism. That such magnetism
exists in nature, is as certain as that gravitation does not; not at any rate,
in the way in which it is taught by Science, which never took into
consideration the different modes in which the dual Force -- that Occultism
calls attraction and repulsion -- may act within our solar system, the earth's
atmosphere, and beyond in the Kosmos.** This was proven by Newton himself; for
there are many phenomena in our
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Correl. Phys. Forces,"
p. 173. This is precisely what Occultism maintains, and on the same principle
that "where force is made to oppose force, and produce static equilibrium,
the balance of pre-existing equilibrium is affected, and fresh motion is
started equivalent to that which is withdrawn into a state of abeyance."
This process finds intervals in the pralaya, but is eternal and ceaseless as
the "Breath," even when the manifested Kosmos rests.
** "Trans-solar space,"
writes the great Humboldt, "does not hitherto show any phenomenon
analogous to our solar system. It is a peculiarity of our System, that matter
should have condensed within it in nebulous rings, the nuclei of which condense
into earths and moons. I say again, heretofore, nothing of the kind has ever been
observed beyond our planetary system." (See Revue Germanique of the 31st
Dec. 1860, art. "Lettres et conversations d'Alexandre Humboldt.")
True, that since 1860 the nebular theory has sprung up, and being better known,
a few identical phenomena were supposed to be observed beyond the solar system.
Yet the great man is quite right; and no earths or moons can be found -- except
in appearance -- beyond, or of the same order of matter as found in our system.
Such is the Occult teaching.
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Solar system, which he confessed his
inability to explain by the law of gravitation. "Such were the uniformity
in the directions of planetary movements, the nearly circular forms of the
orbits, and their remarkable conformity to one plane" (Prof. Winchell).
And if there is one single exception, then the law of gravitation has no right to
be referred to as an universal law. "These adjustments," we are told,
"Newton, in his general Scholium, pronounces to be 'the work of an
intelligent and all-powerful Being.' " Intelligent that "Being"
may be; as to "all-powerful" there would be every reason to doubt the
claim. A poor "God" he, who would work upon minor details and leave
the most important to secondary forces! The poverty of the argument and logic
in this case, is surpassed only by that of Laplace, who, seeking very correctly
to substitute motion for Newton's "all-powerful Being," and ignorant
of the true nature of that eternal motion, saw in it a blind physical law.
"Might not those arrangements be an effect of the laws of motion?" he
asks, forgetting, as all our modern Scientists do, that this law and this
motion are a vicious circle, so long as the nature of both remains unexplained.
His famous answer to Napoleon: "Dieu est devenu une hypothese
inutile," would be correctly stated only by one who adhered to the
philosophy of the Vedantins. It becomes a pure fallacy, if we exclude the
interference of operating, intelligent, powerful (never
"all-powerful") Beings, who are called "gods."
But we would ask the critics of the
mediaeval astronomers why should Kepler be denounced as most unscientific, for
offering just the same solution as Newton did -- only showing himself more
sincere, more consistent and even more logical. Where may be the difference
between Newton's "all-powerful Being" and Kepler's Rectores, his
sidereal and Cosmic Forces, or Angels? Kepler is again criticised for his
"curious hypothesis which made use of a vortical movement within the solar
system;" for his theories in general, for his favouring Empedocles' idea
of attraction and repulsion, and "Solar magnetism" in particular. Yet
several modern men of Science, as will be shown -- Hunt (if Metcalfe is to be
excluded), Dr. Richardson, etc. -- favour the idea very seriously. He is half
excused, however, on the plea that "to the time of Kepler no interaction
between masses of matter had been distinctly recognized which was generically
different from magnetism" (World-Life). Is it distinctly recognised now?
Does Prof. Winchell claim for Science any serious knowledge whatever of the
natures of either electricity or magnetism -- except that both seem to be the
effects of some result arising from an undetermined cause.
The ideas of Kepler, weeded from
their theological tendencies, are purely occult. He saw that:
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(I.) The Sun is a great Magnet.* This
is what some eminent modern scientists and also the Occultists believe in.
(II.) The Solar substance is
immaterial.** (See "Isis Unveiled," Vol. I. pp. 270 to 271.)
(III.) He provided, for the constant
motion and restoration of the Sun's energy and planetary motion, the perpetual
care of a spirit, or spirits. The whole of Antiquity believed in this idea. The
Occultists do not use the word Spirit, but say Creative Forces, which they
endow with intelligence. But we may call them spirits also.
This theory is tabooed a great deal
more on account of the "Spirit" that is given room in it, than of
anything else. Herschell, the elder, believed in it likewise, and so do several
modern scientists also. Nevertheless Professor Winchell declares that "a
hypothesis more fanciful, and less in accord with the requirements of physical
principles, has not been offered in ancient or modern times." (World-Life,
p. 554.)
The same was said, once upon a time,
of the universal Ether, and now it is not only accepted perforce but advocated
as the only possible theory to explain away certain mysteries.
Grove's ideas, when he first
enunciated them in London about 1840, were called as unscientific as the above;
nevertheless, his views on the correlation of forces are now universally
accepted. It would, very likely, require one more conversant with science than
is the writer, to combat with any success some of the now prevailing ideas
about gravitation and other similar "solutions" of Cosmic Mysteries.
But, let us recall a few objections that came from recognized men of Science;
from astronomers and physicists of eminence, who rejected the theory of rotation,
as well as that of gravitation. Thus one reads in the French Encyclopaedia that
"Science agrees, in the face of all its representatives, that it is
impossible to explain the physical origin of the rotatory motion of the solar
system."
If the question is asked, "what
causes rotation?" we are answered: "It is the centrifugal
Force." "And this force, what is it that produces it?" "The
force of rotation," is the grave answer. (Godefroy, Cosmogonie de la Revelation.***)
It will be well, perhaps, to examine both these theories as being directly or
indirectly connected.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* But see Astronomie du Moyen Age, by
Delambre.
** In the sense, of course, of matter
existing in states unknown to Science.
*** We shall be taken to task for
contradiction. It will be said that while we deny God, we admit Souls and
operative Spirits, and quote from Roman Catholic bigoted writers in support of
our argument. To this we reply: "We deny the anthropomorphic god of the
Monotheists, but never the Divine Principle in nature. We combat Protestants
and Roman Catholics on a number of dogmatic theological beliefs of human and
sectarian origin. We agree with them in their belief in Spirits and intelligent
operative powers, though we do not worship "Angels" as the Roman
Latinists do."
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V.
THE THEORIES OF ROTATION IN SCIENCE.
CONSIDERING that "final cause is
pronounced a chimera, and the first Great Cause is remanded to the Sphere of
the Unknown," as a reverend gentleman justly complains, the number of
hypotheses put forward, a nebula in itself, is most remarkable. The profane
student is perplexed, and does not know in which of the theories of exact
science he has to believe. Here we have hypotheses enough for every taste and
power of brain. They are all extracted from a number of scientific volumes.
CURRENT HYPOTHESES EXPLAINING THE
ORIGIN OF ROTATION.
Rotation has originated either --
(a) By the collision of nebular
masses wandering aimlessly in space; or by attraction, "in cases where no
actual impact takes place."
(b) "By the tangential action of
currents of nebulous matter (in the case of an amorphous nebula) descending
from higher to lower levels,* or simply by the action of the central gravity of
the mass."**
"It is a fundamental principle
in physics that no rotation could be generated in such a mass by the action of
its own parts. As well attempt to change the course of a steamer by pulling at
the deck railing," remarks to this Prof. Winchell in
"World-Life."
HYPOTHESES OF THE ORIGIN OF THE SEVEN
PLANETS AND COMETS.
(a) We owe the birth of the Planets
(1) to an explosion of the Sun -- a parturition of its central mass;*** or (2)
to some kind of disruption of the nebular rings.
(b) "The Comets are strangers to
our planetary system" (La Place). "The Comets are undeniably
generated in our Solar system" (Faye).
(c) The "fixed stars are
motionless" says one authority. . . . "All the stars are actually in
motion" answers another authority. . . "Undoubtedly every star is in
motion" (Wolf).
(d) "For over 350,000,000 years,
the slow and majestic movement of the Sun around its axis has never for a
moment ceased" (Panorama des Mondes, Le Couturier.)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The terms "high" and
"low" being only relative to the position of the observer in Space,
any use of those terms tending to convey the impression that they stand for
abstract realities, is necessarily fallacious.
** Jacob Ennis, "The Origin of
the Stars," p. 221 et seq.
*** If such is the case, how does
Science explain the comparatively small size of the planets nearest the Sun?
The theory of meteoric aggregation is only a step farther from truth than the
nebular conception, and has not even the quality of the latter -- its
metaphysical element.
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(e) And "the Sun having Alcyone
in the Pleiades for the centre of its orbit, consumes 180,000,000 of years in
completing its revolution" (Maedler). And also,
(f) That, "the Sun has existed
no more than 15,000,000 of years, and will emit heat for no longer than 10,000,000
years more" (Sir W. Thomson's lecture on "the latent dynamical theory
regarding the probable origin, total amount of heat, and duration of the
Sun," 1887).
A few years ago this eminent
Scientist was telling the world that the time required for the earth to cool
from incipient incrustation to its present state, could not exceed 80,000,000
years*; (Thomson and Tait, Natural Philosophy.) If the encrusted age of the
world is only 40 millions, or the half of the duration once allowed, and the
Sun's age only 15 millions, have we to understand that the earth was at one
time independent of the Sun?
Since the ages of the Sun, planets,
and the Earth, as stated in the many scientific hypotheses of the astronomers
and physicists, are given elsewhere (infra), we have said enough to show the
disagreement between the ministers of modern Science. Whether we accept the
fifteen million years of Sir W. Thomson or the thousand millions of Mr. Huxley,
for the rotational evolution of our solar system, it will always come to this;
by accepting self-generated rotation for the heavenly bodies composed of inert
matter and yet moved by their own internal motion, for millions of years, this
teaching of Science amounts to --
(a) An evident denial of that
fundamental physical law, which states that "a body in motion tends
constantly to inertia, (i.e., to continue in the same state of motion or rest),
unless it is stimulated into further action by a superior active force."
(b.) To an original impulse, which
culminates in an unalterable motion, within a resisting ether that NEWTON had
declared incompatible with that motion.
(c.) Universal gravity, which, we are
taught, always tends to a centre in rectilinear descent -- alone the cause of
the revolution of the whole solar system, which is performing an eternal double
gyration, each body around its axis and orbit. Another occasional version is:--
(d.) A magnet in the Sun; or, the
said revolution due to a magnetic force, which acts, just as gravitation does,
in a straight line -- varying inversely as the square of the distance.
(Coulomb's Law.)
(e.) The whole acting under
invariable and changeless laws, which are, nevertheless, often shown variable,
as during some well-known freaks
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* And even on these figures Bischof
disagrees with Thomson, and calculates that 350 million years would be required
for the earth to cool from a temperature of 20,000 degrees to 200 degrees
centigrade. This is, also, the opinion of Helmholtz.
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of planets and other bodies, as also
when the Comets approach to or recede from the Sun.
(f.) A MOTOR FORCE always
proportionate to the mass it is acting upon; but independent of the specific
nature of that mass, to which it is proportionate; which amounts to saying, as
Le Couturier does, that, "without that Force independent from and of quite
another nature than the said mass, the latter, were it as huge as Saturn, or as
tiny as Ceres, would always fall with the same rapidity" (Musee des
Sciences, 15 August, 1857). A mass, furthermore, which derives its weight from
the body on which it weighs.
Thus neither Laplace's perceptions of
a solar atmospheric fluid, which would extend beyond the orbits of the planets,
nor Le Couturier's electricity, nor Foucault's heat (Panorama des Mondes, p.
55), nor this, nor the other, can ever help any of the numerous hypotheses
about the origin and permanency of rotation to escape from this squirrel's
wheel, any more than the theory of gravity itself. This mystery is the
Procrustean bed of physical Science. If matter is, as now taught, passive, the
simplest movement cannot be said to be an essential property of matter -- if
the latter is simply an inert mass. How, then, can such a complicated movement,
compound and multiple, harmonious and equilibrated, lasting in the eternities
for millions and millions of years, be attributed simply to its own inherent
Force, unless the latter is an intelligence? A physical will is something new
-- a conception that the ancients would have never entertained, indeed!*
"We talk of the weight of the
heavenly bodies," says an astronomer; "but since it is recognised
that weight decreases in proportion to the distance from the centre, it becomes
evident that, at a certain distance, that weight must be forcibly reduced to
Zero? Were there any attraction there would be equilibrium . . . . And since
the modern school recognizes neither a beneath nor an above in universal space,
it is not clear what should cause the Earth to fall, were there even no
gravitation, nor attraction." (Cosmographie.)
Methinks the Count de Maistre was
right in solving the question in his own theological way. He cuts the Gordian
knot by saying:-- "The
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* For over a century all distinction
between body and force is made away with. "Force is but the property of a
body in motion," say the physicists; and "life -- the property of our
animal organs -- is but the result of their molecular arrangement," answer
the physiologists. "In the bosom of that aggregate which is named
planet," teaches Littre, "are developed all the forces immanent to
matter . . . i.e., that matter possesses in itself and through itself the
forces that are proper to it . . . and which are primary, not secondary. Such
forces are the property of weight, the property of electricity, of terrestrial
magnetism, the property of life. . . . Every planet can develop life . . . as
earth, for instance, which had not always mankind on it, and now bears
(produit) men" . . . (Revue des Deux Mondes, July 15, 1860.)
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planets rotate because they are made
to rotate . . . . . and the modern physical system of the universe is a
physical impossibility." (Soirees.) For did not Herschell say the same
thing when he remarked that there is a will needed to impart a circular motion,
and another will to restrain it? (Discours, 165.) This shows and explains how a
retarded planet is cunning enough to calculate so well its time as to hit off
its arrival at the fixed minute. For, if Science sometimes succeeds with its
great ingenuity in explaining some of such stoppages, retrograde motions,
angles outside the orbits, &c., &c., by appearances resulting from the
inequality of their progress and ours in the course of our mutual and
respective orbits, we still know that there are others, and "very real and
considerable deviations," according to Herschell, "which cannot be
explained except by the mutual and irregular action of those planets and by the
perturbing influence of the Sun."
We understand, however, that there
are, besides those little and accidental perturbations, continuous
perturbations called "secular" -- because of the extreme slowness
with which the irregularity increases and affects the relations of the elliptic
movement -- and that these perturbations can be corrected. From Newton, who
found that this world needed repairing very often, down to Reynaud, all say the
same. In his Ciel et Terre (p. 28), the latter speaks of --
". . . . . The orbits described
by the planets as being very far from immutable; on the contrary, subject to a
perpetual mutation in their position and form," -- all prove gravitation
and the peripatetic laws to be as negligent as they are quick to repair their
mistakes. The charge as it stands seems to be that "they (the orbits) are
alternately widening and narrowing, their great axis lengthens and diminishes,
or oscillates at the same time from right to left around the Sun, the plane
itself, in which they are situated, raising and lowering itself periodically
while pivoting around itself with a kind of tremor. . . ."
To this, De Mirville, who believes in
intelligent "workmen" ruling invisibly the solar system -- as we do
-- observes very wittily* . . . . . "Voila certes, a voyage which has
little in it of mechanical rigour; at the utmost, one could compare it to a
steamer, pulled to and fro and tossed on the waves, retarded or accelerated,
all and each of which impediments might put off its arrival indefinitely, were
there not the intelligences of a pilot and engineers to catch up the time lost,
and to repair the damages. . . . ."
The law of gravity, however, seems to
be becoming an obsolete law in starry heaven. At any rate those long-haired
sidereal radicals, called comets, appear to be very poor respecters of the
majesty of that law,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Deuxieme memoire, "Manifestations
Historiques," p. 272.
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and to beard it quite impudently.
Nevertheless, and though presenting in nearly every respect "phenomena not
yet fully understood," comets and meteors are credited by the believers in
modern Science with obeying the same laws and consisting of the same matter,
"as the Suns, stars and nebulae," and even "the earth and its
inhabitants." (Laing's "Modern Science and Modern Thought.")
This is what one might call taking
things on trust, aye, even to blind faith. But exact Science is not to be
questioned, and he who rejects the hypotheses imagined by her students --
gravitation, for instance -- would be regarded as an ignorant fool for it; yet
we are told by the just cited author a queer legend from the scientific annals.
"The comet of 1811 had a tail 120 millions of miles in length and 25
millions of miles in diameter at the widest part, while the diameter of the
nucleus was about 127,000 miles, more than ten times that of the earth."
He tells us, "in order that bodies of this magnitude, passing near the
earth, should not affect its motion or change the length of the year by even a
single second, their actual substance must be inconceivably rare. . . ."
It must be so indeed, yet:--
". . . . . The extreme tenuity
of a comet's mass is also proved by the phenomenon of the tail, which, as the
comet approaches the sun, is thrown out sometimes to a length of 90 millions of
miles in a few hours. And what is remarkable, THIS TAIL IS THROWN OUT AGAINST
THE FORCE OF GRAVITY by some repulsive force, probably electrical, so that it
always points away from the Sun (!!!) And yet, thin as the matter of comets
must be, IT OBEYS THE COMMON LAW OF GRAVITY (!?), and whether the comet
revolves in an orbit within that of the outer planets, or shoots off into the
abysses of Space, and returns only after hundreds of years, its path is, at
each instant, regulated by the same force as that which causes an apple to fall
to the ground." (Ibid, p. 17.)
Science is like Caesar's wife, and
must not be suspected -- this is evident. But it can be respectfully
criticised, nevertheless. At all events, it may be reminded that "the
apple" is a dangerous fruit. For the second time in the history of
mankind, it may become the cause of the FALL -- this time, of "exact"
Science. A comet whose tail defies the law of gravity right in the Sun's face
can hardly be credited with obeying that law.
In a series of scientific works on
Astronomy and the nebular theory, written between 1865 and 1866, the present
writer, a poor tyro in Science, has counted in a few hours, no less than
thirty-nine contradictory hypotheses offered as explanations for the
self-generated, primitive rotatory motion of the heavenly bodies. The writer is
no astronomer, no mathematician, no scientist; but was obliged to examine these
errors in defence of Occultism, in general, and what is still more
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important, in order to support the
occult teachings concerning astronomy and Cosmology. Occultists were threatened
with terrible penalties for questioning scientific truths. But now they feel
braver -- Science is less secure in its "impregnable" position than
they were led to expect, and many of its strongholds are built on very shifting
sands.
Thus, even this poor and unscientific
examination of it was useful, and it was certainly very instructive. We have
learned a good many things, in fact, having studied with particular care
especially those astronomical data that would be the most likely to clash with
our heterodox and "superstitious" beliefs.
So, for instance, we have found
there, concerning gravitation, the axial and orbital motions, that synchronous
movement having been once overcome, in the early stage -- it was enough to
originate a rotatory motion till the end of Manvantara. We have also come to
know in all the aforesaid combinations of possibilities with regard to
incipient rotation -- most complicated in every case, -- some of the causes to
which it may have been due, as well as some others to which it ought and should
have been due, but, in some way or other, was not. Among other things, we were
informed that incipient rotation may be provoked with equal ease in a mass in
igneous fusion, and in one that is characterised by glacial opacity
("Heaven and Earth"). That gravitation is a law which nothing can
overcome, but which, nevertheless, is overcome in and out of season by the most
ordinary celestial or terrestrial bodies -- the tails of impudent comets, for
instance. That we owe the universe to the holy creative Trinity, called Inert
Matter, Senseless Force and Blind Chance. Of the real essence and nature of any
of these three, Science knows nothing, but this is a trifling detail. Ergo, we
are told that, when a mass of cosmic or nebular matter -- whose nature is
unknown (entirely so), and which may be in a state of fusion (Laplace), or dark
and cold (Thomson), for "this intervention of heat is itself a pure hypothesis"
(Faye) -- decides to exhibit its mechanical energy under the form of rotation,
it acts in this wise. It (the mass) either bursts into spontaneous
conflagration, or it remains inert, tenebrous, and frigid, both states being
equally capable of sending it, without any adequate cause, spinning through
space for millions of years. Its movements may be retrograde and they may be
direct, about a hundred various reasons being offered for both motions, in
about as many hypotheses. Anyhow, joining the maze of stars, whose origin
belongs to the same miraculous and spontaneous order -- for "the nebular
theory does not profess to discover the origin of things, but only a stadium in
material history" (Winchell: World-Life) -- those millions of suns, planets,
and satellites, composed of inert matter, will whirl on in most impressive and
majestic symmetry around the firmament, moved
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and guided only, their inertia
notwithstanding, "by their own internal motion."
Shall we wonder after this if learned
mystics, pious Roman Catholics, and even such learned astronomers as were
Chaubard and Godefroy,* have preferred the Kabala and the ancient systems to
the modern dreary and contradictory exposition of the Universe? The Zohar makes
a distinction, at any rate, between "the hajaschar ("the light
Forces"), the hachoser ("Reflected Lights"), and the simple
phenomenal exteriority of their spiritual types." (See Kabala Denudata,
II, 67.)
The question of "gravity"
may now be dismissed, and other hypotheses examined. That physical Science
knows nothing of "Forces" is clear. We may close the argument, however,
by calling to our help one more man of Science -- Professor Jaumes, Member of
the Academy of Medicine at Montpellier. Says this learned man, speaking of
Forces:--
"A cause is that which is
essentially acting in the genealogy of phenomena, in every production as in
every modification. I said that activity (or Force) was invisible. . . . To
suppose it corporeal and residing in the properties of matter would be a
gratuitous hypothesis. . . To reduce all the causes to God. . . . would amount
to embarrassing oneself with a hypothesis hostile to many verities. But to
speak of a plurality of forces proceeding from the Deity and possessing
inherent powers of their own, is not unreasonable. . . . and I am disposed to
admit phenomena produced by intermediate agents called Forces or Secondary
Agents. The distinction of Forces is the principle of the division of Sciences;
so many real and separate forces, so many mother-Sciences. . . . No: Forces are
not suppositions and abstractions, but realities, and the only acting realities
whose attributes can be determined with the help of direct observation and
induction." ("Sur la distinction des Forces," published in the
Memoires de l'Academie des Sciences de Montpellier, Vol. II., fasc. I., 1854.)
--------------
VI.
THE MASKS OF SCIENCE.
PHYSICS OR METAPHYSICS?
IF there is anything on earth like
progress, Science will some day have to give up, nolens volens, such monstrous
ideas as her physical, self-guiding laws -- void of soul and Spirit, -- and
then turn to the occult teachings.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* L'Univers explique par la
Revelation, and Cosmogonie de la Revelation. But see De Mirville's Deuxieme
Memoire. The author, a terrible enemy of Occultism, was yet one who wrote great
truths.
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It has done so already, however
altered are the title-page and revised editions of the Scientific Catechism. It
is now over half a century since, in comparing modern with ancient thought, it
has been found that, however different our philosophy may appear from that of
our ancestors, it is, nevertheless, composed only of additions and subtractions
taken from the old philosophy and transmitted drop by drop through the filter
of antecedents.
This fact was well known to Faraday,
and other eminent men of Science. Atoms, Ether, evolution itself -- all comes
to modern Science from ancient notions, all is based on the conceptions of the
archaic nations. "Conceptions" for the profane, under the shape of
allegories; plain truths taught during the Initiations to the elect, which
truths have been partially divulged through Greek writers and have descended to
us. This does not mean that Occultism has ever had the same views on matter,
atoms and ether as found in the exotericism of the classical Greek writers.
Yet, if we believe Mr. Tyndall, even Faraday was an Aristotelean, and an
Agnostic more than a materialist. In his "Faraday, as a Discoverer"
(p. 123) the author shows the great physicist using "old reflections of
Aristotle" which are "concisely found in some of his works."
Faraday, Boscovitch, and all others, however, who see, in the atoms and
molecules, "centres of force," and in the corresponding element
force, an ENTITY BY ITSELF, are far nearer the truth, perchance, than those,
who, denouncing them, denounce at the same time the "old corpuscular
Pythagorean theory" (one, by the way, which has never passed to posterity
as the great philosopher really taught it), on the ground of its "delusion
that the conceptual elements of matter can be grasped as separate and real
entities."
The chief and most fatal mistake and
fallacy made by Science, in the view of the Occultists, lies in the idea of the
possibility of such a thing as inorganic, or dead matter, in nature. Is
anything dead or inorganic capable of transformation or change? Occultism asks.
And is there anything under the sun which remains immutable or changeless?
This fallacy is nowhere better
illustrated than in the scientific work of a German savant, Professor Philip
Spiller (Der Weltaether als Kosmische Kraft). In this cosmological treatise,
the author attempts to prove that "no material constituent of a body, no
atom, is in itself originally endowed with force, but that every such atom is
absolutely dead,* and without any power to act at a distance" (p. 4).
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Something dead implies that it had
been at some time living. When, at what period of cosmogony? Occultism says
that in all cases when matter appears inert, it is the most active. A wooden or
a stone block is motionless and impenetrable to all intents and purposes.
Nevertheless, and de facto, its particles are in ceaseless eternal vibration
which is so rapid that to the physical eye the body seems absolutely devoid of
motion; [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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This statement, however, does not
prevent Spiller from enunciating an occult doctrine and principle. He asserts
the independent substantiality of force, and shows it as an "incorporeal
stuff" (unkoerperlicher stoff) or substance. Now substance is not matter
in metaphysics, and for argument's sake it may be granted that it is a wrong expression
to use. But this is due to the poverty of European languages, and especially to
that of scientific terms. Then this "stuff" is identified and
connected by Spiller with the aether. Expressed in occult language it might be
said with more correctness that this "force-substance" is the
ever-active phenomenal positive aether -- prakriti; while the omnipresent all
pervading ether is the noumenon of the former, the substratum of all, or Akasa.
Nevertheless, Stallo falls foul of Spiller, as he does of the materialists. He
is accused of "utter disregard of the fundamental correlation of force and
matter" (of neither of which Science knows anything certain). For this
"hypostasized half-concept" is, in the view of all other physicists,
not only imponderable, but destitute of cohesive, chemical, thermal, electric,
and magnetic forces -- of all of which forces -- according to occultism --
aether is the source and cause.
Therefore Spiller, with all his
mistakes, exhibits more intuition than any other modern Scientist, with the
exception of Dr. Richardson, perhaps, the theorist on the "nerve
force," or Nervous Ether, also on "Sun Force and Earth Force."*
For AETHER, in Esotericism, is the very quintessence of all possible energy,
and it is certainly to this universal agent (composed of many agents) that all
the manifestations of energy in the material, psychic and spiritual worlds are
due.
What are Electricity and Light, in
fact? How can Science know that one is a fluid and the other a "mode of
motion"? Why is it not made clear why a difference should be made between
them, since both are considered force-correlations. Electricity is a fluid, we
are told, immaterial and non-molecular (though Helmholtz thinks otherwise), and
the proof of it is that we can bottle it up, accumulate and store it away.
Then, it must be simply matter, and no peculiar "fluid." Nor is it
only "a mode of motion," for motion could hardly be stored in a
Leyden jar. As for light, it is a still more extraordinary "mode of
motion;" since, "marvellous as it may appear, light (also) can
actually be stored up for use," as demonstrated by Professor Grove nearly
half a century ago.
"Take an engraving which has
been kept for some days in the dark, expose it to full sunshine -- that is,
insulate it for 15 minutes; lay it on
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] and the spacial distance between those particles in their vibratory
motion is -- considered from another plane of being and perception -- as great
as that which separates snow flakes or drops of rain. But to physical science
this will be an absurdity.
* See "Popular Science
Review," Vol. V., pp. 329-34.
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sensitive paper in a dark place, and
at the end of 24 hours it will have left an impression of itself on the
sensitive paper, the whites coming out as blacks. . . . There seems to be no
limit for the reproduction of engravings, etc., etc. . . . ."
What is it that remains fixed,
nailed, so to say, on the paper? It is a Force certainly, that fixed the thing,
but what is that thing, the residue of which remains on the paper?
Our learned men will get out of this
through some scientific technicality; but what is it that is intercepted, so as
to imprison a certain quantity of it on glass, paper, or wood? Is it
"Motion" or is it "Force"? Or shall we be told that what
remains behind is the effect only of the force or Motion? Then what is this
Force? Force or energy is a quality; but every quality must belong to a
something, or a somebody. In Physics, Force is defined as "that which
changes or tends to change any physical relation between bodies, whether
mechanical, thermal, chemical, electrical, magnetic, etc." But it is not
that "Force" or that "Motion" which remains behind on the
paper, when the Force or Motion has ceased to act; and yet something, which our
physical senses cannot perceive, has been left there to become a cause in its
turn and produce effects. What is it? It is not matter, as defined by Science
-- i.e., matter in any of its known states. An Alchemist would say it was a
spiritual secretion -- and would be laughed at. But yet, when the physicist
said that Electricity, stored up, was a fluid, or that light fixed on paper is
still Sunlight -- this is Science.* In the opinion of an experienced Occultist,
one who has verified the whole series of Nidanas, of causes and effects that
finally project their last effect on to this our plane of manifestations; one
who has traced matter back to its noumenon, the explanation of the physicist is
like calling anger, or its effects -- the exclamation provoked by it -- a
secretion or a fluid, and man, the cause of it -- its material conductor. But,
as Grove prophetically remarked, that day is fast approaching when it will be
confessed that the "forces" we know of are but the phenomenal
manifestations of realities we know nothing about, -- but which were known to
the ancients and -- by them worshipped.
He made one still more suggestive
remark, however, which ought to have become the motto of Science, but has not.
Sir W. Grove said that "SCIENCE SHOULD HAVE NEITHER DESIRES NOR
PREJUDICES. TRUTH SHOULD BE HER SOLE AIM."
Meanwhile, in our days, Scientists
are more self-opinionated and bigoted than even the clergy. For they minister
to, if they do not actually worship,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The newest Authorities have
rejected these explanations as "exploded theories," and have now
deified "Motion" as their sole Idol. But, surely, they and their idol
will one day share the fate of their predecessors.
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"Force-Matter," which is
their Unknown God. And how unknown it is may be inferred from the many
confessions of the most eminent physicists and biologists, with Faraday at
their head. Not only, he said, could he never presume to pronounce whether
Force was a property or function of Matter, but he actually did not know what
was meant by the word matter.
There was a time, he added, when he
believed he knew something of matter. But the more he lived, and the more
carefully he studied it, the more he became convinced of his utter ignorance of
the nature of matter.* (See Buckwell's "Electric Science.")
The Occultists are often
misunderstood because, for lack of better terms, they apply to the essence of
Force under certain aspects the descriptive epithet of substance. Now the names
for the varieties of "substance" on different planes of perception
and being are legion. Eastern Occultism has a special appellation for each
kind; but Science -- like England, in the recollection of a witty Frenchman,
blessed with thirty-six religions and only one fish-sauce -- has but one name
for all, namely, "Substance." Moreover, neither the orthodox
physicists nor their critics seem to be very certain of their premises, and are
as apt to confuse the effects as they do the causes. It is incorrect, for
instance, to say, as Stallo does, that "matter can no more be realized or
conceived as mere spacial presence than as a concretion of forces," or
that "force is nothing without mass, and mass is nothing without
force" -- for one is the noumenon and the other the phenomenon. Again;
Schelling, when saying that "It is a mere delusion of the phantasy that
something, we know not what, remains after we have denuded an object of all the
predicates belonging to it"** -- could never have applied the remark to
the realm of transcendental metaphysics. It is true that pure force is nothing
in the world of physics; it is ALL in the domain of Spirit. Says Stallo:
"If we reduce the mass upon which a given force, however small, acts to
its limit zero -- or, mathematically expressed, until it becomes infinitely
small -- the consequence is that the velocity of the resulting motion is
infinitely great, and that the 'thing' . . . is at any given moment neither
here nor there, but everywhere -- that there is no
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This ominous confession was made,
we believe, at a Scientific Congress at Swansea. Faraday held a similar
opinion, however, as stated by Tyndall: "What do we know of the atom apart
from its force? You imagine a nucleus which may be called a and surround it by
forces which may be called m; to my mind the a or nucleus vanishes and the
substance consists of the powers m. And, indeed, what notion can we form of the
nucleus independent of its powers? What thought remains on which to hang the
imagination of an a independent of the acknowledged forces?"
** Schelling, "Ideen,"
etc., p. 18.
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real presence; it is impossible,
therefore, to construct matter by a synthesis of forces" (p. 161).
This may be true in the phenomenal
world, inasmuch as the illusive reflection of the one reality of the
supersensual world may appear true to the dwarfed conceptions of a materialist.
It is absolutely incorrect when the argument is applied to things, in what the
Kabalists call the supermundane spheres. Inertia, so called, "is
force" according to Newton (Princ. Def. iii.), and for the student of
Esoteric Sciences the greatest of the occult forces. A body may be considered
divorced from its relations with other bodies -- which, according to physical
and mechanical sciences, give rise to its attributes -- only conceptually, only
on this plane of illusion. In fact, it can never be so detached: death itself
being unable to detach it from its relation with the Universal forces, of which
the one FORCE or LIFE is the synthesis: but simply continues such
inter-relation on another plane. But what, if Stallo is right, can Dr. James Croll
mean when, in speaking "On the Transformation of Gravity"
(Philosophical Magazine, Vol. II., p. 252), he brings forward the views
advocated by Faraday, Waterston, and others? For he says very plainly that
gravity --
". . . . . is a force pervading
Space external to bodies, and that, on the mutual approach of the bodies, the
force is not increased, as is generally supposed, but the bodies merely pass
into a place where the force exists with greater intensity. . . . ."
No one will deny that a force (whether
gravity, electricity, or any other force) which exists outside of the bodies
and in open space -- be it ether or vacuum -- must be something, and not a pure
nothing, when conceived apart from a mass? Otherwise it could hardly exist in
one place with a greater and in another with reduced "intensity." G.
A. Hirn declares the same in his Theorie Mecanique de l'Univers. He tries to
demonstrate that the atom of the chemists is not an entity of pure convention,
or simply an explicative device, but that it exists really, that its volume is
unalterable, and that consequently it is not elastic (!!). "Force,
therefore, is not in the atom; it is in the space which separates the atoms
from each other."
The above-cited views, expressed by
two men of Science of great eminence in their respective countries, show that
it is not in the least unscientific to speak of the substantiality of the
so-called Forces. Subject to some future specific name, this force is substance
of some kind, and can be nothing else; and perhaps one day Science will be the
first to re-adopt the derided name of phlogiston. Whatever may be the future
name given to it, to maintain that force does not reside in the atoms, but only
in "space between them," may be scientific enough; nevertheless it is
not true. To the mind of an Occultist it is like saying
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that water does not reside in the
drops of which the ocean is composed, but only in the space between those
drops!
The objection made that there are two
distinct schools of physicists, by one of which "the force is assumed to
be an independent substantial entity, which is NOT a property of matter nor is
it essentially related to matter,"* is hardly likely to help the profane
to any clearer understanding. It is, on the contrary, still more calculated to
throw the question into greater confusion than ever. For Force is, then,
neither this nor the other. By viewing it as "an independent substantial
entity," the theory extends the right hand of fellowship to Occultism,
while the strange contradictory idea that it is not related to matter
"otherwise than by its power to act upon it,"** leads physical
science to the most absurd contradictory hypotheses. Whether "force"
or "motion," (Occultism, seeing no difference between the two, never
attempts to separate them) it cannot act for the adherents of the
atomo-mechanical theory one way, and for those of the rival school in another
way. Nor can the atoms be, in one case, absolutely uniform in size and weight,
and in another, vary in their weight (Avogadro's law). For, in the words of the
same able critic,
. . . "While the absolute
equality of the primordial units of mass is thus an essential part of the very
foundations of the mechanical theory, the whole modern Science of chemistry is
based upon a principle directly subversive of it -- a principle of which it has
recently been said that 'it holds the same place in chemistry that the law of
gravitation does in astronomy.'*** This principle is known as the law of
Avogadro or Ampere."****
This shows that either modern
chemistry or modern physics is entirely wrong in its respective fundamental
principles. For if the assumption of atoms of different specific gravities on
the basis of the atomic theory in physics is deemed absurd, and chemistry
meets, nevertheless, on its opposite basis (in the question of the formation
and transformation of chemical compounds) with "unfailing experimental
verification,"
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Concepts of Modern
Physics," xxxi., Introductory to the 2nd edition.
