fThe Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol.
2
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 161 A SUGGESTIVE STANZA.
STANZA VII.
FROM THE SEMI-DIVINE DOWN TO THE FIRST
HUMAN RACES.
-------
§§ (24) The higher creators reject in their pride the
forms evolved by the "Sons of Yoga." (25) They will
not incarnate in the early "Egg-born." . . (26) They
select the later androgynes. (27) The first man endowed with mind.
---------------------
24. THE SONS OF WISDOM,
THE SONS OF NIGHT (issued
from the body of Brahma when it became Night),
READY FOR RE-BIRTH, CAME DOWN. THEY SAW
THE (intellectually) VILE FORMS OF THE FIRST
THIRD (still senseless Race) (a). "WE
CAN CHOOSE," SAID THE LORDS, "WE HAVE
WISDOM." SOME ENTERED THE CHHAYAS.
SOME PROJECTED A SPARK. SOME
DEFERRED TILL THE FOURTH (Race).
FROM THEIR OWN ESSENCE THEY FILLED (intensified)
THE KAMA (the vehicle of desire).
THOSE WHO RECEIVED BUT A SPARK REMAINED
DESTITUTE OF (higher) KNOWLEDGE. THE
SPARK BURNT LOW (b). THE THIRD
REMAINED MIND-LESS. THEIR JIVAS
(Monads) WERE NOT READY. THESE
WERE SET APART AMONG THE SEVEN (primitive
human species). THEY (became the)
NARROW-HEADED. THE THIRD WERE READY. IN
THESE SHALL WE DWELL, SAID THE LORDS OF THE FLAME
AND OF THE DARK WISDOM (c).
This Stanza contains, in itself, the whole key to the mysteries
of evil, the so-called Fall of the angels, and the many problems
that have puzzled the brains of the philosophers from the time
that the memory of man began. It solves the secret of the subsequent
inequalities of intellectual capacity, of birth or social position,
and gives a logical explanation to the incomprehensible Karmic
course throughout the aeons which followed. The best explanation
which can be given, in view of the difficulties of the subject,
shall now be attempted.
(a) Up to the Fourth Round, and even to the
later part of the Third Race in this Round, Man -- if
the ever-changing forms that clothed the Monads during the first
three Rounds and the first two and a half races of the present
one can be given that misleading name -- is, so far, only an animal
intellectually. It is only in the actual midway Round
that he develops in himself entirely the fourth principle as a
fit vehicle for the
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 162 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
fifth. But Manas will be relatively fully developed only
in the following Round, when it will have an opportunity of becoming
entirely divine until the end of the Rounds. As Christian Schoettgen
says in Horae Hebraic, etc., the first terrestrial Adam
"had only the breath of life," Nephesh, but not
the living Soul.
(b) Here the inferior Races, of which there
are still some analogues left -- as the Australians (now fast
dying out) and some African and Oceanic tribes -- are meant. "They
were not ready" signifies that the Karmic development
of these Monads had not yet fitted them to occupy the forms of
men destined for incarnation in higher intellectual Races. But
this is explained later on.
(c) The Zohar speaks of "Black Fire,"
which is Absolute Light-Wisdom. To those who, prompted
by old theological prejudice, may say: "But the Asuras
are the rebel Devas, the opponents of the Gods -- hence
devils, and the spirits of Evil," it is answered: Esoteric
philosophy admits neither good nor evil per se, as existing
independently in nature. The cause for both is found, as regards
the Kosmos, in the necessity of contraries or contrasts, and with
respect to man, in his human nature, his ignorance and passions.
There is no devil or the utterly depraved, as there are
no Angels absolutely perfect, though there may be spirits of Light
and of Darkness; thus LUCIFER -- the spirit of
Intellectual Enlightenment and Freedom of Thought -- is metaphorically
the guiding beacon, which helps man to find his way through the
rocks and sandbanks of Life, for Lucifer is the LOGOS
in his highest, and the "Adversary" in his lowest aspect
-- both of which are reflected in our Ego. Lactantius,
speaking of the Nature of Christ, makes the LOGOS,
the Word, the first-born brother of Satan, the "first
of all creatures." (Inst. div. Book
II., c. viii., "Qabbalah," 116.)
The Vishnu Purana describes these primeval creatures
(the Arvaksrota) with crooked digestive canals:
They were "endowed with inward manifestations, but mutually
in ignorance about their kind and nature." The twenty-eight
kinds of Badha, or imperfections, do not apply, as Wilson
thought, to the animals now known and specified by him,* for these
did not exist in those geological periods. This is quite plain
in the said work, in which the first created (on this globe) are
the "five-fold immovable creation," minerals and vegetables;
then come those fabulous animals, Tiryaksrota, (the monsters
of the abyss slain by the "Lords," see Stanzas II.
and III.); then the Urdhwasrotas, the happy
celestial beings, which feed on ambrosia; then lastly, the Arvaksrotas,
human beings -- Brahma's
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See Book I., chap. v., p. 71.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 163 CREATORS AND SUB-CREATORS.
seventh creation so-called. But these "creations," including
the latter, did not occur on this globe, wherever else they may
have taken place. It is not Brahma who creates things and men
on this Earth, but the chief and Lord of the Prajapati, the Lords
of Being and terrestrial Creation.* Obeying the command of Brahma,
Daksha (the synthesis, or the aggregate, of the terrestrial creators
and progenitors, Pitris included) made superior and inferior (vara
and avara) things "referring to putra"
progeny, and "bipeds and quadrupeds, and
subsequently by his will (the Sons of Will and Yoga) made females,"
i.e., separated the androgynes. Here again, we have "bipeds"
or men, created before the "quadrupeds" as in the esoteric
teachings. (Vide supra and Stanza XII as explained.)
