The Secret Doctrine by H. P. Blavatsky -- Vol. 1
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 62 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 63 THE UNIVERSE, A FLITTING SHADOW.
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.
-------
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).
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 64 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
(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
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 65 NATURE'S SYMBOLS.
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
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 66 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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").
-------
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
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 67 THE POWER OF NUMBERS.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 68 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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]]
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 69 THE BLOSSOM OF THE ROOT OF LIFE.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 70 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 71 LIGHT EMERGES FROM DARKNESS.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 72 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 73 THE DRAGON AND THE LOGOI.
(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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 74 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 75 NOUMENAL AND PHENOMENAL LIGHT.
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.)
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 76 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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 
,
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 77 DEITY IN SPACE AND TIME.
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.
-------
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
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 78 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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 
, 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 
,
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 is the symbol of the
Unity and consequently of the unvarying Idea of the Divine operating
through all these. But behind the
in the name Hoa are the letters 
and 
, 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
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 79 PRIMEVAL RADIATIONS FROM THE UNITY.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 80 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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]]
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 81 PRIMEVAL DIFFERENTIATIONS.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 82 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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.
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 83 THE WEB OF BEING.
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.
`. 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
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 84 THE SECRET DOCTRINE.
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
[[Vol. 1, Page]] 85 CONSCIOUS ELECTRICITY.
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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