** Loc. cit.
*** J. P. Cooke, The New Chemistry,
p. 13.
**** "It imports that equal
volumes of all substances, when in the gaseous state, and under like conditions
of pressure and temperature, contain the same number of molecules -- whence it
follows that the weights of the molecules are proportional to the specific
gravities of the gases; that therefore, these being different, the weights of
the molecules are different also; and inasmuch as the molecules of certain
elementary substances are monatomic (consist of but one atom each) while the
molecules of various other substances contain the same number of atoms, that
the ultimate atoms of such substances are of different weights" (Concepts
of Modern Physics, p. 34). As shown further on in the same volume, this
cardinal principle of modern theoretical chemistry is in utter and
irreconcilable conflict with the first proposition of the atomo-mechanical
theory -- namely, the absolute equality of the primordial units of mass.
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then it becomes apparent that it is
the atomo-mechanical theory which is untenable. The explanations of the latter,
that "the differences of weight are only differences of density, and
differences of density are differences of distance between the particles
contained in a given space," are not really valid, because, before a
physicist can argue in his defence that, "as in the atom there is no multiplicity
of particles and no void space: hence differences of density or weight are
impossible in the case of atoms," he must first know what an atom is, in
reality, and that he cannot know. He must bring it under the observation of at
least one of his physical senses -- and that he cannot do: for the simple
reason that no one has ever seen, smelt, heard, touched or tasted an
"atom." The atom belongs wholly to the domain of metaphysics. It is
an entified abstraction -- at any rate for physical Science -- and has nought
to do with physics, strictly speaking, as it can never be brought to the test
of retort or balance. The mechanical conception, therefore, becomes a jumble of
the most conflicting theories and dilemmas, in the minds of the many Scientists
who disagree on this, as on other subjects; the evolution of which the Eastern
Occultist, who follows this scientific strife, beholds in the greatest
bewilderment.
To conclude on the question of
gravity. How can Science presume to know anything certain of it? How can it maintain
its position and its hypotheses against those of the Occultists, who see in
gravity only sympathy and antipathy, or attraction and repulsion, caused by
physical polarity on our terrestrial plane, and by spiritual causes outside of
its influence? How can they disagree with the Occultists before they agree
among themselves? Indeed one hears of the conservation of energy, and in the
same breath of the perfect hardness and inelasticity of the atoms; of the
Kinetic theory of gases being identical with "potential energy," so
called; and, at the same time, of the elementary units of mass being absolutely
hard and inelastic! An Occultist opens a scientific work and reads as
follows:--
"Physical atomism derives all
the qualitative properties of matter from the forms of atomic motion. The atoms
themselves remain as elements utterly devoid of property." (Wundt,
"Die Theorie der Materie," p. 381.)
And further:
"Chemistry in its ultimate form
must be atomic mechanics." (Nazesmann, "Thermochemie," p. 150.)
And a moment after he is told that:
"Gases consist of atoms which
behave like solid, perfectly elastic spheres." (Kroenig, Clausius,
Maxwell, etc., Philosophical Magazine, Vol. XIX., p. 18.)
Finally, to crown all, Sir W. Thomson
is found declaring that:
"We are forbidden by the modern
theory of the conservation of
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energy to assume inelasticity, or
anything short of perfect elasticity of the ultimate molecules whether of ultra
mundane or mundane matter." (!!!) ("Philosophical Magazine," p.
321, loc. cit.)
But what do the men of true Science
say to all this? By the "men of true Science" we mean those who care
too much for truth and too little for their personal vanity to dogmatise on
anything, as the majority do. There are several among them -- perhaps more than
dare publish openly their secret conclusions for fear of the cry "Stone
him to death!" -- men, whose intuitions have made them span the abyss that
lies between the terrestrial aspect of matter, and the -- to us, on our plane of
illusion -- subjective, i.e., TRANSCENDENTALLY OBJECTIVE SUBSTANCE, and led
them to proclaim the existence of the latter. Matter, to the Occultist, it must
be remembered, is that totality of existences in the Kosmos, which falls within
any of the planes of possible perception. We are but too well aware that the
orthodox theories of sound, heat and light, are against the occult doctrines.
But, it is not enough for the men of Science, or their defenders, to say that
they do not deny dynamic power to light and heat; and urge as a proof the fact
that Mr. Crookes' radiometer has unsettled no views. If they would fathom the
ultimate nature of these Forces, they have first to admit their substantial
nature, however supersensuous. Neither do the Occultists deny the correctness
of the vibratory theory.* Only they limit its functions to our Earth --
declaring its inadequacy on other planes than ours, since "Masters"
in the Occult Sciences perceive the CAUSES that produce ethereal vibrations.
Were all these only the fictions of the alchemists, or dreams of the Mystics,
such men as Paracelsus, Philalethes, Van Helmont, and so many others, would
have to be regarded as worse than visionaries: they would become impostors and
deliberate mystificators.
The Occultists are taken to task for
calling the Cause of light, heat, sound, cohesion, magnetism, etc., etc., a
substance.** Mr. Clerk Maxwell has stated that the pressure of strong sunlight
on a square mile is about 3 1/4 lbs. It is, they are told, "the energy of
the myriad ether waves;" and when they call it a "substance"
impinging on that area, their explanation is proclaimed unscientific.
There is no justification for such an
accusation. In no way -- as stated
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Referring to the Aura, one of the
Masters says in the "Occult World," "How could you make yourself
understood by, command in fact, those semi-intelligent forces, whose means of
communication with us are not through spoken words but through sounds and
colours in correlation between the vibrations of the two." It is this
"correlation" that is unknown to modern Science, yet was many times
explained by the Alchemists.
** The "substance" of the
Occultist, however, is to the most refined substance of the physicist, what
radiant matter is to the leather of the Chemist's boots.
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more than once before now -- do the
Occultists dispute the explanations of Science, as affording a solution of the
immediate objective agencies at work. Science only errs in believing that,
because it has detected in vibratory waves the proximate cause of these
phenomena, it has, therefore, revealed ALL that lies beyond the threshold of
Sense. It merely traces the sequence of phenomena on a plane of effects,
illusory projections from the region that Occultism has long since penetrated.
And the latter maintains that those etheric tremors, are not, as asserted by
Science, set up by the vibrations of the molecules of known bodies -- the
matter of our terrestrial objective consciousness, -- but that we must seek for
the ultimate causes of light, heat, etc., etc., in MATTER existing in
super-sensuous states -- states, however, as fully objective to the spiritual
eye of man, as a horse or a tree is to the ordinary mortal. Light and heat are
the ghost or shadow of matter in motion. Such states can be perceived by the
SEER or the Adept during the hours of trance, under the Sushumna ray -- the
first of the Seven Mystic rays of the Sun.*
Thus, we put forward the Occult
teaching which maintains the reality of a supersubstantial and supersensible
essence of that Akasa (not ether, which is only an aspect of the latter), the
nature of which cannot be inferred from its remoter manifestations -- its
merely phenomenal phalanx of effects -- on this terrene plane. Science, on the
contrary, informs us that heat can never be regarded as matter in any
conceivable state.** We are also told that the two great obstacles to the fluid
(?) theory of heat undoubtedly are:--
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The names of the Seven Rays --
which are, Sushumna, Harikesa, Viswakarman, Viswatryarchas, Sannaddha,
Sarvavasu and Swaraj -- are all mystical, and each has its distinct application
in a distinct state of consciousness, for occult purposes. The Sushumna, which,
as said in the Nirukta (11, 6), is only to light up the moon, is the ray
nevertheless cherished by the initiated Yogis. The totality of the Seven Rays
spread through the Solar system constitute, so to say, the physical Upadhi
(basis) of the Ether of Science; in which Upadhi, light, heat, electricity,
etc., etc., -- the forces of orthodox science -- correlate to produce their
terrestrial effects. As psychic and spiritual effects, they emanate from, and
have their origin in, the supra-solar Upadhi, in the ether of the Occultist --
or Akasa.
** To cite a most impartial critic,
one whose authority no one can call in question, as a reminder to Western
Dogmatists, that the question cannot be in any way considered as settled:
"There is no fundamental difference between light and heat . . . each is
merely a metamorphosis of the other. . . . Heat is light in complete repose.
Light is heat in rapid motion. Directly light is combined with a body, it
becomes heat; but when it is thrown off from that body it again becomes
light." (Leslie's Fluid Theory of Light and Heat.) "Whether this is
true or false we cannot tell, and many years, perhaps many generations, will
have to elapse before we shall be able to tell." (Buckle's History of
Civilization, Vol. III., p. 384.)
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(1.) The production of heat by
friction -- excitation of molecular motions.
(2.) The conversion of heat into
mechanical motion.
The answer given is: There are fluids
of various kinds. Electricity is called a fluid, and so was heat quite
recently, but it was on the supposition that heat was some imponderable
substance. This was during the supreme and autocratic reign of matter. When the
latter was dethroned, and MOTION was proclaimed the sole sovereign ruler of the
Universe, heat became "a mode of motion." We need not despair: it may
become something else to-morrow. Like the Universe itself, Science is ever becoming,
and can never say, "I am that I am." On the other hand, Occult
Science has its changeless traditions from prehistoric times. It may err in
particulars; it can never become guilty of a mistake in questions of Universal
laws, simply because that Science, justly referred to by philosophy as the
"divine," was born on higher planes, and was brought on Earth by
beings who were wiser than man will be, even in the seventh Race of his Seventh
Round. And that Science maintains that Forces are not what modern learning would
have them; e.g., Magnetism is not a "mode of motion"; and, in this
particular case, at least, exact "modern Science" is sure to come to
grief some day. Nothing, at the first blush, can appear more ridiculous, more
outrageously absurd than to say, for instance: "the Hindu initiated Yogi
knows really ten times more than the greatest European physicist of the
ultimate nature and constitution of light -- both solar and lunar." Yet
why is the Sushumna ray believed to be that ray which furnishes the moon with its
borrowed light? Why is it "the ray cherished by the initiated Yogi?"
Why is the moon held as the deity of the mind, by those Yogis? We say, because
light, or rather all its occult properties, every combination and correlation
of it with other forces, mental, psychic, and spiritual, were perfectly known
to the old adepts.
Therefore, although, in its knowledge
of the ultimate constitution of matter, or in the so-called ultimate analysis
as opposed to the proximate in chemistry, occult science may be less
well-informed as to the behaviour of compound elements in various cases of
physical correlations: still, it is immeasurably higher in its knowledge of the
ultimate occult states of matter, and of the true nature of matter, than all
the physicists and chemists of our modern day put together.
Now, if we state the truth openly and
in full sincerity, namely, that the ancient Initiates had a far wider knowledge
of physics -- as a Science of Nature -- than our Academies of Science, all
taken together, possess, the statement will be characterized as an impertinence
and an absurdity; for physical sciences are considered to have been carried in
our age to the apex of perfection. Hence, the twitting query -- "Can
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the Occultists meet successfully the
two points, namely (a) the production of heat by friction -- excitation of
molecular motions; and (b) the conversion of heat into mechanical force, if
they hold to the old "exploded" theory of heat being a substance or a
fluid?"
To answer the question, it must first
be observed that the Occult Sciences do not regard either electricity or any of
the forces supposed to be generated by it, as matter, in any of the states
known to physical Science; to put it more clearly, none of these
"forces," so-called, are either solids, gases, or fluids. If it did
not look pedantic, an Occultist would even object to electricity being called a
fluid -- as it is an effect and not a cause. But its noumenon, he would say, is
a conscious cause. The same in the cases of "Force" and the
"Atom." Let us see what an eminent Academician, Butlerof, the
chemist, had to say about these two abstractions.
--------------
"What is Force?" argues
this great man of Science, "what is it from a strictly scientific
stand-point, and as warranted by the law of conservation of energy? Conceptions
of Force are resumed by our conceptions of this, that, or another mode of
motion." Force is thus simply the passage of one state of motion into
another state of the same: of electricity, into heat and light, of heat into
sound or some mechanical function, and so on.* The first time electric fluid
was produced by man on earth it must have been by friction; hence, as
well-known, it is heat that produces it by disturbing its laya state,** and
electricity exists no more on earth per se than heat or light, or any other
force. They are all correlations, as science says. "When a given quantity
of heat, assisted by a steam engine, is transformed into mechanical work, we
speak of steam power (or force). When a falling body strikes an obstacle in its
way, thereby generating heat and sound -- we call it the power of collision.
When electricity decomposes water or heats a platinum wire, we speak of the
force of the electric fluid. When the rays of the sun are intercepted by the
thermometer bulb and its quicksilver expands, we speak of the calorific energy
of the sun. In short, when one state of a determined quantity of motion ceases,
another state of motion equivalent to the preceding takes its place, and the
result of such a transformation or correlation is -- force. In all cases where
such a transformation, or the passage of one state of motion into another, is
entirely absent, there no force is possible. Let us admit for a moment an
absolutely homogeneous state of the Universe, and our conception of force falls
down to nought."
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* On the plane of manifestation and
illusionary matter it may be so; not that it is nothing more, for it is vastly
more.
** Neutral, or zero.
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"Therefore it becomes evident
that the force, which materialism considers as the cause of the diversity that
surrounds us, is in sober reality only an effect, a result of that diversity.
From such point of view force is not the cause of motion, but a result, while
the cause of that force, or forces, is not the substance or matter, but motion
itself. Matter thus must be laid aside and with it the basic principle of
materialism, which has become unnecessary, as force brought down to a state of
motion can give no idea of the substance. If force is the result of motion,
then it becomes incomprehensible why that motion should become witness to
matter and not to Spirit or a Spiritual essence. True, our reason cannot
conceive of a motion minus something moving (and our reason is right); but the
nature or esse of that something moving remains to Science entirely unknown;
and the Spiritualist, in such case, has as much right to attribute it to a
"Spirit," as a Materialist to creative and all-potential matter. A
Materialist has no special privileges in this instance, nor can he claim any.
The law of the conservation of energy, as thus seen, is shown to be illegitimate
in its pretensions and claims in this case. The "great dogma" -- no
force without matter and no matter without force -- falls to the ground, and
loses entirely the solemn significance with which materialism has tried to
invest it. The conception of force still gives no idea of matter and compels us
in no way to see in it "the origin of all origins." ("Scientific
Letters," Professor Butlerof.)
We are assured that real science is
not materialistic; and our own conviction tells us that it cannot be so, when its
learning is real. There is a good reason for it, well defined by some
physicists and chemists themselves. Natural sciences cannot go hand in hand
with materialism. To be at the height of their calling, men of science have to
reject the very possibility of materialistic doctrines having aught to do with
the atomic theory; and we find that Lange, Butlerof, Du Bois Reymond, -- the
latter probably unconsciously -- and several others, have proved it. And it is,
furthermore, demonstrated by the fact, that Kanada in India, and Leucippus,
Democritus, and after them Epicurus -- the earliest atomists in Europe -- while
propagating their doctrine of definite proportions, believed in Gods or
supersensuous entities, at the same time. Their ideas upon matter thus differed
from those now prevalent. We must be allowed to make our statement clearer in a
short synopsis of the ancient and modern views of philosophy upon atoms, and
thus prove that the atomic theory kills Materialism.
From the standpoint of Materialism,
which reduces the beginnings of all to matter, the Universe consists, in its
fullness, of atoms and vacuity. Even leaving aside the axiom -- now absolutely
demonstrated by telescope and microscope -- taught by the ancients, that nature
abhors
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vacuum, what is an atom? "It is,
we are answered by Science," writes Professor Butlerof, "the limited
division of substance, the indivisible particle of matter. To admit the
divisibility of the atom, amounts to an admission of an infinite divisibility
of substance, which is equivalent to reducing substance to nihil, a
nothingness. Owing to a feeling of self-preservation alone, materialism cannot
admit infinite divisibility; otherwise, it would have to bid farewell for ever
to its basic principle and thus sign its own death-warrant." Buchner, for
instance, like a true dogmatist in materialism, declares that "to accept
infinite divisibility is absurd, and amounts to doubting the very existence of
matter." The Atom is indivisible then, saith Materialism? Very well.
"See now what a curious
contradiction this fundamental principle of the materialists is leading them
into," writes Butlerof. "The atom is indivisible, and at the same
time we know it to be elastic. An attempt to deprive it of elasticity is
unthinkable; it would amount to an absurdity. Absolutely non-elastic atoms
could never exhibit a single one of those numerous phenomena that are
attributed to their correlations. Without any elasticity, the atoms could not
manifest their energy, and the substance of the materialists would remain
weeded of every force. Therefore, if the Universe is composed of atoms, then
those atoms must be elastic. It is here that we meet with an insuperable
obstacle. For, what are the conditions requisite for the manifestation of
elasticity? An elastic ball, when striking against an obstacle, is flattened
and contracts, which it would be impossible for it to do, were not that ball to
consist of particles, the relative position of which experiences at the time of
the blow a temporary change. This may be said of elasticity in general; no
elasticity is possible without change with respect to the position of the
compound particles of an elastic body. This means that the elastic body is
changeful and consists of particles, or, in other words, that elasticity can
pertain only to those bodies that are divisible. And the atom is elastic."
This is sufficient to show how absurd
are the simultaneous admissions of the non-divisibility and elasticity of the
atom. The atom is elastic, ergo, the atom is divisible, and must consist of
particles, or of sub-atoms. And these sub-atoms? They are either non-elastic,
and in such case they represent no dynamic importance, or, they are elastic
also; and in that case, they, too, are subject to divisibility. And thus ad
infinitum. But infinite divisibility of atoms resolves matter into simple centres
of force, i.e., precludes the possibility of conceiving matter as an objective
substance.
This vicious circle is fatal to
materialism. It finds itself caught in its own nets, and no issue is possible
for it out of the dilemma. If it says that the atom is indivisible, then it
will have mechanics asking it the awkward question: "How does the Universe
move in this case, and how do its forces correlate? A world built on absolutely
non-elastic atoms, is like an engine without steam, it is doomed to eternal inertia."*
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Scientific Letters,"
Butlerof.
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Accept the explanations and teachings
of Occultism, and, the blind inertia of physical Science being replaced by the
intelligent active Powers behind the veil of matter, motion and inertia become
subservient to those Powers. It is on the doctrine of the illusive nature of
matter, and the infinite divisibility of the atom, that the whole science of
Occultism is built. It opens limitless horizons to substance informed by the
divine breath of its soul in every possible state of tenuity, states still
undreamt of by the most spiritually disposed chemists and physicists.
The above views were enunciated by an
Academician, the greatest chemist in Russia, and a recognised authority even in
Europe -- the late Professor Butlerof. True, he was defending the phenomena of
the Spiritualists, the materializations, so called, in which he believed as
Professors Zollner, and Hare did, as Mr. A. Russell Wallace, Mr. W. Crookes,
and many another Fellow of the Royal Society, do still, whether openly or
secretly. But his argument with regard to the nature of the essence that acts
behind the physical phenomena of light, heat, electricity, etc., is no less
scientific and authoritative for all that, and apply admirably to the case in
hand. Science has no right to deny to the Occultists their claim to a more
profound knowledge of the so-called Forces; which, they say, are only the
effects of causes generated by Powers, substantial, yet supersensuous, and
beyond any kind of matter with which they (the Scientists) have hitherto become
acquainted. The most science can do is to assume the attitude of agnosticism
and to maintain it. Then it can say: "Your case is no more proven than is
ours; but we confess to knowing nothing in reality either about Force or matter,
or that which lies at the bottom of the so-called correlations of Forces.
Therefore, time alone can prove who is right and who is wrong. Let us wait
patiently, and meanwhile show courtesy instead of scoffing at each other."
But to do this requires a boundless
love of truth and the surrender of that prestige -- however false -- of
infallibility, which the men of Science have acquired among the ignorant and
flippant, though cultured, masses of the profane. To blend the two sciences,
the archaic and the modern, requires first of all the abandonment of the actual
materialistic lines. It necessitates a kind of religious mysticism and even the
study of old magic, which our Academicians will never take up. The necessity is
easily explained. Just as in old alchemical works the real meaning of the
substances and elements meant are concealed under the most ridiculous
metaphors, so are the physical, psychic, and spiritual natures of the Elements
(say of fire) concealed in the Vedas, and especially in the Puranas, under
allegories comprehensible only to the Initiates. Had they no meaning, then
indeed all those long legends and allegories about the sacredness of the three
types of fire, and the forty-nine original fires --
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personified by the Sons of Daksha's
daughters and the Rishis, their husbands, "who with the first son of
Brahma and his three descendants constitute the forty-nine fires" -- would
be idiotic verbiage and no more. But it is not so. Every fire has a distinct
function and meaning in the worlds of the physical and the spiritual. It has,
moreover, in its essential nature a corresponding relation to one of the human
psychic faculties, besides its well determined chemical and physical potencies
when coming in contact with the terrestrially differentiated matter. Science
has no speculations to offer upon fire per se; Occultism and ancient religious
science have. This is shown even in the meagre and purposely veiled phraseology
of the Puranas, where (as in the Vayu Purana) many of the qualities of the
personified fires are explained. Thus, Pavaka is electric, or Vaidyuta, fire;
Pavamana, the fire produced by friction, (or Nirmathya): and Suchi is solar (or
Saura) fire* -- all these three being the sons of Abhimanin, the Agni (fire),
eldest son of Brahma and of Swaha. Pavaka, moreover, is made parent to
Kavyavahana, the fire of the Pitris: Suchi to Havyavahana -- the fire of the
gods; and Pavamana, to Saharaksha, the fire of the Asuras. Now all this shows
that the writers of the Puranas were perfectly conversant with the
"Forces" of Science and their correlations; moreover, with the various
qualities of the latter in their bearing upon those psychic and physical
phenomena which receive no credit and are unknown to physical science now. Very
naturally, when an Orientalist, -- especially one with materialistic tendencies
-- reads that these are only appellations of fire employed in the invocations
and rituals, he calls this "Tantrika superstition and mystification";
and he becomes more careful to avoid errors in spelling, than to give attention
to the secret meaning attached to the personifications, or to seek their
explanation in the physical correlations of forces, so far as known. So little
credit, indeed, is given to the ancient Aryans for knowledge, that even such
glaring passages as in Book I. chap. ii, Vishnu Purana, are left without any
notice. Nevertheless, what can this sentence mean? -- "Then Ether, air,
light, water, and earth, severally united with the properties of sound and
other qualities, existed as distinguishable according to their properties, . .
. . but possessing many and various energies and being unconnected, they could
not, without combination, create living beings, not having blended with each
other. . . . Having combined . . . they assumed through mutual association, the
character of one mass of entire unity; and directed by Spirit . . ." etc.
This means, of course, that the writers were perfectly acquainted with
correlation and were well posted about the origin of Kosmos from the
"undiscrete Principle" -- Avyaktanugrahena, as applied
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Called the "drinker of
waters," solar heat causing water to evaporate.
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to Parabrahmam and Mulaprakriti
conjointly, and not to "Avyakta, either First Cause, or matter," as
Wilson gives it. The old Initiates knew of no "miraculous creation,"
but taught the evolution of atoms (on our physical plane), and their first
differentiation from laya into the protyle, as Mr. Crookes has suggestively
named matter, or primordial substance beyond the zero-line:-- there where we
place Mulaprakriti, the "root-Principle" of the world stuff and of
all in the world.
This can be easily demonstrated.
Take, for instance, the newly-published catechism of the Visishtadwaita
Vedantins, an orthodox and exoteric system, yet fully enunciated and taught in
the XIth century (its founder, Ramanujacharya, being born in A.D. 1017), at a
time when European "Science" still believed in the squareness and
flatness of the Earth, of Cosmas-Indicopleustes of the VIth century. It teaches
that before evolution began, Prakriti (Nature) was in a condition of laya or
absolute homogeneity, as "matter exists in two conditions, the sukshma, or
latent and undifferentiated, and the sthula or differentiated condition."
Then it became anu, atomic. It teaches of Sudda-satwa -- "a substance not
subject to the qualities of matter, from which it is quite different," and
adds that out of that substance the bodies of the inhabitants of Vaikuntaloka
(the heaven of Vishnu), the gods, are formed. That every particle or atom of
Prakriti contains Jiva (divine life), and is the sarira (body) of that Jiva
which it contains, while every Jiva is in its turn the sarira of the supreme
spirit, as "Parabrahm pervades every Jiva, as well as every particle of
matter." Dualistic and anthropomorphic as may be the philosophy of the
Visishtadwaita, when compared with that of the Adwaita -- the non-dualists, --
it is yet supremely higher in logic and philosophy than the cosmogony accepted
by either Christianity, or its great opponent, modern Science. The followers of
one of the greatest minds that ever appeared on Earth, the Adwaita Vedantins
are called Atheists, because they regard all save Parabrahm, the secondless, or
Absolute Reality -- as an illusion. Yet the wisest Initiates came from their
ranks, as also the greatest Yogis. The Upanishads show that they most assuredly
knew not only what is the causal substance in the effects of friction, and that
their forefathers were acquainted with the conversion of heat into mechanical
force, but that they were acquainted with the noumena of every spiritual as
well as of every cosmic phenomenon.
Truly the young Brahmin who graduates
in the universities and colleges of India with the highest honours; who starts
in life as an M.A. and an LL.B., with a tail initialed from Alpha to Omega
after his name, and a contempt for his national gods proportioned to the
honours received in his education in physical sciences; truly he has but to
read in the light of the latter, and with an eye to the correlation of
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physical Forces, certain passages in
his Puranas, if he would learn how much more his ancestors knew than he will
ever know -- unless he becomes an occultist. Let him turn to the allegory of
Pururavas and the celestial Gandharva,* who furnished the former with a vessel
full of heavenly fire. The primeval mode of obtaining fire by friction has its
scientific explanation in the Vedas, and is pregnant with meaning for him who
reads between the lines. The Tretagni (sacred triad of fires) obtained by the
attrition of sticks made of the wood of the Aswattha tree (the Bo-tree, of
Wisdom and Knowledge) -- sticks "as many finger-breaths long as there are
syllables in the gayatri" must have a secret meaning, or else the writers
of the Vedas and Puranas were no sacred writers but mystificators. That it has
such a meaning, the Hindu Occultists are a proof, and they alone are able to
enlighten Science, as to why and how, "the fire, that was primevally one,
was made threefold (treta) in our present Manvantara, by the Son of Ila (Vach),
the primeval woman after the Deluge, the wife and daughter of Vaivasvata Manu.
The allegory is suggestive, in whatever Purana it may be read and studied.
--------------
VII.
AN ATTACK ON THE SCIENTIFIC THEORY OF
FORCE BY A MAN OF SCIENCE.
THE wise words of several (English)
men of Science have now to be quoted in our favour. Ostracised for
"principle's sake" by the few, they are tacitly approved of by the
many. That one of them preaches almost Occult doctrines, in some things
identical with, and often amounting to a public recognition of our "Fohat
and his seven Sons" --
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Gandharva of the Veda is the
deity who knows and reveals the secrets of heaven and divine truths to mortals.
Cosmically -- the Gandharvas are the aggregate powers of the solar-fire, and
constitute its Forces; psychically -- the intelligence residing in the
Sushumna, Solar ray, the highest of the seven rays; mystically -- the occult
force in the Soma (the moon, or lunar plant) and the drink made of it;
physically -- the phenomenal, and spiritually -- the noumenal causes of Sound
and the "Voice of Nature." Hence, they are called the 6,333
"heavenly Singers" and musicians of Indra's loka who personify (even
in number) the various and manifold sounds in Nature, both above and below. In
the latter allegories they are said to have mystic power over women, and to be
fond of them. The esoteric meaning is plain. They are one of the forms, if not
the prototypes, of Enoch's angels, the Sons of God, who saw that the daughters
of men were fair (Gen. vi.) who married them, and taught the daughters of the
Earth the secrets of Heaven.
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the Occult Gandharva of the Vedas --
will be recognised by every Occultist, and even by some profane readers.
If the latter open Volume V. of the
Popular Science Review (pp. 329-334), they will find in it an article on
"Sun Force and Earth Force," by Dr. B. W. Richardson, F.R.S., which
reads as follows:--
"At this moment, when the theory
of mere motion as the origin of all varieties of force is again becoming the
prevailing thought, it were almost heresy to re-open a debate, which for a
period appears, by general consent, to be virtually closed; but I accept the
risk, and shall state, therefore, what were the precise views of the immortal
heretic, whose name I have whispered to the readers, (Samuel Metcalfe),
respecting Sun Force. Starting with the argument on which nearly all physicists
are agreed, that there exist in nature two agencies -- matter which is
ponderable, visible, and tangible, and a something which is imponderable,
invisible, and appreciable only by its influence on matter -- Metcalfe
maintains that the imponderable and active agency which he calls 'caloric' is
not a mere form of motion, not a vibration amongst the particles of ponderable
matter, but itself a material substance flowing from the Sun through Space,*
filling the voids between the particles of solid bodies, and conveying by
sensation the property called heat. The nature of caloric, or Sun-Force, is
contended for by him on the following grounds:--
"(i.) That it may be added to,
and abstracted from other bodies and measured with mathematical precision.
"(ii.) That it augments the
volume of bodies, which are again reduced in size by its abstraction.
"(iii.) That it modifies the
forms, properties, and conditions of all other bodies.
"(iv.) That it passes by
radiation through the most perfect vacuum** that can be formed, in which it
produces the same effects on the thermometer as in the atmosphere.
"(v.) That it exerts mechanical
and chemical forces which nothing can restrain, as in volcanoes, the explosion
of gunpowder, and other fulminating compounds.
"(vi.) That it operates in a
sensible manner on the nervous system, producing intense pain; and when in
excess, disorganization of the tissues.
"As against the vibratory
theory, Metcalfe further argues that if caloric were a mere property or quality,
it could not augment the volume of other bodies; for this purpose it must
itself have volume, it must occupy space, and it must, therefore, be a material
agent. If caloric were only the effect of vibratory motion amongst the
particles of ponderable matter, it could not radiate from hot bodies without
the simultaneous transition of the vibrating particles; but the fact stands out
that heat can radiate from material ponderable substance without
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Not only "through space,"
but filling every point of our solar system, for it is the physical residue, so
to say, of Ether, its lining on our plane; Ether having to serve other cosmic
and terrestrial purposes besides being the "agent" for transmitting
light. It is the astral fluid or "Light" of the Kabalists, and the
"Seven rays" of Sun-Vishnu.
** What need, then, of etheric waves
for the transmission of light, heat, etc., if this substance can pass through
vacuum?
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loss of weight of such substance. . .
. With this view as to the material nature of caloric or sun-force; with the
impression firmly fixed on his mind that 'everything in Nature is composed of
two descriptions of matter, the one essentially active and ethereal, the other
passive and motionless,'* Metcalfe based the hypothesis that the Sun-force, or
caloric, is a Self-active principle. For its own particles, he holds, it has
repulsion; for the particles of all ponderable matter it has affinity; it
attracts the particles of ponderable matter with forces which vary inversely as
the squares of the distance. It thus acts through ponderable matter. If
universal space were filled with caloric, sun-force, alone (without ponderable
matter), caloric would also be inactive and would constitute a boundless Ocean
of powerless or quiescent ether, because it would then have nothing on which to
act, while ponderable matter, however inactive of itself, has 'certain
properties by which it modifies and controls the actions of caloric, both of
which are governed by immutable laws that have their origin in the mutual
relations and specific properties of each.'
"And he lays down a law which he
believes is absolute, and which is thus expressed:--
" 'By the attraction of caloric
for ponderable matter, it unites and holds together all things; by its self-repulsive
energy it separates and expands all things.' "
This, of course, is almost the occult
explanation of cohesion. Dr. Richardson continues:--
"As I have already said, the
tendency of modern teaching is to rest upon the hypothesis . . . that heat is
motion, or, as it would, perhaps, be better stated, a specific force or form of
motion.**
"But this hypothesis, popular as
it is, is not one that ought to be accepted to the exclusion of the simpler
views of the material nature of sun-force, and of its influence in modifying
the conditions of matter. We do not yet know sufficient to be
dogmatic."***
. . . "The hypothesis of
Metcalfe respecting sun-force and earth-force is not only very simple, but most
fascinating. . . . Here are two elements in the Universe, the one is ponderable
matter . . . The second element is the all-pervading Ether, solar-fire. It is
without weight, substance, form, or colour; it is matter infinitely divisible,
and its particles repel each other; its rarity
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* And how can it be otherwise? Gross
ponderable matter is the body, the Shell of matter or Substance, the female
passive principle; and this Fohatic force is the second principle, prana -- the
male and the active? On our globe this Substance is the second principle of the
septenary Element -- Earth; in the atmosphere, it is that of air, which is the
cosmic gross body; in the Sun it becomes the Solar body and that of the Seven
rays; in sidereal space it corresponds with another principle, and so on. The
whole is a homogeneous Unity alone, the parts are all differentiations.
** Or the reverberation, and for
sound, repercussion on our plane of that which is a perpetual motion of that
Substance on higher planes. Our world and senses are victims of Maya,
ceaselessly.
*** An honest admission, that.
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is such that we have no word, except
ether,* by which to express it. It pervades and fills space, but alone it too
is quiescent -- dead.** We bring together the two elements, the inert matter,
the self-repulsive Ether (?) and thereupon dead (?) ponderable matter is
vivified"; [Ponderable matter may be inert but never dead -- this is
Occult Law. -- H.P.B.] . . . "through the particles of the ponderable
substance the ether [Ether's second principle. -- H.P.B.] penetrates, and, so
penetrating, it combines with the ponderable particles and holds them in mass,
holds them together in bond of union; they are dissolved in the Ether."
"This distribution of solid
ponderable matter through ether extends, according to the theory before us, to
everything that exists at this moment. The ether is all-pervading. The human
body itself is charged with the ether [Say astral light. -- H.P.B.]; its minute
particles are held together by it; the plant is in the same condition; the most
solid earth, rock, adamant, crystal, metal, all are the same. But there are
differences in the capacities of different kinds of ponderable matter to
receive sun-force, and upon this depends the various changing conditions of
matter; the solid, the liquid, the gaseous condition. Solid bodies have attracted
caloric in excess over fluid bodies, and hence their firm cohesion; when a
portion of molten zinc is poured upon a plate of solid zinc, the molten zinc
becomes as solid because there is a rush of caloric from the liquid to the
solid, and in the equalization the particles, previously loose or liquid, are
more closely brought together. . . . Metcalfe himself, dwelling on the
above-named phenomena, and accounting for them by the unity of principle of
action, which has already been explained, sums up his argument in very clear
terms, in a comment on the densities of various bodies. 'Hardness and softness'
(he says), 'solidity and liquidity, are not essential conditions of bodies, but
depend on the relative proportions of ethereal and ponderable matter of which
they are composed. The most elastic gas may be reduced to the liquid form by
the abstraction of caloric, and again converted into a firm solid, the
particles of which would cling together with a force proportional to their
augmented affinity for caloric. On the other hand, by adding a sufficient
quantity of the same principle to the densest metals, their attraction for it
is diminished when they are expanded into the gaseous state, and their cohesion
is destroyed.' "
Having thus quoted at length the heterodox
views of the great "heretic" -- views that need only a little
alteration of terms here and there, the same eminent scientist -- an original
and liberal thinker, undeniably -- proceeds to sum up those views, and
continues:--
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Yet it is not Ether, but only one
of the principles of Ether, the latter being itself one of the principles of
Akasa.