Since, in the exoteric accounts, the Asuras are the first
beings created from the "body of night," while the Pitris
issue from that of Twilight; the "gods"
being placed by Parasara (Vishnu Purana)
between the two, and shown to evolve from the "body
of the day," it is easy to discover a determined purpose
to veil the order of creation. Man is the Arvaksrota coming
from the "Body of the Dawn"; and elsewhere, man is again
referred to, when the creator of the world, Brahma, is shown "creating
fierce beings, denominated Bhutas and eaters of flesh," or
as the text has it, "fiends frightful from being monkey-coloured
and carnivorous."** Whereas the Rakshasas are generally translated
by "Evil Spirits" and "the enemies of the gods,"
which identifies them with the Asuras. In the Ramayana,
when Hanuman is reconnoitering the enemy in Lanka, he finds there
Rakshasas, some hideous, "while some were beautiful to look
upon," and, in Vishnu Purana, there is a direct
reference to their becoming the Saviours of "Humanity,"
or of Brahma.
The allegory is very ingenious. Great intellect and too much knowledge
are a two-edged weapon in life, and instruments for evil as well
as for good. When combined with Selfishness, they will make of
the whole of Humanity a footstool for the elevation of him who
possesses them, and a means for the attainment of his objects;
while, applied to altruistic humanitarian purposes, they may become
the means of the salvation of many. At all events, the absence
of self-consciousness and intellect will make of man an idiot,
a brute in human form. Brahma is Mahat -- the universal
Mind -- hence the too-selfish among the Rakshasas showing the
desire to become possessed of it all -- to "devour"
Mahat. The allegory is transparent.
At any rate, esoteric philosophy identifies the pre-Brahmanical
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "Vishnu Purana," Book I., chap.
xv. of vol. 2.
** Ibid., Book I., chap. v.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 164 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Asuras, Rudras,* Rakshasas and all the "Adversaries"
of the Gods in the allegories, with the Egos, which, by incarnating
in the still witless man of the Third Race, made him consciously
immortal. They are, then, during the cycle of Incarnations,
the true dual Logos -- the conflicting and two-faced
divine Principle in Man. The Commentary that follows, and the
next Stanzas may, no doubt, throw more light on this very difficult
tenet, but the writer does not feel competent to give it out fully.
Of the succession of Races, however, they say: --
"First come the SELF-EXISTENT on this Earth. They are
the 'Spiritual Lives' projected by the absolute
WILL and LAW, at the dawn of every rebirth of the worlds.
These LIVES are the divine 'Sishta,' (the
seed-Manus, or the Prajapati and the Pitris)."
From these proceed --
1. The First Race, the "Self-born,"
which are the (astral) shadows of their Progenitors.**
The body was devoid of all understanding (mind, intelligence,
and will). The inner being (the higher self or Monad),
though within the earthly frame, was unconnected with it.
The link, the Manas, was not there as yet.
2. From the First (race) emanated the second, called
the "Sweat-born"*** and
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Whom Manu calls "our paternal grandfathers" (III.,
284). The Rudras are the seven manifestations of Rudra-Siva, "the
destroying god," and also the grand Yogi and ascetic.
** See § II, §§ 1, Commentary.
*** To speak of life as having arisen, and of the human
race as having originated, in this absurdly unscientific way,
in the face of the modern Pedigrees of Man, is to court instantaneous
annihilation. The esoteric doctrine risks the danger, nevertheless,
and even goes so far as to ask the impartial reader to compare
the above hypothesis (if it is one) with Haeckel's theory -- now
fast becoming an axiom with science -- which is quoted verbatim:
--
". . . How did life, the living world of organisms, arise?
And, secondly, the special question: How did the human race originate?
The first of these two inquiries, that as to the first appearance
of living beings, can only be decided empirically (! !) by proof
of the so-called Archebiosis, or equivocal generation, or the
spontaneous production of organisms of the simplest conceivable
kind. Such are the Monera (Protogenes, Protamoeba, etc), exceedingly
simple microscopic masses of protoplasm without structure or organisation,
which take in nutriment and reproduce themselves by division.
Such a Moneron as that primordial organism discovered
by the renowned English zoologist Huxley, and named Bathybius
Haeckelii, appears as a continuous thick protoplasmic covering
at the greatest depths of the ocean, between 3,000 and 30,000
feet. It is true that the first appearance of such Monera
has not up to the present moment been actually observed;
but there is nothing intrinsically improbable in such an
evolution." (The "Pedigree of Man,"
Aveling's translation, p 33.)
The Bathybius protoplasm having recently turned out to be no organic
substance at all, there remains little to be said. Nor, after
reading this, does one need to consume further time in refuting
the further assertion that . . . . "in that case man also
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 165 TO THE MONERON THE CREATOR.
the "Boneless." This is the Second
Root-Race, endowed by the preservers (Rakshasas)* and
the incarnating gods (Asuras and the Kumaras) with the
first primitive and weak spark (the germ of intelligence)
. . And from these in turn proceeds: --
3. The Third Root-Race, the "Two-fold"
(Androgynes). The first Races hereof are shells, till
the last is "inhabited" (i.e.,
informed) by the Dhyanis.
The Second Race, as stated above, being also sexless, evolved
out of itself, at its beginning, the Third Androgyne Race by an
analogous, but already more complicated process. As described
in the Commentary, the very earliest of that race were:
--
"The 'Sons of Passive Yoga.* They issued from
the second Manushyas
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous page]] has beyond a doubt
(to the minds of Haeckel and his like) arisen from the lower
mammalia, apes and the earlier simian creatures, the still earlier
Marsupialia, Amphibia, Pisces, by progressive transformations,"
all produced by "a series of natural forces working blindly.
. . . . . . . . aim, without design" (p. 36).
The above-quoted passage bears its criticism on its own face.
Science is made to teach that which, up to the present time, "has
never been actually observed." She is made
to deny the phenomenon of an intelligent nature and a
vital force independent of form and matter, and to find it more
scientific to teach the miraculous performance of "natural
forces working blindly without aim or design."
If so, then we are led to think that the physico-mechanical
forces of the brains of certain eminent Scientists are leading
them on as blindly to sacrifice logic and common sense on the
altar of mutual admiration. Why should the protoplasmic Moneron
producing the first living creature through self-division
be held as a very scientific hypothesis, and an ethereal
pre-human race generating the primeval men in the same
fashion be tabooed as unscientific superstition? Or has
materialism obtained a sole monopoly in Science?