** And so does prana (Jiva) pervade
the whole living body of man; but alone, without having an atom to act upon, it
would be quiescent -- dead; i.e., would be in laya, or as Mr. Crookes has it,
"locked in protyle." It is the action of Fohat upon a compound or
even a simple body that produces life. When a body dies it passes into the same
polarity as its male energy and repels therefore the active agent, which,
losing hold of the whole, fastens on the parts or molecules, this action being
called chemical. Vishnu, the Preserver, transforms himself into Rudra-Siva, the
Destroyer -- a correlation seemingly unknown to Science.
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"I shall not dwell at great
length on this unity of sun-force and earth, which this theory implies. But I
may add that out of it, or out of the hypothesis of mere motion as force, and
of virtue without substance, we may gather, as the nearest possible approach to
the truth on this, the most complex and profound of all subjects, the following
inferences:--
"(a) Space, inter-stellary,
inter-planetary, inter-material, inter-organic, is not a vacuum, but is filled
with a subtle fluid or gas, which for want of a better term* we may still call,
as the ancients did, Aith-ur -- Solar fire, AETHER. This fluid, unchangeable in
composition, indestructible, invisible,** pervades everything and all
[ponderable. -- H. P. B.] matter,*** the pebble in the running brook, the tree
overhanging, the man looking on, is charged with the ether in various degree;
the pebble less than the tree, the tree less than man. All in the planet is in
like manner so charged! A world is built up in ethereal fluid, and moving
through a sea of it.
"(b) The Ether, whatever its
nature is, is from the sun and from the suns**** the suns are the generators of
it, the store-houses of it, the diffusers of it.*****
"(c.) Without the ether there
could be no motion; without it particles of ponderable matter could not glide
over each other; without it there could be no impulse to excite those particles
into action.
"(d.) Ether determines the
constitution of bodies. Were there no ether there could be no change of
constitution in substance; water, for instance, could only exist as a
substance, compact and insoluble beyond any conception we could form of it. It
could never even be ice, never flint, never vapour, except for ether.
"(e.) Ether connects sun with
planet, planet with planet, man with planet, man with man. Without ether there
could be no communication in the Universe; no light, no heat, no phenomenon of
motion."
Thus we find that Ether and elastic
atoms are, in the alleged mechanical conception of the Universe, the Spirit and
Soul of Kosmos, and that the theory -- put it any way and under whatever
disguise -- always leaves a more widely opened issue for men of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Verily, unless the occult terms of
the Kabalists are adopted!
** "Unchangeable" only
during Manvantaric periods, after which it merges once more into Mulaprakriti;
"invisible" for ever, in its own essence, but seen in its reflected
coruscations, called the Astral light by the modern Kabalists. Yet, conscious
and grand Beings clothed in that same Essence move in it.
*** One has to add (ponderable), to
distinguish it from that Ether which is matter still, though a substratum.
**** The Occult Sciences reverse the
statement, and say that it is the sun, and all the suns that are from it, which
emanate at the Manvantaric dawn from the Central Sun.
***** Here, we decidedly beg to
differ with the learned gentleman. Let us remember that this AEther, whether
Akasa is meant by the term, or its lower principle, Ether -- is septenary.
Akasa is Aditi in the allegory, and the mother of Martanda (the sun), the
Deva-matri -- "Mother of the gods." In the solar system, the sun is
her Buddhi and Vahan, the Vehicle, hence the 6th principle; in Kosmos all the
suns are the Kama rupa of Akasa and so is ours. It is only when regarded as an
individual Entity in his own Kingdom that Surya (the sun) is the 7th principle
of the great body of matter.
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Science to speculate beyond the line
drawn by modern materialism -- or call it agnosticism rather, to be more
correct* -- than the majority avails itself of. Atoms, Ether, or both, modern
speculation cannot get out of the circle of ancient thought; and the latter was
soaked through with archaic occultism. Undulatory or corpuscular theory -- it
is all one. It is speculation from the aspects of phenomena, not from the
knowledge of the essential nature of the cause and causes. When modern Science
has explained to its audience the late achievements of Bunsen and Kirchoff, and
shown the seven colours, the "primary" of a ray which is decomposed
in a fixed order on a screen; and described the respective lengths of luminous
waves, what has it proved? It has justified its reputation for exactness in
mathematical achievement by measuring even the length of a luminous wave --
"varying from about seven hundred and sixty millionths of a millimetre at
the red end of the spectrum to about three hundred and ninety-three millionths
of a millimetre at the violet end." But when the exactness of the
calculation with regard to the effect on the light-wave is thus vindicated,
Science is forced to admit that the force (which is the supposed cause) is
believed to produce "inconceivably minute undulations" in some medium
-- "generally regarded as identical with the ethereal medium"** --
and that medium itself is still only -- a "hypothetical agent!"
Auguste Comte's pessimism with
respect to the impossibility of knowing some day the chemical composition of
the sun, has not been belied thirty years later by Kirchoff, as claimed. The
spectroscope has helped us to see that the elements, with which the modern
chemist is familiar, must in all probability be present in the sun's outward
robes -- not in the sun itself; and, taking these "robes," the solar
cosmic veil, for the sun itself, the physicists have declared its luminosity to
be due to combustion and flame, and have mistaken the vital principle of that
luminary for a purely material thing, and called it
"chromosphere."*** We have hypotheses and theories only so far, not
law -- by any means.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Brutal but frank materialism is
more honest than Janus-faced agnosticism in our days. Monism is the Pecksniff
of modern philosophy, turning a pharisaical face to psychology and idealism,
and its natural face of a Roman Augur, swelling his cheek with his tongue -- to
Materialism. The Monists are worse than the Materialists; because, while
looking at the Universe and psycho-spiritual man from the same negative
stand-point, the latter put their case far less plausibly than sceptics of Mr.
Tyndall's or even Mr. Huxley's stamp. Herbert Spencer, Bain and Lewes are more
dangerous to universal truths than Buchner.
** "Geology," by Professor
A. Winchell.
*** See Five Years of Theosophy --
Articles: "Do the Adepts deny the nebular theory?" and "Is the
Sun merely a cooling mass?" -- for the true Occult teaching.
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VIII.
LIFE, FORCE, OR GRAVITY.
THE imponderable fluids have had
their day; "mechanical Forces" are less talked about; Science has put
on a new face for this last quarter of a century; but gravitation has remained,
owing its life to new combinations after the old ones had nearly killed it. It
may answer scientific hypotheses very well, but the question is whether it
answers as well to truth, and represents a fact in nature. Attraction by itself
is not sufficient to explain merely planetary motion; how can it presume to
explain the rotatory motion in the infinitudes of Space? Attraction alone will
never fill all the gaps, unless a special impulse is admitted for every
sidereal body, and the rotation of every planet with its satellites is shown to
be due to some one cause combined with attraction. And even then, says an
astronomer ("Philosophie Naturelle," art. 142), Science would have to
name that cause.
Occultism has named it for ages, and
so have all the ancient philosophers; but then all such beliefs are now
proclaimed exploded superstitions. The "extra cosmic" God has killed
every possibility of belief in intra cosmic intelligent Forces, yet who, or
what is the original pusher in that motion? "When we have learned the
cause, unique et speciale, that pushes, we will be ready to combine it with the
one which attracts," says Francoeur ("Astronomie," p. 342). And
again -- "Attraction between the celestial bodies is only repulsion: it is
the Sun that drives them incessantly onward; for otherwise, their motion would
stop."
If ever this theory of the Sun-Force
being the primal cause of all life on earth and motion in heaven is accepted,
and if that other far bolder one of Herschell -- about certain organisms in the
Sun -- is accepted even as a provisional hypothesis, then will our teachings be
vindicated, and esoteric allegory shown to have anticipated Modern Science by
millions of years, probably, for these are the Archaic teachings. Martanda (the
Sun) watches and threatens -- without abandoning the central position to which
his Mother, Aditi, relegated him -- his seven brothers, the planets; "he
pursues them, turning slowly around himself . . . and follows them from afar,
moving in the same direction that they do, on the path that encircles their
houses" -- or the orbit. (See Comment to Stanza IV., Book I.) It is the
Sun-fluids or Emanations that impart all motion and awaken all into life, in
the Solar System. It is attraction and repulsion, but not as understood by
modern physics and according to the law of gravity; but in harmony with the
laws of Manvantaric motion de-
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signed from the early Sandhya, the
Dawn of the rebuilding and higher reformation of the System. These laws are
immutable; but the motion of all the bodies, which motion is diverse and alters
with every minor Kalpa -- is regulated by the Movers, the Intelligences within
the Cosmic Soul. Are we so very wrong in believing all this? Well, here is a
modern and a great man of Science who, speaking of vital electricity, uses
language far more akin to Occultism than to modern materialistic thought. We
refer the sceptical reader to an article on "The Source of Heat in the
Sun," by Robert Hunt, F.R.S., (in "Popular Science Review," Vol.
IV., p. 148), who, speaking of the luminous envelope of the Sun and its
"peculiar curdy appearance," says:--
"Arago proposed that this
envelope should be called the Photosphere, a name now generally adopted. By the
elder Herschell, the surface of this photosphere was compared to
mother-of-pearl. . . . . It resembles the Ocean on a tranquil summer-day, when
its surface is slightly crisped by a gentle breeze. . . . Mr. Nasmyth has
discovered a more remarkable condition than any that had previously been
suspected . . . objects which are peculiarly lens-shaped . . . . like 'willow
leaves' . . . . different in size . . . . . not arranged in any order crossing
each other in all directions . . . . . with an irregular motion among
themselves . . . . . . . They are seen approaching to and receding from each
other, and sometimes assuming new angular positions, so that the appearance . .
. . . has been compared to a dense shoal of fish, which, indeed, they resemble
in shape. . . . The size of these objects gives a grand idea of the gigantic
scale upon which physical (?) operations are carried out in the Sun. They
cannot be less than 1,000 miles in length, and from two to three hundred miles
in breadth. The most probable conjecture which has been offered respecting
those leaf or lens-like objects, is that the photosphere* is an immense ocean
of gaseous matter (what kind of "matter?") . . . in a state of
intense (apparent) incandescence, and that they are perspective projections of the
sheets of flame. . . ."
Solar "flames" seen through
telescopes are reflections, says Occultism. But see what Occultists have to say
to this in Book I.
"Whatever they may be (those
sheets of flame), it is evident they are the immediate sources of solar heat
and light. Here we have a surrounding envelope of photogenic matter,** which
pendulates with mighty energies, and by communicating its motion to the
ethereal medium in stellar space, produces heat and light in far distant
worlds. We have said that those forms have been compared to certain organisms,
and Herschell says, 'Though it would be too daring to speak of such
organizations as partaking of life [why not?],*** yet we do not know that vital
action is competent to develop heat, light, and electricity.' . . . Can it be
that there is truth in this fine thought? May the pulsing of vital matter
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* And the central mass, too, as will
be found, or rather the centre of the reflection.
** That "matter" is just
like the reflection in a mirror of the flame from a "photogenic"
lamp-wick.
*** See "Five Years of
Theosophy," p. 258 -- answer to this speculation of Herschell's.
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in the central Sun of our System be
the source of all that life which crowds the earth, and without doubt
overspreads the other planets, to which the Sun is the mighty Minister?" .
. .
Occultism answers these queries in
the affirmative; and Science will find this to be the case, one day.
Again, on p. 156, Mr. Hunt writes:--
"But regarding Life -- Vital
Force -- as a power far more exalted than either light, heat, or electricity,
and indeed capable of exerting a controlling power over them all" (this is
absolutely occult). . . . . "we are certainly disposed to view with
satisfaction that speculation which supposes the photosphere to be the primary
seat of vital power, and to regard with a poetic pleasure that hypothesis which
refers the Solar energies to Life."
Thus, we have an important scientific
corroboration for one of our fundamental dogmas -- namely, that (a) the Sun is
the store-house of Vital Force, which is the Noumenon of Electricity; and (b)
that it is from its mysterious, never-to-be-fathomed depths, that issue those
life currents which thrill through Space, as through the organisms of every
living thing on Earth. For see what another eminent physician says, who calls
this (our life-fluid) "nervous Ether." Change a few sentences in the
article, extracts from which now follow, and you have another quasi-Occult
treatise on Life Force. This once, it is again Dr. B. W. Richardson, F.R.S.,
who gives his views in the "Popular Science Review," Vol. X., p.
380-3, on "Nervous Ether," as he has on "Sun-Force" and
"Earth-Force":--
"The idea attempted to be
conveyed by the theory is, that between the molecules of the matter, solid or
fluid, of which the nervous organisms, and, indeed, of which all the organic
parts of a body are composed, there exists a refined subtle medium, vaporous or
gaseous, which holds the molecules in a condition for motion upon each other,
and for arrangement and rearrangement of form; a medium by and through which
all motion is conveyed; by and through which the one organ or part of the body
is held in communion with the other parts, by which and through which the outer
living world communicates with the living man: a medium, which, being present,
enables the phenomena of life to be demonstrated, and which, being universally
absent, leaves the body actually dead. . . . . ."
And the whole Solar System falls into
Pralaya -- the author might have added. But let us read further:
. . . "I use the word Ether in
its general sense as meaning a very light, vaporous or gaseous matter; I use
it, in short, as the astronomer uses it when he speaks of the Ether of Space,
by which he means a subtle but material medium. . . . . When I speak of a
nervous Ether, I do not convey that the ether is existent in nervous structure
only: I believe truly that it is a special part of the nervous organization;
but, as nerves pass into all structures that have capacities for movement and
sensibilities, so the nervous ether passes into all such parts; and as the
nervous ether is, according to my view, a direct product from blood, so we may
look upon it as a part of the atmosphere of the blood.
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. . . The evidence in favour of the
existence of an elastic medium pervading the nervous matter and capable of
being influenced by simple pressure is all-convincing. . . . In nervous
structure there is, unquestionably, a true nervous fluid, as our predecessors
taught* The precise chemical (?)** composition of this fluid is not yet well
known; the physical characters of it have been little studied. Whether it moves
in currents, we do not know; whether it circulates, we do not know; whether it
is formed in the centres and passes from them to the nerves, or whether it is
formed everywhere where blood enters nerve, we do not know. The exact uses of
the fluid we do not consequently know. It occurs to my mind, however, that the
veritable fluid of nervous matter is not of itself sufficient to act as the
subtle medium that connects the outer with the inner universe of man and
animal. I think -- and this is the modification I suggest to the older theory
-- there must be another form of matter present during life; a matter which
exists in the condition of vapour or gas, which pervades the whole nervous
organism, surrounds as an enveloping atmosphere*** each molecule of nervous
structure, and is the medium of all motion, communicated to and from the
nervous centres. . . . When it is once fairly presented to the mind that during
life there is in the animal body a finely diffused form of matter, a vapour filling
every part -- and even stored in some parts; a matter constantly renewed by the
vital chemistry; a matter as easily disposed of as the breath, after it has
served its purpose -- a new flood of light breaks on the Intelligence ." .
. . .
A new flood of light is certainly
thrown on the wisdom of ancient and mediaeval Occultism and its votaries. For
Paracelsus wrote the same thing more than three hundred years ago, namely, in
the sixteenth century, as follows:--
"The whole of the Microcosm is
potentially contained in the Liquor Vitae, a nerve fluid . . . in which is
contained the nature, quality, character, and essence of beings." . . .
(De Generatione Hominis). . . . "The Archaeus or Liquor Vitae is an
essence that is equally distributed in all parts of the human body. . . . The
Spiritus Vitae takes its origin from the Spiritus Mundi. Being an emanation of
the latter, it contains the elements of all cosmic influences, and is therefore
the cause by which the action of the stars (cosmic forces) upon the invisible
body of man (his vital lingasharira) may be explained." (De Viribus
Membrorum. See "Life of Paracelsus" by Franz Hartmann, M.D., F.T.S.)
Had Dr. Richardson studied all the
secret works of Paracelsus, he would not have been obliged to confess so often
-- "we do not know" . . . . "it is not known to us" . . . .
etc., etc. Nor would he have ever pronounced the following sentence, recanting
the best portions of his independent rediscovery, in which he says (p. 384):--
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Paracelsus for one, who called it
liquor vitae, and Archaeus.
** Rather alchemical --
"composition."
*** "This vital force . . .
radiates around man like a luminous sphere" . . . says Paracelsus in
Paragranum.
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"It may be urged that in this
line of thought is included no more than the theory of the existence of the
ether . . . . supposed to pervade space. . . . . It may be said that this
universal ether pervades all the organism of the animal body as from without,
and as part of every organization. This view would be Pantheism physically discovered
if it were true (!!) It fails to be true because it would destroy the
individuality of every individual sense. . . . ."
We fail to see it, and we know it is
not so. Pantheism may be "physically rediscovered." It was known,
seen, and felt by the whole of antiquity. Pantheism manifests itself in the
vast expanse of the starry heavens, in the breathing of the seas and oceans and
the quiver of life of the smallest blade of grass. Philosophy rejects one
finite and imperfect God in the universe, as the anthropomorphic deity of the
monotheist is represented by his followers. It repudiates in its name of
Philo-Theo-Sophia the grotesque idea that Infinite, Absolute Deity should, or
rather could, have any, whether direct or indirect, relation to finite illusive
evolutions of matter, and therefore cannot imagine a universe outside that
Deity, or the latter absent from the smallest speck of animate or inanimate
substance.* Why either the Ether of Space, or "nervous Ether" should
"destroy the individuality of every sense" seems incomprehensible for
one acquainted with the real nature of that "nervous ether" under its
Sanskrit, or rather esoteric and Kabalistic name. Dr. Richardson agrees that --
"If we did not individually
produce the medium of communication between ourselves and the outer world, if
it were produced from without and adapted to one kind of vibration alone, there
were fewer senses required than we possess: for, taking two illustrations only
-- ether of light is not adapted for sound, and yet we hear as well as see;
while air, the medium of motion of sound, is not the medium of light, and yet
we see and hear."
This is not so. The opinion that
"Pantheism fails to be true because it would destroy the individuality of
every individual sense" shows that all the conclusions of the learned
doctor are based on the modern physical theories, though he would fain reform
them. But he will find it impossible to do this unless he allows the existence
of spiritual senses to replace the gradual atrophy of the physical. "We
see and hear," in accordance (of course in Dr. Richardson's mind) with the
explanations of the phenomena of sight and hearing, by that same materialistic
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This does not mean that every bush,
tree or stone is God or a god; but only that every speck of the manifested
material of Kosmos belongs to and is the substance of "God," however
low it may have fallen in its cyclic gyration through the Eternities of the
ever becoming,; and also that every such speck individually, and Kosmos
collectively, is an aspect and a reminder of that universal One Soul -- which
philosophy refuses to call God, thus limiting the eternal and ever-present root
and essence.
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science which postulates that we
cannot see and hear otherwise. The Occultists and mystics know better. The
Vedic Aryans were as familiar with the mysteries of sound and colour as our
physiologists are on the physical plane, but they had mastered the secrets of
both on planes inaccessible to the materialist. They knew of a double set of
senses; spiritual and material. In a man who is deprived of one or more senses,
the remaining become the more developed: e.g., the blind man will recover his
sight through the senses of touch, of hearing, etc., and he who is deaf will be
able to hear through sight, by seeing audibly the words uttered by the lips and
mouth of the speaker. But these are cases that belong to the world of matter
still. The spiritual senses, those that act on a higher plane of consciousness
are rejected a priori by physiology because the latter is ignorant of the
sacred science. It limits the action of ether to vibrations, and, dividing it
from air -- though air is simply differentiated and compound ether -- makes it
assume functions to fit in with the special theories of the physiologist. But
there is more real science in the teachings of the Upanishads when these are
correctly understood, than the Orientalists, who do not understand them at all,
are ready to admit. Mental as well as physical correlations of the seven senses
(seven on the physical and seven on the mental planes) are clearly explained
and defined in the Vedas, and especially in the Upanishad called Anugita:
"The indestructible and the destructible, such is the double manifestation
of the Self. Of these the indestructible is the existent (the true essence or
nature of Self, the underlying principles). The manifestation as an individual
(or entity) is called the destructible." Thus speaks the ASCETIC in
Anugita; and also: "Every one who is twice-born (initiated) knows such is
the teaching of the ancients. . . . . Space is the first entity. . . . . Now
Space (Akasa, or the noumenon of Ether) has one quality . . . and that is sound
only . . . and the qualities of sound are Shadga, Rishabha, Gandhara, Madhyama,
Panchama, and beyond these five Nishada and Dhaivata"; (the Hindu gamut).
These seven notes of the scale are the principles of sound. (Vide ch. xxxvi. of
Anugita.) The qualities of every Element, as of every sense, are septenary, and
to judge and dogmatize on them from their manifestation (likewise sevenfold in
itself) on the material or objective plane above is quite arbitrary. For it is
only by the SELF emancipating itself from these (seven) causes of illusion that
one acquires the knowledge (secret wisdom) of the qualities of objects of sense
on their dual plane of manifestation -- the visible and the invisible. Thus it
is said:--
"State this wonderful mystery .
. . . . Hear the assignment of causes exhaustively. The nose, and the tongue,
and the eye, and the
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skin, and the ear as the fifth (organ
of sense) Mind and Understanding,* these seven (senses) should be understood to
be the causes of (the knowledge of their) qualities. Smell, and taste, and
colour, sound, and touch as the fifth, the object of the mental operation, and
the object of the Understanding (the highest spiritual sense or perception), these
seven are causes of action. He who smells, he who eats, he who sees, he who
speaks, and he who hears as the fifth, he who thinks, and he who understands,
these seven should be regarded as the causes of the agents.** These (the
agents) being possessed of qualities (sattwa, rajas, tamas), enjoy their own
qualities, agreeable and disagreeable" (Anugita).
Then one reads in the Bhagavadgita
(chap. vii.) the Deity (or Krishna) saying:--
". . . . Only some know me
truly. Earth, Water, Fire, Air, Space (or Akasa, AEther), Mind, Understanding
and Egoism (or the perception of all the former on the illusive plane). . .
This is a lower form of my nature. Know (that there is) another (form of my)
nature, and higher than this, which is animate, O you of mighty arms! and by
which this Universe is upheld. . . . All this is woven upon me, like numbers of
pearls upon a thread (Mundakopanishad, p. 298). . . . I am the taste in the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The division of the physical senses
into five, comes to us from great antiquity. But while adopting the number, no
modern philosopher has asked himself how these senses could exist, i.e., be
perceived and used in a self-conscious way, unless there was the sixth sense,
mental perception to register and record them; and (this for the Metaphysicians
and Occultists) the SEVENTH to preserve the spiritual fruition and remembrance
thereof, as in a Book of Life which belongs to Karma. The ancients divided the
senses into five, simply because their teachers (the Initiates) stopped at the
hearing, as being that sense which developed in the physical plane (got dwarfed
rather, limited to this plane) only at the beginning of the Fifth Race. (The
Fourth Race already had begun to lose the spiritual condition, so pre-eminently
developed in the Third Race.)
** The modern commentators, failing
to comprehend the subtle meaning of the ancient Scholiasts, take this sentence,
"causes of the agents," to mean "that the powers of smelling,
etc., when attributed to the Self, make him appear as an agent, as an active
principle" (!), which is entirely fanciful. These "seven" are
understood to be the causes of the Agents, because "the objects are
causes, as their enjoyment causes an impression." It means esoterically
that they, these seven senses, are caused by the AGENTS, which are the
"deities," for what does, or can, the sentence which follows this one
mean? "Thus," it is said, "these seven (senses) are the causes
of emancipation" (i.e., when these causes are made ineffectual). "And
among the learned (the wise Initiates) who understand the qualities which are
in the position (in the nature, rather) of the deities, each in its
place," means simply that the "learned" understand the nature of
the noumenoi of the various phenomena; and that "qualities," in this
instance, mean the qualities of the high planetary or Elementary gods or
Intelligences, which rule the elements and their products, and not at all
"the senses," as the modern commentator thinks. For the "learned
do not suppose their senses to have aught to do with them, any more than with
their SELF." (Vide pp. 278 and 279 of the VIII. Vol. of "The Sacred
Books of the East." Anugita.)
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water, O son of Kunti! I am the light
of the sun and moon. I am . . . sound ('i.e., the Occult essence which
underlies all these and the other qualities of the various things mentioned,'
Transl.), in space . . . the fragrant smell in the earth, refulgence in the
fire . . . etc., etc."
Truly, then, one should study Occult
philosophy before one begins to verify and seek the mysteries of nature on its
surface alone, as he alone "who knows the truth about the qualities of
nature, who understands the creation of all entities . . . is emancipated"
from error. Says the "preceptor": "Accurately understanding the
great tree of which the unperceived (Occult nature, the root of all) is the
sprout from the seed (Parabrahmam) which consists of the understanding (Mahat,
or the universal intelligent Soul) as its trunk, the branches of which are the
great egoism,* in the holes of which are the sprouts, namely, the senses, of
which the great (Occult, or invisible) elements are the flower-bunches,** the
gross elements (the gross objective matter), the smaller boughs, which are
always possessed of leaves, always possessed of flowers . . . . which is
eternal and the seed of which is the Brahman (the deity); and cutting it with
that excellent sword -- knowledge (secret wisdom) -- one attains immortality
and casts off birth and death."
This is the Tree of Life, the
Asvattha tree, only after the cutting of which the slave of life and death,
MAN, can be emancipated.
But the men of Science know nought,
nor will they hear of the "Sword of Knowledge" used by the adepts and
ascetics. Hence the one-sided remarks of the most liberal among them, based on
and flowing from undue importance given to the arbitrary divisions and
classification of physical science. Occultism heeds them very little, and
nature still less. The whole range of physical phenomena proceed from the
Primary of Ether -- Akasa, as dual-natured Akasa proceeds from undifferentiated
Chaos, so-called, the latter being the primary aspect of Mulaprakriti, the
root-matter and the first abstract Idea one can form of Parabrahmam. Modern
Science may divide its hypothetically conceived ether in as many ways as it
likes; the real AEther of Space will remain as it is throughout. It has its
seven principles, as all the rest of nature has, and where there was no Ether
there would be no sound, as it is the vibrating sound-board in nature in all of
its seven differentiations. This is the first mystery the Initiates of old have
learned. Our present normal physical senses were (from our present point of
view) abnormal in those days of slow and progressive downward evolution and
fall into matter. And there was a day when all that which in our modern times
is regarded as phenomena, so puzzling to the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Ahamkara, I suppose, that Egoship
(or Ahamship) which leads to every error.
** The elements are the five
tanmatras of earth, water, fire, air and ether, the producers of the grosser
elements.
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physiologists now compelled to
believe in them -- such as thought transference, clairvoyance, clairaudience,
etc.; in short, all that which is called now "wonderful and abnormal"
-- all that and much more belonged to the senses and faculties common to all
humanity. We are, however, cycling back and cycling forward; i.e., having lost
in spirituality that which we acquired in physical development until almost the
end of the Fourth Race, we (mankind) are as gradually and imperceptibly losing
now in the physical all that we regain once more in the spiritual re-evolution.
This process must go on until the period which will bring the Sixth Root-Race
on a parallel line with the spirituality of the Second, long extinct mankind.
But this will hardly be understood at
present. We must return to Dr. Richardson's hopeful though somewhat incorrect
hypothesis about "nervous ether." Under the misleading translation of
the word as "Space" (Akasa), it has just been shown in the ancient
Hindu system as the "first born" of the One, having but one quality,
SOUND (which is septenary). In esoteric language this "One" is the
"Father" Deity, and "Sound" is synonymous with Logos
(Verbum, or the Son). Whether consciously or otherwise, it must be the latter;
and Dr. Richardson, while preaching an Occult doctrine -- chooses the lowest
form of the septenary nature of that "SOUND" and speculates upon it,
adding:--
"The theory, I offer, is that
the nervous Ether is an animal product. In different classes of animals it may
differ in physical quality so as to be adapted to the special wants of the
animal, but essentially it plays one part in all animals, and is produced, in
all, in the same way. . . ."
Herein lies the nucleus of error
leading to all the resultant mistaken views. This "Nervous Ether" is
the lowest principle of the Primordial Essence which is Life. It is animal
vitality diffused in all nature and acting according to the conditions it finds
for its activity. It is not an "animal product," but the living
animal, the living flower or plant are its products. The animal tissues only
absorb it according to their more or less morbid or healthy state -- as do
physical materials and structures (in their primogenial State -- nota bene) --
and henceforward, from the moment of the birth of the Entity, are regulated,
strengthened, and fed by it. It descends in a larger supply to vegetation in
the Sushumna sun-ray which lights and feeds the moon, and it is through her
beams that it pours its light upon, and penetrates man and animal, more during
their sleep and rest, than when they are in full activity. Therefore Dr.
Richardson errs again in stating that:--
"The nervous ether is not,
according to my idea of it, in itself active, nor an excitant of animal motion
in the sense of a force; but it is essential as supplying the conditions by
which the motion is rendered possible." (It is just the reverse.) . . . .
"It is the conductor of all vibrations of heat, of light, of sound, of
electrical action, of mechanical
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friction.* It holds the nervous
system throughout in perfect tension, during states of life (true). By exercise
it is disposed of (rather generated) . . . and when demand for it is greater
than the supply, its deficiency is indicated by nervous collapse or
exhaustion.** It accumulates in the nervous centres during sleep, bringing
them, if I may so speak, to their due tone, and therewith raising the muscles
to awakening and renewed life. . . ."
Just so; this is quite correct, and
as comprehensible. Therefore, "The body fully renewed by it, presents
capacity for motion, fulness of form, life. The body bereft of it presents
inertia, the configuration of shrunken death, the evidence of having lost
something physical that was in it when it lived."
Modern Science denies the existence
of a "vital principle." This extract is a clear proof of its grand mistake.
But this "physical something," that we call life-fluid -- the Liquor
Vitae of Paracelsus -- has not deserted the body, as Dr. Richardson thinks. It
has only changed its state from activity to passivity, and become latent owing
to the too morbid state of the tissues, on which it has no more hold. Once the
rigor mortis absolute, the "Liquor Vitae" will re-awaken into action,
and begin its work on the atoms chemically. Brahma-Vishnu -- the creator and
the Preserver of Life -- will have transformed himself into Siva the Destroyer.
Lastly he writes on p. 387:--
"The nervous Ether may be
poisoned; it may, I mean, have diffused through it, by simple gaseous
diffusion, other gases or vapours derived from without; it may derive from
within products of substances swallowed and ingested, or gases of decomposition
produced during disease in the body itself."
And the learned gentleman might have
added on the same Occult principle: "That the 'nervous Ether' of one
person can be poisoned by the 'nervous Ether' of another person or his auric
emanations. But see what Paracelsus said of 'Nervous Ether'":--
"The Archaeus is of a magnetic
nature, and attracts or repels other sympathetic or antipathetic forces
belonging to the same plane. The less power of resistance for astral influences
a person possesses, the more will he be subject to such influences. The vital
force is not enclosed in man, but radiates (within) and around him like a
luminous sphere (aura) and it may be made to act at a distance. . . . It may
poison the essence of life (blood) and cause diseases, or it may purify it
after
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The conductor in the sense of
Upadhi -- a material or physical basis; but, as the second principle of the
universal Soul and Vital Force in Nature, it is intelligently guided by the
fifth principle thereof.
** And too great an exuberance of it
in the nervous system leads as often to disease and death. If it were the
animal system which generated it, such would not be the case, surely. Hence,
the latter emergency shows its independence of the system, and connection with
the Sun-Force, as Metcalfe and Professor Hunt explain it.
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it has been made impure, and restore
the health" (Paragranum; "Life of Paracelsus," by Dr. F.
Hartmann.)
That the two, Archaeus and
"nervous Ether," are identical, is shown by the English Scientist,
who says that the tension of it generally may be too high or too low; that it
may be so "owing to local changes in the nervous matter it invests."
. . . "Under sharp excitation it may vibrate as if in a storm and plunge
every muscle under cerebral or spinal control into uncontrolled motion
--unconscious convulsions."
This is called nervous excitation,
but no one, except Occultists, knows the reason of such nervous perturbation or
explains the primary causes of it. The "principle of Life" may kill
when too exuberant, as also when there is too little of it. But this principle
on the manifested (or our) plane is but the effect and the result of the
intelligent action of the "Host" -- collectively, Principle -- the
manifesting LIFE and LIGHT. It is itself subordinate to, and emanates from the
ever-invisible, eternal and Absolute ONE LIFE in a descending and a
re-ascending scale of hierarchic degrees -- a true septenary ladder, with SOUND
(or the Logos) at the upper end and the Vidyadharas* (the inferior Pitris) at
the lower.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In a recent work on the Symbolism
in Buddhism and Christianity (in Buddhism and Roman Catholicism, rather, many
later rituals and dogmas in Northern Buddhism in its popular exoteric form,
being identical with those of the Latin Church) some curious facts are to be
found. The author of this volume, with more pretensions than erudition, has
indiscriminately crammed into his work ancient and modern Buddhist teachings,
and sorely confused Lamaism with Buddhism. On page 404 of this volume, called
"Buddhism in Christendom, or Jesus the Essene," our
pseudo-Orientalist devotes himself to criticizing the "Seven
Principles" of the Esoteric Buddhists, and attempts to ridicule them. On
page 405, the closing page, he speaks enthusiastically of the Vidyadharas,
"the seven great legions of dead men made wise." Now, these
"Vidyadharas," whom some Orientalists call "demi-gods," are
in fact, exoterically, a kind of Siddhas, "affluent in devotion,"
and, esoterically, they are identical with the seven classes of Pitris, one
class of which endow man in the Third Race with Self-Consciousness by
incarnating in the human shells. The "Hymn to the Sun," at the end of
his queer volume of mosaic, which endows Buddhism with a personal god (!!), is
an unfortunate thrust at the very proofs so elaborately collected by the
unlucky author.
Theosophists are fully aware that Mr.
Rhys Davids has expressed his opinion on their beliefs likewise. He said that
the theories propounded by the author of Esoteric Buddhism "were not
Buddhism, and were not Esoteric." The remark is the result of (a) the
unfortunate mistake of writing "Buddhism" instead of "Budhaism,"
or Budhism, i.e., of connecting the system with Gautama's religion instead of
with the Secret Wisdom taught by Krishna, Sankaracharya, and by many others, as
much as by Buddha; and (b) of the impossibility of Mr. Rhys Davids knowing
anything of true esoteric teachings. But he is, at all events, the greatest
Pali and Buddhist scholar of the day, and whatever he may say is entitled to
respectful hearing. But when one who knows no more of exoteric Buddhism on
scientific and materialistic lines, than he knows of esoteric philosophy,
defames those whom he honours with his spite, and assumes with the Theosophists
the airs of a profound scholar, one can only smile and -- heartily laugh at
him.
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Of course, the Occultists are fully
aware of the fact that the Vitalist "fallacy," so derided by Vogt and
Huxley, is, nevertheless, still countenanced in very high scientific quarters,
and, therefore, they are happy to feel that they do not stand alone. Thus,
Professor de Quatrefages writes:--
"It is very true we do not know
what life is; but no more do we know what the force is that set the stars in
motion. . . . . Living beings are heavy, and therefore subject to gravitation;
they are the seat of numerous and various physico-chemical phenomena which are
indispensable to their existence, and which must be referred to the action of
etherodynamy (electricity, heat, etc.). But these phenomena are here manifested
under the influence of another force. . . . . Life is not antagonistic to the
inanimate forces, but it governs and rules their action by its laws."*
--------------
IX.
THE SOLAR THEORY.
A SHORT ANALYSIS OF THE COMPOUND AND
SINGLE ELEMENTS OF SCIENCE AS AGAINST THE OCCULT TEACHINGS. HOW FAR SCIENTIFIC
IS THIS THEORY, AS GENERALLY ACCEPTED.
IN his reply to Dr. Gull's attack on
the theory of vitality (connected inseparably with the Elements of the ancients
in the Occult philosophy), Professor Beale, the great physiologist, has a few
words as suggestive as they are beautiful:--
"There is a mystery in life -- a
mystery which has never been fathomed, and which appears greater, the more
deeply the phenomena of life are studied and contemplated. In living centres --
far more central than the centres seen by the highest magnifying powers, in
centres of living matter, where the eye cannot penetrate, but towards which the
understanding may tend -- proceed changes of the nature of which the most
advanced physicists and chemists fail to afford us the conception: nor is there
the slightest reason to think that the nature of these changes will ever be
ascertained by physical investigation, inasmuch as they are certainly of an
order or nature totally distinct from that to which any other phenomenon known
to us can be relegated."
This "mystery," or the
origin of the LIFE ESSENCE, Occultism locates in the same centre as the nucleus
of prima materia (for they are one) of our Solar system.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "The Human Species," p.
11.
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"The Sun is the heart of the
Solar World (System) and its brain is hidden behind the (visible) Sun. From
thence, sensation is radiated into every nerve-centre of the great body, and
the waves of the life-essence flow into each artery and vein. . . . The planets
are its limbs and pulses. . . ." (Commentary.)
It was stated elsewhere (in the
Theosophist) that Occult philosophy denies that the Sun is a globe in
combustion, but defines it simply as a world, a glowing sphere, the real Sun
being hidden behind, and the visible being only its reflection, its shell. The
Nasmyth willow leaves, mistaken by Sir J. Herschell for "Solar
inhabitants," are the reservoirs of solar vital energy, "the vital
electricity that feeds the whole system. . . . . The Sun in abscondito being
thus the storehouse of our little Kosmos, self-generating its vital fluid, and
ever receiving as much as it gives out," and the visible Sun only a window
cut into the real Solar palace and presence, which reflects, however,
faithfully the interior work.
Thus, there is a regular circulation
of the vital fluid throughout our system, of which the Sun is the heart -- the
same as the circulation of the blood in the human body -- during the
manvantaric solar period, or life; the Sun contracting as rhythmically at every
return of it, as the human heart does. Only, instead of performing the round in
a second or so, it takes the solar blood ten of its years, and a whole year to
pass through its auricles and ventricles before it washes the lungs and passes
thence to the great veins and arteries of the system.
This, Science will not deny, since
Astronomy knows of the fixed cycle of eleven years when the number of solar
spots increases,* which is due to the contraction of the Solar HEART. The
universe (our world in this case) breathes, just as man and every living
creature, plant, and even mineral does upon the earth; and as our globe itself
breathes every twenty-four hours. The dark region is not due "to the absorption
exerted by the vapours issuing from the bosom of the sun and interposed between
the observer and the photosphere," as Father Secchi would have it
("Le Soleil" II., 184), nor are the spots formed "by the matter
(heated gaseous matter) which the irruption projects upon the solar disc"
(ibid). It is similar to the regular and healthy pulsation of the heart, as the
life fluid passes through its hollow muscles. Could the human heart be made
luminous, and the living and throbbing organ be made visible, so as to have it
reflected upon a screen, such as
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Not only does it not deny the
occurrence, though attributing it to a wrong cause, as always, each theory
contradicting every other, (see the theories of Secchi, of Faye, and of Young),
the spots depending on the superficial accumulation of vapours cooler than the
photosphere (?), etc., etc., but we have men of science who astrologize upon
the spots. Professor Jevons attributes all the great periodical commercial
crises to the influence of the Sun spots every eleventh cyclic year. (See his
"Investigations into Currency and Finance.") This is worthy of praise
and encouragement surely.
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used by the astronomers in their
lectures -- say for the moon -- then every one would see the Sun-spot
phenomenon repeated every second -- due to its contraction and the rushing of
the blood.
It is said in a work on Geology that
it is the dream of Science that "all the recognized chemical elements will
one day be found but modifications of a single material element."
("World-Life," p. 48.)
Occult philosophy has taught this
since the existence of human speech and languages, adding only, on the
principle of the immutable law of analogy -- "as it is above, so it is
below" -- that other axiom, that there is neither Spirit nor matter, in reality,
but only numberless aspects of the One ever-hidden IS (or Sat). The homogeneous
primordial Element is simple and single only on the terrestrial plane of
consciousness and sensation, since matter, after all, is nothing else than the
sequence of our own states of consciousness, and Spirit an idea of psychic
intuition. Even on the next higher plane, that single element which is defined
on our earth by current science, as the ultimate undecomposable constituent of
some kind of matter, would be pronounced in the world of a higher spiritual
perception as something very complex indeed. Our purest water would be found to
yield, instead of its two declared simple elements of oxygen and hydrogen, many
other constituents, undreamt of by our terrestrial modern chemistry. As in the
realm of matter, so in the realm of Spirit, the shadow of that which is
cognized on the plane of objectivity exists on that of pure subjectivity. The
speck of the perfectly homogeneous substance, the sarcode of the Haeckelian
monera, is now viewed as the archebiosis of terrestrial existence (Mr. Huxley's
"protoplasm")*; and Bathybius Haeckelii has to be traced to its
pre-terrestrial archebiosis. This is first perceived by the astronomers at its
third stage of evolution, and in the "secondary creation," so-called.
But the students of Esoteric philosophy understand too well the secret meaning
of the stanza: "Brahma has essentially the aspect of prakriti, both
evolved and unevolved . . . . Spirit, O twice-born, (Initiate) is the leading
aspect of Brahma. The next is a two-fold aspect -- of Prakriti and Purusha,
both evolved and unevolved; and time is the last! Anu is one of the names of
Brahma (as distinct from Brahma neuter), and it means "atom":
Aniyamsam aniyasam, "the most atomic of the atomic," the "immutable
and imperishable (achyuta) Purushottama."
Surely, then, the elements now known
to us -- be their number whatever it may -- as they are understood and defined
at present, are not,
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Unfortunately, as these pages are
being written the "archebiosis of terrestrial existence" has turned,
under a somewhat stricter chemical analysis, into a simple precipitate of
sulphate of lime -- hence from the scientific standpoint not even an organic
substance!!! Sic transit gloria mundi!
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nor can they be, the primordial
elements. Those were formed from "the curds of the cold radiant
mother" and "the fire-seed of the hot Father" who "are
one," or, to express it in the plainer language of modern science, those elements
had their genesis in the depths of the primordial fire-mist -- the masses of
incandescent vapour of the irresolvable nebulae; for as Professor Newcomb shows
(in his "Popular Astronomy," on page 444), resolvable nebulae are not
a class of proper nebulae.
More than half of those which were at
first mistaken for nebulae -- he thinks -- are what he calls "starry
clusters." The elements now known, have arrived at their state of
permanency in this 4th Round and 5th Race. They have a short period of rest before
they are propelled once more on their upward spiritual evolution; when the
"living fire of Orcus" will dissociate the most irresolvable and
scatter them into the primordial ONE -- again.
Meanwhile the Occultist goes further,
as has been shown in the Commentaries on the Seven Stanzas. Hence he can hardly
hope for any help or recognition from science, which will reject both his
"aniyamsam aniyasam" (the absolutely spiritual atom) and his
Manasaputras -- "mind-born men." By resolving the "single
material element" into one absolute irresolvable element -- Spirit, or
"Root-matter," thus placing it at once outside the reach and province
of physical philosophy -- he has, of course but little in common with the
orthodox men of science. He maintains that Spirit and Matter are two FACETS of
the unknowable UNITY, their apparently contrasted aspects depending, (a) on the
various degrees of differentiation of the latter, and (b) on the grades of
consciousness attained by man himself. This is, however, metaphysics, and has
little to do with physics -- however great in its own terrestrial limitation
that physical philosophy may now be.
Nevertheless, once that Science
admits, if not the actual existence, at any rate, the possibility of the
existence, of a Universe with its numberless forms, conditions, and aspects
built out of a "single Substance,"* it has
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In his "World-Life" --
page 48 -- in the appended foot notes, Professor Winchell says:-- "It is
generally admitted that at excessively high temperatures matter exists in a
state of dissociation -- that is, no chemical combination can exist;" and
would appeal, to prove the unity of matter, to the spectrum, which in every
case of homogeneity will show a bright line, whereas in the case of several
molecular arrangements existing -- in the nebulae say, or a star -- "the
spectrum should consist of two or three bright lines!" This would be no
proof either way to the physicist-Occultist, who maintains that beyond a certain
limit of visible matter, no spectrum, no telescope and no microscope are of any
use. The unity of matter, of that which is real cosmic matter to the Alchemist,
or "Adam's Earth" as the Kabalists call it, can hardly be proved or
disproved, by either the French savant Dumas, who suggests "the composite
nature of the "elements" on certain relations of atomic
weights," or even by Mr. Crookes's "radiant matter," though his
experiments may seem [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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to go further. Unless it also admits
the possibility of One Element, or the ONE LIFE of the Occultists. It will have
to hang up that "single substance," especially if limited to only the
solar nebulae, like the coffin of Mahomet, in mid air, though minus the
attractive magnet that sustains that coffin. Fortunately for the speculative
physicists, if unable to state with any degree of precision what the nebular
theory does imply, we have, thanks to Professor Winchell, and several
disagreeing astronomers, been able to learn what it does not imply.* (Vide
Supra.)
Unfortunately, this is far from
clearing even the most simple of the problems that have vexed, and still do
vex, the men of learning in their research after truth. We have to proceed with
our inquiries, starting with the earliest hypotheses of modern science, if we
would discover where and why it sins. Perchance it may be found that Stallo is
right, after all. That the blunders, contradictions, and fallacies made by the
most eminent men of learning are simply due to their abnormal attitude. They
are, and want to remain materialistic quand meme, and yet "the general
principles of the atomo-mechanical theory -- the basis of modern physics -- are
substantially identical with the cardinal doctrines of ontological
metaphysics." Thus, "the fundamental errors of ontology become
apparent in proportion to the advance of physical Science." (Int. p. VI.,
"Concepts of Modern Physics.") Science is honeycombed with
metaphysical conceptions, but the Scientists will not admit the charge and
fight desperately to put atomo-mechanical masks on purely incorporeal and
spiritual laws in nature, on our plane -- refusing to admit their
substantiality even on other planes, the bare existence of which they reject a
priori.
It is easy to show, however, how
Scientists, wedded to their materialistic views, have endeavoured, ever since
the day of Newton, to put false masks on fact and truth. But their task is
becoming with every year more difficult; and with every year also, Chemistry,
above all the other sciences, approaches nearer and nearer the realm of the Occult
in nature. It is assimilating the very truths taught by the Occult Sciences
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] "to be best understood on the hypothesis of the homogeneity of the
elements of matter, and the continuity of the states of matter." For all
this does not go beyond MATERIAL matter, so to say, even in what is shown by
the spectrum, that modern "eye of Siva" of physical experiments. It
is of this matter only, that H. St. Claire Deville could say that "when
bodies, deemed to be simple, combine with one another, they vanish, they are
individually annihilated"; simply because he could not follow those bodies
in their further transformation in the world of spiritual cosmic matter. Verily
modern science will never be able to dig deep enough into the cosmological
formations to find the roots of the world-stuff or matter, unless she works on
the same lines of thought as the medieval alchemist did.
* "World-Life," Ibid.
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for ages, but hitherto bitterly
derided. "Matter is eternal," says the Esoteric Doctrine. But the
matter the Occultists conceive of in its laya, or zero state, is not the matter
of modern science; not even in its most rarefied gaseous state. Mr. Crookes'
"radiant matter" would appear matter of the grossest kind in the
realm of the beginnings, as it becomes pure spirit before it has returned back
even to its first point of differentiation. Therefore, when the adept or
alchemist adds that, though matter is eternal, for it is PRADHANA, yet atoms
are born at every new manvantara, or reconstruction of the universe, it is no
such contradiction as a materialist, who believes in nothing beyond the atom,
might think. There is a difference between manifested and unmanifested matter,
between pradhana, the beginningless and endless cause, and prakriti, or the manifested
effect. Says the sloka; --
"That which is the unevolved
cause is emphatically called by the most eminent sages, pradhana, original
base, which is subtile prakriti, viz., that which is eternal, and which at once
is, and is not, a mere process."*
That which in modern phraseology is
respectively referred to as Spirit and Matter, is ONE in eternity as the
perpetual cause, and it is neither Spirit nor matter, but IT -- rendered in
Sanskrit TAD ("that"), -- all that is, was, or will be, all that the imagination
of man is capable of conceiving. Even the exoteric Pantheism of Hinduism
renders it as no monotheistic philosophy ever did, for in superb phraseology
its cosmogony begins with the well-known words:--
"There was neither day nor
night, neither heaven nor earth, neither darkness nor light. And there was not
ought else apprehensible by the senses or by the mental faculties. There was
then one Brahma, essentially prakriti (Nature) and Spirit. For the two aspects
of Vishnu which are other than his supreme essential aspect are prakriti and
Spirit, and Brahman. When these two other ASPECTS of his no longer subsist, but
are dissolved, then that aspect whence form and the rest, i.e., creation,
proceed anew, is denominated time, O twice-born."
It is that which is dissolved, or the
illusionary dual aspect of That, the essence of which is eternally ONE, that we
call eternal matter or Substance (Vide in Part II., "Primordial Substance
and Divine Thought"), formless, sexless, inconceivable, even to our sixth
sense or mind,** in which, therefore, we refuse to see that which Monotheists
call a personal, anthropomorphic God.
How are these two propositions --
"that matter is eternal," and "the atom periodical, and not
eternal" -- viewed by modern exact Science? The materialistic physicist
will criticize and laugh them to scorn. The
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Book I. ch. II. Vishnu Purana,
Fitzedward Hall's Translation.
** Vide preceding Section IX.,
"Life, Force, and Gravity," quotation from Anugita.
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liberal and progressive man of
Science, however, the true and earnest scientific searcher after truth -- e.g.,
the eminent chemist, Mr. Crookes, will corroborate the probability of the two
statements. For, hardly has the echo of his lecture on the "Genesis of the
Elements" died away --the lecture which, delivered by him before the
Chemical Section of the British Association, at the last Birmingham meeting, so
startled every evolutionist who heard or read it -- than there came another one
in March last, 1888. Once more the President of the Chemical Society brings
before the world of Science and the public the fruits of some new discoveries
in the realm of atoms, and these discoveries justify the occult teachings in
every way. They are more startling even than the statements made by him in the
first lecture (quoted later) and deserve well the attention of every Occultist,
Theosophist, and Metaphysician. This is what he says in his "Elements and
Meta-Elements," thus justifying Stallo's charges and prevision with the
fearlessness of a scientific mind which loves science for truth's sake,
regardless of any consequences to his own glory and reputation. We quote his
own words:
Permit me, gentlemen, now to draw
your attention for a short time to a subject which concerns the fundamental
principles of chemistry, a subject which may lead us to admit the possible
existence of bodies which, though neither compounds nor mixtures, are not
elements in the strictest sense of the word -- bodies which I venture to call
"meta-elements." To explain my meaning it is necessary for me to
revert to our conception of an element. What is the criterion of an element?
Where are we to draw the line between distinct existence and identity? No one
doubts that oxygen, sodium, chlorine, sulphur are separate elements; and when
we come to such groups as chlorine, bromine, iodine, &c., we still feel no
doubt, although were degrees of "elementicity" admissible -- and to
that we may ultimately have to come -- it might be allowed that chlorine approximates
much more closely to bromine than to oxygen, sodium, or sulphur. Again, nickel
and cobalt are near to each other, very near, though no one questions their
claim to rank as distinct elements. Still I cannot help asking what would have
been the prevalent opinion among chemists had the respective solutions of these
bodies and their compounds presented identical colours, instead of colours
which, approximately speaking, are mutually complementary. Would their distinct
nature have even now been recognised? When we pass further and come to the
so-called rare earths the ground is less secure under our feet. Perhaps we may
admit scandium, ytterbium, and others of the like sort to elemental rank; but
what are we to say in the case of praseo- and neo-dymium, between which there
may be said to exist no well-marked chemical difference, their chief claim to
separate individuality being slight differences in basicity and crystallizing
powers, though their physical distinctions, as shown by spectrum observations,
are very strongly marked? Even here we may imagine the disposition of the
majority of chemists would incline toward the side of leniency, so that they
would admit these two bodies within the charmed circle. Whether in so doing
they would be able to appeal to any broad principle is an open question. If we
admit these candidates
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how in justice are we to exclude the
series of elemental bodies or meta-elements made known to us by Kruss and
Nilson? Here the spectral differences are well marked, while my own researches
on didymium show also a slight difference in basicity between some at least of
these doubtful bodies. In the same category must be included the numerous
separate bodies into which it is probable that yttrium, erbium, samarium, and
other "elements" -- commonly so-called -- have been and are being
split up. Where then are we to draw the line? The different groupings shade off
so imperceptibly the one into the other that it is impossible to erect a
definite boundary between any two adjacent bodies and to say that the body on
this side of the line is an element, while the one on the other side is non-elementary,
or merely something which simulates or approximates to an element. Wherever an
apparently reasonable line might be drawn it would no doubt be easy at once to
assign most bodies to their proper side, as in all cases of classification the
real difficulty comes in when the border-line is approached. Slight chemical
differences, of course, are admitted, and, up to a certain point, so are
well-marked physical differences. What are we to say, however, when the only
chemical difference is an almost imperceptible tendency for the one body -- of
a couple or of a group -- to precipitate before the other? Again, there are
cases where the chemical differences reach the vanishing point, although
well-marked physical differences still remain. Here we stumble on a new
difficulty: in such obscurities what is chemical and what is physical? Are we
not entitled to call a slight tendency of a nascent amorphous precipitate to
fall down in advance of another a "physical difference?" And may we
not call coloured reactions depending on the amount of some particular acid
present and varying, according to the concentration of the solution and to the
solvent employed, "chemical differences?" I do not see how we can
deny elementary character to a body which differs from another by well-marked
colour, or spectrum-reactions, while we accord it to another body whose only
claim is a very minute difference in basic powers. Having once opened the door
wide enough to admit some spectrum differences, we have to inquire how minute a
difference qualifies the candidate to pass? I will give instances from my own
experience of some of these doubtful candidates.
And here the great chemist gives
several cases of the very extraordinary behaviour of molecules and earths,
apparently the same, and which yet, when examined very closely, were found to
exhibit differences which, however imperceptible, still show that none of them
are simple bodies, and that the 60 or 70 elements accepted in chemistry, can no
longer cover the ground. Their name, apparently, is legion, but as the
so-called "periodic theory" stands in the way of an unlimited
multiplication of elements, Mr. Crookes is obliged to find some means of
reconciling the new discovery with the old theory. "That theory," he
says:--
"Has received such abundant
verification that we cannot lightly accept any interpretation of phenomena
which fails to be in accordance with it. But if we suppose the elements
reinforced by a vast number of bodies slightly differing from each other in
their properties, and forming, if I may use the expression,
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aggregations of nebulae where we formerly
saw, or believed we saw, separate stars, the periodic arrangement can no longer
be definitely grasped. No longer, that is, if we retain our usual conception of
an element. Let us, then, modify this conception. For "element" read
"elementary group" -- such elementary groups taking the place of the
old elements in the periodic scheme -- and the difficulty falls away. In
defining an element, let us take not an external boundary, but an internal
type. Let us say, e.g., the smallest ponderable quantity of yttrium is an
assemblage of ultimate atoms almost infinitely more like each other than they
are to the atoms of any other approximating element. It does not necessarily
follow that the atoms shall all be absolutely alike among themselves. The
atomic weight which we ascribed to yttrium, therefore, merely represents a mean
value around which the actual weights of the individual atoms of the
"element" range within certain limits. But if my conjecture is
tenable, could we separate atom from atom, we should find them varying within
narrow limits on each side of the mean. The very process of fractionation
implies the existence of such differences in certain bodies."
Thus fact and truth have once more
forced the hand of "exact" Science, and compelled it to enlarge its
views and change its terms which, masking the multitude, reduced them to one
body -- like the Septenary Elohim and their hosts transformed by the
materialistic religionists into one Jehovah. Replace the chemical terms
"Molecule," "atom," "particle," etc., by the
words "Hosts," "Monads," "Devas," etc., and one
might think the genesis of gods, the primeval evolution of manvantaric
intelligent Forces, was being described. But the learned lecturer adds
something still more suggestive to his descriptive remarks; whether consciously
or unconsciously, who knoweth? For he says the following:--
"Until lately such bodies passed
muster as elements. They had definite properties, chemical and physical; they
had recognised atomic weights. If we take a pure dilute solution of such a
body, yttrium for instance, and if we add to it an excess of strong ammonia, we
obtain a precipitate which appears perfectly homogeneous. But if instead we add
very dilute ammonia in quantity sufficient only to precipitate one-half of the base
present, we obtain no immediate precipitate. If we stir up the whole thoroughly
so as to insure a uniform mixture of the solution and the ammonia, and set the
vessel aside for an hour, carefully excluding dust, we may still find the
liquid clear and bright, without any vestige of turbidity. After three or four
hours, however, an opalescence will declare itself, and the next morning a
precipitate will have appeared. Now let us ask ourselves, What can be the
meaning of this phenomenon? The quantity of precipitant added was insufficient
to throw down more than half the yttria present, therefore a process akin to
selection has been going on for several hours. The precipitation has evidently
not been effected at random, those molecules of the base being decomposed which
happened to come in contact with a corresponding molecule of ammonia, for we
have taken care that the liquids should be uniformly mixed, so that one
molecule of the original salt would not be more exposed to decomposition
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than any other. If, further, we
consider the time which elapses before the appearance of a precipitate, we
cannot avoid coming to the conclusion that the action which has been going on
for the first few hours is of a selective character. The problem is not why a
precipitate is produced, but what determines or directs some atoms to fall down
and others to remain in solution. Out of the multitude of atoms present, what
power is it that directs each atom to choose the proper path? We may picture to
ourselves some directive force passing the atoms one by one in review,
selecting one for precipitation and another for solution till all have been
adjusted."
The italics in the above passage are
ours. Well may a man of science ask himself, "What power is it that
directs each atom," and what is it that its character should be selective?
Theists would solve the question by answering "God"; and would solve
nothing philosophically. Occultism answers on its own pantheistic grounds, and
refers the reader to a subsequent section, "Gods, Monads, and Atoms."
The learned lecturer sees in it that which is his chief concern: the
finger-posts and the traces of a path which may lead to the discovery, and the
full and complete demonstration of an homogeneous element in nature. He
remarks:--
"In order that such a selection
can be effected there evidently must be some slight differences between which
it is possible to select, and this difference almost certainly must be one of
basicity, so slight as to be imperceptible by any test at present known, but
susceptible of being nursed and encouraged to a point when the difference can
be appreciated by ordinary tests."
Occultism, which knows of the
existence and presence in Nature of the One eternal element at the first
differentiation of which the roots of the tree of life are periodically struck,
needs no scientific proofs. It says:-- Ancient Wisdom has solved the problem
ages ago. Aye; earnest, as well as mocking reader, Science is slowly but as
surely approaching our domains of the Occult. It is forced by its own
discoveries to adopt nolens volens our phraseology and symbols. Chemical
Science is now compelled, by the very force of things, to accept even our
illustration of the evolution of the gods and atoms, so suggestively and
undeniably figured in the caduceus of Mercury, the God of Wisdom, and in the
allegorical language of the Archaic Sages. Says a commentary in the esoteric
doctrine:--
. . . . The trunk of the ASVATTHA
(the tree of Life and Being, the ROD of the caduceus) grows from and descends
at every Beginning (every new manvantara) from the two dark wings of the Swan
(HANSA) of Life. The two Serpents, the ever-living and its illusion (Spirit and
matter) whose two heads grow from the one head between the wings, descend along
the trunk, interlaced in close embrace. The two tails join on earth (the
manifested Universe) into one, and this is the great illusion, O Lanoo!"
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Every one knows what the caduceus is,
already modified by the Greeks. The original symbol -- with the triple head of
the serpent -- became altered into a rod with a knob, and the two lower heads
were separated, thus disfiguring somewhat the original meaning. Yet it is as
good an illustration as can be for our purpose, this laya rod entwined by two
serpents. Verily the wonderful powers of the magic caduceus were sung by all
the ancient poets, with a very good reason for those who understood the secret
meaning.
[[diagram]]
Now what says the learned President
of the Chemical Society of Great Britain, in that same lecture, which has any
reference to, or bearing upon, our above-mentioned doctrine. Very little; only
this -- and nothing more:--
"In the Birmingham address
already referred to I asked my audience to picture the action of two forces on
the original protyle --- one being time, accompanied by a lowering of
temperature; the other, swinging to and fro like a mighty pendulum, having
periodic cycles of ebb and swell, rest and activity, being intimately connected
with the imponderable matter, essence, or source of energy we call electricity.
Now, a simile like this effects its object if it fixes in the mind the
particular fact it is intended to emphasize, but it must not be expected necessarily
to run parallel with all the facts. Besides the lowering of temperature with
the periodic ebb and flow of electricity, positive or negative, requisite to
confer on the newly-born elements their particular atomicity, it is evident
that a third factor must be taken into account. Nature does not act on a flat
plane; she demands space for her cosmogenic operations, and if we introduce
space as the third factor, all appears clear. Instead of a pendulum, which,
though to a certain extent a good illustration, is impossible as a fact, let us
seek some more satisfactory way of representing what I conceive may have taken
place. Let us suppose the zigzag diagram not drawn upon a plane, but projected
in space of three dimensions. What figure can we best select to meet all the
conditions involved? Many of the facts can be well explained by supposing the
projection in space of Professor Emerson Reynolds' zigzag curve to be a spiral.
This figure is, however, inadmissible, inasmuch as the curve has to pass through
a point neutral as to electricity and chemical energy twice in each cycle. We
must, therefore, adopt some other figure. A figure of eight (8), or lemniscate,
will foreshorten into a zigzag just as well as a spiral, and it fulfils every
condition of the problem."
A lemniscate for the evolution
downward, from Spirit into matter;
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another form of a spiral, perhaps, in
its reinvolutionary path onward, from matter into Spirit, and the necessary
gradual and final reabsorption into the laya state, that which Science calls in
her own way "the point neutral as to electricity" etc., or the zero
point. Such are the Occult facts and statement. They may be left with the
greatest security and confidence to Science, to be justified some day. Let us
hear some more, however, about this primordial genetic type of the symbolical
caduceus.
"Such a figure will result from
three very simple simultaneous motions. First, a simple oscillation backwards
and forwards (suppose east and west); secondly, a simple oscillation at right
angles to the former (suppose north and south) of half the periodic time -- i.e.,
twice as fast; and thirdly, a motion at right angles to these two (suppose
downwards), which, in its simplest form, would be with unvarying velocity. If
we project this figure in space we find on examination that the points of the
curves, where chlorine, bromine, and iodine are formed, come close under each
other; so also will sulphur, selenium, and tellurium; again, phosphorus,
arsenic, and antimony; and in like manner other series of analogous bodies. It
may be asked whether this scheme explains how and why the elements appear in
this order? Let us imagine a cyclical translation in space, each evolution
witnessing the genesis of the group of elements which I previously represented
as produced during one complete vibration of the pendulum. Let us suppose that
one cycle has thus been completed, the centre of the unknown creative force in
its mighty journey through space having scattered along its track the primitive
atoms -- the seeds, if I may use the expression -- which presently are to
coalesce and develop into the groupings now known as lithium, beryllium, boron,
carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, fluorine, sodium, magnesium, aluminium, silicon,
phosphorus, sulphur, and chlorine. What is most probably the form of track now
pursued? Were it strictly confined to the same plane of temperature and time,
the next elementary groupings to appear would again have been those of lithium,
and the original cycle would have been eternally repeated, producing again and
again the same 14 elements. The conditions, however, are not quite the same.
Space and electricity are as at first, but temperature has altered, and thus,
instead of the atoms of lithium being supplemented with atoms in all respects
analogous with themselves, the atomic groupings which come into being when the
second cycle commences form, not lithium, but its lineal descendant, potassium.
Suppose, therefore, the vis generatrix travelling to and fro in cycles along a
lemniscate path, as above suggested, while simultaneously temperature is
declining and time is flowing on -- variations which I have endeavoured to
represent by the downward sink -- each coil of the lemniscate track crosses the
same vertical line at lower and lower points. Projected in space, the curve
shows a central line neutral as far as electricity is concerned, and neutral in
chemical properties -- positive electricity on the north, negative on the
south. Dominant atomicities are governed by the distance east and west from the
neutral centre line, monatomic elements being one remove from it, diatomic two
removes, and so on. In every successive coil the same law holds good."
And, as if to prove the postulate of
Occult Science and Hindu philos-
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ophy, that, at the hour of the
Pralaya, the two aspects of the unknowable deity, "the Swan in
darkness" -- Prakriti and Purusha, nature or matter in all its forms and
Spirit -- "no longer subsist but are (absolutely) dissolved," we
learn the conclusive scientific opinion of the great English chemist, who caps
his proofs by saying:-- "We have now traced the formation of the chemical
elements from knots and voids in a primitive, formless fluid. We have shown the
possibility, nay, the probability that the atoms are not eternal in existence,
but share with all other created beings the attributes of decay and
death."
Occultism says amen to this, as the
Scientific "possibility" and "probability" are for it facts
demonstrated beyond the necessity of further proof or any extraneous physical
evidence. Nevertheless, it repeats with as much assurance as ever: "MATTER
IS ETERNAL, becoming atomic (its aspect) only periodically." This is as
sure as that the other proposition, which is almost unanimously accepted by
astronomers and physicists -- namely, that the wear and tear of the body of the
Universe is steadily going on, and that it will finally lead to the extinction
of the Solar fires and the destruction of the Universe -- is quite erroneous on
the lines traced by Men of Science. There will be, as there ever were in time
and eternity, periodical dissolutions of the manifested Universe, but (a) a
partial pralaya after every "Day of Brahma;" and (b) an Universal
pralaya -- the MAHA-PRALAYA -- only after the lapse of every Brahma's age. But
the scientific causes for such dissolution, as brought forward by exact
Science, have nothing to do with the true causes. However that may be,
Occultism is once more justified by Science, for Mr. Crookes said:--
"We have shown, from arguments
drawn from the chemical laboratory, that in matter which has responded to every
test of an element, there are minute shades of difference which may admit of
selection. We have seen that the time-honoured distinction between elements and
compounds no longer keeps pace with the developments of chemical science, but
must be modified to include a vast array of intermediate bodies --
"meta-elements." We have shown how the objections of Clerk-Maxwell,
weighty as they are, may be met; and finally, we have adduced reasons for
believing that primitive matter was formed by the act of a generative force,
throwing off at intervals of time atoms endowed with varying quantities of
primitive forms of energy. If we may hazard any conjectures as to the source of
energy embodied in a chemical atom, we may, I think, premise that the heat
radiations propagated outwards through the ether from the ponderable matter of
the universe, by some process of nature not yet known to us, are transformed at
the confines of the universe into the primary -- the essential -- motions of
chemical atoms, which, the instant they are formed, gravitate inwards, and thus
restore to the universe the energy which otherwise would be lost to it through
radiant heat. If this conjecture be well founded, Sir William Thomson's
startling prediction of the final decrepitude of the universe through the
dissipation of its energy falls to the ground. In this
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fashion, gentlemen, it seems to me
that the question of the elements may be provisionally treated. Our slender
knowledge of these first mysteries is extending steadily, surely, though
slowly."
By a strong and curious coincidence
even our "septenary" doctrine seems to force the hand of Science. If
we understand rightly, Chemistry speaks of fourteen groupings of primitive
atoms -- lithium, beryllium, boron, carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, fluorine, sodium,
magnesium, aluminium, silicon, phosphorus, sulphur and chlorine; and Mr.
Crookes, speaking of the "dominant atomicities," enumerates seven
groups of these, for he says:--
"As the mighty focus of creative
energy goes round, we see it in successive cycles sowing in one tract of space
seeds of lithium, potassium, rubidium, and caesium; in another tract, chlorine,
bromine, and iodine; in a third, sodium, copper, silver, and gold; in a fourth,
sulphur, selenium, and tellurium; in a fifth, beryllium, calcium, strontium,
and barium; in a sixth, magnesium, zinc, cadmium, and mercury; in a seventh,
phosphorus, arsenic, antimony, and bismuth" -- which makes seven groupings
on the one hand. And after showing "in other tracts the other elements --
namely, aluminium, gallium, indium, and thallium; silicon, germanium, and tin;
carbon, titanium, and zirconium."
He adds: "While a natural
position near the neutral axis is found for the three groups of elements
relegated by Professor Mendeleeff to a sort of Hospital for Incurables -- his
eighth family." It might be interesting to compare these "seven of
the eighth family of 'incurables'" with the allegories concerning the
seven primitive sons of "Mother, Infinite Space," or Aditi, and the
eighth son rejected by her. Many a strange coincidence may thus be found
between "those intermediate links . . . named 'meta-elements or
elementoids and those whom occult science names their noumenoi,' the
intelligent minds and rulers of those groupings of Monads and Atoms. But this
would lead us too far. Let us be content with finding the confession of the
fact that "this deviation from absolute homogeneity should mark the
constitution of these molecules or aggregations of matter which we designate
elements and will perhaps be clearer if we return in imagination to the
earliest dawn of our material universe, and, face to face with the Great
Secret, try to consider the processes of elemental evolution." Thus
finally Science, in the person of its highest representatives, in order to make
itself clearer to the profane, adopts the phraseology of such old adepts as
Roger Bacon, and returns to the "protyle." All this is hopeful and
suggestive of the "signs of the times."
Indeed these "signs" are
many and multiply daily; but none are more important than those just quoted.
For now the chasm between the occult "superstitious and unscientific"
teachings and "exact" science is completely bridged, and one, at least,
of the few eminent chemists of the day is in the realm of the infinite
possibilities of occultism. Every new
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step he will take will bring him
nearer and nearer to that mysterious centre, from which radiate the innumerable
paths that lead down Spirit into matter, and which transform the gods and the
living monads into man and sentient nature.
But we have something more to say on
this subject in the following section.
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X.
THE COMING FORCE.
ITS POSSIBILITIES AND
IMPOSSIBILITIES.
Shall we say that Force is
"moving matter," or "matter in motion," and a manifestation
of energy; or that matter and force are the phenomenal differentiated aspects
of the one primary, undifferentiated Cosmic Substance?
This query is made with regard to
that Stanza which treats of FOHAT and his "Seven brothers or Sons,"
in other words, of the cause and the effects of Cosmic Electricity, the latter
called, in Occult parlance, the seven primary forces of Electricity, whose
purely phenomenal, and hence grossest effects are alone cognizable by
physicists on the cosmic and especially on the terrestrial plane. These
include, among other things, Sound, Light, Colour, etc., etc. Now what does
physical Science tell us of these "Forces"? SOUND, it says, is a
sensation produced by the impact of atmospheric molecules on the tympanum,
which, by setting up delicate tremors in the auditory apparatus, thus
communicate themselves to the brain. LIGHT is the sensation caused by the
impact of inconceivably minute vibrations of ether on the retina of the eye.