* The Rakshasas, regarded in Indian popular theology
as demons, are called the "Preservers" beyond the Himalayas.
This double and contradictory meaning has its origin in a philosophical
allegory, which is variously rendered in the Puranas. It is stated
that when Brahma created the demons, Yakshas (from Yaksh,
to eat) and the Rakshasas, both of which kinds of demons,
as soon as born, wished to devour their creator, those among them
that called out "Not so! oh, let him be saved (preserved)"
were named Rakshasas (Vishnu Purana Book I. ch. v.).
The Bhagavata Purana (III, 20, 19-21) renders
the allegory differently. Brahma transformed himself into night
(or ignorance) invested with a body, upon which the Yakshas and
Rakshasas seized, exclaiming "Do not spare it; devour it."
Brahma then cried out, "Do not devour me, spare me."
This has an inner meaning of course. The "body of Night"
is the darkness of ignorance, and it is the darkness of silence
and secrecy. Now the Rakshasas are shown in almost every case
to be Yogis, pious Saddhus and Initiates, a rather unusual occupation
for demons. The meaning then is that while we have power
to dispel the darkness of ignorance, "devour it,"
we have to preserve the sacred truth from profanation. "Brahma
is for the Brahmins alone," says that proud caste. The moral
of the fable is evident.
** The gradual evolution of man in the Secret Doctrine shows that
all the later (to the profane the earliest) Races have their physical
origin in the early Fourth Race. But it is the sub-race,
which preceded the one that separated sexually, that is to be
[[Footnote continued on next page]]
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 166 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
(human race), and became oviparous. The emanations that came
out of their bodies during the seasons of procreation were ovulary;
the small spheroidal nuclei developing into a large soft, egg-like
vehicle, gradually hardened, when, after a period of gestation,
it broke and the young human animal issued from it unaided, as
the fowls do in our race."
This must seem to the reader ludicrously absurd. Nevertheless,
it is strictly on the lines of evolutionary analogy, which science
perceives in the development of the living animal species. First
the moneron-like procreation by self-division
(vide Haeckel); then, after a few stages, the
oviparous, as in the case of the reptiles, which are followed
by the birds; then, finally, the mammals with their ovoviviparous
modes of producing their young ones.
If the term ovoviviparous is applied to some fish and
reptiles, which hatch their eggs within their bodies, why should
it not be applied to female mammalians, including woman? The ovule,
in which, after impregnation, the development of the foetus takes
place, is an egg.
At all events, this conception is more philosophical than that
of Eve with a suddenly created placenta giving birth to Cain,
because of the Apple, when even the marsupial, the earliest of
mammals, is not placental yet.
Moreover, the progressive order of the methods of reproduction,
as unveiled by science, is a brilliant confirmation of esoteric
Ethnology. It is only necessary to tabulate the data in order
to prove our assertion. (Cf. especially Schmidt's
"Doctrine of Descent and Darwinism," p.
39, et. seq., and Laing's "A Modern
Zoroastrian," pp. 102-111.)I
1. Fission: --
(a) As seen in the division of the homogeneous
speck of protoplasm, known as Moneron or Amoeba, into two.
(b) As seen in the division of the nucleated cell, in
which the cell-nucleus splits into two sub-nuclei, which either
develop within the original cell-wall or burst it, and multiply
outside as independent entities. (Cf., the First Root-Race.)
II. Budding: --
A small portion of the parent structure swells out at the surface
and finally parts company, growing to the size of the original
organism; e.g., many vegetables, the sea-anemone, etc.
(Cf., the Second Root-Race.)*
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
[[Footnote continued from previous page]] regarded as the spiritual
ancestors of our present generations, and especially of the
Eastern Aryan Races. Weber's idea that the Indo-Germanic Race
preceded the Aryan Vedic Race is, to the Occultist, grotesque
to the last degree.
* Every process of healing and cicatrization in the higher animal
groups -- even in the case of reproduction of mutilated limbs
with the Amphibians -- is effected by fission and gemmation
of the elementary morphological elements.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 167 MONADS AND ROUNDS.
III. Spores: --
A single cell thrown off by the parent organism, which develops
into a multicellular organism reproducing the features of the
latter, e.g., bacteria and mosses.
IV. Intermediate Hermaphroditism: --
Male and female organs inhering in the same individual; e.g.,
the majority of plants, worms, and snails, etc.; allied to budding.
(Cf. Second and early Third Root-Races.)
V. True sexual union: --
(Cf. later Third Root-Race.)
We now come to an important point with regard to the double evolution
of the human race. The Sons of Wisdom, or the spiritual Dhyanis,
had become "intellectual" through their contact with
matter, because they had already reached, during previous cycles
of incarnation, that degree of intellect which enabled them to
become independent and self-conscious entities, on this plane
of matter. They were reborn only by reason of Karmic effects.
They entered those who were "ready," and became
the Arhats, or sages, alluded to above. This needs explanation.
It does not mean that Monads entered forms in which other
Monads already were. They were "Essences," "Intelligences,"
and conscious spirits; entities seeking to become
still more conscious by uniting with more developed matter. Their
essence was too pure to be distinct from the universal essence;
but their "Egos," or Manas (since they are
called Manasaputra, born of "Mahat," or Brahma)
had to pass through earthly human experiences to become all-wise,
and be able to start on the returning ascending cycle. The
Monads are not discrete principles, limited
or conditioned, but rays from that one universal absolute
Principle. The entrance into a dark room through the same
aperture of one ray of sunlight following another will not constitute
two rays, but one ray intensified. It is not in the course
of natural law that man should become a perfect septenary
being, before the seventh race in the seventh Round. Yet he has
all these principles latent in him from his birth. Nor is it part
of the evolutionary law that the Fifth principle (Manas),
should receive its complete development before the Fifth Round.
All such prematurely developed intellects (on the spiritual
plane) in our Race are abnormal; they are
those whom we call the "Fifth-Rounders." Even in the
coming seventh Race, at the close of this Fourth Round, while
our four lower principles will be fully developed, that of Manas
will be only proportionately so. This limitation, however,
refers solely to the spiritual development. The intellectual,
on the physical plane, was reached during the Fourth Root-Race.
Thus, those who were "half ready," who received "but
a spark," constitute the average humanity which has to acquire
its intellectuality during the present Manvantaric evolution,
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 168 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
after which they will be ready in the next for the full reception
of the "Sons of Wisdom." While those which "were
not ready" at all, the latest Monads, which had hardly evolved
from their last transitional and lower animal forms at the close
of the Third Round, remained the "narrow-brained" of
the Stanza. This explains the otherwise unaccountable degrees
of intellectuality among the various races of men -- the savage
Bushman and the European -- even now. Those tribes of savages,
whose reasoning powers are very little above the level of the
animals, are not the unjustly disinherited, or the unfavoured,
as some may think -- nothing of the kind. They are simply
those latest arrivals among the human Monads, which were
not ready: which have to evolve during the present Round,
as on the three remaining globes (hence on four different planes
of being) so as to arrive at the level of the average class when
they reach the Fifth Round. One remark may prove useful, as food
for thought to the student in this connection. The MONADS of the
lowest specimens of humanity (the "narrow-brained"*
savage South-Sea Islander, the African, the Australian) had
no Karma to work out when first born as men, as their more favoured
brethren in intelligence had. The former are spinning out
Karma only now; the latter are burdened with past, present, and
future Karma. In this respect the poor savage is more fortunate
than the greatest genius of civilised countries.
Let us pause before giving any more such strange teachings. Let
us try and find out how far any ancient Scriptures, and even Science,
permit the possibility of, or even distinctly corroborate, such
wild notions as are found in our Anthropogenesis.
Recapitulating that which has been said we find: -- That the Secret
Doctrine claims for man, (1) a polygenetic origin. (2) A variety
of modes of procreation before humanity fell into the ordinary
method of generation. (3) That the evolution of animals -- of
the mammalians at any rate -- follows that of man instead of preceding
it. And this is diametrically opposed to the now generally accepted
theories of evolution and the descent of man from an animal ancestor.
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The term here means neither the dolicho-cephalic nor the brachyo-cephalic,
nor yet skulls of a smaller volume, but simply brains devoid of
intellect generally. The theory which would judge of the intellectual
capacity of a man according to his cranial capacity, seems absurdly
illogical to one who has studied the subject. The skulls of the
stone period, as well as those of African Races (Bushmen included)
show that the first are above rather than below the average of
the brain capacity of the modern man, and the skulls of the last
are on the whole (as in the case of Papuans and Polynesians generally)
larger by one cubic inch than that of the average Frenchman. Again,
the cranial capacity of the Parisian of to-day represents an average
of 1437 cubic centimetres compared to 1523 of the Auvergnat.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 169 MONOGENISM OR POLYGENISM.
Let us, by giving to Caesar what is Caesar's, examine, first of
all, the chances for the polygenetic theory among the men of science.
Now the majority of the Darwinian evolutionists incline to a polygenetic
explanation of the origin of Races. On this particular question,
however, scientists are, as in many other cases, at sixes and
sevens; they agree to disagree.
"Does man descend from one single couple or from
several groups -- monogenism or polygenism? As far as
one can venture to pronounce on what in the absence of witnesses
(?) will never be known (?), the second hypothesis is far the
most probable."* Abel Hovelacque, in his "Science of
Language," comes to a similar conclusion, arguing from the
evidence available to a linguistic enquirer.
In an address delivered before the British Association, Professor
W. H. Flower remarked on this question: --
"The view which appears best to accord with what is now known
of the characters and distribution of the races of man . . . .
is a modification of the monogenistic hypothesis (!). Without
entering into the difficult question of the method of man's first
appearance upon the world, we must assume for it a vast antiquity,
at all events as measured by any historical standard. If we
had any approach to a complete palaeontological record, the history
of Man could be re-constructed, but nothing of the kind is forthcoming."
Such an admission must be regarded as fatal to the dogmatism of
the physical Evolutionists, and as opening a wide margin to occult
speculations. The opponents of the Darwinian theory were, and
still remain, polygenists. Such "intellectual giants"
as John Crawford and James Hunt discussed the problem and favoured
polygenesis, and in their day there was a far stronger feeling
in favour of than against this theory. It is only in 1864 that
Darwinians began to be wedded to the theory of unity, of which
Messrs. Huxley and Lubbock became the first coryphai.
As regards that other question, of the priority of man to the
animals in the order of evolution, the answer is as promptly given.
If man is really the Microcosm of the Macrocosm, then the teaching
has nothing so very impossible in it, and is but logical. For,
man becomes that Macrocosm for the three lower kingdoms under
him. Arguing from a physical standpoint, all the lower kingdoms,
save the mineral -- which is light itself, crystallised and immetallised
-- from plants to the creatures which preceded the first mammalians,
all have been consolidated in their physical structures by means
of the "cast-off dust" of those minerals, and the
refuse of the human matter, whether from living or dead
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* A. Lefevre, "Philosophy," p. 498.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 170 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
bodies, on which they fed and which gave them their outer
bodies. In his turn, man grew more physical, by re-absorbing
into his system that which he had given out, and which became
transformed in the living animal crucibles through which it had
passed, owing to Nature's alchemical transmutations. There were
animals in those days of which our modern naturalists have never
dreamed; and the stronger became physical material man, the giants
of those times, the more powerful were his emanations. Once that
Androgyne "humanity" separated into sexes, transformed
by Nature into child-bearing engines, it ceased to procreate its
like through drops of vital energy oozing out of the body. But
while man was still ignorant of his procreative powers on the
human plane, (before his Fall, as a believer in Adam would say,)
all this vital energy, scattered far and wide from him, was used
by Nature for the production of the first mammal-animal forms.