So, too, we say. But this is simply
the effect produced in our atmosphere and its immediate surroundings, all, in
fact, which falls within the range of our terrestrial consciousness. Jupiter
Pluvius sent his symbol in drops of rain, of water composed, as is believed, of
two "elements," which chemistry dissociates and recombines. The
compound molecules are in its power, but their atoms still elude its grasp.
Occultism sees in all these Forces and manifestations a ladder, the lower rungs
of which belong to exoteric physics, and the higher are traced to a living, intelligent,
invisible Power, which is, as a rule, the unconcerned, and exceptionally, the
conscious cause of the sense-born phenomenon designated as this or another
natural law.
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We say and maintain that SOUND, for
one thing, is a tremendous Occult power; that it is a stupendous force, of
which the electricity generated by a million of Niagaras could never counteract
the smallest potentiality when directed with occult knowledge. Sound may be
produced of such a nature that the pyramid of Cheops would be raised in the
air, or that a dying man, nay, one at his last breath, would be revived and
filled with new energy and vigour.
For Sound generates, or rather
attracts together, the elements that produce an ozone, the fabrication of which
is beyond chemistry, but within the limits of Alchemy. It may even resurrect a
man or an animal whose astral "vital body" has not been irreparably
separated from the physical body by the severance of the magnetic or odic
chord. As one saved thrice from death by that power, the writer ought to be
credited with knowing personally something about it.
And if all this appears too
unscientific to be even noticed, let Science explain to what mechanical and
physical laws known to it, is due the recently produced phenomena of the
so-called "Keely motor?" What is it that acts as the formidable generator
of invisible but tremendous force, of that power which is not only capable of
driving an engine of 25 horse-power, but has even been employed to lift the
machinery bodily? Yet this is done simply by drawing a fiddle-bow across a
tuning fork, as has been repeatedly proven. For the etheric Force, discovered
by the well-known (in America and now in Europe) John Worrell Keely, of
Philadelphia, is no hallucination. Notwithstanding his failure to utilize it, a
failure prognosticated and maintained by some Occultists from the first, the
phenomena exhibited by the discoverer during the last few years have been
wonderful, almost miraculous, not in the sense of the supernatural* but of the
superhuman. Had Keely been permitted to succeed, he might have reduced a whole
army to atoms in the space of a few seconds as easily as he reduced a dead ox
to the same condition.
The reader is now asked to give a
serious attention to that newly-discovered potency which the discoverer has
named "Inter-Etheric Force and Forces."
In the humble opinion of the
Occultists, as of his immediate friends,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The word "supernatural"
implies above or outside of nature. Nature and Space are one. Now Space for the
metaphysician exists outside of any act of sensation, and is a purely
subjective representation; materialism, which would connect it forcibly with
one or the other datum of sensation, notwithstanding. For our senses, it is
fairly subjective when independent of anything within it. How then can any
phenomenon, or anything else, step outside of or be performed beyond that which
has no limits? But when spacial extension becomes simply conceptual, and is
thought of in an idea connected with certain actions, as by the materialists
and the physicists, then again they have hardly a right to define and claim
that which can or cannot be produced by Forces generated within even limited
spaces, as they have not even an approximate idea of what those forces are.
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Mr. Keely, of Philadelphia, was, and
still is, at the threshold of some of the greatest secrets of the Universe; of
that chiefly on which is built the whole mystery of physical Forces, and the
esoteric significance of the "Mundane Egg" symbolism. Occult
philosophy, viewing the manifested and the unmanifested Kosmos as a UNITY,
symbolizes the ideal conception of the former by that "Golden Egg"
with two poles in it. It is the positive pole that acts in the manifested world
of matter, while the negative is lost in the unknowable absoluteness of SAT --
"Be-ness."* Whether this agrees with the philosophy of Mr. Keely, we
cannot tell, nor does it really much matter. Nevertheless, his ideas about the
ethero-material construction of the Universe look strangely like our own, being
in this respect nearly identical. This is what we find him saying in an able
pamphlet compiled by Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore, an American lady of wealth and
position, whose incessant efforts in the pursuit of truth can never be too
highly appreciated:-- "Mr. Keely, in explanation of the working of his
engine, says: 'In the conception of any machine heretofore constructed, the
medium for inducing a neutral centre has never been found. If it had, the
difficulties of perpetual-motion seekers would have ended, and this problem
would have become an established and operating fact. It would only require an
introductory impulse of a few pounds, on such a device, to cause it to run for
centuries. In the conception of my vibratory engine, I did not seek to attain
perpetual motion; but a circuit is formed that actually has a neutral centre,
which is in a condition to be vivified by my vibratory ether, and, while under
operation by said substance, is really a machine that is virtually independent
of the mass (or globe),** and it is the wonderful velocity of the vibratory
circuit which makes it so. Still, with all its perfection, it requires to be
fed with the vibratory ether to make it an independent motor . . . ."
"All structures require a
foundation in strength according to the weight of the mass they have to carry,
but the foundations of the universe rest on a vacuous point far more minute
than a molecule; in fact, to express this truth properly, on an inter-etheric
point, which requires an infinite mind to understand it. To look down into the
depths of an etheric centre is precisely the same as it would be to search into
the broad space of heaven's ether to find the end, with this difference: that
one is the positive field, while the other is the negative field . . . ."
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is not correct, when speaking of
idealism, to show it based upon "the old ontological assumptions that
things or entities exist independently of each other, and otherwise than as
terms of relations" (Stallo). At any rate, it is incorrect to say so of
idealism in Eastern philosophy and its cognition, for it is just the reverse.
** Independent, in a certain sense,
but not disconnected with it.
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This, as easily seen, is precisely
the Eastern doctrine. His inter-etheric point is the laya-point of the
Occultists, which, however, does not require "an infinite mind to
understand it," but only a specific intuition and ability to trace its
hiding-place in this world of matter. Of course, the laya centre cannot be
produced, but an inter-etheric vacuum can -- as proved in the production of
bell-sounds in space. Mr. Keely speaks as an unconscious Occultist,
nevertheless, when he remarks in his theory of planetary suspension:--
"As regards planetary volume, we
would ask in a scientific point of view, How can the immense difference of
volume in the planets exist without disorganising the harmonious action that
has always characterised them? I can only answer this question properly by
entering into a progressive analysis, starting on the rotating etheric centres
that were fixed by the Creator* with their attractive or accumulative power. If
you ask what power it is that gives to each etheric atom its inconceivable
velocity of rotation (or introductory impulse), I must answer that no finite
mind will ever be able to conceive what it is. The philosophy of accumulation
is the only proof that such a power has been given. The area, if we can so
speak, of such an atom, presents to the attractive or magnetic, the elective or
propulsive, all the receptive force and all the antagonistic force that
characterises a planet of the largest magnitude; consequently, as the accumulation
goes on, the perfect equation remains the same. When this minute centre has
once been fixed, the power to rend it from its position would necessarily have
to be so great as to displace the most immense planet that exists. When this
atomic neutral centre is displaced, the planet must go with it. The neutral
centre carries the full load of any accumulation from the start, and remains
the same, for ever balanced in the eternal space."
Mr. Keely illustrates his idea of
"a neutral centre" in this way:--
"We will imagine that, after an
accumulation of a planet of any diameter, say, 20,000 miles, more or less, for
the size has nothing to do with the problem; there should be a displacement of
all the material, with the exception of a crust 5,000 miles thick, leaving an
intervening void between this crust and a centre of the size of an ordinary
billiard ball, it would then require a force as great to move this small
central mass as it would to move the shell of 5,000 miles thickness. Moreover, this
small central mass would carry the load of this crust for ever, keeping it
equidistant; and there could be no opposing power, however great, that could
bring them together. The imagination staggers in contemplating the immense load
which bears upon this point of centre, where weight ceases. . . . This is what
we understand by a neutral centre."
And what Occultists understand by a
"laya centre."
The above is pronounced
"unscientific" by many. But so is everything that is not sanctioned
and kept on strictly orthodox lines by physical science. Unless the explanation
given by the inventor himself is accepted -- and his explanations, being, as
observed, quite orthodox from
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "By Fohat, more likely,"
would be an Occultist's reply.
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the spiritual and the Occult stand-points,
if not from that of materialistic speculative (called exact) Science, are
therefore ours in this particular -- what can science answer to facts already
seen which it is no longer possible for anyone to deny? Occult philosophy
divulges few of its most important vital mysteries. It drops them like precious
pearls, one by one, far and wide apart, and only when forced to do so by the
evolutionary tidal wave that carries on humanity slowly, silently, but steadily
toward the dawn of the Sixth-Race mankind. For once out of the safe custody of
their legitimate heirs and keepers, those mysteries cease to be occult: they
fall into the public domain and have to run the risk of becoming in the hands
of the selfish -- of the Cains of the human race -- curses more often than
blessings. Nevertheless, whenever such individuals as the discoverer of Etheric
Force -- John Worrell Keely -- men with peculiar psychic and mental capacities*
are born, they are generally and more frequently helped than allowed to go
unassisted; groping on their way, though, if left to their own resources,
falling very soon victims to martyrdom and unscrupulous speculators. Only they
are helped on the condition that they should not become, whether consciously or
unconsciously, an additional peril to their age: a danger to the poor, now
offered in daily holocaust by the less wealthy to the very wealthy.** This
necessitates a short digression and an explanation.
Some twelve years back, during the
Philadelphia Centennial Exhibition, the writer, in answering the earnest
queries of a theosophist, one of the earliest admirers of Mr. Keely, repeated
to him what she had heard in quarters, information from which she could never
doubt.
It had been stated that the inventor
of the "Self-Motor" was what is called, in the jargon of the
Kabalists, a "natural-born magician." That he was and would remain
unconscious of the full range of his powers, and would work out merely those
which he had found out and ascertained in his own nature -- firstly, because,
attributing them to a wrong source, he could never give them full sway; and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The reason for such psychic
capacities is given farther on.
** The above was written two years
ago, at a time when hopes of success for the "Keely Motor" were at
their highest. What was then said by the writer proved true, in every word, and
now only a few remarks are added to it with regard to the failure of his
expectations, so far, which has now been admitted by the discoverer himself.
Though, however, the word failure is here used the reader should understand it
in a relative sense, for as Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore explains: "What Mr.
Keely does admit is that, baffled in applying vibratory force to mechanics,
upon his first and second lines of experimental research, he was obliged either
to confess a commercial failure, or to try a third departure from his base or
principle; seeking success through another channel."
. . And this "channel" is
on the physical plane.
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secondly, because it was beyond his
power to pass to others that which was a capacity inherent in his special
nature. Hence the whole secret could not be made over permanently to anyone for
practical purposes or use.*
Individuals born with such a capacity
are not very rare. That they are not heard of more frequently is due to the fact
that they live and die, in almost every case, in utter ignorance of being
possessed of abnormal powers at all. Mr. Keely possesses powers which are
called "abnormal" just because they happen in our day to be as little
known as blood circulation was before Harvey's time. Blood existed, and it
behaved as it does at present in the first man born from woman; and so does
that principle in man which can control and guide etheric vibratory force. At
any rate it exists in all those mortals whose inner selves are primordially
connected, by reason of their direct descent, with that group of Dhyan-Chohans
who are called "the first-born of Ether." Mankind, psychically
considered, is divided into various groups, each of which is connected with one
of the Dhyanic groups that first formed psychic man; (see paragraphs 1, 2, 3,
4, 5 in the Commentary to Stanza VII.) Mr. Keely being greatly favoured in this
respect, and moreover, besides his psychic temperament, being intellectually a
genius in mechanics, may thus achieve most wonderful results. He has achieved
some already -- more than any mortal man, not initiated into the final
mysteries, has achieved in this age up to the present day. What he has done is
certainly quite sufficient "to demolish with the hammer of Science the
idols of Science" -- the idols of matter with the feet of clay -- as his
friends justly predict and say of him. Nor would the writer for a moment think
of contradicting Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore, when in her paper on "Psychic
Force and Etheric Force," she states that Mr. Keely, as a philosopher,
"is great enough in soul, wise enough in mind, and sublime enough in
courage to overcome all difficulties, and to stand at last before the world as
the greatest discoverer and inventor in the world."
And again she writes:-- "Should
Keely do no more than lead scientists from the dreary realms where they are
groping into the open field of elemental force, where gravity and cohesion are
disturbed in their haunts and diverted to use; where, from unity of origin,
emanates infinite energy in diversified forms, he will achieve immortal fame.
Should he demonstrate, to the destruction of materialism, that the universe is
animated by a mysterious principle to which matter, however perfectly
organized, is absolutely subservient, he will be a greater spiritual benefactor
to our race than the modern world has yet found in any man. Should he be able
to substitute, in the treatment of disease,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* We learn that these remarks are not
applicable to Mr. Keely's latest discovery; time alone can show the exact limit
of his achievements.
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the finer forces of nature for the
grossly material agencies which have sent more human beings to their graves
than war, pestilence and famine combined, he will merit and receive the
gratitude of mankind. All this and more will he do, if he and those who have
watched his progress, day by day for years, are not too sanguine in their
expectations."
Writing in the T. P. S.
("Theosophical Publication Society") series (No. 9), the same lady,
in her pamphlet, "Keely's Secrets," brings forward a passage from an
article, written a few years ago by the writer of the present volume, in her
journal, the Theosophist, in these words:--
"The author of No. 5 of the
pamphlets issued by the Theosophical Publication Society, 'What is Matter and
What is Force,' says therein, 'The men of science have just found out "a
fourth state of matter," whereas the Occultists have penetrated years ago
beyond the sixth, and therefore do not infer, but know of, the existence of the
seventh, the last.' This knowledge comprises one of the secrets of Keely's
so-called 'compound secret.' It is already known to many that his secret
includes 'the augmentation of energy,' the insulation of the ether, and the
adaptation of dynaspheric force to machinery."
It is just because Keely's discovery
would lead to a knowledge of one of the most occult secrets, a secret which can
never be allowed to fall into the hands of the masses, that his failure to push
his discoveries to their logical end seems certain to Occultists. But of this
more presently. Even in its limitations this discovery may prove of the
greatest benefit. For:--
"Step by step, with a patient
perseverance which some day the world will honour, this man of genius has made
his researches, overcoming the colossal difficulties which again and again
raised up in his path what seemed to be (to all but himself) insurmountable
barriers to further progress: but never has the world's index finger so pointed
to an hour when all is making ready for the advent of the new form of force
that mankind is waiting for. Nature, always reluctant to yield her secrets, is
listening to the demands made upon her by her master, necessity. The coal mines
of the world cannot long afford the increasing drain made upon them. Steam has
reached its utmost limits of power, and does not fulfil the requirements of the
age. It knows that its days are numbered. Electricity holds back, with bated
breath, dependent upon the approach of her sister colleague. Air ships are
riding at anchor, as it were, waiting for the force which is to make aerial
navigation something more than a dream. As easily as men communicate with their
offices from their homes by means of the telephone, so will the inhabitants of
separate continents talk across the ocean. Imagination is palsied when seeking
to foresee the grand results of this marvellous discovery, when once it is
applied to art and mechanics. In taking the throne which it will force steam to
abdicate, dynaspheric force will rule the world with a power so mighty in the
interests of civilization, that no finite mind can conjecture the results.
Laurence Oliphant, in his preface to 'Scientific Religion,' says: 'A new moral
future is dawning upon the human race -- one, certainly, of which it stands
much in need.' In no way could this
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new moral future be so widely, so
universally, commenced as by the utilizing of dynaspheric force to beneficial
purposes in life. . . . ."
The Occultists are ready to admit all
this with the eloquent writer. Molecular vibration is, undeniably,
"Keely's legitimate field of research," and the discoveries made by
him will prove wonderful -- yet only in his hands and through himself. The
world so far will get but that with which it can be safely entrusted. The truth
of this assertion has, perhaps, not yet quite dawned upon the discoverer
himself, since he writes that he is absolutely certain that he will accomplish
all that he has promised, and will then give it out to the world; but it must
dawn upon him, and at no very far distant date. And what he says in reference to
his work is a good proof of it:--
"In considering the operation of
my engine, the visitor, in order to have even an approximate conception of its
modus operandi, must discard all thought of engines that are operated upon the
principle of pressure and exhaustion, by the expansion of steam or other
analogous gas which impinges upon an abutment, such as the piston of a
steam-engine. My engine has neither piston nor eccentrics, nor is there one
grain of pressure exerted in the engine, whatever may be the size or capacity
of it.
"My system, in every part and
detail, both in the developing of my power and in every branch of its
utilization, is based and founded on sympathetic vibration. In no other way
would it be possible to awaken or develop my force, and equally impossible
would it be to operate my engine upon any other principle. . . . . . .This,
however, is the true system; and henceforth all my operations will be conducted
in this manner -- that is to say, my power will be generated, my engines run,
my cannon operated, through a wire.
"It has been only after years of
incessant labour, and the making of almost innumerable experiments, involving
not only the construction of a great many most peculiar mechanical structures,
and the closest investigation and study of the phenomenal properties of the
substance 'ether,' per se, produced, that I have been able to dispense with
complicated mechanism, and to obtain, as I claim, mastery over the subtle and
strange force with which I am dealing."
The passages underlined by us, are
those which bear directly on the occult side of the application of the
vibratory force, or what Mr. Keely calls "sympathetic vibration." The
"wire" is already a step below, or downward from the pure etheric
plane into the terrestrial. The discoverer has produced marvels -- the word
"miracle" is not too strong -- when acting through the inter-etheric
Force alone, the fifth and sixth principles of Akasa. From a
"generator" six feet long, he has come down to one "no larger
than an old-fashioned silver watch;" and this by itself is a miracle of
mechanical (but not spiritual) genius. But, as well expressed by his great
patroness and defender, Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore, "the two forms of force
which he has been experimenting with, and the phenomena attending them, are the
very antithesis of each other." One was generated and acted upon by and
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through himself. No one, who should
have repeated the thing done by himself, could have produced the same results.
It was "Keely's ether" that acted truly, while "Smith's or
Brown's" ether would have remained for ever barren of results. For Keely's
difficulty has hitherto been to produce a machine which would develop and
regulate the "force" without the intervention of any "will
power" or personal influence, whether conscious or unconscious of the
operator. In this he has failed, so far as others were concerned, for no one
but himself could operate on his "machines." Occultly this was a far
more advanced achievement than the "success" which he anticipates
from his "wire," but the results obtained from the fifth and sixth
planes of the etheric (or Astral) Force, will never be permitted to serve for
purposes of commerce and traffic. That Keely's organism is directly connected
with the production of the marvellous results is proven by the following
statement emanating from one who knows the great discoverer intimately.
At one time the shareholders of the
"Keely Motor Co." put a man in his workshop for the express purpose
of discovering his secret. After six months of close watching, he said to J. W.
Keely one day: "I know how it is done, now." They had been setting up
a machine together, and Keely was manipulating the stop-cock which turned the
force on and off. "Try it, then," was the answer. The man turned the
cock, and nothing came. "Let me see you do it again," the man said to
Keely. The latter complied, and the machinery operated at once. Again the other
tried, but without success. Then Keely put his hand on his shoulder and told
him to try once more. He did so, with the result of an instantaneous production
of the current. This fact, if true, settles the question.
We are told that Mr. Keely defines
electricity "as a certain form of atomic vibration." In this he is
quite right; but this is electricity on the terrestrial plane, and through
terrestrial correlations. He estimates --
Molecular vibrations at 100,000,000
per second.
Inter-molecular vibrations at
300,000,000 per second
Atomic vibrations at 900,000,000 per
second
Inter-atomic vibrations at
2,700,000,000 per second
AEtheric vibrations at 8,100,000,000
per second
Inter-AEtheric vibrations at
24,300,000,000 per second
This proves our point. There are no
vibrations that could be counted or even estimated at an approximate rate
beyond "the realm of the fourth son of Fohat," using an occult
phraseology, or that motion which corresponds to the formation of Mr. Crookes'
radiant matter, or lightly called some years ago the "fourth state of
matter" -- on this our plane.
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If the question is asked why Mr.
Keely was not allowed to pass a certain limit, the answer is easy; because that
which he has unconsciously discovered, is the terrible sidereal Force, known
to, and named by the Atlanteans MASH-MAK, and by the Aryan Rishis in their
Ashtar Vidya by a name that we do not like to give. It is the vril of Bulwer
Lytton's "Coming Race," and of the coming races of our mankind. The
name vril may be a fiction; the Force itself is a fact doubted as little in
India as the existence itself of their Rishis, since it is mentioned in all the
secret works.
It is this vibratory Force, which,
when aimed at an army from an Agni Rath fixed on a flying vessel, a balloon,
according to the instructions found in Ashtar Vidya, reduced to ashes 100,000
men and elephants, as easily as it would a dead rat. It is allegorised in the
Vishnu Purana, in the Ramayana and other works, in the fable about the sage
Kapila whose glance made a mountain of ashes of King Sagara's 60,000 sons, and
which is explained in the esoteric works, and referred to as the Kapilaksha --
"Kapila's Eye."
And is it this Satanic Force that our
generations were to be allowed to add to their stock of Anarchist's baby-toys,
known as melenite, dynamite clock-works, explosive oranges, "flower
baskets," and such other innocent names? Is it this destructive agency,
which, once in the hands of some modern Attila, e.g., a blood-thirsty
anarchist, would reduce Europe in a few days to its primitive chaotic state
with no man left alive to tell the tale -- is this force to become the common
property of all men alike?
What Mr. Keely has already done is
grand and wonderful in the extreme; there is enough work before him in the
demonstration of his new system to "humble the pride of those scientists
who are materialistic, by revealing those mysteries which lie behind the world
of matter," without revealing it nolens volens to all. For surely
Psychists and Spiritualists -- of whom there are a good number in the European
armies -- would be the first to experience personally the fruits of such
mysteries revealed. Thousands of them would find themselves (and perhaps with
the populations of whole countries to keep them company) in blue Ether very
soon, were such a Force to be even entirely discovered, let alone made publicly
known. The discovery in its completeness is by several thousand -- or shall we
say hundred thousand? -- years too premature. It will be at its appointed place
and time only when the great roaring flood of starvation, misery, and underpaid
labour ebbs back again -- as it will when happily at last the just demands of
the many are attended to; when the proletariat exists but in name, and the
pitiful cry for bread, that rings throughout the world unheeded, has died away.
This may be hastened by the spread of learning,
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and by new openings for work and
emigration, with better prospects than exist now, and on some new continent
that may appear. Then only will "Keely's Motor and Force," as
originally contemplated by himself and friends, be in demand, because it will
be more needed by the poor than by the wealthy.
Meanwhile the force discovered by him
will work through wires, and this, if he succeeds, will be quite sufficient in
the present generation to make of him the greatest discoverer of this age.
What Mr. Keely says of Sound and
Colour is also correct from the Occult stand-point. Hear him talk as though he
were the nursling of the "Gods-revealers," and had gazed all his life
into the depths of Father-Mother AEther.
In comparing the tenuity of the
atmosphere with that of the etheric flows, obtained by him from his invention
for breaking up the molecules of air by vibration, Keely says that:--
. . . "It is as platina to
hydrogen gas. Molecular separation of air brings us to the first sub-division
only; inter-molecular, to the second; atomic, to the third; inter-atomic, to
the fourth; etheric, to the fifth; and inter-etheric, to the sixth
sub-division, or positive association with luminiferous ether.* In my
introductory argument I have contended that this is the vibratory envelope of
all atoms. In my definition of atom I do not confine myself to the sixth
sub-division where this luminiferous ether is developed in its crude form as
far as my researches prove.** I think this idea will be pronounced by the
physicists of the present day, a wild freak of the imagination. Possibly, in
time, a light may fall upon this theory that will bring its simplicity forward
for scientific research. At present I can only compare it to some planet in a
dark space, where the light of the sun of science has not yet reached it. .
."
"I assume that sound, like
odour, is a real substance of unknown and wonderful tenuity, emanating from a
body where it has been induced by percussion and throwing out absolute
corpuscles of matter, inter-atomic particles, with velocity of 1,120 feet per
second; in vacuo 20,000. The substance which is thus disseminated is a part and
parcel of the mass agitated, and, if kept under this agitation continuously,
would, in the course of a certain cycle of time, become thoroughly absorbed by
the atmosphere; or, more truly, would pass through the atmosphere to an
elevated point of tenuity corresponding to the condition of sub-division that
governs its liberation from its parent body." . . .
"The sounds from vibratory
forks, set so as to produce etheric chords, while disseminating their tones
(compound), permeate most thoroughly all substances that come under the range
of their atomic bombardment. The clapping of a bell in vacuo liberates these
atoms with the same velocity and volume as one in the open air; and were the
agitation of the bell kept up continuously for a few millions of centuries it
would
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This also is the division, made by
the Occultists, under other names.
** Quite so, since there is the
seventh beyond, which begins the same enumeration, from the first to the last,
on another and higher plane.
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thoroughly return to its primitive element;
and, if the chamber were hermetically sealed, and strong enough, the vacuous
volume surrounding the bell would be brought to a pressure of many thousands of
pounds to the square inch, by the tenuous substance evolved. In my estimation,
sound truly defined is the disturbance of atomic equilibrium, rupturing actual
atomic corpuscles; and the substance thus liberated must certainly be a certain
order of etheric flow. Under these conditions, is it unreasonable to suppose
that, if this flow were kept up, and the body thus robbed of its element, it
would in time disappear entirely? All bodies are formed primitively from this
highly tenuous ether, animal, vegetable, and mineral, and they are only
returned to their high gaseous condition when brought under a state of
differential equilibrium." . . .
"As regards odour, we can only
get some definite idea of its extreme and wondrous tenuity by taking into
consideration that a large area of atmosphere can be impregnated for a long
series of years from a single grain of musk; which, if weighed after that long
interval, will be found to be not appreciably diminished. The great paradox
attending the flow of odorous particles is that they can be held under
confinement in a glass vessel! Here is a substance of much higher tenuity than
the glass that holds it, and yet it cannot escape. It is as a sieve with its
meshes large enough to pass marbles, and yet holding fine sand which cannot
pass through; in fact, a molecular vessel holding an atomic substance. This is
a problem that would confound those who stop to recognize it. But infinitely
tenuous as odour is, it holds a very crude relation to the substance of
sub-division that governs a magnetic flow (a flow of sympathy, if you please to
call it so). This sub-division comes next to sound, but is above sound. The
action of the flow of a magnet coincides somewhat to the receiving and
distributing portion of the human brain, giving off at all times a depreciating
ratio of the amount received. It is a grand illustration of the control of mind
over matter, which gradually depreciates the physical till dissolution takes
place. The magnet on the same ratio gradually loses its power and becomes
inert. If the relations that exist between mind and matter could be equated and
so held, we would live on in our physical state eternally, as there would be no
physical depreciation. But this physical depreciation leads, at its terminus,
to the source of a much higher development -- viz., the liberation of the pure
ether from the crude molecular; which, in my estimation, is to be much
desired." -- (From Mrs. Bloomfield-Moore's paper, "The New
Philosophy.")
It may be remarked that, save a few
small divergencies, no Adept nor Alchemist could have explained the above any
better, in the light of modern Science, however much the latter may protest
against the novel views. This is, in all its fundamental principles, if not
details, Occultism pure and simple, yet withal, modern natural philosophy as
well.
This "New Force," or
whatever Science may call it, the effects of which are undeniable -- admitted
by more than one naturalist and physicist who has visited Mr. Keely's
laboratory and witnessed personally its tremendous effects -- what is it? Is it
a "mode of motion," also, "in Vacuo," since there is no
matter to generate it except Sound -- another "mode of motion," no
doubt, a sensation caused like
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colour by vibrations? Fully as we
believe in these vibrations as the proximate -- the immediate -- cause of such
sensations, we as absolutely reject the one-sided scientific theory that there
is no factor to be considered as external to us, other than etheric or
atmospheric vibrations.*
There is a transcendental set of
causes put in motion -- so to speak -- in the occurrence of these phenomena,
which, not being in relation to our narrow range of cognition, can only be
traced to their source and their nature, and understood by the Spiritual
faculties of the Adept. They are, as Asclepios puts it to the King,
"incorporeal corporealities" -- such as "appear in the
mirror," and "abstract forms" that we see, hear, and smell, in
our dreams, and visions. What have the "modes of motion," light, and
ether to do with these? Yet we see, hear, and smell, and touch them, ergo they
are as much realities to us in our dreams, as any other thing on this plane of
Maya.
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XI.
ON THE ELEMENTS AND ATOMS.
FROM THE STAND-POINT OF SCIENCE AND
THAT OF OCCULTISM.
WHEN the Occultist speaks of
"Elements," and of human Beings who lived during those geological
ages, the duration of which it is found as impossible to determine, according
to the opinion of one of the best
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In this case the American
"Substantialists" are not wrong (though too anthropomorphic and
material in their views to be accepted by the Occultists) when arguing through
Mrs. M. S. Organ, M.D., that "there must be positive entitative properties
in objects which have a constitutional relation to the nerves of animal
sensations, or there can be no perception. No impression of any kind can be
made upon brain, nerve, or mind -- no stimulus to action -- unless there is an
actual and direct communication of a substantial force."
("Substantial" as far as it appears in the usual sense of the word in
this universe of illusion and MAYA, of course; not so in reality.) "That
force may be the most refined and sublimated immaterial Entity (?). Yet it must
exist; for no sense, element, or faculty of the human being can have a
perception, or be stimulated into action, without some substantial force coming
in contact with it. This is the fundamental law pervading the whole organic and
mental world. In the true philosophical sense there is no such thing as
independent action: for every force or substance is correlated to some other
force or substance. We can with just as much truth and reason assert that no
substance possesses any inherent gustatory property or any olfactory property
-- that taste and odour are simply sensations caused by vibrations; and hence
mere illusions of animal perceptions. . . ."
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English geologists*, as the nature of
matter, it is because he knows what he is talking about. When he says
"Man" and Elements, he neither means "man" in his present
physiological and anthropological form, nor the elemental atoms, those
hypothetical conceptions, the entitative abstractions of matter in its highly
attenuated state, as existing at present in scientific minds; nor, again, the
compound Elements of antiquity. In Occultism the word Element means
"rudiment" in every case. When we say "Elementary Man," we
mean either the proemial, incipient sketch of man, in its unfinished and undeveloped
condition, hence in that form which now lies latent in physical man during his
life-time, and takes shape only occasionally and under certain conditions; or
that form which for a time survives the material body, and which is better
known as an "Elementary."** With regard to "Element," when
the term is used metaphysically, it means, in distinction to the mortal, the
incipient divine man; and, in its physical usage, inchoate matter in its first
undifferentiated condition, or in the laya state, which is the eternal and the
normal condition of substance, differentiating only periodically, and is during
that differentiation in an abnormal state -- in other words, a transitory
illusion of the senses.
As to the "elemental
atoms," so called, the Occultists refer to them by that name with a
meaning analogous to that which is given by the Hindu to Brahma when he calls
him ANU, the "Atom." Every elemental atom, in search of which more
than one Chemist has followed the path indicated by the Alchemists, is, in
their firm belief (when not knowledge), a SOUL; not necessarily a disembodied
soul, but a jiva, as the Hindus call it, a centre of POTENTIAL VITALITY, with
latent intelligence in it, and, in the case of compound Souls -- an intelligent
active EXISTENCE, from the highest to the lowest order, a form composed of more
or less differentiations. It requires a metaphysician -- and an Eastern
metaphysician -- to understand our meaning. All those atom-Souls are
differentiations from the ONE, and in the same relation to it as the divine Soul
-- the Buddhi -- to its informing and inseparable Spirit, or Atman.
Modern physics, while borrowing from
the ancients their atomic theory, forgot one point, the most important of the
doctrine; hence they got only the husks and will never be able to get at the
kernel. They left behind, in the adoption of physical atoms, the suggestive
fact that
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In answer to a friend, that eminent
geologist writes: . . . ."I can only say, in reply to your letter, that it
is at present, and perhaps always will be, IMPOSSIBLE to reduce, even
approximately, geological time into years, or even into millenniums."
(Signed William Pengelly, F.R.S.)
** Plato speaking of the irrational,
turbulent Elements "composed of fire, air, water, and earth," means
Elementary Daemons. (See Timaeus.)
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from Anaxagoras down to Epicurus, the
Roman Lucretius, and finally even to Galileo, all those Philosophers believed
more or less in ANIMATED atoms, not in invisible specks of so-called
"brute" matter. Rotatory motion was generated in their views, by
larger (read, more divine and pure) atoms forcing downwards other atoms; the
lighter ones being thrust simultaneously upward. The esoteric meaning of this
is the ever cyclic curve downward and upward of differentiated elements through
intercyclic phases of existence, until each reaches again its starting point or
birthplace. The idea was metaphysical as well as physical; the hidden
interpretation embracing "gods" or souls, in the shape of atoms, as
the causes of all the effects produced on Earth by the secretions from the
divine bodies.* No ancient philosopher, not even the Jewish Kabalists, ever
dissociated Spirit from matter or vice versa. Everything originated in the ONE,
and, proceeding from the one, must finally return to the One. "Light
becomes heat, and consolidates into fiery particles; which, from being ignited,
become cold, hard particles, round and smooth. And this is called Soul,
imprisoned in its robe of matter;"** Atoms and Souls having been
synonymous in the language of the Initiates. The "whirling Souls,"
Gilgoolem, a doctrine in which so many learned Jews have believed (See
Mackenzie's Royal Masonic Cyclopaedia), had no other meaning esoterically. The
learned Jewish Initiates never meant by the "Promised land" Palestine
alone, but the same Nirvana as the learned Buddhist and Brahmin do -- the bosom
of the ETERNAL ONE, symbolized by that of Abraham, and by Palestine as its
substitute on Earth.*** The passage of the SOUL-ATOM "through the Seven
Planetary Chambers" had the same metaphysical and also physical meaning.
It had the latter when it was said to dissolve into Ether (See Isis Unveiled,
Vol. I., p. 297.) Even Epicurus, the model Atheist and materialist, knew and
believed so much in the ancient Wisdom, that he taught that the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Plato uses the words
"secretions" of turbulent Elements (Timaeus).
** Valentinus' Esoteric Treatise on
the Doctrine of Gilgul.
*** Surely no educated Jew ever
believed the literal sense of this allegory -- namely, that "the bodies of
Jews deposited in foreign lands contain within them a principle of Soul which
cannot rest, until by a process called the "whirling of the Soul" the
immortal particle reaches once more the sacred Soil of the "Promised
land." The meaning is evident to an occultist. The process was supposed to
be accomplished by a kind of metempsychosis, the psychic spark being conveyed
through bird, beast, fish, and the most minute insect. (See Royal Masonic
Cyclo. Mackenzie.) The Allegory relates to the atoms of the body, which have
each to pass through every form before all reach the final state, which is the
first starting point of the departure of every atom -- its primitive Laya
State. But the primitive meaning of Gilgoolem, or "Revolution of Souls,"
was the idea of the re-incarnating Souls or Egos. "All the Souls go into
the gilgoolah," into a cyclic or revolving process; i.e., they all proceed
on the cyclic path of re-births. Some Kabalists interpret this doctrine to mean
only a kind of purgatory for the souls of the wicked. But this is not so.
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Soul (entirely distinct from immortal
Spirit when the former is enshrined latent in it, as it is in every atomic
speck), was composed of a fine, tender essence, formed from the smoothest,
roundest, and finest atoms.