Evolution is an eternal cycle of becoming, we are taught;
and nature never leaves an atom unused. Moreover, from the beginning
of the Round, all in Nature tends to become Man. All the impulses
of the dual, centripetal and centrifugal Force are directed towards
one point -- MAN. The progress in the succession
of beings, says Agassiz, "consists in an increasing similarity
of the living fauna, and, among the vertebrates, especially, in
the increasing resemblance to man. Man is the end towards which
all animal creation has tended from the first appearance
of the first palaeozoic fishes."*
Just so; but "the palaeozoic fishes" being at the lower
curve of the arc of the evolution of forms, this Round
began with astral man, the reflection of the Dhyan Chohans,
called the "Builders." Man is the
alpha and the omega of objective creation. As said in "Isis
Unveiled," "all things had their origin in spirit
-- evolution having originally begun from above and proceeding
downwards, instead of the reverse, as taught in the Darwinian
theory."** Therefore, the tendency spoken of by the eminent
naturalist above quoted, is one inherent in every atom. Only,
were one to apply it to both sides of the evolution, the observations
made would greatly interfere with the modern theory, which has
now almost become (Darwinian) law.
But in citing the passage from Agassiz' work with approval, it
must not be understood that the occultists are making any
concession to the theory, which derives man from the animal
kingdom. The fact that in this Round he preceded the mammalia
is obviously not impugned by the consideration that the latter
(mammalia) follow in the wake of man.
-------
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* "Principles of Zoology," p. 206.
** Vol. I, p. 154.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 171 A SUGGESTIVE EXPLANATION.
25. HOW DID THE MANASA, THE
SONS OF WISDOM ACT? THEY
REJECTED THE SELF-BORN, (the boneless).
THEY ARE NOT READY. THEY
SPURNED THE (First) SWEAT-BORN.*
THEY ARE NOT QUITE READY. THEY
WOULD NOT ENTER THE (First) EGG-BORN.**
To a Theist or a Christian this verse would suggest a rather theological
idea: that of the Fall of the Angels through Pride. In the Secret
Doctrine, however, the reasons for the refusal to incarnate in
half-ready physical bodies seem to be more connected
with physiological than metaphysical reasons. Not all the organisms
were sufficiently ready. The incarnating powers chose the ripest
fruits and spurned the rest.***
By a curious coincidence, when selecting a familiar name for the
continent on which the first androgynes, the Third Root-Race,
separated, the writer chose, on geographical considerations, that
of "Lemuria," invented by Mr. P. L. Sclater. It is only
later, that reading Haeckel's "Pedigree of Man," it
was found that the German "Animalist" had chosen the
name for his late continent. He traces, properly enough, the centre
of human evolution to "Lemuria," but with a slight scientific
variation. Speaking of it as that "cradle of mankind,"
he pictures the gradual transformation of the anthropoid mammal
into the primeval savage!! Vogt, again, holds that in America
Man sprang from a branch of the platyrrhine apes, independently
of the origination of the African and Asian root-stocks from
the old world catarrhinians. Anthropologists are, as usual, at
loggerheads on this question, as on many others. We shall examine
this claim in the light of esoteric philosophy in Stanza VIII.
Meanwhile, let us give a few moments of attention to the various
consecutive modes of procreation according to the laws of Evolution.
Let us begin by the mode of reproduction of the later sub-races
of the Third human race, by those who found themselves endowed
with the sacred fire from the spark of higher and then
independent Beings, who were the psychic and spiritual parents
of Man, as the lower Pitar Devata (the Pitris)
were the progenitors of his physical body. That Third and
holy Race consisted of men who, at their zenith, were described
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* This is explained in the section which follows this series of
Stanzas in the allegory from the Puranas concerning Kandu, the
holy sage, and Pramlocha, the nymph alleged to have hypnotised
him, (Vide § II, Commentary after St.I.), a suggestive allegory,
scientifically, as the drops of perspiration, which she exuded,
are the symbols of the spores of science (Vide infra).
** This will be explained as we proceed. This unwillingness to
fashion men, or create, is symbolized in the Puranas by Daksha
having to deal with his opponent Narada, the "strife-making
ascetic."
*** Vide Verse 24.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 172 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
as, "towering giants of godly strength and beauty, and the
depositories of all the mysteries of Heaven and Earth." Have
they likewise fallen, if, then, incarnation was the Fall?
Of this presently. The only thing now to be noted of these is,
that the chief gods and heroes of the Fourth and Fifth Races,
as of later antiquity, are the deified images of these men
of the Third. The days of their physiological purity, and
those of their so-called Fall, have equally survived in the hearts
and memories of their descendants. Hence, the dual nature shown
in those gods, both virtue and sin being exalted to their highest
degree, in the biographies composed by posterity. They were the
pre-Adamite and the divine Races, with which even theology,
in whose sight they are all "the accursed Cainite Races,"
now begins to busy itself.
But the action of "spiritual progenitors" of that Race
has first to be disposed of. A very difficult and abstruse point
has to be explained with regard to Stanzas 26 and 27. These say:
--
-------
26. WHEN THE SWEAT-BORN PRODUCED
THE EGG-BORN, THE TWO-FOLD (androgyne
Third Race*), THE MIGHTY, THE POWERFUL
WITH BONES, THE LORDS OF WISDOM
SAID: "NOW SHALL WE CREATE" (a).
Why "now" -- and not earlier? This the following sloka
explains.
-------
27. (Then) THE THIRD
(race) BECAME THE VAHAN (vehicle) OF
THE LORDS OF WISDOM.
IT CREATED SONS OF "WILL
AND YOGA," BY KRIYASAKTI
(b), IT CREATED THEM, THE HOLY FATHERS,
ANCESTORS OF THE ARHATS. . .
.
(a) How did they create, since the "Lords
of Wisdom" are identical with the Hindu Devas, who refuse
"to create"? Clearly they are the
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The evolutionist Professor Schmidt alludes to "the fact
of the separation of sexes, as to the derivation of which from
species once hermaphrodite all (the believers in creation
naturally excepted) are assuredly of one accord." Such indeed
is the incontestable evidence drawn from the presence of rudimentary
organs. (Cf., his "Doctrine of Descent and Darwinism,"
p. 159.) Apart from such palpable traces of a primeval hermaphroditism,
the fact may be noted that, as Laing writes, "a study of
embryology. . . . shows that in the human higher animal species
the distinction of sex is not developed until a considerable
progress has been made in the growth of the embryo."