And this shows that the ancient
Initiates, who were followed more or less closely by all profane antiquity,
meant by the term "ATOM," a Soul, a Genius or Angel, the first-born
of the ever-concealed CAUSE of all causes; and in this sense their teachings
become comprehensible. They claimed, as do their successors, the existence of
Gods and Genii, angels or "demons," not outside, or independent of,
the Universal Plenum, but within it. Only this Plenum, during the life-cycles,
is infinite. They admitted and taught a good deal of that which modern Science
teaches now --namely, the existence of a primordial "World-stuff or Cosmic
Substance," from which worlds are formed, ever and eternally homogeneous,
except during its periodic existence, when it differentiates its universal
diffusion throughout infinite space; and the gradual formation of sidereal
bodies from it. They taught the revolution of the Heavens, the Earth's
rotation, the Heliocentric System, and the Atomic Vortices -- Atoms -- in
reality Souls and intelligences. But those "Atomists" were spiritual,
most transcendental, and philosophical Pantheists. It is not they who would
have ever conceived, or dreamt that monstrous contrasted progeny, the nightmare
of our modern civilized Race; namely -- inanimate material, self-guiding atoms,
on the one hand, and an extra-Cosmic God on the other.
It may be useful to show what, in the
teachings of the old Initiates, the Monad was, and what its origin.
Modern exact Science, as soon as it
began to grow out of its teens, perceived the great, and, to it, hitherto
esoteric axiom, that nothing -- whether in the spiritual, psychic, or physical
realm of being -- could come into existence out of nothing. There is no cause
in the manifested universe without its adequate effects, whether in space or
time; nor can there be an effect without its primal cause, which itself owes
its existence to a still higher one -- the final and absolute cause having to
remain to man for ever an incomprehensible CAUSELESS CAUSE. But even this is no
solution, and must be viewed, if at all, from the highest philosophical and
metaphysical standpoints, otherwise the problem had better be left
unapproached. It is an abstraction, on the verge of which human reason --
however trained to metaphysical subtleties -- trembles, threatening to
collapse. This may be demonstrated to any European who would undertake to solve
the problem of existence by the articles of faith of the true Vedantin, for
instance. Let him read and study the sublime teachings on the subject of Soul
and Spirit, of
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Sankaracharya (Viveka Chudamani)*,
and the reader will realize what is now said.
While the Christian is taught that
the human soul is a breath of God -- being created by him for sempiternal
existence, i.e., having a beginning, but no end (and therefore never to be
called eternal) -- the Occult teaching says, "Nothing is created, but is
only transformed. Nothing can manifest itself in this universe -- from a globe
down to a vague, rapid thought -- that was not in the universe already;
everything on the subjective plane is an eternal IS; as everything on the
objective plane is an ever becoming -- because transitory."
The monad -- a truly
"indivisible thing," as defined by Good, who did not give it the
sense we now do -- is here rendered as the Atma in conjunction with Buddhi and
the higher Manas. This trinity is one and eternal, the latter being absorbed in
the former at the termination of all conditioned and illusive life. The monad,
then, can be traced through the course of its pilgrimage and its changes of
transitory vehicles only from the incipient stage of the manifested Universe.
In Pralaya, or the intermediate period between two manvantaras, it loses its
name, as it loses it when the real ONE self of man merges into Brahm in cases
of high Samadhi (the Turiya state) or final Nirvana; "when the
disciple" in the words of Sankara, "having attained that primeval
consciousness, absolute bliss, of which the nature is truth, which is without
form and action, abandons this illusive body that has been assumed by the atma
just as an actor (abandons) the dress (put on)." For Buddhi (the
Anandamaya sheath) is but a mirror which reflects absolute bliss; and,
moreover, that reflection itself is yet not free from ignorance, and is not the
Supreme Spirit, being subject to conditions, being a spiritual modification of
Prakriti, and an effect; Atma alone is the one real and eternal substratum of
all -- the essence and absolute knowledge -- the Kshetragna.** It is called in
the Esoteric philosophy "the One Witness,"
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Translated for the Theosophist, by
Mohini M. Chatterji as "Crest Jewel of Wisdom," 1886. (See
Theosophist, July and August numbers).
** Now that the revised version of
the gospels has been published and the most glaring mistranslations of the old
versions are corrected, one will understand better the words in St. John v.,
vi., and vii.: "It is the Spirit that beareth witness because the Spirit
is the truth." The words that follow in the mistranslated version about
the "three witnesses," -- hitherto supposed to stand for "the
Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost" -- show the real meaning of the
writer (St. John) very clearly, thus still more forcibly identifying his
teaching in this respect with that of Sankaracharya. For what can the sentence,
"there are three who bear witness: the Spirit and the Water and the
Blood" -- mean, if they bear no relation to, or connection with, the more
philosophical statement of the great Vedanta teacher, who, speaking of the
sheaths (the principles in man) Jiva, Vignanamaya, etc., which are, in their
physical manifestation, "water and blood" or life, adds that atma
(spirit) alone is what remains after the [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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and, while it rests in Devachan, is
referred to as "the Three Witnesses to Karma."
Atma (our seventh principle) being
identical with the universal Spirit, and man being one with it in his essence,
what is then the Monad proper? It is that homogeneous spark which radiates in
millions of rays from the primeval "Seven;" -- of which seven further
on. It is the EMANATING spark from the UNCREATED Ray -- a mystery. In the
esoteric, and even exoteric Buddhism of the North, Adi Buddha (Chogi dangpoi
sangye), the One unknown, without beginning or end, identical with Parabrahm
and Ain-Soph, emits a bright ray from its darkness.
This is the Logos (the first), or
Vajradhara, the Supreme Buddha (also called Dorjechang). As the Lord of all
Mysteries he cannot manifest, but sends into the world of manifestation his
heart -- the "diamond heart," Vajrasattva (Dorjesempa). This is the
second logos of creation, from whom emanate the seven (in the exoteric blind
the five) Dhyani Buddhas, called the Anupadaka, "the parentless."
These Buddhas are the primeval monads from the world of incorporeal being, the
Arupa world, wherein the Intelligences (on that plane only) have neither shape
nor name, in the exoteric system, but have their distinct seven names in
esoteric philosophy. These Dhyani Buddhas emanate, or create from themselves,
by virtue of Dhyana, celestial Selves -- the super-human Bodhisattvas. These
incarnating at the beginning of every human cycle on earth as mortal men,
become occasionally, owing to their personal merit, Bodhisattvas among the Sons
of Humanity, after which they may re-appear as Manushi (human) Buddhas. The
Anupadaka (or Dhyani-Buddhas) are thus identical with the Brahminical
Manasaputra, "mind-born sons" -- whether of Brahma or either of the
other two Trimurtian Hypostases, hence identical also with the Rishis and
Prajapatis. Thus, a passage is found in Anugita, which, read esoterically,
shows plainly, though under another imagery, the same idea and system. It says:
"Whatever entities there are in this world, moveable or immoveable, they
are the very first to be dissolved (at pralaya); and next the developments
produced from the elements (from which the visible Universe is fashioned); and,
after these developments (evolved entities), all the elements. Such is the
upperward gradation among entities. Gods, Men, Gandharvas, Pisachas, Asuras,
Rakshasas, all have been created by Svabhava (Prakriti, or plastic nature), not
by actions, nor by a cause" -- i.e., not by any physical cause.
"These Brahmanas (the Rishi
Prajapati?), the creators of the world, are born here (on earth) again and
again. Whatever is produced from
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] subtraction of the sheaths and that it is the ONLY witness, or
synthesized unity. The less spiritual and philosophical school, solely with an
eye to a trinity made three witnesses out of "one," thus connecting
it more with earth than with heaven.
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them is dissolved in due time in
those very five great elements (the five, or rather seven, Dhyani Buddhas, also
called "Elements" of Mankind), like billows in the ocean. These great
elements are in every way beyond the elements that make up the world (the gross
elements). And he who is released even from these five elements (the
tanmatras)* goes to the highest goal." "The Lord Prajapati (Brahma)
created all this by the mind only," i.e., by Dhyana, or abstract
meditation and mystic powers like the Dhyani Buddhas (vide supra). Evidently
then, these "Brahmanas" are identical with the Bodhisattvas (the
terrestrial) of the heavenly Dhyani Buddhas. Both, as primordial, intelligent
"Elements," become the creators or the emanators of the monads destined
to become human in that cycle; after which they evolve themselves, or, so to
say, expand into their own selves as Bodhisattvas or Brahmanas, in heaven and
earth, to become at last simple men --"the creators of the world are born
here, on earth again and again" -- truly. In the Northern Buddhist system,
or the popular exoteric religion, it is taught that every Buddha, while
preaching the good law on earth, manifests himself simultaneously in three
worlds: in the formless, as Dhyani Buddha, in the World of forms, as a Bodhisattva,
and in the world of desire, the lowest (or our world) as a man. Esoterically
the teaching differs: The divine, purely Adi-Buddhic monad manifests as the
universal Buddhi (the Maha-buddhi or Mahat in Hindu philosophies) the
spiritual, omniscient and omnipotent root of divine intelligence, the highest
anima mundi or the Logos. This descends "like a flame spreading from the
eternal Fire, immoveable, without increase or decrease, ever the same to the
end" of the cycle of existence, and becomes universal life on the Mundane
Plane. From this Plane of conscious Life shoot out, like seven fiery tongues,
the Sons of Light (the logoi of Life); then the Dhyani-Buddhas of
contemplation: the concrete forms of their formless Fathers -- the Seven Sons
of Light, still themselves, to whom may be applied the Brahmanical mystic
phrase: "Thou art 'THAT' -- Brahm." It is from these Dhyani-Buddhas
that emanate their chhayas (Shadows) the Bodhisattvas of the celestial realms,
the prototypes of the super-terrestrial Bodhisattvas, and of the terrestrial
Buddhas, and finally of men. The "Seven Sons of Light" are also
called "Stars."
The star under which a human Entity
is born, says the Occult teaching, will remain for ever its star, throughout
the whole cycle of its incarnations in one Manvantara. But this is not his
astrological star. The latter is concerned and connected with the personality,
the former with
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Tanmatras are literally the
type or rudiment of an element devoid of qualities; but esoterically, they are
the primeval noumenoi of that which becomes in the progress of evolution a
Cosmic element in the sense given to the term in antiquity, not in that of
physics. They are the logoi, the seven emanations or rays of the logos.
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the INDIVIDUALITY. The
"Angel" of that Star, or the Dhyani-Buddha will be either the guiding
or simply the presiding "Angel," so to say, in every new rebirth of
the monad, which is part of his own essence, though his vehicle, man, may
remain for ever ignorant of this fact. The adepts have each their Dhyani-Buddha,
their elder "twin Soul," and they know it, calling it
"Father-Soul," and "Father-Fire." It is only at the last
and supreme initiation, however, that they learn it when placed face to face
with the bright "Image." How much has Bulwer Lytton known of this
mystic fact when describing, in one of his highest inspirational moods, Zanoni
face to face with his Augoeides?
The Logos, or both the unmanifested
and the manifested WORD, is called by the Hindus, Iswara, "the Lord,"
though the Occultists give it another name. Iswara, say the Vedantins, is the
highest consciousness in nature. "This highest consciousness," answer
the Occultists, "is only a synthetic unit in the world of the manifested
Logos -- or on the plane of illusion; for it is the sum total of Dhyan-Chohanic
consciousnesses." "Oh, wise man, remove the conception that
not-Spirit is Spirit," says Sankaracharya. Atma is not-Spirit in its final
Parabrahmic state, Iswara or Logos is Spirit; or, as Occultism explains, it is
a compound unity of manifested living Spirits, the parent-source and nursery of
all the mundane and terrestrial monads, plus their divine reflection, which
emanate from, and return into, the Logos, each in the culmination of its time.
There are seven chief groups of such Dhyan Chohans, which groups will be found
and recognised in every religion, for they are the primeval SEVEN Rays.
Humanity, occultism teaches us, is divided into seven distinct groups and their
sub-divisions, mental, spiritual, and physical.* The monad, then, viewed as
ONE, is above the seventh principle (in Kosmos and man), and as a triad, it is
the direct radiant progeny of the said compound UNIT, not the breath (and
special creation out of nihil) of "God," as that unit is called; for
such an idea is quite unphilosophical, and degrades Deity, dragging it down to
a finite, attributive condition. As well expressed by the translator of the
"Crest-Jewel of Wisdom" -- though Iswara is "God"
"unchanged in the profoundest depths of pralayas and in the intensest
activity of the manvantaras" . . ., still "beyond (him) is
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Hence the seven chief planets, the
spheres of the indwelling seven spirits, under each of which is born one of the
human groups which is guided and influenced thereby. There are only seven
planets (specially connected with earth), and twelve houses, but the possible
combinations of their aspects are countless. As each planet can stand to each
of the others in twelve different aspects, their combinations must, therefore,
be almost infinite; as infinite, in fact, as the spiritual, psychic, mental,
and physical capacities in the numberless varieties of the genus homo, each of
which varieties is born under one of the seven planets and one of the said
countless planetary combinations. See Theosophist, for August, 1886.
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'ATMA,' round whose pavilion is the
darkness of eternal MAYA."* The "triads" born under the same
Parent-planet, or rather the radiations of one and the same Planetary Spirit
(Dhyani Buddha) are, in all their after lives and rebirths, sister, or
"twin-souls," on this Earth.**
This was known to every high Initiate
in every age and in every country: "I and my Father are one," said
Jesus (John x. 30).*** When He is made to say, elsewhere (xx. 17): "I
ascend to my Father and your Father," it meant that which has just been
stated. It was simply to show that the group of his disciples and followers
attracted to Him belonged to the same Dhyani Buddha, "Star," or
"Father," again of the same planetary realm and division as He did.
It is the knowledge of this occult doctrine that found expression in the review
of "The Idyll of the White Lotus," when Mr. T. Subba Row wrote:
"Every Buddha meets at his last initiation all the great adepts who
reached Buddhahood during the preceding ages . . . every class of adepts has
its own bond of spiritual communion which knits them together. . . . . The only
possible and effectual way of entering into such brotherhood . . . . is by
bringing oneself within the influence of the Spiritual light which radiates
from one's own Logos. I may further point out here . . . . that such communion
is only possible between persons whose souls derive their life and sustenance
from the same divine RAY, and that, as seven distinct rays radiate from the
'Central Spiritual Sun,' all adepts and Dhyan Chohans are divisible into seven
classes, each of which is guided, controlled, and overshadowed by one of the
seven forms or manifestations of the divine Wisdom."
("Theosophist," Aug., 1886.)
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The now universal error of
attributing to the ancients the knowledge of only seven planets, simply because
they mentioned no others, is based on the same general ignorance of their
occult doctrines. The question is not whether they were, or were not, aware of
the existence of the later discovered planets; but whether the reverence paid
by them to the four exoteric and three secret great gods -- the star-angels,
had not some special reason. The writer ventures to say there was such a
reason, and it is this. Had they known of as many planets as we do now (and
this question can hardly be decided at present, either way), they would have
still connected with their religious worship only the seven, because these
seven are directly and specially connected with our earth, or, using esoteric
phraseology, with our septenary ring of spheres. (See supra.)
** It is the same, only still more
metaphysical idea, as that of the Christian Trinity -- "Three in One"
-- i.e., the Universal "over-Spirit," manifesting on the two higher
planes, those of Buddhi and Mahat; and these are the three hypostases,
metaphysical, but never personal.
*** The identity, and at the same
time the illusive differentiation of the Angel-Monad and the Human-Monad is
shown by the following sentences: "My Father is greater than I" (John
xiv. 26); "Glorify your Father who is in Heaven" (Matt. v. 16);
"The righteous will shine in the kingdom of their Father" (not our
Father) (Matt. xiii. 43) "Know ye not ye are a temple of God, and that the
Spirit of God dwelleth in you? (I Cor. iii. 16); "I ascend to my
Father," etc., etc.
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It is then the "Seven Sons of
Light" -- called after their planets and (by the rabble) often identified
with them -- namely Saturn, Jupiter, Mercury, Mars, Venus, and -- presumably
for the modern critic, who goes no deeper than the surface of old religions* --
the Sun and Moon, which are, according to the Occult teachings, our heavenly
Parents, or "Father," synthetically. Hence, as already remarked,
polytheism is really more philosophical and correct, as to fact and nature,
than anthropomorphic monotheism. Saturn, Jupiter, Mercury, and Venus, the four
exoteric planets, and the three others, which must remain unnamed, were the
heavenly bodies in direct astral and psychic communication with the Earth, its
Guides, and Watchers -- morally and physically; the visible orbs furnishing our
Humanity with its outward and inward characteristics, and their
"Regents" or Rectors with our Monads and spiritual faculties. In
order to avoid creating new misconceptions, let it be stated that among the
three secret orbs (or star-angels) neither Uranus nor Neptune entered; not only
because they were unknown under these names to the ancient Sages, but because
they, as all other planets, however many there may be, are the gods and
guardians of other septenary chains of globes within our systems.
Nor do the two last discovered great
planets depend entirely on the Sun like the rest of the planets. Otherwise, how
explain the fact that Neptune receives 900 times less light than our Earth, and
Uranus 390 times less, and that their satellites show a peculiarity of inverse
rotation found in no other planets of the Solar System. At any rate, what we
say applies to Uranus, though recently the fact begins again to be disputed.
This subject will, of course, be
considered mere vagary by all those who confuse the universal order of being
with their own systems of classification. Here, however, simple facts from
Occult teachings are stated, to be either accepted or rejected, as the case may
be. There are details which, on account of their great metaphysical
abstractions, cannot be entered upon. Hence, we merely state that only seven of
our planets are as intimately related to our globe, as the Sun is to all
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* These are planets accepted for
purposes of judicial astrology only. The astrotheogonical division differed
from this one. The Sun, being a central star and no planet, stands in more
occult and mysterious relations with its seven planets of our globe than is
generally known. The Sun was, therefore, considered the great Father of all the
Seven "Fathers," which accounts for the variations found between
seven and eight great gods of the Chaldean and other countries. Neither the
earth nor the moon -- its satellite -- nor yet stars, for another reason --
were anything else than substitutes for esoteric purposes. Yet, even with the
Sun and the Moon thrown out of the calculation, the ancients seem to have known
of seven planets. How many more are known to us, so far, if we throw out the
Earth and Moon? Seven, and no more: Seven primary or principal planets, the
rest planetoids rather than planets.
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the bodies subject to him in his
system. Of these bodies the poor little number of primary and secondary planets
known to astronomy, looks wretched enough, in truth.* Therefore, it stands to
reason that there are a great number of planets, small and large, that have not
been discovered yet, but of the existence of which ancient astronomers -- all
of them initiated adepts -- must have certainly been aware. But, as their
relation to the gods was sacred, it had to remain arcane, as also the names of
various other planets and stars.
Besides which, even the Roman
Catholic theology speaks of "seventy planets that preside over the
destinies of the nations of this globe"; and, save the erroneous
application, there is more truth in this tradition than in exact modern
astronomy. The seventy planets are connected with the seventy elders of the
people of Israel (Numb. 11, 16) because the regents of these planets are meant,
not the orbs themselves; and the word seventy is a play and a blind upon the 7
x 7 of the subdivisions. Each people and nation, as said already, has its
direct Watcher, Guardian and Father in Heaven -- a Planetary Spirit. We are
willing to leave their own national God, Jehovah, to the descendants of Israel,
the worshippers of Sabaoth or SATURN; for, indeed, the monads of the people
chosen by him are his own, and the Bible has never made a secret of it. Only
the text of the English (Protestant) Bible is, in disagreement, as usual, with
those of the Septuagint and the Vulgate. Thus, while in the former one reads
(in Deuter. xxxii., 8 and 9) "When the MOST HIGH (not Jehovah) divided to
the nations their inheritance . . . he set the bounds of the people according
to the number of the children of Israel," in the Septuagint the text reads
"according to the number of the Angels" (Planet-Angels), which is
more concordant with truth and fact. Moreover, all the texts agree that
"the Lord's (Jehovah) portion is his people; Jacob is the lot of his
inheritance" (Deut. xxxii. 9); and this settles the question. The
"Lord" Jehovah took for his portion Israel -- what have other nations
to do with that particular national Deity? Let then, the "angel
Gabriel" watch over Iran and "Mikael-Jehovah" over the Hebrews.
These are not the gods of other nations, and it is difficult to see why
Christians
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* When one remembers that under the
powerful telescope of Sir W. Herschell, that eminent astronomer, gauging merely
that portion of heaven in the equatorial plane, the approximate centre of which
is occupied by our Earth -- saw pass in one quarter of an hour, 16,000 stars;
and applying this calculation to the totality of the "Milky Way" he
found in it no less than 18 (eighteen) millions of SUNS -- one wonders no
longer that Laplace, in conversation with Napoleon I. should have called God a
HYPOTHESIS -- perfectly useless to speculate upon for exact physical Science,
at any rate. Occult metaphysics and transcendental philosophy will alone be
able to lift the smallest corner of the impenetrable veil in this direction.
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should have selected a god against
whose commandments Jesus was the first one to rise in rebellion.
The Planetary origin of the Monad
(Soul) and of its faculties was taught by the Gnostics. On its way to the
Earth, as on its way back from the Earth, each soul born in, and from, the
"Boundless Light,"* had to pass through the seven planetary regions
both ways. The pure Dhyani and Devas of the oldest religions had become, in
course of time, with the Zoroastrians, the Seven Devs, the ministers of
Ahriman, "each chained to his planet" (see Origen's Copy of the
Chart); with the Brahmins, the Asuras and some of its Rishis -- good, bad and
indifferent; and among the Egyptian Gnostics it was Thoth or (Hermes) who was
the chief of the seven whose names are given by Origen as Adonai, genius of the
Sun; Tao, of the Moon; Eloi, of Jupiter; Sabao, of Mars; Orai, of Venus;
Astaphai, of Mercury; and Ildabaoth (Jehovah), of Saturn. Finally, the
Pistis-Sophia, which the greatest modern authority on exoteric Gnostic beliefs,
the late Mr. C. W. King, refers to as "that precious monument of
Gnosticism," -- this old document echoes, while distorting it to sectarian
purposes, the archaic belief of the ages. The Astral Rulers of the Spheres (the
planets) create the monads (the Souls) from their own substance out of the
"tears of their eyes, and the sweat of their torments," endowing the
monads with a spark of the Divine Light, which is their substance. It will be
shown in Book II. why these "Lords of the Zodiac and Spheres" have
been transformed by sectarian theology into the rebellious angels of the
Christians, who took them from the Seven Devs of the Magi, without
understanding the significance of the allegory. (Vide Part II., "On the
Seven Souls," and Section xv. in this Part, "GODS, MONADS AND
ATOMS").
As usual, that which is and was from
its beginning divine, pure, and spiritual in its earliest unity, became, by
reason of its differentiation by the distorted prism of man's conceptions,
human and impure, as reflecting man's own sinful nature. Thus, in time, the
planet Saturn became reviled by the worshippers of other "gods." The
nations born under Saturn -- the Jewish, for instance -- with whom he had
become Jehovah, after having been held as a son of Saturn, or Ilda-Baoth, by
the Ophites, and in the book of Jasher -- were eternally fighting with those
born under Jupiter, Mercury, or any other planet, except Saturn-Jehovah;
genealogies and prophecies notwithstanding, Jesus the initiate (or Jehoshua) --
the type from whom the "historical" Jesus was
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* C. W. King, identifies it with
"that summum bonum of Oriental aspiration, the Buddhist Nirvana,"
perfect repose, the Epicurean Indolentia, which looks flippant enough in its
expression, though not quite untrue.
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copied -- was not of pure Jewish
blood, and thus recognised no Jehovah; nor did he worship any planetary god
beside his own "Father," whom he knew, and with whom he communed as
every high initiate does, "Spirit to Spirit and Soul to Soul." This
can hardly be taken exception to, unless the critic explains to every one's
satisfaction the strange sentences put in the mouth of Jesus by the author of
the Fourth Gospel (chapter viii.) during his disputes with the Pharisees.
"I know ye are Abraham's seed* .
. . I speak the things which I have seen with my Father; and ye do the things
which ye heard from your Father. . . . . Ye do the works of your Father. . . .
. Ye are of your Father, the Devil. . . . . He was a murderer from the
beginning, and stood not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When
one speaketh a lie he speaketh of his own; for his father also is a liar and
the father thereof," etc., etc.
That "Father" of the
Pharisees was Jehovah, because identical with Cain, Saturn, Vulcan, etc. -- the
planet under which they were born, and the God whom they worshipped. Evidently
there must be an occult meaning sought in these words and admonitions, however
mistranslated, since they are pronounced by one who threatened with hell-fire
anyone who says simply raca (fool) to his brother (Matthew v., 22). And
evidently, again, the planets are not merely spheres, twinkling in Space, and
made to shine for no purpose, but the domains of various beings with whom the
profane are so far unacquainted; nevertheless, having a mysterious, unbroken,
and powerful connection with men and globes. Every heavenly body is the temple
of a god, and these gods themselves are the temples of GOD, the Unknown
"Not Spirit." There is nothing profane in the Universe. All Nature is
a consecrated place, as Young says:--
"Each of these Stars is a
religious house." . . . .
Thus can all exoteric religions be
shown the falsified copies of the esoteric teaching. It is the priesthood which
has to be held responsible for the reaction in favour of materialism of our
day. It is by worshiping and enforcing on the masses the worship of the shells
-- personified for purposes of allegory -- of pagan ideals, that the latest
exoteric religion has made of Western lands a Pandemonium, in which the higher
classes worship the golden calf, and the lower and ignorant masses are made to
worship an idol with feet of clay.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Abraham and Saturn are identical in
astro-symbology, and he is the forefather of the Jehovistic Jews.
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XII.
ANCIENT THOUGHT IN MODERN DRESS.
MODERN SCIENCE IS ANCIENT THOUGHT
DISTORTED, and no more. We have seen, however, WHAT INTUITIONAL SCIENTISTS
THINK, and are busy about; and now the reader may be given a few more proofs of
the fact that more than one F.R.S. is unconsciously approaching the derided
Secret Sciences.
With regard to cosmogony and primeval
matter, modern speculations are undeniably ancient thought, improved by
contradictory theories of recent origin. But the whole foundation belongs to
Grecian and Indian Archaic astronomy and physics, in those days always called
philosophy. In all the Aryan and Greek speculations, one meets with the
conception of an all-pervading, unorganized, and homogeneous matter, or Chaos,
re-named by modern scientists "Nebular condition of the world-stuff."
What Anaxagoras called "Chaos" in his Homoiomeria is now called
"primitive fluid" by Sir W. Thomson. The Hindu and Greek Atomists --
Kanada, Leucippus, Democritus, Epicurus, Lucretius, etc., etc., are now
reflected as in a clear mirror, in the supporters of the atomic theory of our
modern days, beginning with Leibnitz's Monads, and ending with the
"Vortical Atoms" of Sir W. Thomson.* True, the corpuscular theory of
old is rejected, and the undulatory theory has taken its place. But the
question is, whether the latter is so firmly established as not to be liable to
be dethroned as was its predecessor? Light from its metaphysical aspect was
fully treated of in "Isis Unveiled":--
"Light is the first begotten,
and the first emanation of the Supreme, and Light is Life, says the Evangelist
and the Kabalist. Both are electricity -- the life principle, the anima mundi,
pervading the universe, the electric vivifier of all things. Light is the great
Protean magician, and under the divine will of the architect,** or rather the
architects, the "Builders" (called One collectively), its
multifarious, omnipotent waves gave birth to every form as well as to every
living being. From its swelling electric bosom, spring matter and spirit.
Within its beams lie the beginnings of all physical and chemical action, and of
all cosmic and spiritual phenomena; it vitalizes and disorganizes; it gives
life and produces death, and from its primordial point gradually emerged into existence
the myriads of worlds, visible and invisible celestial bodies. It was at the
ray of this First mother, one in three, that "God," according to
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* The Elemental Vortices inaugurated
by the Mind have not been improved by their modern transformation.
** I have been often taken to task
for using expressions in Isis denoting belief in a personal and anthropomorphic
God. This is not my idea. Kabalistically speaking, the "Architect" is
the generic name for the Sephiroth, the Builders of the Universe, as the
"Universal Mind" represents the collectivity of the Dhyan Chohanic
Minds.
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Plato, lighted a fire which we now
call the sun,"* and which is not the cause of either light or heat, but
merely the focus, or, as we might say, the lens, by which the rays of the
primordial light become materialised, are concentrate upon our Solar System,
and produce all the correlations of forces."
This is the Ether, as just explained
in the views of Metcalfe, repeated by Dr. Richardson, save the submission of
the former to some details of the modern undulatory theory. We do not say that
we deny the theory, but assert only that it needs completion and
re-arrangement. But the Occultists are by no means the only heretics in this
respect; for Mr. Robert Hunt, F.R.S., remarks, in his Researches on Light in
its Chemical Relations, that:--
. . . . "the undulatory theory
does not account for the results of his experiments. Sir David Brewster, in his
Treatise on Optics, showing 'that the colours of vegetable life arise . . . .
from a specific attraction which the particles of these bodies exercise over
the differently-coloured rays of light,' and that 'it is by the light of the
sun that the coloured juices of plants are elaborated, that the colours of
bodies are changed, etc. . . . .' remarks that it is not easy to allow 'that
such effects can be produced by the mere vibration of an ethereal medium.' And
he is forced, he says, 'by this class of facts, to reason as if light was
material (?).' Professor Josiah P. Cooke, of Harvard University, says that he
'cannot agree . . . . with those who regard the wave-theory of light as an
established principle of science.'** Herschell's doctrine, that the intensity
of light, in effect of each undulation, 'is inversely as the square of the
distance from the luminous body,' if correct, damages a good deal, if it does
not kill the undulatory theory. That he is right, was proved repeatedly by
experiments with photometers; and though it begins to be much doubted, the
undulatory theory is still alive." ("Isis Unveiled.")
To this remark of Sir W. Brewster --
"forced to reason as if light was material" -- there is a good deal
to reply. Light, in one sense, is certainly as material as electricity itself
is. And if electricity is not material, if it is only "a mode of
motion," how is it that it can be stored up in Faure's accumulators?
Helmholtz says that electricity must be as atomic as matter; and Mr. W.
Crookes, F.R.S., supported the view in his address to the Chemical Section of
the British Association, of which he was President (at Birmingham, 1886). This
is what Helmholtz says (in his Faraday Lectures, 1881):--
"If we accept the hypothesis
that the elementary substances are composed of atoms, we cannot avoid concluding
that electricity also, positive as well as negative, is divided into definite
elementary portions, which behave like atoms of electricity."
Here we have to repeat that which was
already said in Section IX: there is but one science that can henceforth direct
modern research into the one path which will lead to the discovery of the
whole, hitherto
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Timaeus."
** Modern Chemistry.
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occult, truth, and it is the youngest
of all -- chemistry, as it now stands reformed. There is no other, not excluding
astronomy, that can so unerringly guide scientific intuition, as chemistry can.
Two proofs of it are to be found in the world of Science -- two great chemists,
each among the greatest in his own country, and these are Mr. Crookes and the
late Professor Butlerof: one, a thorough believer in abnormal phenomena; the
other, as fervid a Spiritualist as he was great in natural Sciences. It becomes
evident that while pondering over the ultimate divisibility of matter, and in
the hitherto fruitless chase after the element of negative atomic weight, the
scientifically trained mind of the chemist must feel irresistibly drawn towards
those ever-shrouded worlds, to the mysterious beyond, whose measureless depths
seem to close against the approach of the too materialistic hand that would
fain draw aside its veil. "It is the unknown and the ever
unknowable," warns the Monist-Agnostic. Not so; answers the persevering
chemist:-- "We are on the track and are not daunted, and fain would we
enter the mysterious region which ignorance tickets unknown."*
A few lines at the very close of his
lecture on the Genesis of the Elements -- two or three sentences -- showed the
eminent Scientist to be on the royal road to the greatest discoveries. He has
been overshadowing for some time "the original protyle," and came to
the conclusion that "he who grasps the Key will be permitted to unlock
some of the deepest mysteries of creation." The protyle, as that great
chemist explains:--
". . . is a word analogous to
protoplasm, to express the idea of the original primal matter existing before
the evolution of the chemical elements. The word I have ventured to use for
this purpose is compounded of [[pro]] (earlier than) and [[hyle]] (the stuff of
which things are made). The word is scarcely a new coinage, for 600 years ago
Roger Bacon wrote in his Arte Chymiae, "The elements are made out of
[[hyle]] and every element is converted into the nature of another
element."
The Knowledge of Roger Bacon did not
come to this wonderful old magician** by inspiration, but because he studied
ancient works on
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Mr. Crookes' "Presidential
Address" at Birmingham. "There is but one unknown -- the ultimate
substratum of Spirit (Space). That which is not the Absolute and the One is, in
virtue of that very differentiation, however far removed from the physical
senses, always accessible to the spiritual human mind, which is a coruscation
of the undifferentiable Integral." -- (Practical Lessons on the Occult.)
** Thus, what the writer of the
present work said ten years ago in "Isis Unveiled" (Vol. I.) was
prophetic, it seems. These are the words: "Many of these mystics, by
following what they were taught by some treatises, secretly preserved from one
generation to another, achieved discoveries which would not be despised even in
our modern days of exact sciences. Roger Bacon, the friar, was laughed at as a
quack, and is now generally numbered among 'pretenders' to magic art; but his
discoveries were nevertheless accepted, and are now used by those who ridicule
him the most. Roger Bacon belonged by right, if not by fact, to that
Brotherhood which includes all those who [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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magic and alchemy, having a key to
the real meaning of words. But see what Mr. Crookes says of protyle, next
neighbour to the unconscious Mulaprakriti of the Occultists:--
. . . . . "Let us start at the
moment when the first element came into existence. Before this time, matter, as
we know it, was not. It is equally impossible to conceive of matter without
energy, as of energy without matter; from one point of view both are
convertible terms. Before the birth of atoms, all those forms of energy, which
become evident when matter acts upon matter, could not have existed* -- they
were locked up in the protyle as latent potentialities only. Coincident with
the creation of atoms, all those attributes and properties, which form the
means of discriminating one chemical element from another, start into existence
fully endowed with energy." (Presidential Address, p. 16.)
With every respect due to the great
knowledge of the lecturer, the Occultist would put it otherwise. They would say
that no atom is ever "created," for the atoms are eternal within the
bosom of the One Atom, -- "the atom of atoms" -- viewed during
Manvantara as the Jagad-Yoni the material causative womb of the world. Pradhana
(unmodified matter), that which is the first form of Prakriti, or material
visible, as well as invisible nature, and Purusha, spirit, are eternally one;
and they are Nirupadhi, (without adventitious qualities or attributes) only
during Pralaya, and when beyond any of the planes of consciousness of
existence. The atom, as known to modern science, is inseparable from Purusha,
which is spirit, but is now called "Energy" in Science. The protyle
atom has not been comminuted or subtilized: it has simply passed into that
plane, which is no plane, but the eternal state of everything beyond the planes
of illusion. Both Purusha and Pradhana are immutable and unconsumable, or
Aparinamin and Avyaya, in eternity; and both during the Mayavic periods may be
referred to as Vyaya and Parinamin, or that which can expand, pass away and
disappear, and is "modifiable." In this sense Purusha, must of course,
be held distinct in our conceptions from Parabrahmam. Nevertheless that, which
is called "energy" or "force" in Science and has been
explained as a dual Force by Metcalfe, is never, in fact, and cannot be energy
alone; for it is the substance of the world, its soul, the all-permeant
"Sarvaga," in conjunction with Kala "time." The three are
the trinity in one, during Manvantara, the all-potential Unity, which acts on
the plane of illusion (Maya) as three distinct things. In Orphic
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] study the occult sciences. Living in the thirteenth century, almost a
contemporary, therefore, of Albertus Magnus and Thomas Aquinas, his discoveries
-- such as gunpowder and optical glasses, and his mechanical achievements --
were considered by everyone as so many miracles. He was accused of having made
a compact with the Evil One."