("A Modern Zoroastrian," p.106.) The
Law of Retardation -- operative alike in the case of human races,
animal species, etc., when a higher type has once been evolved
-- still preserves hermaphroditism as the reproductive method
of the majority of plants and many lower animals.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 173 THE SONS OF KRIYASAKTI.
Kumaras of the Hindu Pantheon and Puranas, those elder
sons of Brahma, "Sanandana and the other sons of Vedhas,"
who, previously created by him "without desire or passion,
remained chaste, full of holy wisdom and undesirous of progeny?"*
The power, by which they first created, is just that which has
since caused them to be degraded from their high status to the
position of evil spirits, of Satan and his Host, created in their
turn by the unclean fancy of exoteric creeds. It was by Kriyasakti,
that mysterious and divine power latent in the will of every
man, and which, if not called to life, quickened and developed
by Yogi-training, remains dormant in 999,999 men out of a million,
and gets atrophied. This power is explained in the "Twelve
Signs of the Zodiac,"** as follows: --
(b) "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 (and Will) 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 (Will-power)
and Kriyasakti."
The Third Race had thus created the so-called SONS
OF WILL AND YOGA, or the "ancestors"
(the spiritual forefathers) of all the subsequent and
present Arhats, or Mahatmas, in a truly immaculate way.
They were indeed created, not begotten, as were
their brethren of the Fourth Race, who were generated sexually
after the separation of sexes, the Fall of Man. For creation
is but the result of will acting on phenomenal matter, the calling
forth out of it the primordial divine Light and eternal
Life. They were the "holy seed-grain" of the
future Saviours of Humanity.
Here we have to make again a break, in order to explain certain
difficult points, of which there are so many. It is almost impossible
to avoid such interruptions. For explanations and a philosophical
account of the nature of those beings, which are now viewed as
the "Evil" and rebellious Spirits, the creators by Kriyasakti,
the reader is referred to the chapters on "The Fallen Angels"
and "The Mystic Dragons," in Part II.
of this Volume.
The order of the evolution of the human Races stands thus in the
Fifth Book of the Commentaries, and was already given: --
The First men were Chhayas (1) ; the second,
the "Sweat-born" (2), the
Third, "Egg-born," and the holy Fathers
born by the power of Kriyasakti (3); the Fourth were
the children of the Padmapani (Chenresi) (4).
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See "Vishnu Purana," Book I., ch.
7, para. 1.
** See "Five Years of Theosophy," p.
777.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 174 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
Of course such primeval modes of procreation -- by the evolution
of one's image, through drops of perspiration, after that by Yoga,
and then by what people will regard as magic (Kriyasakti) -- are
doomed beforehand to be regarded as fairy-tales. Nevertheless,
beginning with the first and ending with the last, there is really
nothing miraculous in them, nor anything which could not be shown
natural. This must be proven.
1. Chhaya-birth, or that primeval mode of sexless
procreation, the first Race having oozed out, so
to say, from the bodies of the Pitris, is hinted at in a Cosmic
allegory in the Puranas.* It is the beautiful allegory and story
of Sanjna, the daughter of Viswakarman -- married to the Sun,
who, "unable to endure the fervours of her lord," gave
him her chhaya (shadow, image, or astral body),
while she herself repaired to the jungle to perform religious
devotions, or Tapas. The Sun, supposing the "chhaya"
to be his wife begat by her children, like Adam with Lilith --
an ethereal shadow also, as in the legend, though an
actual living female monster millions of years ago.
But, perhaps, this instance proves little except the exuberant
fancy of the Puranic authors. We have another proof ready. If
the materialised forms, which are sometimes seen oozing out of
the bodies of certain mediums could, instead of vanishing, be
fixed and made solid -- the creation of the first Race
would become quite comprehensible. This kind of procreation cannot
fail to be suggestive to the student. Neither the mystery nor
the impossibility of such a mode is certainly any greater
-- while it is far more comprehensible to the mind of the true
metaphysical thinker - than the mystery of the conception of the
foetus, its gestation and birth as a child, as we now know it.
Now to the curious and little understood corroboration in the
Puranas about the "Sweat-born."
2. Kandu is a sage and a Yogi, eminent in holy wisdom and pious
austerities, which, finally, awaken the jealousy of the gods,
who are represented in the Hindu Scriptures as being in never-ending
strife with the ascetics. Indra, the "King of the Gods,"**
finally sends one of his female Apsarasas to tempt the sage. This
is no worse than Jehovah sending Sarah, Abraham's wife, to tempt
Pharaoh; but in truth it is those gods (and god), who are ever
trying to disturb ascetics and thus make them lose the fruit of
their austerities, who ought to be regarded as "tempting
demons," instead of applying the term to the Rudras, Kumaras,
and Asuras, whose great sanctity and chastity seem a standing
reproach to the Don Juanic gods of the Pantheon. But it is
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* Vide "Vishnu-Purana," Book
III., chap. 2.
** In the oldest MS. of "Vishnu-Purana"
in the possession of an Initiate in Southern India, the god
is not Indra, but Kama, the god of love and desire. See text further
on.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 175 A SAINT -- HYPNOTISED.
the reverse that we find in all the Puranic allegories, and not
without good esoteric reason.
The king of the gods (or Indra) sends a beautiful Apsarasas (nymph)
named Pramlocha to seduce Kandu and disturb his penance. She succeeds
in her unholy purpose and "907 years six months and three
days"* spent in her company seem to the sage as one day.
When this psychological or hypnotic state ends, the Muni curses
bitterly the creature who seduced him, thus disturbing his devotions.
"Depart, begone!" he cries, "vile bundle of illusions!"
. . . And Pramlocha, terrified, flies away, wiping the perspiration
from her body with the leaves of the trees as she passes
through the air. She went from tree to tree, and as, with the
dusky shoots that crowned their summits, she dried her limbs,
the child she had conceived by the Rishi came forth from the pores
of her skin in drops of perspiration. The trees received the living
dews; and the winds collected them into one mass. "This,"
said Soma (the Moon), "I matured by my rays; and gradually
it increased in size, till the exhalation that had rested on the
tree tops became the lovely girl named Marisha."**
Now Kandu stands here for the First Race. He is a son
of the Pitris, hence one devoid of mind, which is hinted
at by his being unable to discern a period of nearly one thousand
years from one day; therefore he is shown to be so easily deluded
and blinded. Here is a variant of the allegory in Genesis,
of Adam, born an image of clay, into which the "Lord-god"
breathes the breath of life but not of intellect and
discrimination, which are developed only after he had tasted of
the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge; in other words when he has
acquired the first development of Mind, and had implanted in him
Manas, whose terrestrial aspect is of the Earth earthy,
though its highest faculties connect it with Spirit and the divine
Soul. Pramlocha is the Hindu Lilith of the Aryan Adam; and
Marisha, the daughter born of the perspiration from her pores,
is the "sweat-born," and stands as a symbol for the
Second Race of Mankind.
As remarked in the foot note (vide supra) it
is not Indra, who now figures in the Puranas, but Kamadeva, the
god of love and desire, who sends Pramlocha on Earth. Logic, besides
the esoteric doctrine, shows that it must be so. For Kama is the
king and lord of the Apsarasas, of whom Pramlocha is one; and,
therefore, when Kandu, in cursing her,
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* These are the exoteric figures given in a purposely reversed
and distorted way, being the figure of the duration of the cycle
between the first and second human race. All Orientalists to the
contrary, there is not a word in any of the Puranas that has not
a special esoteric meaning.
** "Vishnu Purana," Book I., ch. 15.
Cf. also Vivien's temptation of Merlin (Tennyson), the same legend
in Irish tradition.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 176 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
exclaims "Thou hast performed the office assigned by the
monarch of the gods, go!" he must mean by that monarch Kama
and not Indra, to whom the Apsarasas are not subservient. For
Kama, again, is in the Rig Veda (x. 129) the personification
of that feeling which leads and propels to creation. He was the
first movement that stirred the ONE,
after its manifestation from the purely abstract principle, to
create, "Desire first arose in It, which was the primal
germ of mind; and which sages, searching with their
intellect, have discovered to be the bond which connects Entity
with Non-Entity." A hymn in the Atharva Veda exalts
Kama into a supreme God and Creator, and says: "Kama was
born the first. Him, neither gods nor fathers (Pitara) nor men
have equalled." . . . . The Atharva Veda identifies him with
Agni, but makes him superior to that god. The Taittariya
Brahmana makes him allegorically the son of Dharma (moral
religious duty, piety and justice) and of Sraddha (faith). Elsewhere
Kama is born from the heart of Brahma; therefore he is Atma-Bhu
"Self-Existent," and Aja, the "unborn."
His sending Promlocha has a deep philosophical meaning; sent by
Indra -- the narrative has none. As Eros was connected in early
Greek mythology with the world's creation, and only afterwards
became the sexual Cupid, so was Kama in his original Vedic character,
(Harivansa making him a son of Lakshmi, who is Venus). The allegory,
as said, shows the psychic element developing the physiological,
before the birth of Daksha, the progenitor of real physical
men, made to be born from Marisha and before whose time living
beings and men were procreated "by the will, by sight, by
touch and by Yoga," as will be shown.
This, then, is the allegory built on the mode of procreation of
the Second or the "Sweat-born." The same for
the Third Race in its final development.
Marisha, through the exertions of Soma, the Moon, is taken to
wife by the Prachetasas, the production of the "Mind-born"
sons of Brahma also*, from whom they beget the Patriarch Daksha,
a son of Brahma
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* The text has: -- "From Brahma were born mind-engendered
progeny, with forms and faculties derived from his corporeal nature,
embodied spirits produced from the limbs (gatra)
of Dhimat (all-wise deity). These beings were the abode
of the three qualities of deva-sarga (divine creation,
which, as the five-fold creation, is devoid of clearness of
perception, without reflection, dull of nature). But as they
did not multiply themselves, Brahma created "other
mind-born sons like himself," namely, the Brahma-rishis,
or the Prajapati (ten and seven). Sanandana and the other sons
of Vedhas (Brahma) were previously created, but, as shown elsewhere,
they were "without desire or passion, inspired with
holy wisdom, estranged from the universe and undesirous of progeny"
(Book I, ch. 7). These Sanandana and other Kumaras are
then the Gods, who after refusing to "create progeny"
are forced to incarnate in senseless men. The reader must pardon
unavoidable repetitions in view of the great number of the facts
given.
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 177 SWEAT-BORN AND ANDROGYNES.
also, in a former Kalpa or life, explain and add the
Puranas, in order to mislead, yet speaking the truth.
(3.) The early Third Race, then, is formed from drops of "sweat,"
which, after many a transformation, grow into human bodies. This
is not more difficult to imagine or realise than the growth of
the foetus from an imperceptible germ, which foetus develops into
a child, and then into a strong, heavy man. But this race again
changes its mode of procreation according to the Commentaries.
It is said to have emanated a vis formativa, which changed
the drops of perspiration into greater drops, which grew, expanded,
and became ovoid bodies -- huge eggs. In these the human foetus
gestated for several years. In the Puranas, Marisha, the daughter
of Kandu, the sage, becomes the wife of the Prachetasas and
the mother of Daksha. Now Daksha is the father of the first human-like
progenitors, having been born in this way. He is mentioned
later on. The evolution of man, the microcosm, is analogous to
that of the Universe, the macrocosm. His evolution stands between
that of the latter and that of the animal, for which man, in his
turn, is a macrocosm.