* Just so; "those forms of
energy . . . which become evident . . ." in the laboratory of the chemist
and physicist; but there are other forms of energy wedded to other forms of
matter, -- which are supersensuous, yet known to the adepts.
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philosophy in Greece they were called
Phanes, Chaos, and Chronos -- the triad of the Occult philosophers of that
period.
But see how closely Mr. Crookes
brushes by the "Unknowable," and what "potentialities"
there are for the acceptance of Occult truths in his discoveries. He continues,
speaking of the evolution of atoms:--
". . . . Let us pause at the end
of the first complete vibration and examine the result. We have already found
the elements of water, ammonia, carbonic acid, the atmosphere, plant and animal
life, phosphorus for the brain, salt for the seas, clay for the solid earth . .
. phosphates and silicates sufficient for a world and inhabitants not so very
different from what we enjoy at the present day. True the human inhabitants
would have to live in a state of more than Arcadian simplicity, and the absence
of calcic phosphate would be awkward as far as the bone is concerned* . . . At
the lower end of our curve . . . we see a great hiatus . . . This oasis, and
the blanks which precede and follow it, may be referred with much probability
to the particular way in which our Earth developed into a member of our solar
system. If this be so, it may be that on our Earth only these blanks occur, and
not generally throughout the universe."
This justifies several assertions in
the Occult works.
Firstly, "that neither stars nor
the sun can be said to be constituted of those terrestrial elements with which
the chemist is familiar, though they are all present in the sun's outward robes
-- and a host more of elements so far unknown to science."
Secondly, that our globe has its own
special laboratory on the far-away outskirts of its atmosphere, crossing which,
every atom and molecule change and differentiate from their primordial nature.
And Thirdly, that though no element
present on our earth could ever be possibly found wanting in the sun, there are
many others which have either not reached, or not as yet been discovered on,
our globe. "Some may be missing in certain stars and heavenly bodies in
the process of formation; or, though present in them, these elements, on
account of their present state, may not respond as yet to the usual scientific
tests."** Mr. Crookes speaks of an element of still lower atomic weight
than hydrogen, an element purely hypothetical as far as our earth is concerned
. . . though existing in abundance in the chromosphere of the Sun -- the
helium. Occult Science adds that not one of the elements regarded by chemistry
as such really deserves the name.
Again we find Mr. Crookes speaking
with approbation of "Dr. Carnelly's weighty argument in favour of the
compound nature of the so-called elements, from their analogy to the compound
radicles! " Hitherto,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* It is just the existence of such
worlds in other planes of consciousness that is claimed by the Occultist. The
secret science teaches that the primitive race was boneless. (See Book II.);
and that there are (to us) invisible worlds, peopled as our own, besides the
populations of Dhyan Chohans.
** "Five Years of
Theosophy," p. 258 et seq.
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alchemy alone succeeded within the
historical periods, and in the so-called civilized countries, in obtaining a
real element, or a particle of homogeneous matter, the Mysterium Magnum of
Paracelsus. But then it was before Lord Bacon's day.*
". . . Let us now turn to the
upper portion of the scheme. With hydrogen of atomic weight = 1, there is
little room for other elements, save, perhaps, for hypothetical Helium. But
what if we get 'through the looking-glass,' and cross the zero line in search
of new principles -- what shall we find on the other side of zero? Dr. Carnelly
asks for an element of negative atomic weight; here is ample room and verge
enough for a shadow series of such unsubstantialities. Helmholtz says that
electricity is probably as atomic as matter; is electricity one of the negative
elements, and the luminiferous ether another? Matter, as we now know it, does
not here exist; the forms of energy which are apparent in the motions of matter
are as yet only latent possibilities. A substance of negative weight is not
inconceivable.** But can we form a clear conception of a body which combines
with other bodies in proportions expressible by negative qualities?"***
"A genesis of the elements such
as is here sketched out would not be confined to our little solar system, but
would probably follow the same general sequence of events in every centre of
energy now visible as a star."
"Before the birth of atoms to
gravitate towards one another, no pressure could be exercised; but at the
outskirts of the fire-mist sphere, within which all is protyle -- at the shell
on which the tremendous forces involved in the birth of a chemical element
exert full sway -- the fierce heat would be accompanied by gravitation
sufficient to keep the newly-born elements from flying off into space. As
temperature increases, expansion and molecular motion increase, molecules tend
to fly asunder, and their chemical affinities become deadened; but the enormous
pressure of the gravitation of the mass of atomic matter, outside what I may
for brevity call the birth-shell, would counteract the action of heat."
"Beyond the birth-shell would be
a space in which no chemical action could take place, owing to the temperature
there being above what is called the dissociation-point for compounds. In this
space the lion and the lamb would lie down together; phosphorus and oxygen
would mix without union; hydrogen and chlorine would show no tendency to closer
bonds; and even fluorine, that
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Says Mr. Crookes in the same
address: "The first riddle which we encounter in chemistry is: 'What are
the elements?' Of the attempts hitherto made to define or explain an element,
none satisfy the demands of the human intellect. The text books tell us that an
element is 'a body which has not been decomposed ''that it is 'a something to
which we can add, but from which we can take nothing,' or 'a body which
increases in weight with every chemical change.' Such definitions are doubly
unsatisfactory: they are provisional, and may cease to-morrow to be applicable
in any given case. They take their stand, not on any attribute of the things to
be defined, but on the limitations of human power: they are confessions of
intellectual impotence."
** And the lecturer quotes Sir George
Airy, who says (in Faraday's Life and Letters Vol. II., p. 354), "I can
easily conceive that there are plenty of bodies about us not subject to this
intermutual action, and therefore not subject to the law of gravitation."
*** The Vedantic philosophy conceives
of such; but then it is not physics, but metaphysics, called by Mr. Tyndall
"poetry" and "fiction."
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energetic gas which chemists have
only isolated within the last month or two, would float about free and
uncombined."
"Outside this space of free
atomic matter would be another shell, in which the formed chemical elements
would have cooled down to the combination point, and the sequence of events so
graphically described by Mr. Mattieu Williams in "The Fuel of the
Sun" would now take place, culminating in the solid earth and the
commencement of geological time" (p. 19).
This is, in a strictly scientific,
but beautiful language, the description of the evolution of the differentiated
Universe in the secret teachings. The learned gentleman closes his address in
words, every sentence of which is like a flash of light from beyond the dark
veil of materiality, hitherto thrown upon the exact sciences, and a step
forward towards the Sanctum Sanctorum of the Occult. (Vide § XV., "Gods,
Monads, and Atoms.") Thus he says:--
"We have glanced at the
difficulty of defining an element; we have noticed, too, the revolt of many
leading physicists and chemists against the ordinary acceptation of the term
element; we have weighed the improbability of their eternal existence,* or
their origination by chance. As a remaining alternative, we have suggested
their origin by a process of evolution like that of the heavenly bodies
according to Laplace, and the plants and animals of our globe according to
Lamarck, Darwin, and Wallace.** In the general array of the elements, as known
to us, we have seen a striking approximation to that of the organic world.*** In
lack of direct evidence of the decomposition of any element, we have sought and
found indirect evidence . . . . We have next glanced at the view of the genesis
of the elements; and lastly we have reviewed a scheme of their origin suggested
by Professor Reynold's method of illustrating the periodic classification**** .
. . Summing up all the above considerations we cannot,
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* In the form they are now, we
conceive?
** And to Kapila and Manu --
especially and originally.
*** Here is a scientific
corroboration of the eternal law of correspondences and analogy.
**** This method of illustrating the
periodic law in the classification of elements is, in the words of Mr. Crookes,
proposed by Professor Emerson Reynolds, of Dublin University, who . . . .
"points out that in each period, the general properties of the elements
vary from one to another, with approximate regularity until we reach the seventh
member, which is in more or less striking contrast with the first element of
the same period, as well as with the first of the next. Thus chlorine, the
seventh member of Mendeleef's third period, contrasts sharply with both sodium,
the first member of the same series, and with potassium, the first member of
the next series; whilst on the other hand, sodium and potassium are closely
analogous. The six elements, whose atomic weights intervene between sodium and
potassium, vary in properties, step by step, until chlorine, the contrast to
sodium, is reached. But from chlorine to potassium, the analogue of sodium,
there is a change in properties per saltum. . . . . If we thus recognise a
contrast in properties -- more or less decided -- between the first and the last
members of each series, we can scarcely help admitting the existence of a point
of mean variation within each system. In general the fourth element of each
series possesses the property we might expect a transition-element to exhibit.
. . . . Thus for the purpose of graphic translation, Professor Reynolds
considers that the fourth member of a period -- silicon, for example -- may be
placed at the apex of a symmetrical [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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indeed, venture to assert positively
that our so-called elements have been evolved from one primordial matter; but
we may contend that the balance of evidence, I think, fairly weighs in favour
of this speculation."
Thus inductive Science, in its
Branches of Astronomy, Physics, and Chemistry, while advancing timidly towards
the conquest of Nature's secrets in her final effects on our terrestrial plane,
recedes to the days of Anaxagoras and the Chaldees in its discoveries of (a)
the origin of our phenomenal world, and (b) the modes of formation of the
bodies that compose the universe. And having to turn back for their
cosmogonical hypotheses to the beliefs of the earliest philosophers, and the
systems of the latter -- systems that were all based on the teachings of a
universal secret doctrine with regard to the primeval matter with its
properties, functions, and laws, -- have we not the right to hope that the day
is not far off when Science will show a better appreciation of the wisdom of
the ancients than it has hitherto done?
No doubt Occult philosophy could
learn a good deal from exact modern science; but the latter, on the other hand,
might profit by ancient learning in more than one way, and chiefly in
Cosmogony. For
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] curve, which shall represent for that particular period, the direction
in which the properties of the series of elements vary with rising atomic
weights.
Now, the writer humbly confesses
complete ignorance of modern chemistry and its mysteries. But she is pretty
well acquainted with the Occult doctrine with regard to correspondences of
types and antitypes in nature, and perfect analogy as a fundamental law in
Occultism. Hence she ventures a remark which will strike every Occultist,
however it may be derided by orthodox Science. This method of illustrating the
periodic law in the behaviour of elements, whether or not still a hypothesis in
chemistry, is a law in Occult Sciences. Every well-read Occultist knows that
the seventh and fourth members -- whether in a septenary chain of worlds, the
septenary hierarchy of angels, or in the constitution of man, animal, plant, or
mineral atom -- that the seventh and fourth members, we say, in the
geometrically and mathematically uniform workings of the immutable laws of
Nature, always play a distinct and specific part in the septenary system. From
the stars twinkling high in heaven, to the sparks flying asunder from the rude
fire built by the savage in his forest; from the hierarchies and the essential
constitution of the Dhyan Chohans -- organized for diviner apprehensions and a
loftier range of perception than the greatest Western psychologist ever dreamed
of, down to Nature's classification of species among the humblest insects;
finally from worlds to atoms, everything in the universe, from great to small,
proceeds in its spiritual and physical evolution, cyclically and septennially,
showing its seventh and fourth number (the latter the turning point) behaving
in the same way as shown in that periodic law of atoms. Nature never proceeds
per saltum. Therefore, when Mr. Crookes remarks to this that he does not
"wish to infer that the gaps in Mendeleef's table, and in this graphic
representation of it (the diagram showing the evolution of atoms) necessarily
mean that there are elements actually existing to fill up the gaps; these gaps
may only mean that at the birth of the elements there was an easy potentiality
of the formation of an element which would fit into the place" -- an
Occultist would respectfully remark to him that the latter hypothesis can only
hold good, if the septenary arrangement of atoms is not interfered with. This
is the one law, and an infallible method that must always lead to success, one
who follows it.
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instance, the mystical signification,
alchemical and transcendental, of the many imponderable substances that fill
interplanetary space, and which, interpenetrating each, are the direct cause,
at the lower end, of the production of natural phenomena manifesting through
vibration (so-called). The knowledge of the real (not the hypothetical) nature
of Ether, or rather of the Akasa, and other mysteries, in short, can alone lead
to the knowledge of Forces. It is that substance against which the
materialistic school of the physicists rebels with such fury, especially in
France,* and which exact Science has to advocate notwithstanding. They cannot
make away with it without incurring the risk, like a modern Samson, of pulling
down the pillars of the Temple of Science, and getting buried under its roof.
The theories built upon the rejection
of Force outside and independent of Matter pure and simple, have been all shown
fallacious. They do not, and cannot, cover the ground, and many of the
scientific data are thus proved unscientific. "Ether produced Sound"
is said in the Puranas, and the statement is laughed at. It is the vibrations
in the air, we are corrected. And what is air? Could it exist if there were no
etheric medium in Space to buoy up its molecules? The case stands simply thus.
Materialism cannot admit the existence of anything outside matter, because with
the acceptance of an imponderable Force -- the source and head of all the
physical Forces -- other intelligent Forces would have to be admitted
virtually, and that would lead Science very far. For it would have to accept as
a sequel the presence in Man of a still more spiritual power -- entirely
independent, for once, of any kind of matter physicists know anything about.
Hence, apart from an hypothetical ether of Space and gross physical bodies, the
whole Sidereal and unseen Space is, in the sight of the materialists, one
boundless void in nature -- blind, unintelligent, useless.
And now the next question is: What is
that Cosmic Substance, and how far can one go to suspect its nature or to
wrench from it its secrets, and thus feel justified in giving it a NAME? How
far, especially, has modern Science gone in the direction of those secrets, and
what it is doing to solve them. The latest hobby of Science, the "Nebular
Theory," may afford us some answer to this question. Let us then examine
the credentials of the NEBULAR THEORY.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* A group of electricians has just
protested against the new theory of Clausius, the famous professor of the
University of Bonn. The character of the protest is shown in the signature,
which has "Jules Bourdin, in the name of the group of Electricians, which
had the honour of being introduced to Professor Clausius in 1881, and whose
war-cry (cri de ralliement) is A bas l'Ether" -- down with ether, even;
they want Universal Void, you see!
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XIII.
SCIENTIFIC AND ESOTERIC EVIDENCE FOR,
AND OBJECTIONS TO, THE MODERN NEBULAR THEORY.
OF late Esoteric Cosmogony has been
frequently opposed by the phantom of this theory and its ensuing hypotheses.
"Can this most scientific teaching be denied by your adepts?" it is
asked. "Not entirely," is the reply, "but the admissions of the
men of Science themselves kill it; and there remains nothing for the adepts to
deny."
To make of Science an integral whole
necessitates, indeed, the study of spiritual and psychic, as well as physical
Nature. Otherwise it will ever be like the anatomy of man, discussed of old by
the profane from the point of view of his shell-side and in ignorance of the
interior work. Even Plato, the greatest philosopher of his country, became
guilty, before his initiation, of such statements as that liquids pass into the
stomach through the lungs. Without metaphysics, as Mr. H. J. Slack says, real
science is inadmissible.
The nebulae exist; yet the nebular
theory is wrong. A nebula exists in a state of entire elemental dissociation.
It is gaseous and -- something else besides, which can hardly be connected with
gases, as known to physical science; and it is self-luminous. But that is all.
The sixty-two "coincidences" enumerated by Professor Stephen
Alexander,* confirming the nebular theory, may all be explained by esoteric
science; though, as this is not an astronomical work, the refutations are not
attempted at present. Laplace and Faye come nearer to the correct theory than
any; but of the speculations of Laplace there remains little in the present
theory except its general features. Nevertheless, "there is in Laplace's theory,"
says John Stuart Mill, "nothing hypothetical; it is an example of
legitimate reasoning from present effect to its past cause; it assumes nothing
more than that objects which really exist, obey the laws which are known to be
obeyed by all terrestrial objects resembling them." (System of Logic, p.
229).
This from such an eminent logician as
Mill was, would be valuable, if it could only be proved that "terrestrial
objects resembling . . ." celestial objects at such a distance as the
nebulae are -- resemble those objects in reality, not alone in appearance.
Another of the fallacies from the
Occult stand-point, which are embodied in the modern theory as it now stands,
is the hypothesis that the planets were all detached from the Sun; that they
are bone of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Smithsonian
Contributions," xxi., Art. 1, pp. 79-97.
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his bone, and flesh of his flesh;
whereas, the Sun and planets are only co-uterine brothers, having had the same
nebular origin, only in a different mode from that postulated by modern
astronomy.
The many objections raised against
the homogeneity of original diffuse matter, on the ground of the uniformity in
the composition of the fixed stars, by some opponents of the modern nebular
theory, do not affect the question of that homogeneity at all, but only the
said theory. Our solar nebula may not be completely homogeneous, or, rather, it
may fail to reveal itself as such to the astronomers, and yet be de facto
homogeneous. The stars do differ in their constituent materials and even
exhibit elements quite unknown on earth; nevertheless, this does not affect the
point that primeval matter -- i.e., as it appeared even in its first
differentiation from its laya condition* -- is yet to this day homogeneous, at
immense distances, in the depths of infinitude, and likewise at points not far
removed from the outskirts of our solar system.
Finally, there does not exist one
single fact brought forward by the learned objectors against the "nebular
theory," (false as it is, and hence, illogically enough, fatal to the
hypothesis of the homogeneity of matter,) that can withstand criticism. One
error leads into another. A false premise will naturally lead to a false
conclusion, although an inadmissible inference does not necessarily affect the
validity of the major proposition of the syllogism. Thus, one may leave every
side-issue and inference from the evidence of spectra, and lines, as simply
provisional for the present, and abandon all matters of detail to physical
science. The duty of the Occultist lies with the Soul and Spirit of Cosmic
Space, not merely with its illusive appearance and behaviour. That of official
physical science is to analyze and study its shell -- the Ultima Thule of the
Universe and man, in the opinion of Materialism.
With the latter, Occultism has nought
to do. It is only with the theories of such men of learning as Kepler, Kant,
Oersted, and Sir W. Herschell, who believed in a Spiritual world, that Occult
Cosmogony might treat, and attempt a satisfactory compromise. But the views of
those physicists differed vastly from the latest modern speculations. Kant and
Herschell had in their mind's eye speculations upon the origin and the final
destiny, as well as the present aspect, of the Universe, from a far more
philosophical and psychic standpoint; whereas modern Cosmology and Astronomy
now repudiate anything like research into the mysteries of being. The result is
what might be expected: complete failure and inextricable contradictions in the
thousand and one varieties of so-called scientific theories, and in this theory
as in all others.
The nebular hypothesis, involving the
theory of the existence of a
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* Beyond the zero-line of action.
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primeval matter, diffused in a
nebulous condition, is of no modern date in astronomy as everyone knows. Anaximenes,
of the Ionian school, had already taught that the sidereal bodies were formed
through the progressive condensation of a primordial pregenetic matter, which
had almost a negative weight, and was spread out through Space in an extremely
sublimated condition.
Tycho Brahe, who viewed the Milky Way
as an ethereal substance, thought the new star that appeared in Cassiopoeia, in
1572, had been formed out of that matter. ("Progymnasmata" p. 795.)
Kepler believed the star of 1606 had been likewise formed out of the ethereal
substance that fills the universe ("De stella nova in pede
Serpentarii," p. 115). He attributed to that same ether the apparition of
a luminous ring around the moon, during the total eclipse of the sun observed
at Naples in 1605. ("Hypotheses Cosmogoniques," C. Wolf.) Still
later, in 1714, -- the existence of a self-luminous matter was recognised by
Halley ("Philosophical Transactions"). Finally, the journal of this
name published in 1811 the famous hypothesis on the transformation of the
nebulae into stars, by the eminent astronomer, Sir W. Herschell (See
"Philosophical Transactions," of 1811, p. 269, et seq.), after which
the nebular theory was accepted by the Royal Academies.
In "Five years of
Theosophy," on p. 245, an article headed "Do the Adepts deny the
Nebular Theory?" may be read. The answer there given is "No; they do
not deny its general propositions, nor the approximative truth of the
scientific hypotheses. They only deny the completeness of the present, as well
as the entire error of the many so-called "exploded" old theories,
which, during the last century, have followed each other in such rapid
succession."
This was proclaimed at the time
"an evasive answer." Such disrespect to official science, it was
argued, must be justified by the presentation, to replace the orthodox
speculation, of another theory more complete than theirs, and having a firmer
ground to stand upon. To this there is but one reply; it is useless to give out
isolated theories with regard to things embodied in a whole and consecutive
system, which, when separated from the main body of the teaching, would
necessarily lose their vital coherence and thus do no good when studied
independently. To be able to appreciate and accept the occult views on the
nebular theory, one has to study the whole esoteric cosmogonical system. And
the time has hardly arrived for the astronomers to be asked to accept Fohat and
the divine Builders. Even the undeniably correct surmises of Sir W. Herschell],
that had nothing "supernatural" in them, about the sun being called
"globe of fire" (perhaps) metaphorically, and his early speculations
about the nature of that which is now called the Nasmyth willow-leaf theory --
caused that most eminent of all astro-
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nomers to be smiled at by other, far
less eminent colleagues, who saw and now see in his ideas only "imaginative
and fanciful theories." Before the whole esoteric system could be given
out and appreciated by the astronomers, they would have to return to some of
those "antiquated ideas," not only to those of Herschell, but to the
dreams of the oldest Hindu astronomers, and to abandon their own theories, none
the less "fanciful" because they have appeared in one case nearly 80
years and in the other many thousands of years later. Foremost of all they
would have to repudiate the ideas on the Sun's solidity and incandescence; the
sun "glowing" most undeniably, but not "burning." Then it
is stated, with regard to Sir W. Herschell's view that those
"objects," as he called the "willow leaves," are the
immediate sources of the solar light and heat. And though the esoteric teaching
does not regard these as he did -- namely, organisms as partaking of the nature
of life," for the Solar "Beings" will hardly place themselves
within telescopic focus -- yet it asserts that the whole Universe is full of
such "organisms," conscious and active according to the proximity or
distance of their planes to, or from, our plane of consciousness; and that
finally the great astronomer was right in saying that "we do not know that
vital action is competent to develop at once heat, light, and electricity"
while speculating on those supposed "organisms." For, at the risk of
being laughed at by the whole world of physicists, the Occultists maintain that
all the "Forces" of the Scientists have their origin in the Vital Principle,
the ONE LIFE collectively of our Solar system -- that "life" being a
portion, or rather one of the aspects of the One Universal LIFE.
We may, therefore, as in the article
under consideration, wherein, on the authority of the Adepts, it was maintained
that it is "sufficient to make a resume of what the solar physicists do
not know," -- we may, we maintain, define our position with regard to the
modern nebular theory and its evident incorrectness, by simply pointing out
facts diametrically opposed to it in its present form. And to begin with, what
does it teach?
Summarizing the aforesaid hypotheses,
it becomes plain that Laplace's theory -- now made quite unrecognisable,
moreover -- was an unfortunate one. He postulates in the first place Cosmic
matter, existing in a state of diffuse nebulosity "so fine that its
presence could hardly have been suspected." No attempt is made by him to
penetrate into the arcana of being, except as regards the immediate evolution
of our small solar system.
Consequently, whether one accepts or
rejects his theory in its bearing upon the immediate cosmological problems
presented for solution, he can only be said to have thrown back the mystery a
little further. To the eternal query -- "Whence matter itself; whence the
evolutionary impetus
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determining its cyclic aggregations
and dissolutions; whence the exquisite symmetry and order into which the
primeval atoms arrange and group themselves?" -- no answer is attempted by
Laplace. All we are confronted with, is a sketch of the probable broad
principles on which the actual process is assumed to be based. Well, and what
is this now celebrated note on the said process? What has he given so
wonderfully new and original, that its ground-work, at any rate, should have
served as a basis for the modern nebular theory? This is what one gathers from
various astronomical works.
Laplace thought that, consequent on
the condensation of the atoms of the primeval nebula, according to the
"Law" of gravity, the now gaseous, or perhaps, partially liquid mass,
acquired a rotatory motion. As the velocity of this rotation increased, it
assumed the form of a thin disc; finally, the centrifugal force overpowering
that of cohesion, huge rings were detached from the edge of the whirling
incandescent masses, contracting necessarily by gravitation (as accepted) into
spheroidal bodies, which would necessarily still continue to preserve the same
orbit occupied previously by the outer zone from which they were separated.
("Laplace conceived that the external and internal zones of the ring would
rotate with the same angular velocity, which would be the case with a solid
ring; but the principle of equal areas requires the inner zones to rotate more
rapidly than the outer.")* The velocity of the outer edge of each nascent
planet, he said, exceeding that of the inner, there results a rotation on its
axis. The more dense bodies would be thrown off last; and finally, during the
preliminary state of their formation, the newly-segregated orbs in their turn
throw off one or more satellites . . . In formulating the history of the
rupture and planetation of rings, Laplace says:
"Almost always each ring of
vapours must have broken up into numerous masses, which, moving with a nearly
uniform velocity, must have continued to circulate at the same distance around
the Sun. These masses must have taken a spheroidal form with a motion of
rotation in the same direction as their revolution, since the inner molecules
(those nearer to the Sun) would have less actual velocity than the exterior
ones. They must then have formed as many planets in a state of vapour. But, if
one of them was sufficiently powerful to unite successively, by its attraction,
all the others around its centre, the ring of vapours must have been thus
transformed into a single spheroidal mass of vapours circulating around the Sun
with a rotation in the same direction as its revolution. The latter case has
been the more common, but the solar system presents us the first case, in the
four small planets which move between Jupiter and Mars."
While few will be found to deny
"the magnificent audacity of this
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* "World-Life." Prof.
Winchell points to a good many mistakes of Laplace in his work; but as a
geologist he is not infallible himself in his "astronomical speculations."
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hypothesis," it is impossible
not to recognise the insurmountable difficulties with which it is attended.
Why, for instance, do we find that the satellites of Neptune and Uranus display
a retrograde motion; that, in spite of its closer proximity to the Sun, Venus
is less dense than the Earth? Similarly, the more distant Uranus is more dense
than Saturn? How is it that so many variations in the inclination of their axes
and orbits are present in the supposed progeny of the central orb; that such
startling variations in the size of the planets is noticeable; that the Satellites
of Jupiter are more dense by .288 than their primary -- that the phenomena of
meteoric and cometic systems still remain unaccounted for? To quote the words
of a Master: "They (the Occultists) find that the centrifugal theory of
Western birth is unable to cover all the ground. That, unaided, it can neither
account for every oblate spheroid, nor explain away such evident difficulties
as are presented by the relative density of some planets. How, indeed, can any
calculation of centrifugal force explain to us, for instance, why Mercury,
whose rotation is, we are told, only about one-third that of the Earth, and its
density only about one-fourth greater than the Earth, should have a polar
compression more than ten times as great as the latter? And again, why Jupiter,
whose equatorial rotation is said to be 'twenty-seven times greater, and its
density only about one-fifth that of the earth' should have its polar
compression seventeen times greater than that of the earth? Or why Saturn, with
an equatorial velocity fifty-five times greater than Mercury for centripetal
force to contend with, should have its polar compression only three times
greater than Mercury's? To crown the above contradictions, we are asked to
believe in the Central Forces, as taught by Modern Science, even when told that
the equatorial matter of the Sun, with more than four times the centrifugal
velocity of the Earth's equatorial surface, and only about one-fourth part of
the gravitation of the equatorial matter, has not manifested any tendency to
bulge at the Solar equator, nor shown the least flattening of the poles of the
Solar axis. In other and clearer words, the Sun, with only one fourth of our
Earth's density for the centrifugal force to work upon, has no polar
compression at all! We find this objection made by more than one astronomer,
yet never explained away satisfactorily so far as the 'Adepts' are aware."
"Therefore, do they (the Adepts)
say, that the great men of science of the West, knowing . . . . . next to
nothing either about cometary matter, centrifugal and centripetal forces, the
nature of the nebulae, or the physical constitution of the Sun, the Stars, or
even the Moon, are imprudent to speak as confidently as they do about the
'central mass of the Sun' whirling out into space planets, comets, and what not
. . . ." "We maintain that it (the Sun) evolves out only the
life-principle, the
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Soul of those bodies, giving and
receiving it back, in our solar system, as the 'Universal Life-Giver' . . . .
in infinitude and Eternity; that the solar system is as much the microcosm of
the ONE Macrocosm as man is the former when compared with his own little Solar
Cosmos."*
The essential faculty possessed by
all the cosmic and terrestrial elements, of generating within themselves a
regular and harmonious series of results, a concatenation of causes and
effects, is an irrefutable proof that they are either animated by an extra or
intra INTELLIGENCE, or conceal such within or behind the manifested veil.
Occultism does not deny the certainty of the mechanical origin of the Universe;
it only claims the absolute necessity of mechanicians of some sort behind those
Elements (or within) -- a dogma with us. It is not the fortuitous assistance of
the atoms of Lucretius, who himself knew better, that built the Kosmos and all
in it. Nature herself contradicts such a theory. Celestial space, containing
matter so attenuated as is Ether, cannot be called on, with or without
attraction, to explain the common motion of the sidereal hosts. Although the
perfect accord of their mutual revolution indicates clearly the presence of a
mechanical cause in Nature, Newton, who of all men had best right to trust to
his deductions and views, was nevertheless forced to abandon the idea of ever
explaining, by the laws of known Nature and its Material forces, the original
impulse given to the millions of orbs. He recognised fully the limits that
separate the action of natural Forces from that of the INTELLIGENCES that set
the immutable laws into order and action. And if a NEWTON had to renounce such
hope, which of the modern materialistic pigmies has the right of saying:
"I know better"?
To become complete and
comprehensible, a cosmogonical theory has to start with a primordial Substance
diffused throughout boundless Space, of an intellectual and divine Nature. That
substance must be the Soul and Spirit, the Synthesis and Seventh Principle of
the manifested Kosmos, and, to serve as a spiritual Upadhi to this, there must
be the sixth, its vehicle -- primordial physical matter, so to speak, though
its nature must escape for ever our limited normal senses. It is easy for an
astronomer, if endowed with an imaginative faculty, to build a theory of the
emergence of the universe out of chaos, by simply applying to it the principles
of mechanics. But such a universe will always prove, with respect to its scientific
human creator, a Frankenstein's monster; it will lead him into endless
perplexities. The application of the mechanical laws only can never carry the
speculator beyond the objective world; nor will it unveil to men the origin and
final destiny of Kosmos. This is
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "Five Years of
Theosophy," pp. 249-50. Art. "Do the Adepts deny the Nebular
Theory?"
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whither the nebular theory has led
Science. In sober fact and truth this theory is twin sister to that of Ether,
and both are the offsprings of necessity; one as indispensable to account for
the transmission of light, as the other to explain the problem of the origin of
the solar systems. The question with them is, how the same homogeneous matter*
could, obeying the laws of Newton, give birth to bodies -- sun, planets, and
their satellites -- subject to conditions of identity of motion and formed of
such heterogeneous elements.
Has the nebular theory helped to
solve the problem, even if applied solely to bodies considered as inanimate and
material? We say most decidedly not. What progress has it made since 1811, when
Sir W. Herschell's paper, first presenting facts based on observation and
showing the existence of nebular matter, made the "Sons" of the Royal
Society "shout for joy"? Since then a still greater discovery has permitted,
through spectrum analysis, the verification and corroboration of Sir W.
Herschell's conjecture. Laplace demanded some kind of primitive "world
stuff " to prove the idea of progressive world-evolution and growth. Here
it is, as offered two millenniums ago.
The "world stuff," now
nebulae, was known from the highest antiquity. Anaxagoras taught that, having
differentiated, the subsequent commixture of heterogeneous substances remained
motionless and unorganized, until finally "the Mind" -- the collective
body of Dhyan Chohans, we say -- began to work upon and communicated to it
motion and order (Aristotle's "Physica," viii, 1.) The theory is now
taken up in its first portion, that of any "Mind" interfering with it
being rejected. Spectrum analysis reveals the existence of nebulae formed
entirely of gases and luminous vapours. Is this the primitive nebular matter?
The spectra reveal, it is said, the physical conditions of the matter which
emits cosmic light. The spectra of the resolvable and the irresolvable nebulae
are shown to be entirely different, the spectra of the latter showing their
physical state to be that of glowing gas or vapour. The bright lines of one
nebula reveal the existence of hydrogen in it, and of other material substances
known and unknown. The same in the atmospheres of the Sun and stars. This leads
to the direct inference that a star is formed by the condensation of a nebula;
hence that even the metals themselves on earth are
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Had astronomers held simply, in
their present state of knowledge, to the hypothesis of Laplace, which was
simply the formation of the planetary system, it might in time have resulted in
something like an approximate truth. But the two parts of the general problem,
that of the formation of the universe, or the formation of the suns and stars
from the primitive matter, and then the development of the planets around their
sun, rest on quite different facts in nature and are even so viewed by Science
itself. They are at the opposite poles of being.
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formed owing to the condensation of
hydrogen or some other primitive matter, some ancestral cousin to
"helium," perhaps, or some yet unknown stuff? This does not clash
with the occult teachings. And this is the problem that chemistry is trying to
solve; and it must succeed sooner or later in the task, accepting nolens
volens, when it does, the esoteric teaching. But when this does happen, it will
kill the nebular theory as it now stands.
Meanwhile Astronomy cannot accept in
any way, if it is to be regarded as an exact science, the present theory of the
filiation of stars -- even if occultism does so in its own way, as it explains
this filiation differently -- because astronomy has not one single physical
datum to show for it. Astronomy could anticipate Chemistry in proving the
existence of the fact, if it could show a planetary nebula exhibiting a
spectrum of three or four bright lines, gradually condensing and transforming
into a star, with a spectrum all covered with a number of dark lines. But
"the question of the variability of the nebula, even as to their form, is
yet one of the mysteries of Astronomy. The data of observation possessed so far
are of too recent an origin, too uncertain to permit us to affirm
anything." (Cosmogonical Hypotheses of Wolf.)
Since the discovery of the
spectroscope, its magic power has revealed to its adepts only one single
transformation of a star of this kind; and even that one showed directly the
reverse of what is needed as proof in favour of the nebular theory; namely -- a
star transforming itself into a planetary nebula. As told in The Observatory
(Vol. I., p. 185), the temporary star which appeared in the constellation
Cygnus, in November, 1876, discovered by J. F. J. Schmidt, exhibited a spectrum
broken by very brilliant lines. Gradually, the continuous spectrum and most of
the lines disappeared, leaving finally one single brilliant line, which
appeared to coincide with the green line of the nebula.
Though this metamorphosis is not
irreconcileable with the hypothesis of the nebular origin of the stars,
nevertheless this single solitary case rests on no observation whatever, least
of all on direct observation. The occurrence may have been due to several other
causes. Since astronomers are inclined to think our planets are tending toward
precipitation on the Sun, why should not that star have blazed out owing to a
collision of such precipitated planets, or, as many suggest, the appulse of a
comet? Anyhow, the only known instance of a star transformation since 1811 is
not favourable to the nebular theory. Moreover, on the question of this theory,
as in all others, astronomers disagree.
In our own age, it was Buffon, before
Laplace ever thought of it, who, very much struck by the identity of motion in
the planets, was the first to propose the hypothesis of the planets and their
satellites originating in
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the bosom of the Sun. Forthwith, and
for the purpose, he invented a special comet, supposed to have torn out, by a
powerful oblique blow, the quantity of matter necessary to their formation.
Laplace gave its dues to the "comet" in his "Exposition du Systeme
du Monde." (Note VII.) But the idea was seized and even improved upon by a
conception of the alternate evolution from the Sun's central mass of planets
apparently without weight or influence on the motion of the visible planets --
and as evidently without any more existence than the likeness of Moses in the
moon.