Then the race becomes: --
(4.) The androgyne, or hermaphrodite. This process of men-bearing
explains, perhaps, why Aristophanes* describes the nature of the
old race as androgynous, the form of every individual
being rounded, "having the back and sides as in a circle,"
whose "manner of running was circular . . . . terrible
in force and strength and with prodigious ambition." Therefore,
to make them weaker, "Zeus divided them (in the Third Root-Race)
into two, and Apollo (the Sun), under his direction, closed up
the skin." The Madagascans (the island belonged to Lemuria)
have a tradition about the first man, who lived at first without
eating, and, having indulged in food, a swelling appeared in his
leg; this bursting, there emerged from it a female, who became
the mother of their race. Truly . . . "We have our sciences
of Heterogenesis and Parthenogenesis, showing
that the field is yet open. . . . . The polyps . . . . produce
their offspring from themselves, like the buds and ramifications
of a tree. . . . " Why not the primitive human polyp?
The very interesting polyp Stauridium passes alternately
from gemmation into the sex method of reproduction. Curiously
enough, though it grows merely as a polyp on a stalk, it produces
gemmules, which ultimately develop into a sea-nettle or Medusa.
The Medusa is utterly dissimilar to its parent-organism,
the Stauridium. It also reproduces itself differently, by sexual
method, and from the resulting eggs Stauridia once more
put in
[[Footnote(s)]] -------------------------------------------------
* See Plato's "Banquet."
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 178 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
an appearance. This striking fact may assist many to understand
that a form may be evolved -- as in the sexual Lemurians
from Hermaphrodite parentage -- quite unlike its immediate
progenitors. It is, moreover, unquestionable that in the case
of human incarnations the law of Karma, racial or individual,
overrides the subordinate tendencies of "Heredity,"
its servant.
The meaning of the last sentence in the above-quoted Commentary
on Stanza 27, namely, that the Fourth Race were the children of
Padmapani, may find its explanation in a certain letter from the
Inspirer of "Esoteric Buddhism" quoted
on p. 68. "The majority of mankind belongs to the seventh
sub-race of the Fourth Root-Race -- the above-mentioned Chinamen
and their off-shoots and branchlets. (Malayans, Mongolians, Tibetans,
Hungarians, Finns, and even the Esquimaux are all remnants of
this last offshoot.)"
Padmapani, or Avalokiteswara in Sanskrit, is, in Tibetan, Chenresi.
Now, Avalokiteswara is the great Logos in its higher
aspect and in the divine regions. But in the manifested planes,
he is, like Daksha, the progenitor (in a spiritual sense) of men.
Padmapani-Avalokiteswara is called esoterically Bhodhisatva
(or Dhyan Chohan) Chenresi Vanchug, "the powerful
and all-seeing." He is considered now as the greatest protector
of Asia in general, and of Tibet in particular. In order to guide
the Tibetans and Lamas in holiness, and preserve the great Arhats
in the world, this heavenly Being is credited with manifesting
himself from age to age in human form. A popular legend has it
that whenever faith begins to die out in the world, Padmapani
Chenresi, the "lotus-bearer," emits a brilliant ray
of light, and forthwith incarnates himself in one of the two great
Lamas -- the Dalai and Teschu Lamas; finally, it is believed that
he will incarnate as "the most perfect Buddha" in Tibet,
instead of in India, where his predecessors, the great Rishis
and Manus had appeared in the beginning of our Race, but now appear
no longer. Even the exoteric appearance of Dhyani Chenresi is
suggestive of the esoteric teaching. He is evidently, like Daksha,
the synthesis of all the preceding Races and the progenitor of
all the human Races after the Third, the first complete
one, and thus is represented as the culmination of the four
primeval races in his eleven-faced form. It is a
column built in four rows, each series having three faces or heads
of different complexions: the three faces for each race being
typical of its three fundamental physiological transformations.
The first is white (moon-coloured); the second is yellow; the
third, red-brown; the fourth, in which are only two faces -- the
third face being left a blank -- (a reference to the untimely
end of the Atlanteans) is brown-black. Padmapani (Daksha) is seated
on the column, and forms the apex. In this reference
[[Vol. 2, Page]] 179 THE BIRTH-DAYS OF THE DHYANIS.
compare Stanza 39. The Dhyan Chohan is represented with four arms,
another allusion to the four races. For while two are folded,
the third hand holds a lotus (Padmapani, "the lotus-bearer"),
this flower symbolizing generation, and the fourth holds a serpent,
emblem of the Wisdom in his power. On his neck is a rosary, and
on his head the sign of water 
-- matter, deluge -- while on his brow rests the third eye (Siva's
eye, that of spiritual insight). His name is "Protector"
(of Tibet), "Saviour of Humanity." On other occasions
when he has only two arms, he is Chenresi, the Dhyani and Bhodisatva,
Chakna-padmakarpo, "he who holds a lotus."
His other name is Chantong, "he of the 1,000 eyes,"
when he is endowed with a thousand arms and hands, on the palm
of each of which is represented an eye of Wisdom, these arms radiating
from his body like a forest of rays. Another of his names is Lokapati
and Lokanatha (Sanskrit) "Lord of the World"; and Jigtengonpo
(Tibetan), "Protector and Saviour against evil" of any
kind.
Padmapani, however, is the "lotus-bearer" symbolically
only for the profane; esoterically, it means the supporter of
the Kalpas, the last of which, the present Maha-Kalpa (the Varaha),
is called Padma, and represents one half of the life of Brahma.
Though a minor Kalpa, it is called Maha, "great," because
it comprises the age in which Brahma sprang from a lotus. Theoretically,
the Kalpas are infinite, but practically they are divided and
sub-divided in Space and Time, each division -- down to the smallest
-- having its own Dhyani as patron or regent. Padmapani (Avalokiteshwara)
becomes, in China, in his female aspect, Kwan-yin, "who assumes
any form, at pleasure, in order to save mankind." The knowledge
of the astrological aspect of the constellations on the respective
"birth-days" of these Dhyanis -- Amitabha (the O-mi-to
Fo, of China), included: e.g., on the 19th day of the
second month, on the 17th day of the eleventh month, and on the
7th day of the third month, etc., etc. -- gives the Occultist
the greatest facilities for performing what are called "magic"
feats. The future of an individual is seen, with all its coming
events marshalled in order, in a magic mirror placed
under the ray of certain constellations. But -- beware of the
reverse of the medal, SORCERY.
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