But the modern theory is also a
variation on the systems elaborated by Kant and Laplace. The idea of both was
that, at the origin of things, all that matter which now enters into the composition
of the planetary bodies was spread over all the space comprised in the solar
system -- and even beyond. It was a nebula of extremely small density, whose
condensation gradually gave birth, by a mechanism that has hitherto never been
explained, to the various bodies of our systems. This is the original nebular
theory, an incomplete yet faithful repetition -- a short chapter out of the
large volume of universal esoteric cosmogony -- of the teachings in the Secret
Doctrine. And both systems, Kant's and Laplace's, differ greatly from the
modern theory, redundant with conflicting sub-theories and fanciful hypotheses.
"The essence of cometary matter
and of that which composes the stars is totally different from any of the
chemical or physical characteristics with which Western Science is now
acquainted. While the spectroscope has shown the probable similarity (owing to
the chemical action of terrestrial light upon the intercepted rays) of earthly
and sidereal substance, the chemical actions, peculiar to the variously
progressed orbs of space, have not been detected, nor proven to be identical
with those observed on our own planet" -- say the Teachers (op. cit.). Mr.
Crookes says almost the same in the fragment quoted from his lecture,
"Elements and Meta-Elements."
"At the utmost," observes
C. Wolf,* "could the nebular hypothesis show in its favour, with W.
Herschell, the existence of planetary nebulae in various degrees of
condensation, and of spiral nebulae, with nuclei of condensation on the branches
and centre.** But, in fact, the knowledge of the bond that unites the nebulae
to the stars is yet denied to us; and lacking as we do direct observation, we
are even debarred from establishing it even on the analogy of chemical
composition."
It is evident that, even if the men
of science, leaving aside the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Member of the Institute, Astronomer
of the Observatory, Paris, "Cosmogonical Hypotheses."
** But the spectra of these nebulae
have never yet been ascertained. When they are found with bright lines, then
only may they be cited.
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difficulty arising for them out of
such undeniable variety and heterogeneity of matter in the constitution of
nebulae, did admit, with the ancients, that the origin of all the visible and
invisible heavenly bodies must be sought for in one primordial homogeneous
world-stuff, in a kind of PRE-protyle,* -- it is evident that this would not
put an end to their perplexities. Unless they admit also that our actual
visible Universe is merely the Sthula-Sharira, the gross body, of the sevenfold
Kosmos, they will have to face another problem; especially if they risk
maintaining that its now visible bodies are the result of the condensation of
that one and single primordial matter. For mere observation shows them that the
actions which produced the actual Universe are far more complex than could ever
be embraced in that theory.
First of all, there are two distinct
classes of irresolvable nebulae, -- as Science itself teaches.
The telescope is unable to
distinguish between the two, but the spectroscope can, and notices, therefore,
an essential difference between their physical constitutions.**
"Some of these," Wolf tells
us, "have a spectrum of three or four bright lines, others a continuous
spectrum. The first are gaseous, the others formed of a pulverulent matter. The
former must constitute a veritable atmosphere: it is among these that the solar
nebula of Laplace has to be placed. The latter form an ensemble of particles
that may be considered as independent, and the rotation of which obeys the laws
of
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Mr. Crookes' "Protyle"
must not be regarded as the primary stuff, out of which the Dhyan Chohans, in
accordance with the immutable laws of nature, wove our solar system. This
protyle cannot even be the first prima-materia of Kant, which that great mind
saw used up in the formation of the worlds, and thus existing no longer in a
diffused state. It is a MEDIATE phase in the progressive differentiation of
cosmic substance from its normal undifferentiated state. Protyle is then the
aspect assumed by matter in its middle passage into full objectivity.
** "The question of the
resolvability of the nebulae has been often presented in too affirmative a
manner and quite contrary to the ideas expressed by the illustrious
experimenter with the spectra of these constellations -- Mr. Huggins. Every
nebula whose spectrum contains only bright lines is gaseous, it is said, and
hence is irresolvable; every nebula with a continuous spectrum must end by
resolving into stars with an instrument of sufficient power. This assumption is
contrary at once to the results obtained, and to spectroscopic theory. The Lyra
nebula, the Dumb-bell nebula, the central region of the nebula of Orion, appear
resolvable, and show a spectrum of bright lines; the nebula of Canis Venatici
is not resolvable, and gives a continuous spectrum. Because, indeed, the
spectroscope informs us of the physical state of the constituent matter of the
stars, but affords us no notions of their modes of aggregation. A nebula formed
of gaseous globes (or even of nuclei, faintly luminous, surrounded by a
powerful atmosphere) would give a spectrum of lines and be still resolvable;
such seems to be the state of Huggins' region in the Orion nebula. A nebula
formed of solid or fluidic particles in a state of incandescence, a true cloud,
will give a continuous spectrum but will be irresolvable." (C. Wolf,
Cosmogonical Hypotheses.)
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internal weight: such are the nebulae
adopted by Kant and Faye. Observation allows us to place the one as the other
at the very origin of the planetary world. But when we try to go beyond and
ascend to the primitive chaos which has produced the totality of the heavenly
bodies, we have first to account for the actual existence of these two classes
of nebulae. If the primitive chaos were a cold luminous gas,* one could
understand how the contraction resulting from attraction could have heated it
and made it luminous. We have to explain the condensation of this gas to the
state of incandescent particles, the presence of which is revealed to us in
certain nebulae by the spectroscope. If the original chaos was composed of such
particles, how did certain of their portions pass into the gaseous state, while
others have preserved their primitive condition? . . . ."
Such is the synopsis of the
objections and difficulties to the acceptance of the nebular theory brought
forward by the French savant, who concludes his interesting chapter by
declaring that:--
"The first part of the
Cosmogonical problem, -- what is the primitive matter of chaos; and how did
that matter give birth to the sun and stars? -- thus remains to this day in THE
DOMAIN OF ROMANCE AND OF MERE IMAGINATION."**
If this is the last word of Science
upon that subject, whither then should one turn in order to learn what the nebular
theory is supposed to teach? What, in fact, is this theory? What it is, no one
seems to know for a certainty. What it is not -- we learn from the erudite
author of the "World-Life." He tells us that:--
(I.) It "is not a theory of the
evolution of the Universe . . . but only and primarily a genetic explanation of
the phenomena of the solar system, and accessorily a co-ordination of the
principal phenomena in the stellar and nebular firmament, as far as human vision
has been able to penetrate."
(II.) "That it does not regard
the Comets as involved in that particular evolution which has produced the
solar system." (Esoteric doctrine does.)
(It does, because it, too, recognises
the comets as forms of cosmic existence co-ordinated with earlier stages of
nebular evolution; and it actually assigns to them chiefly the formation of all
worlds.)
(III.) "That it does not deny an
antecedent history of the luminous fire mist" -- (the secondary stage of
evolution in the Secret Doctrine) . . . . "and makes no claim to having
reached an absolute beginning." And even
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* See Stanza III. about "Light,
or the cold Flame," and Commentary Number 8, where it is explained that
the "mother" (Chaos) is a cold Fire, a cool Radiance, colourless,
formless, devoid of every quality. "Motion is the One Eternal is, and
contains the potentialities of every quality in the Manvantaric Worlds,"
it is said.
** Hypotheses Cosmogoniques, C. Wolf,
1886.
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it allows that this "fire mist
may have previously existed in a cold, nonluminous and invisible
condition" . . . .
(IV.) "And that finally: it does
not profess to discover the ORIGIN of things, but only a stadium in material
history" . . . . leaving "the philosopher and theologian as free as
they ever were to seek for the origin of the modes of being."*
But this is not all. Even the
greatest philosopher of England -- Mr. Herbert Spencer -- arrayed himself
against the fantastic theory by saying that (a) "The problem of existence
is not resolved" by it; (b) the nebular hypothesis "throws no light
upon the origin of diffused matter," and (c) that "the nebular
hypothesis (as it now stands) implies a First Cause."**
The latter, we are afraid, is more
than our modern physicists have bargained for. Thus, it seems that the poor
"hypothesis" can hardly expect to find help or corroboration even in
the world of the metaphysicians.
Considering all this, the Occultists
believe they have a right to present their philosophy, however misunderstood
and ostracised it may be at present. And they maintain that this failure of the
scientists to discover the truth is entirely due to their materialism and
contempt for transcendental sciences. Yet although the scientific minds in our
century are as far from the true and correct doctrine of Evolution as ever,
there may be still some hope left for the future, as we find another great
scientist giving us a faint glimmer of it.
In an article in Popular Science
Review (Vol. XIV., p. 252) on "Recent Researches in Minute Life," we
find Mr. H. J. Slack, F.C.S., Sec. R.M.S., saying: "There is an evident
convergence of all sciences, from physics to chemistry and physiology, toward
some doctrine of evolution and development, of which the facts of Darwinism
will form part, but what ultimate aspect this doctrine will take, there is
little, if any, evidence to show, and perhaps it will not be shaped by the
human mind until metaphysical as well as physical inquiries are much more
advanced."
This is a happy forecast indeed. The
day may come, then, when the "Natural Selection," as taught by Mr.
Darwin and Mr. Herbert Spencer, will form only a part, in its ultimate
modification, of our Eastern doctrine of Evolution, which will be Manu and
Kapila esoterically explained.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "World-Life," p. 196.
** Westminster Review, XX., July 27,
1868.
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XIV.
FORCES -- MODES OF MOTION OR
INTELLIGENCES?
THIS is, then, the last word of
physical science up to the present year, 1888. Mechanical laws will never be
able to prove the homogeneity of primeval matter, except inferentially and as a
desperate necessity, when there will remain no other issue -- as in the case of
Ether. Modern Science is secure only in its own domain and region; within the
physical boundaries of our solar system, beyond which everything, every
particle of matter, is different from the matter it knows: which matter exists
in states of which Science can form no idea. That matter, which is truly
homogeneous, is beyond human perceptions, if perception is tied down merely to
the five senses. We feel its effects through those INTELLIGENCES which are the
results of its primeval differentiation, whom we name Dhyan-Chohans; called in
the Hermetic works the "Seven Governors," those to whom Pymander, the
"Thought Divine," refers as the Building Powers, and whom Asklepios
calls the "Supernal Gods." That matter -- the real primordial
substance, the noumenon of all the "matter" we know of, -- even some
of the astronomers have been led to believe in, and to despair of the
possibility of ever accounting for rotation, gravitation, and the origin of any
mechanical physical laws -- unless these Intelligences be admitted by Science.
In the abovequoted work upon astronomy, by Wolf,* the author endorses fully the
theory of Kant, and the latter, if not in its general aspect, at any rate in
some of its features, reminds one strongly of certain esoteric teachings. Here
we have the world's system reborn from its ashes, through a nebula; the
emanation from the bodies, dead and dissolved in Space -- resultant of the
incandescence of the solar centre reanimated by the combustible matter of the
planets. In this theory, generated and developed in the brain of a young man
hardly twenty-five years of age, who had never left his native place, a small
town of Northern Prussia (Konigsberg) one can hardly fail to recognise either
an inspiring external power, or the reincarnation which the Occultists see in
it. It fills a gap which Newton, with all his genius, failed to bridge. And
surely it is our primeval matter, Akasa, that Kant had in view, when proposing
to solve Newton's difficulty and his failure to explain, by the natural forces,
the primitive impulse imparted to the planets, by the postulation of a
universally pervading primordial substance. For, as he remarks in chapter
viii., if it is once admitted that the perfect harmony of the stars and planets
and
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* "LES HYPOTHESES COSMOGONIQUES.
Examen des Theories Scientifiques modernes sur l'Origine des Mondes, suivi de
la Traduction de la Theorie du Ciel de Kant."
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the coincidence of their orbital
planes prove the existence of a natural cause, which would thus be the primal
cause, "that cause cannot really be the matter which fills to-day the
heavenly spaces." It must be that which filled space -- was space --
originally, whose motion in differentiated matter was the origin of the actual
movements of the sidereal bodies; and which, "in condensing itself in
those very bodies, thus abandoned the space that is found void to-day." In
other words, it is that same matter of which are now composed the planets,
comets, and the Sun himself, which, having in the origin formed itself into
those bodies, has preserved its inherent quality of motion; which quality, now
centred in their nuclei, directs all motion. A very slight alteration of words
is needed, and a few additions, to make of this our Esoteric Doctrine.
The latter teaches that it is this
original, primordial prima materia, divine and intelligent, the direct
emanation of the Universal Mind -- the Daiviprakriti (the divine light
emanating from the Logos*) -- which formed the nuclei of all the
"self-moving" orbs in Kosmos. It is the informing, ever-present
moving-power and life-principle, the vital soul of the suns, moons, planets,
and even of our Earth. The former latent: the last one active -- the invisible
Ruler and guide of the gross body attached to, and connected with, its Soul,
which is the spiritual emanation, after all, of these respective planetary
Spirits.
Another quite occult doctrine is the
theory of Kant, that the matter of which the inhabitants and the animals of
other planets are formed is of a lighter and more subtle nature and of a more
perfect conformation in proportion to their distance from the Sun. The latter
is too full of Vital Electricity, of the physical, life-giving principle. Therefore,
the men on Mars are more ethereal than we are, while those of Venus are more
gross, though far more intelligent, if less spiritual.
The last doctrine is not quite ours
-- yet those Kantian theories are as metaphysical, and as transcendental as any
occult doctrines; and more than one man of Science would, if he but dared speak
his mind, accept them as Wolf does. From this Kantian mind and soul of the Suns
and Stars to the MAHAT (mind) and Prakriti of the Puranas, there is but a step.
After all, the admission of this by Science would be only the admission of a
natural cause, whether it would or would not stretch its belief to such
metaphysical heights. But then Mahat, the MIND, is a "God," and
physiology admits "mind" only as a temporary function of the material
brain, and no more.
The Satan of Materialism now laughs
at all alike, and denies the visible as well as the invisible. Seeing in light,
heat, electricity, and even in the phenomenon of life, only properties inherent
in matter, it
[[Footnote(s)]]
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* Which "Light" we call
Fohat.
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laughs whenever life is called VITAL
PRINCIPLE, and derides the idea of its being independent of and distinct from
the organism.
But here again scientific opinions
differ as in everything else, and there are several men of science who accept
views very similar to ours. Consider, for instance, what Dr. Richardson, F.R.S.
(elsewhere quoted at length) says of that "Vital principle," which he
calls "nervous ether" ("Popular Science Review," Vol.
10):--
"I speak only of a veritable
material agent, refined, it may be, to the world at large, but actual and
substantial: an agent having quality of weight and of volume, an agent
susceptible of chemical combination, and thereby of change of physical state
and condition, an agent passive in its action, moved always, that is to say, by
influences apart from itself,* obeying other influences, an agent possessing no
initiative power, no vis or energia naturae,** but still playing a most
important, if not a primary part in the production of the phenomena resulting
from the action of the energeia upon visible matter" (p. 379).
As Biology and Physiology now deny,
in toto, the existence of a "vital principle," this extract, together
with de Quatrefages' admission, is a clear confirmation that there are men of
science who take the same views about "things occult" as theosophists
and occultists do. These recognise a distinct vital principle independent of
the organism -- material, of course, as physical force cannot be divorced from
matter, but of a substance existing in a state unknown to Science. Life for
them is something more than the mere interaction of molecules and atoms. There
is a vital principle without which no molecular combinations could ever have
resulted in a living organism, least of all in the so-called
"inorganic" matter of our plane of consciousness.
By "molecular combinations"
is meant, of course, those of the matter of our present illusive perceptions,
which matter energises only on this, our plane. And this is the chief point at
issue.***
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* This is a mistake, which implies a
material agent, distinct from the influences which move it, i.e. blind matter
and perhaps "God" again, whereas this ONE Life is the very God and
Gods "Itself."
** The same error.
*** "Is the Jiva a myth, as
science says, or is it not?" ask some Theosophists, wavering between
materialistic and idealistic Science. The difficulty of really grasping
esoteric problems concerning the "ultimate state of matter" is again
the old crux of the objective and the subjective. What is matter? Is the matter
of our present objective consciousness anything but our SENSATIONS? True, the
sensations we receive come from without, but can we really (except in terms of
phenomena) speak of the "gross matter" of this plane as an entity
apart from and independent of us? To all such arguments Occultism answers:
True, in reality matter is not independent of, or existent outside, our
perceptions. Man is an illusion: granted. But the existence and actuality of
other, still more illusive, but not less actual, entities than we are, is not a
claim which is lessened, but rather strengthened by this doctrine of Vedantic
and even Kantian Idealism.
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Thus the Occultists are not alone in
their beliefs. Nor are they so foolish, after all, in rejecting even the
"gravity" of modern Science along with other physical laws, and in
accepting instead attraction and repulsion. They see, moreover, in these two
opposite Forces only the two aspects of the universal unit, called
"MANIFESTING MIND"; in which aspects, Occultism, through its great
Seers, perceives an innumerable Host of operative Beings: Cosmic Dhyan-Chohans,
Entities, whose essence, in its dual nature, is the Cause of all terrestrial
phenomena. For that essence is co-substantial with the universal Electric
Ocean, which is LIFE; and being dual, as said -- positive and negative -- it is
the emanations of that duality that act now on earth under the name of
"modes of motion"; even Force having now become objectionable as a
word, for fear it should lead someone, even in thought, to separate it from
matter! It is, as Occultism says, the dual effects of that dual essence, which
have now been called centripetal and centrifugal forces, negative and positive
poles, or polarity, heat and cold, light and darkness, etc., etc.
And it is maintained that even the
Greek and Roman Catholic Christians, are wiser in believing, as they do -- even
if blindly connecting and tracing them all to an anthropomorphic god -- in
Angels, Archangels, Archons, Seraphs, and Morning Stars: in all those theological
Deliciae humani generis, in short, that rule the cosmic elements, than Science
is, in disbelieving in them altogether, and advocating its mechanical Forces.
For these act very often with more than human intelligence and pertinency.
Nevertheless, that intelligence is denied and attributed to blind chance. But,
as De Maistre was right in calling the law of gravitation merely a word which
replaced "the thing unknown" (Soirees), so are we right in applying
the same remark to all the other Forces of Science. And if it is objected that
the Count was an ardent Roman Catholic, then we may cite Le Couturier, as
ardent a materialist, who said the same thing, as also did Herschell and many
others. (Vide Musee des Sciences, August, 1856.)
From Gods to men, from Worlds to
atoms, from a star to a rush-light, from the Sun to the vital heat of the
meanest organic being -- the world of Form and Existence is an immense chain,
whose links are all connected. The law of Analogy is the first key to the
world-problem, and these links have to be studied coordinately in their occult
relations to each other.
When, therefore, the Secret Doctrine
-- postulating that conditioned or limited space (location) has no real being
except in this world of illusion, or, in other words, in our perceptive
faculties -- teaches that every one of the higher, as of the lower worlds, is
interblended with our own objective world; that millions of things and beings
are, in point of
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localization, around and in us, as we
are around, with, and in them; it is no metaphysical figure of speech, but a
sober fact in Nature, however incomprehensible to our senses.
But one has to understand the
phraseology of Occultism before criticising what it asserts. For example, the
Doctrine refuses (as Science does, in one sense) to use the words
"above" and "below," "higher" and "lower,"
in reference to invisible spheres, as being without meaning. Even the terms
"East" and "West" are merely conventional, necessary only
to aid our human perceptions. For, though the Earth has its two fixed points in
the poles, North and South, yet both East and West are variable relatively to
our own position on the Earth's surface, and in consequence of its rotation
from West to East. Hence, when " other worlds" are mentioned --
whether better or worse, more spiritual or still more material, though both
invisible -- the Occultist does not locate these spheres either outside or
inside our Earth, as the theologians and the poets do; for their location is
nowhere in the space known to, and conceived by, the profane. They are, as it
were, blended with our world interpenetrating it and interpenetrated by it.
There are millions and millions of worlds and firmaments visible to us; there
still greater numbers beyond those visible to the telescopes, and many of the
latter kind do not belong to our objective sphere of existence. Although as
invisible as if they were millions of miles beyond our solar system, they are
yet with us, near us, within our own world, as objective and material to their
respective inhabitants as ours is to us. But, again, the relation of these
worlds to ours is not that of a series of egg-shaped boxes enclosed one within
the other, like the toys called Chinese nests; each is entirely under its own
special laws and conditions, having no direct relation to our sphere. The
inhabitants of these, as already said, may be, for all we know, or feel,
passing through and around us as if through empty space, their very habitations
and countries being interblended with ours, though not disturbing our vision,
because we have not yet the faculties necessary for discerning them. Yet by
their spiritual sight the Adepts, and even some seers and sensitives, are
always able to discern, whether in a greater or smaller degree, the presence
and close proximity to us of Beings pertaining to other spheres of life. Those
of the (spiritually) higher worlds, communicate only with those terrestrial
mortals who ascend to them, through individual efforts, on to the higher plane
they are occupying. . . .
"THE SONS OF Bhumi (EARTH)
REGARD THE SONS OF Deva-lokas (ANGEL-SPHERES) AS THEIR GODS; AND THE SONS OF
LOWER KINGDOMS LOOK UP TO THE MEN OF Bhumi, AS TO THEIR devas (GODS); MEN
REMAINING UNAWARE OF IT IN THEIR BLINDNESS. . . . THEY (men) TREMBLE
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BEFORE THEM WHILE USING THEM (for
magical purposes). . . . THE FIRST RACE OF MEN WERE THE "Mind-born
sons" OF THE FORMER. THEY (the pitris and devas) ARE OUR PROGENITORS. . .
. (Book II. of Commentary on the Book of DZYAN.)
"Educated people,"
so-called, deride the idea of Sylphs, Salamanders, Undines, and Gnomes; the men
of science regard as an insult any mention of such superstitions; and with a
contempt of logic and common good sense, that is often the prerogative of
"accepted authority," they allow those, whom it is their duty to
instruct, to labour under the absurd impression that in the whole Kosmos, or at
any rate in our own atmosphere, there are no other conscious, intelligent
beings, save ourselves.* Any other humanity (composed of distinct human beings)
than a mankind with two legs, two arms, and a head with man's features on it,
would not be called human; though the etvmology of the word would seem to have
little to do with the general appearance of a creature. Thus, while Science
sternly rejects even the possibility of there being such (to us, generally)
invisible creatures, Society, while believing in it all secretly, is made to
deride the idea openly. It hails with mirth such works as the Count de Gabalis,
and fails to understand that open satire is the securest mask.
Nevertheless, such invisible worlds
do exist. Inhabited as thickly as our own is, they are scattered throughout
apparent Space in immense number; some far more material than our own world,
others gradually etherealizing until they become formless and are as
"Breaths." That our physical eye does not see them, is no reason to
disbelieve in them; physicists can see neither their ether, atoms, nor
"modes of motion," or Forces. Yet they accept and teach them.
If we find, even in the natural world
with which we are acquainted, matter affording a partial analogy in the
difficult conception of such invisible worlds, there seems little difficulty in
recognizing the possibility of such a presence. The tail of a comet, which,
though attracting our attention by virtue of its luminosity, yet does not
disturb or impede our vision of objects, which we perceive through and beyond
it, affords the first stepping-stone toward a proof of the same. The tail of a
comet passes rapidly across our horizon, and we should neither feel it, nor be
cognizant of its passage, but for the brilliant coruscation, often perceived only
by a few interested in the phenomenon, while everyone else remains ignorant of
its presence and passage through, or across, a portion of our globe. This tail
may, or may not, be an integral portion of the being of the comet, but its
tenuity sub-
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Even the question of the plurality
of worlds inhabited by sentient creatures is rejected or approached with the
greatest caution! And yet see what the great astronomer, Camille Flammarion,
says in his "Pluralite des Mondes."
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serves our purpose as an
illustration. Indeed, it is no question of superstition, but simply a result of
transcendental science, and of logic still more, to admit the existence of
worlds formed of even far more attenuated matter than the tail of a comet. By
denying such a possibility, Science has played for the last century into the
hands of neither philosophy nor true religion, but simply into those of
theology. To be able to dispute the better the plurality of even material
worlds, a belief thought by many churchmen incompatible with the teachings and
doctrines of the Bible,* Maxwell had to calumniate the memory of Newton, and
try to convince his public that the principles contained in the Newtonian
philosophy are those "which lie at the foundation of all atheistical
systems." (Vide Vol. II., "Plurality of Worlds.")
"Dr. Whewell disputed the
plurality of worlds by appeal to scientific evidence," writes Professor
Winchell.** And if even the habitability of physical worlds, of planets, and
distant stars which shine in myriads over our heads is so disputed, how little
chance is there for the acceptance of invisible worlds within the apparently
transparent space of our own!
But, if we can conceive of a world
composed (for our senses) of matter still more attenuated than the tail of a
comet, hence of inhabitants in it who are as ethereal, in proportion to their
globe, as we are in comparison with our rocky, hard-crusted earth, no wonder if
we do not perceive them, nor sense their presence or even existence. Only, in
what is the idea contrary to science? Cannot men and animals, plants and rocks,
be supposed to be endowed with quite a different set of senses from those we
possess? Cannot their organisms be born, developed, and exist, under other laws
of being than those that rule our little world? Is it absolutely necessary that
every corporeal being should be clothed in "coats of skin" like those
that Adam and Eve were provided with in the legend of Genesis? Corporeality, we
are told, however, by more than one man of science, "may exist under very
divergent conditions."*** Do not we know through the
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
* Nevertheless, it will be shown on
the testimony of the Bible itself, and of such good Christian theologians as
Cardinal Wiseman, that this plurality is taught in both the Old and the New
Testaments.
** See "The Plurality of the
Worlds," wherein the list of many men of Science, who wrote to prove the
theory, is given.
*** Professor A. Winchell -- arguing
upon the plurality of the worlds -- makes the following remarks: "It is
not at all improbable that substances of a refractory nature might be so mixed
with other substances, known or unknown to us, as to be capable of enduring
vastly greater vicissitudes of heat and cold than is possible with terrestrial
organisms. The tissues of terrestrial animals are simply suited to terrestrial
conditions. Yet even here we find different types and species of animals
adapted to the trials of extremely dissimilar situations. . . . . . That an
animal should be a quadruped or a [[Footnote continued on next page]]
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discoveries of that very all-denying
science that we are surrounded by myriads of invisible lives? If these
microbes, bacteria and the tutti quanti of the infinitesimally small, are
invisible to us by virtue of their minuteness, cannot there be, at the other
pole of it, beings as invisible owing to the quality of their texture or matter
-- to its tenuity, in fact? Conversely, as to the effects of cometary matter,
have we not another example of a half visible form of life and matter? The ray
of sunlight entering our apartment, reveals in its passage myriads of tiny
beings living their little life and ceasing to be, independent and heedless of
whether they are perceived or not by our grosser materiality. And so again, of
the microbes and bacteria and such-like unseen beings in other elements. We
passed them by, during those long centuries of dreary ignorance, after the lamp
of knowledge in the heathen and highly philosophical systems had ceased to
throw its bright light on the ages of intolerance and bigotry during early Christianity;
and we would fain pass them by again now.
And yet these lives surrounded us
then as they do now. They have worked on, obedient to their own laws, and it is
only as they were gradually revealed by Science that we have begun to take
cognisance of them, as of the effects produced by them.
[[Footnote(s)]]
-------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous
page]] biped is something not depending on the necessities of organization, or
instinct, or intelligence. That an animal should possess just five senses is
not a necessity of percipient existence. There may be animals on the earth with
neither smell nor taste. There may be beings on other worlds, and even on this,
who possess more numerous senses than we. The possibility of this is apparent
when we consider the high probability that other properties and other modes of
existence lie among the resources of the Kosmos, and even of terrestrial
matter. There are animals which subsist where rational man would perish -- in
the soil, in the river, and the sea" . . . (and why not human beings of
different organizations, in such case?) . . . "Nor is incorporated
rational existence conditioned on warm blood, nor on any temperature which does
not change the forms of matter of which the organism may be composed. There may
be intelligences corporealized after some concept not involving the processes
of injection, assimilation, and reproduction. Such bodies would not require
daily food and warmth. They might be lost in the abysses of the ocean, or laid
up on a stormy cliff through the tempests of an Arctic winter, or plunged in a
volcano for a hundred years, and yet retain consciousness and thought. It is
conceivable. Why might not psychic natures be enshrined in indestructible flint
and platinum? These substances are no further from the nature of intelligence
than carbon, hydrogen, oxygen, and lime. But, not to carry the thought to such
an extreme (?), might not high intelligences be embodied in frames as
indifferent to external conditions as the sage of the western plains, or the
lichens of Labrador, the rotifers that remain dried for years, or the spores of
bacteria which pass living through boiling water. . . . These suggestions are
made simply to remind the reader how little can be argued respecting the
necessary conditions of intelligent, organized existence, from the standard of
corporeal existence found upon the earth. Intelligence is, from its nature, as
universal and as uniform as the laws of the Universe. Bodies are merely the
local fitting of intelligence to particular modifications of universal matter
or Force." (World-Life, or Comparative Geology, pp. 496-498 et seq.)
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How long has it taken the world, as
it is now, to become what it is? If it can be said of cosmic dust that some of
it comes to the present day "which had never belonged to the earth
before" ("World-Life"), how much more logical to believe -- as
the Occultists do -- that through the countless ages and millions of years that
have rolled away, since that dust aggregated and formed the globe we live in
around its nucleus of intelligent primeval substance -- many humanities,
differing from our present mankind, as greatly as the one which will evolve
millions of years hence will differ from our races, appeared but to disappear
from the face of the earth, as our own will. Those primitive and far-distant
humanities, having, as geologists think, left no tangible relics of themselves,
are denied. All trace of them is swept away, and therefore they have never
existed. Yet their relics -- a very few of them, truly -- are to be found, and
they have to be discovered by geological research. Though, even if they were
never to be met with, there is no reason to say that no men could have ever
lived in those geological times, to which the period of their presence on earth
is assigned. For their organisms needed no warm blood, no atmosphere, no
feeding; the author of "World-Life" is right, and it is no such great
extreme to believe even as we do, that as there may be, on scientific
hypotheses, "psychic natures enshrined in indestructible flint and platinum"
to this day, so there were psychic natures enshrined in forms of equal
indestructible primeval matter the real forefathers of our fifth race.
When we speak, therefore, as in Book
II., of men who inhabited this globe 18,000,000 years back, we have in the mind
neither the men of our present races, nor the present atmospheric laws, thermal
conditions, etc. The Earth and mankind, like the Sun, Moon, and planets, have
all their growth, changes, developments, and gradual evolution in their
life-periods; they are born, become infants, then children, adolescents,
grown-up bodies, grow old, and finally die. Why should not Mankind be also
under this universal law? Says Uriel to Enoch: "Behold, I have showed thee
all things. Thou seest the Sun, Moon, and those which conduct the stars of
heaven, which cause all their operations, seasons, and arrivals to return. . .
. In the days of sinners the years shall be shortened . . . everything done on
Earth shall be subverted . . . the moon shall change its laws" . . . etc.
(Ch. lxxix.)
The "days of Sinners" meant
the days when matter would be in its full sway on Earth, and man would have
reached the apex of physical development in stature and animality. That came to
pass during the period of the Atlanteans, about the middle point of their Race
(the 4th), which was drowned as prophesied by Uriel. Since then man began
decreasing in physical stature, strength, and years, as will be shown in
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Book II. But as we are in the
mid-point of our sub-race of the Fifth Root Race -- the acme of materiality in
each -- therefore the animal propensities, though more refined, are not the
less developed for that: and they are so chiefly in civilized countries.
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§ XV.
GODS, MONADS, AND ATOMS.
SOME years ago we remarked* that
"the Esoteric Doctrine may well be called the 'thread-doctrine,' since,
like Sutratman, in the Vedanta philosophy,** it passes through and strings
together all the ancient philosophical religious systems, and reconciles and
explains them all." We say now it does more. It not only reconciles the
various and apparently conflicting systems, but it checks the discoveries of
modern exact science, and shows some of them to be necessarily correct, since
they are found corroborated in the ancient records. All this will, no doubt, be
regarded as terribly impertinent and disrespectful, a veritable crime of
lese-Science; nevertheless, it is a fact.
Science is, undeniably,
ultra-materialistic in our days; but it finds, in one sense, its justification.
Nature behaving in actu ever esoterically, and being, as the Kabalists say, in
abscondito, can only be judged by the profane through her appearance, and that
appearance is always deceitful on the physical plane. On the other hand, the
naturalists refuse to blend physics with metaphysics, the body with its
informing soul and spirit, which they prefer ignoring. This is a matter of
choice with some, while the minority strive very sensibly to enlarge the domain
of physical science by trespassing on the forbidden grounds of metaphysics, so
distasteful to some materialists. These scientists are wise in their
generation. For all their wonderful discoveries would go for nothing, and
remain for ever headless bodies, unless they lift the veil of matter and strain
their eyes to see beyond. Now that they have studied nature in the length,
breadth, and thickness of her physical frame, it is time to remove the skeleton
to the second plane and search within the unknown depths for the living and
real entity, for its SUB-stance -- the noumenon of evanescent matter.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "The Septenary
Principle," art. in "Five Years of Theosophy," p. 197.
** The Atman or Spirit (the Spiritual
SELF) passing like a thread through the five subtle bodies (or principles,
Koshas) is called "thread-soul," or Sutratman in Vedantic philosophy.
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It is only by acting on such lines
that some of the truths, now called "exploded superstitions," will be
discovered to be facts and the relics of ancient knowledge and wisdom.
One of such "degrading"
beliefs -- in the opinion of the all-denying sceptic -- is found in the idea
that Kosmos, besides its objective planetary inhabitants, its humanities in
other inhabited worlds, is full of invisible, intelligent Existences. The
so-called Arch-Angels, Angels and Spirits, of the West, copies of their
prototypes, the Dhyan-Chohans, the Devas and Pitris, of the East, are no real
Beings but fictions. On this point Materialistic Science is inexorable. To
support its position, it upsets its own axiomatic law of uniformity in the laws
of nature, that of continuity, and all the logical sequence of analogies in the
evolution of being. The masses of the profane are asked, and made, to believe
that the accumulated testimony of History, which shows even the Atheists of old
-- such as Epicurus and Democritus -- believing in gods, was false; and that philosophers
like Socrates and Plato, asserting their existence, were mistaken enthusiasts
and fools. If we hold our opinions merely on historical grounds, on the
authority of legions of the most eminent Sages, Neo-Platonists, Mystics of all
the ages, from Pythagoras down to the eminent Scientists and Professors of the
present century, who, if they reject "gods," believe in
"spirits," shall we consider such authorities as weak-minded and
foolish as any Roman Catholic peasant, who believes in and prays to his once
human Saint, or the Archangel, St. Michael? But is there no difference between
the belief of the peasant and that of the Western heirs to the Rosicrucians and
Alchemists of the Middle Ages? Is it the Van Helmonts, the Khunraths, the
Paracelsuses and Agrippas, from Roger Bacon down to St. Germain, who were all
blind enthusiasts, hysteriacs or cheats, or is it the handful of modern
sceptics -- the "leaders of thought" -- who are struck with the
cecity of negation? The latter, we opine. It would be a miracle indeed, quite
an abnormal fact in the realm of probabilities and logic, were that handful of
negators to be the sole custodians of truth, while the million-strong hosts of
believers in gods, angels, and spirits -- in Europe and America alone -- namely,
Greek and Latin Christians, Theosophists, Spiritualists, Mystics, etc., etc.,
should be no better than deluded fanatics and hallucinated mediums, and often
no higher than the victims of deceivers and impostors! However varying in their
external presentations and dogmas, beliefs in the Hosts of invisible
Intelligences of various grades have all the same foundation. Truth and error
are mixed in all. The exact extent, depth, breadth, and length of the mysteries
of Nature are to be found only in Eastern esoteric sciences. So vast and so
profound are these that hardly a few, a very few of the highest Initiates --
those whose very existence is known but to a small number of